Hamlet by William Shakespeare (Critical Analysis)

Brief Biography of William Shakespeare

Shakespeare's father was a glove-maker, and Shakespeare received no more than a grammar school education. He
married Anne Hathaway in 1582, but left his family behind around 1590 and moved to London, where he became an
actor and playwright. He was an immediate success: Shakespeare soon became the most popular playwright of the
day as well as a part-owner of the Globe Theater. His theater troupe was adopted by King James as the King's Men in
1603. Shakespeare retired as a rich and prominent man to Stratford-upon-Avon in 1613, and died three years later.

Historical Context of Hamlet

Hamlet is in many ways a product of the Reformation, in which Protestants broke away from the until-then dominant
Catholic Church, as well as the skeptical humanism of late Renaissance Northern Europe, which held that there were
limits on human knowledge. Hamlet's constant anxiety about the difference between appearance and reality, as well
as his concerns about and difficulties with religion (the sinfulness of suicide, the unfairness that killing a murderer
while the murderer is praying would result in sending the murder to heaven) can be seen as directly emerging from
the breaks in religion and thought brought on by the Reformation and Renaissance humanist thought.

Other Books Related to Hamlet

Hamlet falls into the tradition of revenge tragedy, in which the central character's quest for revenge usually results in
general tragedy. This tradition existed from Roman times (the Roman playwright Seneca was well known for writing
revenge tragedies). The most famous revenge tragedy of Shakespeare's day before Hamlet was Thomas Kyd's The
Spanish Tragedy and some believe that Kyd wrote an earlier play of Hamlet, now lost, which scholars call the Ur-Hamlet.
The story of Hamlet is based on a Danish revenge story first recorded by Saxo Grammaticus in the 1100s. In these
stories, a Danish prince fakes madness in order to take revenge on his uncle, who had killed the prince's father and
married his mother. But Shakespeare modified this rather straightforward story and filled it with dread and
uncertaintyHamlet doesn't just feign madness; he seems at times to actually be crazy.

Key Facts about Hamlet

Full Title: The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark

When Written: Between 1599 - 1601

Where Written: England

When Published: 1603 (First Quarto), 1604 (Second Quarto).

Literary Period: The Renaissance (1500 - 1660)

Genre: Tragic drama; Revenge tragedy

Setting: Denmark during the late middle ages (circa 1200), though characters in the play occasionally reference
things or events from the Elizabethan Age (circa 1500).

Climax: The climax of Hamlet is a subject of debate. Some say it occurs when Hamlet kills Claudius, others
when Hamlet hesitates to kill Claudius while Claudius is praying, others when Hamlet kills Polonius, and still
others when Hamlet vows to focus on revenge at the end of Act 4.
Shakespeare or Not? There are some who believe Shakespeare wasn't educated enough to write the plays attributed
to him. The most common anti-Shakespeare theory is that Edward de Vere, the Earl of Oxford, wrote the plays and
used Shakespeare as a front man because aristocrats were not supposed to write plays. Yet the evidence supporting
Shakespeare's authorship far outweighs any evidence against. So until further notice, Shakespeare is still the most
influential writer in the English language.

Hamlet Summary

A ghost resembling the recently deceased King of Denmark stalks the ramparts of Elsinore, the royal castle. Terrified
guardsmen convince a skeptical nobleman, Horatio, to watch with them. When he sees the ghost, he decides they
should tell Hamlet, the dead King's son. Hamlet is also the nephew of the present King, Claudius, who not only
assumed his dead brother's crown but also married his widow, Gertrude. Claudius seems an able King, easily handling
the threat of the Norwegian Prince Fortinbras. But Hamlet is furious about Gertrude's marriage to Claudius. Hamlet
meets the ghost, which claims to be the spirit of his father, murdered by Claudius. Hamlet quickly accepts the ghost's
command to seek revenge.

Yet Hamlet is uncertain if what the ghost said is true. He delays his revenge and begins to act half-mad, contemplate
suicide, and becomes furious at all women. The Lord Chamberlain, Polonius, concludes that Hamlet's behavior comes
from lovesickness for Ophelia, Polonius's daughter. Claudius and Gertrude summon two of Hamlet's old friends,
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to find out what's wrong with him. As Polonius develops a plot to spy on a meeting
between Hamlet and Ophelia, Hamlet develops a plot of his own: to have a recently arrived troupe of actors put on a
play that resembles Claudius's alleged murder of Old Hamlet, and watch Claudius's reaction.

Polonius and Claudius spy on the meeting between Ophelia and Hamlet, during which Hamlet flies into a rage against
women and marriage. Claudius concludes Hamlet neither loves Ophelia nor is mad. Seeing Hamlet as a threat, he
decides to send him away. At the play that night, Claudius runs from the room during the scene of the murder, proving
his guilt. Hamlet gets his chance for revenge when, on the way to see Gertrude, he comes upon Claudius, alone and
praying. But Hamlet holds offif Claudius is praying as he dies then his soul might go to heaven. In Gertrude's room,
Hamlet berates his mother for marrying Claudius so aggressively that she thinks he might kill her. Polonius, who is
spying on the meeting from behind a tapestry, calls for help. Hamlet thinks Polonius is Claudius, and kills him.

Claiming that he wants to protect Hamlet from punishment for killing Polonius, Claudius sends Hamlet to England with
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. But Claudius sends with the three men a letter asking the King of England to execute
Hamlet. Meanwhile, Polonius' son, Laertes, returns to Denmark from France to get revenge for his father's death.
Claudius convinces Laertes the death is Hamlet's fault. When a pirate attack allows Hamlet to escape back to Denmark,
Claudius comes up with a new plot in which a supposedly friendly duel between Hamlet and Laertes will actually be a
trap, because Laertes's blade will be poisoned. As a backup, Claudius will also poison some wine that he'll give to
Hamlet if he wins.

Meanwhile, grief drives Ophelia insane, and she drowns in what seems to be a suicide. Hamlet arrives just as the
funeral is taking place. He claims to love Ophelia and scuffles with Laertes. Back at the castle, Hamlet tells Horatio he
switched the letter sent to England: now Rosencrantz and Guildenstern will be executed. He also says he is ready to
die, and agrees to participate in the fencing match.

During the match, Gertrude drinks to Hamlet's success from the poisoned glass of wine before Claudius can stop her.
Laertes then wounds Hamlet with the poisoned blade, but in the scuffle they exchange swords and Hamlet wounds
Laertes. Gertrude falls, saying the wine was poisoned, and dies. Laertes reveals Claudius's treachery. Hamlet kills
Claudius, and exchanges forgiveness with Laertes. Laertes dies. As Hamlet dies, he hears the drums of Fortinbras's
army marching through Denmark after a battle with the Polish, and says Fortinbras should be the next King of
Denmark. Fortinbras enters with the Ambassadors from England, who announce that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
are dead. Horatio tells Hamlet's story as Hamlet's body is taken offstage with the honors due a soldier.

Themes:

Action and Inaction

Hamlet fits in a literary tradition called the revenge play, in which a man must take revenge against those who have in
some way wronged him. Yet Hamlet turns the revenge play on its head in an ingenious way: Hamlet, the man seeking
revenge, can't actually bring himself to take revenge. For reason after reason, some clear to the audience, some not,
he delays. Hamlet's delay has been a subject of debate from the day the play was first performed, and he is often held
up as an example of the classic "indecisive" person, who thinks to much and acts too little. But Hamlet is more
complicated and interesting than such simplistic analysis would indicate. Because while it's true that Hamlet fails to
act while many other people do act, it's not as if the actions of the other characters in the play work out. Claudius's
plots backfire, Gertrude marries her husband's murderer and dies for it, Laertes is manipulated and killed by his own
treachery, and on, and on, and on. In the end, Hamlet does not provide a conclusion about the merits of action versus
inaction. Instead, the play makes the deeply cynical suggestion that there is only one result of both action and
inactiondeath.

Appearance vs. Reality

In Act 1, scene 2 of Hamlet, Gertrude asks why Hamlet is still in mourning two months after his father died: "Why seems
it so particular with thee?" Hamlet responds: "Seems, madam? Nay, it is, I know not 'seems.'" (1.2.75-76). The
difference between "seems" (appearance) and "is" (reality) is crucial in Hamlet. Every character is constantly trying
to figure out what the other characters think, as opposed to what those characters are pretending to think. The
characters try to figure each other out by using deception of their own, such as spying and plotting.

But Hamlet takes it a step further. He not only investigates other people, he also peers into his own soul and asks
philosophical and religious questions about life and death. Hamlet's obsession with what's real has three main effects:
1) he becomes so caught up in the search for reality that he ceases to be able to act; 2) in order to prove what's real
and what isn't Hamlet himself must hide his "reality" behind an "appearance" of madness; 3) the more closely Hamlet
looks, the less real and coherent everything seems to be. Many analyses of Hamlet focus only on the first effect,
Hamlet's indecisiveness. But the second two effects are just as important. The second shows that the relationship
between appearance and reality is indistinct. The third suggests that the world is founded on fundamental
inconsistencies that most people overlook, and that it is this failure to recognize inconsistencies that allows them to
act. Hamlet's fatal flaw isn't that he's wrong to see uncertainty in everything, but that he's right.

Women

There are two important issues regarding women in Hamlet: how Hamlet sees women and women's social position.
Hamlet's view of women is decidedly dark. In fact, the few times that Hamlet's pretend madness seems to veer into
actual madness occur when he gets furious at women. Gertrude's marriage to Claudius has convinced Hamlet that
women are untrustworthy, that their beauty is a cover for deceit and sexual desire. For Hamlet, women are living
embodiments of appearance's corrupt effort to eclipse reality.

As for women's social position, its defining characteristic is powerlessness. Gertrude's quick marriage to Claudius,
though immoral, is also her only way to maintain her status. Ophelia has even fewer options. While Hamlet waits to
seek revenge for his father's death, Ophelia, as a woman, can't actall she can do is wait for Laertes to return and
take his revenge. Ophelia's predicament is symbolic of women's position in general in Hamlet: they are completely
dependent on men.

The presence of only two named female characters says something about the role of women within Hamlet. The death
of both women also indicates a social commentary.

Hamlet is at his most agitated state when talking to either female character. Although he cares for both, he's
suspicious, as well. In the case of his mother, Gertrude, Hamlet feels she remarried too quickly and that her remarriage
means she didn't love her first husband all that much. The idea freaks Hamlet out.

Then there's Ophelia. From the way the characters talk, we know Hamlet has been wooing Ophelia for some time. But
after Hamlet starts to act mad, it doesn't take long for him to assume that Ophelia is in cahoots with Gertrude,
Claudius, and Polonius. In reality, Ophelia obeyed her father and her monarch.

In both cases, Hamlet feels as if each woman has let him down, respectively. He's critical and quick to point out flaws
though puns and backhanded comments. Ophelia is usually viewed as a true victim, while Gertrude's role is interpreted
with more flexibility. In either case, the role and treatment of women in Hamlet is essential to discuss with an open
mind.

Religion, Honor, and Revenge

Every society is defined by its codes of conductits rules about how to act and behave. There are many scenes in
Hamlet when one person tells another how to act: Claudius lectures Hamlet on the proper show of grief; Polonius
advises Laertes on practical rules for getting by at university in France; Hamlet constantly lectures himself on what he
should be doing. In Hamlet, the codes of conduct are largely defined by religion and an aristocratic code that demands
honor and revenge if honor has been soiled.

But as Hamlet actually begins to pursue revenge against Claudius, he discovers that the codes of conduct themselves
don't fit together. Religion actually opposes revenge, which would mean that taking revenge could endanger Hamlet's
own soul. In other words, Hamlet discovers that the codes of conduct on which society is founded are contradictory.
In such a world, Hamlet suggests, the reasons for revenge become muddy, and the idea of justice confused.

Poison, Corruption, Death

In medieval times people believed that the health of a nation was connected to the legitimacy of its king. In Hamlet,
Denmark is often described as poisoned, diseased, or corrupt under Claudius's leadership. As visible in the nervous
soldiers on the ramparts in the first scene and the commoners outside the castle who Claudius fears might rise up in
rebellion, even those who don't know that Claudius murdered Old Hamlet sense the corruption of Denmark and are
disturbed. It is as if the poison Claudius poured into Old Hamlet's ear has spread through Denmark itself.

Hamlet also speaks in terms of rot and corruption, describing the world as an "unweeded garden" and constantly
referring to decomposing bodies. But Hamlet does not limit himself to Denmark; he talks about all of life in these
disgusting images. In fact, Hamlet only seems comfortable with things that are dead: he reveres his father, claims to
love Ophelia once she's dead, and handles Yorick's skull with tender care. No, what disgusts him is life: his mother's
sexuality, women wearing makeup to hide their age, worms feeding on a corpse, people lying to get their way. By the
end of the play, Hamlet argues that death is the one true reality, and he seems to view all of life as "appearance" doing
everything it canfrom seeking power, to lying, to committing murder, to engaging in passionate and illegitimate
sexto hide from that reality.

Mortality
The weight of one's mortality and the complexities of life and death are introduced from the beginning of Hamlet. In
the wake of his father's death, Hamlet can't stop pondering and considering the meaning of life and its eventual
ending. Many questions emerge as the text progresses. What happens when you die? If you're murdered, then will
you go to heaven? Do kings truly have a free pass to heaven?

In Hamlet's mind the idea of dying isn't so bad. It's the uncertainty of the afterlife that frightens Hamlet away from
suicide, even though he's obsessed with the notion.

A turning point for Hamlet occurs in the graveyard scene in Act V. Before, Hamlet has been appalled and revolted by
the moral corruption of the living. Seeing Yorick's skull (someone Hamlet loved and respected) propels Hamlet's
realization that death eliminates the differences between people.

The sheer number of bodies at the end of Hamlet can be misleading. Even though eight of the nine primary
characters die, the question of mortality is not fully answered. The questions about death, suicide, and what comes
after are left unanswered. What Hamlet presents in an exploration and discussion without a true resolution.

Madness

Hamlet's originally acts mad (crazy, not angry) to fool people into think he is harmless while probing his father's
death and Claudius's involvement. Early on, the bumbling Polonius says "[t]hough this be madness, yet there is
method in't" (Act II, Scene II). Polonius's assertion is ironic because he is right and wrong. Polonius falsely believes
Hamlet's madness stems from Hamlet's love of Ophelia. To notice a method behind the crazy talk was impressive of
Polonius.

But as the play progresses, Hamlet's behavior become more erratic. His acting mad seems to cause Hamlet to lose
his grip on reality. The circumstances he has to manage emotionally are difficult, to say the least. Succumbing to
physical violence when under extreme stress shows that Hamlet has deeper-set issues than merely acting mad. In
reflection, Hamlet's choices and impulses beg the question, what gives him the right to act as such without
consequences?

Political Livelihood

The state of the nation in Denmark is deteriorating. The death of a king throws any nation into political turmoil. With
a new king on the throne and the deceased king's son acting erratically, something's clearly off.

When the guard Marcellus famously says "[s]omething is rotten in the state of Denmark" (Act I, Scene IV), he's not
being ironic about Hamlet's bathing habits. Marcellus's words refer to how something evil and vile is afoot. This
moment could be interpreted as foreshadowing of the impending deaths of most of the principle characters. But it
also refers to the political unrest Denmark is feeling as a nation. The political livelihood of Denmark can be directly
linked back to the mental state of Hamlet at many points throughout the play.

Symbols

Yorick's Skull

Hamlet is not a very symbolic play. In fact, the only object that one can easily pick out as a symbol in the play is the
skull of Yorick, a former court jester, which Hamlet finds with Horatio in the graveyard near Elsinore in Act 5, scene 1.
As Hamlet picks up the skull and both talks to the deceased Yorick and to Horatio about the skull, it becomes clear
that the skull represents the inevitability of death. But what is perhaps most interesting about the skull as a symbol is
that, while in most plays, a symbol means one thing to the audience and another to the characters in the novel or play,
in Hamlet it is Hamlet himself who recognizes and explains the symbolism of Yorick's skull. Even this symbol serves to
emphasize Hamlet's power as a character: he is as sophisticated as his audience.

Character Analysis

Hamlet

The prince of Denmark, son of Gertrude, nephew of Claudius, and heir to the throne. Hamlet is a deep thinker, focusing
on impossible to answer questions about religion, death, truth, reality, and the motivations of others. He even
obsessively contemplates the fact that he obsessively contemplates. He loves Ophelia and his mother, but his
mother's marriage to Claudius makes him mistrust and even hate all women. He detests all forms of deception, yet
plots and pretends to be insane. At times he even seems to be insane. Despite his obsessive thinking, he can act
impulsively, as when he kills Polonius. Hamlet is an enigma, a man so complex even he doesn't completely know
himself. In other words, he seems like a real personwhich has made Hamlet the most well-known character in
English literature.

Hamlet is an enigma. No matter how many ways critics examine him, no absolute truth emerges. Hamlet breathes
with the multiple dimensions of a living human being, and everyone understands him in a personal way. Hamlet's
challenge to Guildenstern rings true for everyone who seeks to know him: "You would pluck out the heart of my
mystery." None of us ever really does.

The conundrum that is Hamlet stems from the fact that every time we look at him, he is different. In understanding
literary characters, just as in understanding real people, our perceptions depend on what we bring to the
investigation. Hamlet is so complete a character that, like an old friend or relative, our relationship to him changes
each time we visit him, and he never ceases to surprise us. Therein lies the secret to the enduring love affair
audiences have with him. They never tire of the intrigue.

The paradox of Hamlet's nature draws people to the character. He is at once the consummate iconoclast, in self-
imposed exile from Elsinore Society, while, at the same time, he is the adulated champion of Denmark the
people's hero. He has no friends left, but Horatio loves him unconditionally. He is angry, dejected, depressed, and
brooding; he is manic, elated, enthusiastic, and energetic. He is dark and suicidal, a man who loathes himself and his
fate. Yet, at the same time, he is an existential thinker who accepts that he must deal with life on its own terms, that
he must choose to meet it head on. "We defy augury. There is special providence in the fall of a sparrow."

Hamlet not only participates in his life, but astutely observes it as well. He recognizes the decay of the Danish society
(represented by his Uncle Claudius), but also understands that he can blame no social ills on just one person. He
remains aware of the ironies that constitute human endeavor, and he savors them. Though he says, "Man delights
not me," the contradictions that characterize us all intrigue him. "What a piece of work is a man! How noble in
reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in
apprehension how like a god!"

As astutely as he observes the world around him, Hamlet also keenly critiques himself. In his soliloquys he upbraids
himself for his failure to act as well as for his propensity for words.

Hamlet is infuriatingly adept at twisting and manipulating words. He confuses his so-called friends Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern whom he trusts as he "would adders fang'd" with his dissertations on ambition, turning their
observations around so that they seem to admire beggars more than their King. And he leads them on a merry chase
in search of Polonius' body. He openly mocks the dottering Polonius with his word plays, which elude the old man's
understanding. He continually spars with Claudius, who recognizes the danger of Hamlet's wit but is never smart
enough to defend himself against it.

Words are Hamlet's constant companions, his weapons, and his defenses. In Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead,
a play that was later adapted into a film, playwright and screen playwright Tom Stoppard imagines the various
wordplays in Hamlet as games. In one scene, his characters play a set of tennis where words serve as balls and rackets.
Hamlet is certainly the Pete Sampras of wordplay.

And yet, words also serve as Hamlet's prison. He analyzes and examines every nuance of his situation until he has
exhausted every angle. They cause him to be indecisive. He dallies in his own wit, intoxicated by the mix of words he
can concoct; he frustrates his own burning desire to be more like his father, the Hyperion. When he says that
Claudius is " . . .no more like my father than I to Hercules" he recognizes his enslavement to words, his inability to
thrust home his sword of truth. No mythic character is Hamlet. He is stuck, unable to avenge his father's death
because words control him.

What an ass am I! This is most brave,

That I, the son of a dear murderd
Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,
Must like a whore unpack my heart with words,
And fall-a-cursing like a very drab,
A scallion!
Hamlet's paradoxical relationship with words has held audiences in his thrall since he debuted in 1603 or so. But the
controversy of his sexual identity equally charms and repels people.

Is Hamlet in love with his mother? The psychoanalytic profile of the character supports Freud's theory that Hamlet
has an unnatural love for his mother. Hamlet unequivocally hates his stepfather and abhors the incestuous
relationship between Claudius and Gertrude. But whether jealousy prompts his hatred, whether his fixation on his
mother causes his inability to love Ophelia, and whether he lusts after Gertrude all depend on interpretation. And no
interpretation is flawless.

Hamlet's love life could result from his Puritanical nature. Like the Puritans whose presence was growing in England
of the time, Hamlet is severely puritanical about love and sex. He is appalled by Gertrude's show of her pleasure at
Claudius' touch, and he clearly loathes women. His anger over Claudius' and Gertrude's relationship could as easily
result from a general distaste for sexual activity as from desire to be with his mother.

Hamlet could be, at heart, a brutal misogynist, terrified of love because he is terrified of women. He verbally abuses
Ophelia, using sexual innuendo and derision, and he encourages her to get to a nunnery. Another play on words,
nunnery, in this instance, symbolizes both sexual abstinence and sexual perversity. In a cloister, Ophelia would take
a vow of chastity, and in a brothel, she would serve as the basest sexual object.

Can concluding whether Hamlet is mad or merely pretending madness determine all the questions about Hamlet's
nature? Could a madman manipulate his destiny as adeptly as Hamlet turns the tables on Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern? Perhaps he is crazy like a fox . . . calculated and criminal. Or perhaps his own portrayal of madness
his "antic disposition" that he dons like a mask or a costume actually drives him.

Could Hamlet's madness be his tragic flaw? Or is his flaw that he believes he is pretending to be mad? Are words his
tragic flaw? Or could his tragic flaw be that he possesses the same hubris that kills all the great tragic heroes that
be believes he can decide who should live and who should die, who should be forgiven and who should be punished?
Then, perhaps, is the ghost a manifestation of his own conscience and not a real presence at all?

Which leads to the question students must ultimately consider: Is Hamlet a tragic hero at all? The Greek philosopher
Aristotle defined the tragic hero with Oedipus as the archetype a great man at the pinnacle of his power who,
through a flaw in his own character, topples, taking everyone in his jurisdiction with him. Hamlet has no great
power, though it is clear from Claudius' fears and from Claudius' assessment of Hamlet's popularity that he might
have power were he to curry it among the people. His topple results as much from external factors as from his own
flaws. Nevertheless, he certainly does take everyone with him when he falls.

Perhaps, like Arthur Miller, who redefined tragedy in an essay called "Tragedy and the Common Man,"Shakespeare
modified Aristotle's definition for his own age and created a tragic hero who can appeal to a larger, more enduring
segment of the population. Hamlet fulfills the Aristotelian requirement that the tragic hero invoke in us a deep sense
of pity and fear, that we learn from him how not to conduct our lives. Hamlet is our hero because he is, as we are, at
once both confused and enticed by endless dilemmas that come from being, after all, merely human.

Claudius

Hamlet's uncle, and Gertrude's second husband. Power-hungry and lustful, Claudius murders his brother in order to
take the throne of Denmark and marry his wife. Claudius is a great talker and schemer. He easily charms the royal court
into accepting his hasty marriage to his brother's widow, and comes up with plot after plot to protect his ill-gained
power. He is the consummate politician, yet his hold on power is always slightly tenuous. At various times he does
show guilt for killing his brother, and his love of Gertrude seems genuine.

Shakespeare's villains are complex. Unlike the earlier antiheroes of the revenge or morality plays that were popular
in Elizabethan and Jacobean culture, Shakespearean criminals lack the simple clarity of absolute evil. Claudius is a
perfect example of a quintessential Shakespearean antagonist.

Claudius is socially adept, and his charm is genuine. He can exhibit deep distress over his "dear brother's death" and
admiration for his wife, "Th'imperial jointress to this warlike state." He knows the value of a great funeral, but
quickly turns mourning into celebration and moves on "With mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage" to
whatever lies ahead. He is a decisive man, fair in his politics and commanding if Gertrude's allegiance is any
indication in his bedroom.

The Queen has chosen to marry Claudius, and she defends him even to her son. In fact, she never opposes Claudius
in anything. Were he dark and sinister in all things, she would fear and despise him; she follows him willingly even
when he arranges to send her beloved son into the jaws of death. He must be sincere in his love for her. He explains
his feelings for her at the end of Act IV, but he has proven these feelings consistently throughout the play

The Queen his mother

Lives almost by his looks, and for myself,
My virtue or my plague, be it either which,
She's so conjunctive to my life and soul
That as the star moves not but in his sphere,
I could not by her.

A character who loves is not merely a cold-blooded killer. Like Hamlet, his conflicting imperatives tear him apart.
Whereas he recognizes that he his "offense is rank" and "smells to heaven," he also admits that he will not make
amends with God because he refuses to give up what his crime has bought him. He is willing to take the
consequences of his actions.

In some ways, Claudius exhibits more heroism than Hamlet. He manipulates fortune and takes what is not rightfully
his, but remains unapologetic for his actions; he possesses enough strength to admit that he would do the same
again. Hamlet, torn by conscience to smite the morally deficient Claudius, causes the death of six innocent people
before he accomplishes his goal. By taking full responsibility for his actions, Claudius mitigates his evil nature.

The mark of a great Shakespearean antagonist is how completely he mirrors the protagonist. Claudius is no more
Machiavellian than Hamlet; both ultimately believe that the end justifies the means, and both ultimately sacrifice
humanity and humaneness in the acquisition of their goals.

What makes Claudius a villain is that he is wrong, and Hamlet is right. Claudius is a sneak who murdered and lied.
Hamlet commits his murders in the open and suffers the pangs of his own conscience. Claudius subverts his conscience
and refuses to ask for divine forgiveness. Hamlet seeks contrition and absolves himself of guilt before he dies; Claudius
receives no absolution and seeks none. Hamlet will spend eternity in Heaven; Claudius will burn in Hell.

Gertrude

Hamlet's mother. After Hamlet's father dies, Gertrude quickly marries Hamlet's uncle, Claudius. Though she is a good
woman and loving mother, she is weak-willed and unable to control her personal passions. Whether because of lust,
love, or a desire to maintain her status as queen, she marries Claudius, though this is clearly a breach of proper
morals. Though some critics have argued that Gertrude might have been involved in Claudius's plot to kill Old
Hamlet, evidence in the text suggests that she is unaware of and uninvolved in the plot.

Gertrude is a shadowy character with little substance on which to hang a characterization. We can examine her
through what others say about her more than through what she says.

That she is "th'imperial jointress" to the throne of Denmark indicates that she wields some power and suggests that
Claudius' decision to marry her had political implications. Yet Hamlet indicts all women by calling her fickle
"frailty, thy name is woman." We see through Hamlet the picture of a woman who one day lived obediently and in
the shadow of one king to whom she was devoted. The next day she allies herself in love and politics with the polar
opposite of the man she formerly called husband.

The most haunting questions about Gertrude's character revolve around whether she knows that Claudius is a
criminal. Is she merely a dependent woman who needs to live through her man? Is she a conniving temptress who
used her power to conspire with Claudius to kill King Hamlet and usurp Prince Hamlet's ascendancy?

No textual references are conclusive. The ghost of King Hamlet calls her his "most seeming virtuous queen." He
entreats Hamlet to "Leave her to Heaven / And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge / To prick and sting her."
These words could imply that she has reason to be guilty, that she is not blameless. Later, the ghost implores Hamlet
to comfort her. "But look, amazement on thy mother sits. / Oh step between her and her fighting soul." Again, he
waxes protective of her but implies that she has some reason to be spiritually conflicted.

When Rosencrantz and Guildenstern arrive at Elsinore, she tells them that they have been sent for because of the
way Hamlet "hath talked of you," and she promises them compensation fit for " a king's remembrance." She
exhibits apparent sincerity in her concern for Hamlet, and yet, even after Hamlet has told her what he knows about
Claudius, even after he has shared his fears of the trip to England, even after Hamlet has clearly proven that
something is rotten in the state of Denmark, she never opposes Claudius to protect Hamlet. Unless, as some critics
believe, she drinks the poisoned wine as an act of maternal protectiveness. Does she know the wine is poisoned?
When "the Queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet" is she deliberately drinking to prevent Hamlet's death?

If Gertrude has overheard Claudius and Laertes plotting, she would know all. If she is in Claudius' confidence, she
would be complicit with all his conspiracies. Though Claudius professes love and admiration for Gertrude, he never
confides to anyone the extent of their relationship. Gertrude describes her love for Hamlet when she asks him not to
return to Wittenberg. When she shares with Ophelia her hope that the young woman would have married her
Hamlet, she divulges her wish for his happiness. However, she never declares any kind of emotion for Claudius,
either positive or negative.

Ultimately, Gertrude's character remains malleable. In the hands of an astute actor and a clever director, she can come
across as either Claudius' co-conspirator or Hamlet's defender. Either interpretation works, if built substantially.

Polonius

The Lord Chamberlain of Denmark, and the father of Laertes and Ophelia, whom he loves deeply and wishes to
protect, even to the point of spying on them. Polonius is pompous and long-winded, and has a propensity to
scheme, but without Hamlet's or Claudius's skill. He is very aware of his position and role, and is always careful to try
to be on the good side of power.

Casting Polonius in a demeaning light is a common danger. While he is a blowhard, and he does spout aphorisms
that were, even in the 16th century, clichs, his clichs constitute sound advice and his observations prove
themselves prophetic.

Polonius may be elderly and demented, but he must have been at least politically adept. He admits that he is not a
man of great prestige, and yet he has risen to be counselor to the King. Presumably, he counseled King Hamlet as
well.

An actor portraying Polonius should address the question of whether he is a devoted father or a ruthless politician.
Does he sacrifice Ophelia to his ambitions and/or his fear of being discarded by the King? Does he send Reynaldo to
spy on Laertes because he cares about his son, or is he worried about what Laertes' possible behavior might reflect
back on his own character? Is he more concerned with his position in Denmark than with the welfare of his children?
Is he then the victim of his own contrivances?

Ophelia

Polonius's daughter, Laertes's sister, and Hamlet's love. As a woman, Ophelia must obey the men around her and is
forced by her father first to stop speaking to Hamlet and then to help spy on him. Ophelia's loyalty to her father and
resulting estrangement from Hamlet ultimately causes her to lose her mind. Though Laertes and Fortinbras are the
characters usually seen as Hamlet's "doubles," Ophelia functions as a kind of female double of Hamletmirroring
Hamlet's half-madness with her own full-blown insanity, and takes his obsession with suicide a step further and
actually commits it.

Ophelia is a difficult role to play because her character, like Gertrude's, is murky. Part of the difficulty is that
Shakespeare wrote his female roles for men, and there were always limitations on them that restricted and defined
the characterizations devised. In the case of an ingnue like Ophelia, a very young and lovely woman, Shakespeare
would have been writing for a boy. The extent to which a boy could grasp subtle nuances might have prevented the
playwright from fleshing out the character more fully.
We do know that Ophelia is torn between two contradictory poles. Her father and brother believe that Hamlet
would use her, that he would take her virginity and throw it away because she could never be his wife. Her heart has
convinced her that Hamlet loved her, though he swears he never did. To her father and brother, Ophelia is the
eternal virgin, the vessel of morality whose purpose is to be a dutiful wife and steadfast mother. To Hamlet, she is a
sexual object, a corrupt and deceitful lover. With no mother to guide her, she has no way of deciphering the
contradictory expectations.

Just like Hamlet, the medieval precept that the father's word is unquestionable governs Ophelia. But her
Renaissance sense of romantic love also rules her. How can she be obedient to her father and true to her love? When
she lies to Hamlet and tells him that Polonius is home when he is concealed in the room eavesdropping, Ophelia
proves she cannot live in both worlds. She has chosen one, and her choice seals her fate.

The dilemma also forces her into madness. She has no way to reconcile the contradictory selves her men demand that
she be and still retain an equilibrium. Ophelia's desperation literally drives her crazy, and she has no means with which
to heal herself.

Laertes

Hamlet and Laertes presumably grew up together, fencing with one another and confiding in one another. Then
Hamlet went away to Wittenberg and Laertes to Paris, parting the friendship. Still, Hamlet refers to Laertes as "a
very noble youth."

Hamlet recognizes what Shakespeare has made abundantly clear throughout the play, that Laertes is Hamlet's foil.
He mirrors Hamlet but behaves in the opposite manner. Where Hamlet is verbal, Laertes is physical; where Hamlet
broods, Laertes blusters. Laertes' love for Ophelia and duty to Polonius drive him to passionate action, while Hamlet's
love for Gertrude and duty to King Hamlet drive him to passionate inaction. In Laertes resides the picture of what
Hamlet could be if the sound of his own words did not mesmerize him.

The Ghost

The spirit that claims to be Hamlet's dead father, forced to endure the fires of Purgatory because he was murdered
by Claudius in his sleep without being able to ask forgiveness for his sins. The Ghost orders Hamlet to get revenge
against Claudius, but spare Gertrude. Evidence in the play suggests that the Ghost really is the spirit of Hamlet's father,
though Hamlet himself wonders at times if the Ghost might be a demon in disguise.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

Friends of Hamlet's from Wittenberg who help Claudius and Gertrude try and figure out the source of Hamlet's
melancholy. Hamlet sees that the two are, essentially, spying on him, and turns on them. Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern aren't the smartest fellows, but they do seem to mean well, and the announcement of their deaths at
the end of the play helps to drive home the absurd and bloody lengths to which vengeance can extend once it is
unleashed.

Horatio

Horatio epitomizes the faithful friend. He only questions Hamlet's judgment once, when Hamlet confides the fates
of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Otherwise, Horatio supports every rash decision Hamlet makes.

Horatio is the man Hamlet wants to be. He is intelligent, but not driven by his intellectual creativity. Horatio seems to
accept the world as it is handed to him where Hamlet is driven by his impulse question all apparent truths. (What T.S.
Eliot calls "the energy to murder and create" in "The Lovesong J. Alfred Prufrock," a poem in which the the title
character, paralyzed by words and feelings protests, "I will not be Prince Hamlet.") Marcellus and Bernardo
Marcellus and Barnardo admire Horatio's intellect enough to want his opinion about the ghost, but no one accuses
Horatio of talking or thinking too much. He can follow Hamlet's elaborate wordplays, but he is not inclined to
engage in any. He knows enough to value what ignorance he has that can protect him from political ruin, but neither
ambition nor deceit determines his loyalties.

Horatio loves Hamlet so much that he would rather impale himself on his own sword than live on after Hamlet's death.
Hamlet passionately demonstrates his own deep love and admiration for Horatio in his request that Horatio tell
Hamlet's story. Hamlet trusts his friend enough to leave him the task of finding the words that will divine the truth.
For Hamlet, entrusting the task to Horatio declares his love better than expressing that love through any of Hamlet's
poetry or philosophy. Action has at last spoken louder than words.

CRITICAL APPRECIATION OF HAMLET by: E.K. Chambers

The criticism of Hamlet is apt to center round the question, "Was Hamlet mad?" The problem is not merely insoluble;
it cannot even be propounded in an intelligible guise. Psychology knows no rigid dividing line between the sane and
the insane. The pathologist, indeed, may distinguish certain abnormal conditions of brain-areas, and call them
diseased; or the lawyer may apply practical tests to determine the point where restraint of the individual liberty
becomes necessary in the public interest. But beyond this you cannot go; you cannot, from any wider point of view,
lay your finger upon one element here or there in the infinite variety of human character and say, "that way madness
lies." Of this, however, we may be sure. Shakespeare did not mean Hamlet to be mad in any sense which would put
his actions in a quite different category from those of other men. That would have been to divest his work of humanity
and leave it meaningless. For the tragedy of Hamlet does not lie in the fact that it begins with a murder and ends with
a massacre; it is something deeper, more spiritual than that. The most tragic, the most affecting thing in the world is
the ruin of a high soul. This is the theme of Hamlet; it is a tragedy of failure, of a great nature confronted with a low
environment, and so, by the perversity of things, made ineffective and disastrous through its own greatness. Keeping,
then, this central idea in mind, let us attempt an analysis of the play in which it is set forth.

Hamlet is presented to us as a man of sensitive temperament and high intellectual gifts. He is no ordinary prince; his
spirit has been touched to finer issues; his wit is keen-edged and dipped in irony; his delicacy of moral insight is unusual
among the ruder Danes. He is no longer in his first youth when the play opens, but up to that moment his life has been
serene and undisturbed. His father's unexpected death has called him back from the University of Wittenberg, where
his time has been spent in an atmosphere of studious calm and philosophic speculation. His tastes are those of the
scholar; he loves to read for hours together, and, like most literary men, he takes great delight in the stage, with whose
theory and practice he is familiar. He is no recluse; he has the genius for friendship and for love; when at Elsinore he
has been conspicuous in the gallant exercises of the age. He is the darling of the court and beloved by the people. But
his real interest is all in speculation, in the play of the mind around a subject, in the contemplation of it on all sides and
from every point of view. Such a training has not fitted him to act a kingly part in stirring times; the intellectual element
in him has come to outweigh the practical; the vivid consciousness of many possible courses of conduct deters him
from the strenuous pursuit of one; so that he has lost the power of deliberate purposeful action, and, by a strange
paradox, if this thoughtful man acts at all, it must be from impulse.

Quite suddenly the dreamer finds himself face to face with a thing to be done. According to the ethics of the day it
becomes his imperative duty to revenge his father's murder; a difficult task, and one whose success might well seem
doubtful. But Hamlet does not shrink at first from recognizing the obligation; it is 'cursed spite' that the burden of
setting the world straight should have fallen upon him, but he will not refuse to shoulder it. Only the habits of a lifetime
are not to be thrown off so easily. As the excitement of the ghost's revelation passes away, the laws of character
begin to reassert themselves. The necessity of "thinking it over" is potent with Hamlet. Instead of revealing all to his
friends and enlisting their assistance, he binds them to secrecy and forms the plan of pretending madness that he may
gain time to consider his position. Let us consider it with him.

In the first place, he is absolutely alone. The court at Elsinore is filled with quite ordinary people, none of whom can
understand him, to none of whom he can look for help. This note of contrast between Hamlet and his surroundings is
struck again and again. They are of another world than his, limited, commonplace, incapable of ideals. His motives and
feelings, his scruples and hesitations, are hopelessly beyond their comprehension. And therefore--this is the irony of
it--most of them are far more fitted to deal with a practical crisis in life than this high-strung idealist of a prince. There
are "the good king and queen"; Claudius, shrewd and ready for an emergency, one who has set foot in the paths of
villainy and will not turn back, for all the dim visitings of momentary remorse; Gertrude, a slave to the stronger nature,
living in the present, unable to realize her own moral degradation. There is Horatio, a straightforward upright soldier,
one whom Hamlet intensely respects, comes even to envy, but who is not subtle enough to be of much use to him.
There is Polonius, a played-out state official, vain and slow-witted, pattering words of wisdom which he does not
understand and cannot put into practice. There are his son and daughter, Laertes and Ophelia: Laertes, a shallow
vigorous young noble, quick with a word, and quick with a blow, but demoralized by the esprit Gaulois; Ophelia, a timid
conventional girl, too fragile a reed for a man to lean upon. Hamlet loves her, and she loves Hamlet, but it is not a love
that will bear him through the deep waters of affliction. The rest of the court are typified by Osric the water fly, and
by Guildenstern and Rosencrantz, of whom if you say Rosencrantz and Guildenstern it makes no difference; echoes,
nonentities. With Hamlet on one side and these on the other, the elements of a tragedy are complete; the problem
can work out to no satisfactory conclusion.

Once Hamlet has shrunk from immediate action, the possibilities of delay exercise an irresistible fascination over him.
The ingenuity of his intellect exhausts itself in the discovery of obstacles; he takes every turn and twist to avoid the
fatal necessity for action. At first he turns to Ophelia, the well-beloved. She will give him strength to accomplish his
mission; but the scene in her closet, and still more the lie which she tells when her father is behind the arras, confess
her weakness and compel him to renunciation. In the meantime, he continues the assumption of madness. It serves a
double purpose: he is free from the intolerable burden of keeping on good terms with Claudius and the rest; he can
fight out the battle with himself in peace, while he mocks them with the ironies congenial to his mood. And what is
more, he can let himself go; the strain of his overwrought mind relieves itself in bursts of an extravagance only half
affected. He plays the madman to prevent himself from becoming one. But all the while he is no nearer the end. He
has turned the whole matter over and cannot decide. His thoughts slip away from the plain issue and lose themselves
in a bitter criticism of all created things. In this the speculative temper infallibly betrays itself; the interest of the
universal, not of the particular, is always dominant with Hamlet; not his mother's sin, but the frailty of women, is his
natural theme. And so it is with a pang that he constantly recalls himself to the insistent actual life, from the world in
which he is a past-master to that wherein he gropes ineffectively. Of course he is fully aware of his own weakness; a
deficiency of self-analysis is not likely to be one of his failings; but this does not give him power to throw it off, nor
help him from his maze of recurring dilemmas. More than once he is on the point of cutting the knot of death, but
even for that he has not the resolution.

At last the crisis comes. Hamlet has resolved that the play-scene shall decide once for all the question of the king's
guilt. That guilt is made most manifest, and the opportunity for revenge is offered him. He does not take it. Covering
his weakness with unreal reasons, he passes into the queen's chamber. After that it is too late. The impetuous murder
of Polonius is the first link in a chain of calamities. Moreover, it gives Claudius his chance. The king has never been
wholly deceived by Hamlet's madness; he is sent to England, and only escapes that trap to fall into another. True, in
the end the king dies by one impulsive stroke; but that cannot repair the ruin which Hamlet's want of purpose has
caused. The infinitely sad fate of Ophelia; the deaths of Polonius, Laertes, Gertrude, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern; for all
their faults, all these are a sacrifice on the altar of his infirmity. Only for Hamlet himself was the fatal blow "a
consummation devoutly to be wished."

The ineffectiveness of the speculative intellect in a world of action, that is the key-note of the play. In Hamlet, as in
Brutus, the idealist gets the worse of it, and we are left to wonder at the irony of things by which it is so. And just as
the figure of Brutus is set between the two triumphant Philistines, Caesar and Antony, so Shakespeare is careful to
provide a similar contrast for Hamlet. Partly this is to be found in Horatio and Laertes, but still more in the Norwegian,
Fortinbras. The very existence of Fortinbras and the danger with which he threatens the state show the need for an
iron hand in Denmark; Hamlet's reflections on his meeting with the Norwegian soldiers emphasizes the same point,
and the final appearance of Fortinbras and his selection by Hamlet as the true savior of society is fully significant. It is
the lesson of Henry V, the lesson of the "still strong man in a blatant land". Only in Hamlet it is the other side that is
apparent; not the political principle, but the human tragedy, the ruin of the great soul because it is not strong,
practical.

It would be an interesting task to estimate how far the genius of Shakespeare has been impaired for a modern reader
by the change in sentiments which the lapse of three crowded centuries has brought about. An Elizabethan dramatist
could appeal with confidence to sympathies which are evanescent today. The Merchant of Venice, for instance, in spite
of all its beauty and all its wit, yet bears an air of unreality to us, because its leading motive, that of the Judenhetze, no
longer finds an echo outside the limits of Whitechapel. Probably Mr. Irving's histrionic instinct was right when it led
him to convert a villain into a hero, and to present the play as an apology for toleration, though this was an idea foreign
to Shakespeare and impossible on the boards of the Theatre. It is remarkable, however, that there is one tragedy at
least in which the normal law is reversed, and which is more vivid, more intelligible to us than it could have been to
our Elizabethan ancestors. Modern civilization has indeed discarded the ethics of the vendetta; the moral sentiment
which holds revenge for a father's murder to be a binding duty upon the son no longer appears obvious and natural.
An effort of the historic imagination is required to grasp its importance as a leading idea in the drama of Hamlet. But
with the dominant figure, with Hamlet himself, it is otherwise. A prolonged study of the character leaves one with the
startling sense that one out of the plenitude of his genius Shakespeare has here depicted a type of humanity which
belongs essentially not to his age but to our own. There was, we know, an older Hamlet, a popular revenge play,
pulsating, no doubt, like Titus Andronicus, with blood and fire. Into the midst of such a story the poet has deliberately
set this modern born out of due time, this high-strung dreamer, who moves through it to such tragic issues. The key-
note of Hamlet's nature is the over-cultivation of the mind. He is the academic man, the philosopher brought suddenly
into the world of strenuous action. The fatal habit of speculation, fatal at Elsinore, however proper and desirable at
Wittenberg, is his undoing. Cursed with the

"craven scruple

Of thinking too precisely on the event",

He is predestined to practical failure, failure from which no delicacy of moral fiber, no truth and intensity of feeling,
can save him. It is surely no mere accident that so many features in the portrait of Hamlet are reproduced in Mrs.
Ward's Edward Langham. The worship of intellect, the absorbing interest in music and the theatre, the nervous
excitability, the consciousness of ineffectiveness taking revenge in irony and sarcasm, these and countless other
points stamp them as temperaments of kindred mold. And in both lives the tragic woof is the same; it is the tragedy
of spiritual impotence, of deadened energies and paralyzed will, the essential tragedy of modernity. Hamlet fascinates
us, just as Langham fascinates us, because we see in him ourselves; we are all actual or potential Hamlets.
Was Shakespeare, then, a prophet, or how came he to hit upon a conception so alien to the "form and pressure" of
the time? One thinks of Elizabethan England as vigorous and ardent, flushed with youth and hope, little vexed with
intellectual subtleties. Laertes is its type, not Hamlet. Perhaps the Sonnets, with the personal insight they give us into
the poet's temper, help to solve the problem. Shakespeare was not Hamlet, but he touched him on many sides. The
maker, like the puppet, had his moments of world-weariness, and breathed his sigh for "restful death". But there is
another than Shakespeare himself in whom we would willingly recognize in some measure the original Hamlet. It is
not needful to commit ourselves to the growing modern theory that the dramas of Shakespeare, comedies and
tragedies alike, are largely Aristophanes in their intent, filled with topical sketches and allusions, to which in many
cases the clue is now lost. But it is difficult not to think it probable that in this particular the poet gathered some hints
from the noticeable personality of Sir Philip Sidney. Sidney is curiously lacking in the characteristic of Elizabethan
blitheness; he looks by preference on the gloomy side of things; the pessimistic note comes out no less in his letters
than in the bitter mockery of the famous dirge. And, like Hamlet, he was a scholar and an idealist, set in an uncongenial
environment and always striving ineffectually to escape from it into the life of action. The lingering and futility of his
later years were due in great measure to the force of external circumstance, yet something in them may also be traced,
clearly enough, to Hamlet's irresolution and impotence of will. Nor can one fail to be struck by the parallel between
the language common to the wits and poets of Elizabeth's court in speaking of "the president of noblesse and of
chivalry" and the lament of Ophelia over the unstrung nerves of her lover:

"Oh, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown!

The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword,
The expectancy and rose of the fair state,
The glass of fashion and the mould of form,
The observed of all observers, quite, quite down!"

Important Quotations and their explanations

1. O that this too too solid flesh would melt, By what it fed on: and yet, within a month,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew! Let me not think ont,Frailty, thy name is
Or that the Everlasting had not fixd woman!
His canon gainst self-slaughter! O God! O God! A little month; or ere those shoes were old
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable With which she followed my poor fathers body
Seem to me all the uses of this world! Like Niobe, all tears;why she, even she,
Fie ont! O fie! tis an unweeded garden, O God! a beast that wants discourse of reason,
That grows to seed; things rank and gross in Would have mournd longer,married with mine
nature uncle,
Possess it merely. That it should come to this! My fathers brother; but no more like my father
But two months dead!nay, not so much, not Than I to Hercules: within a month;
two: Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears
So excellent a king; that was, to this, Had left the flushing in her galled eyes,
Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother, She married: O, most wicked speed, to post
That he might not beteem the winds of heaven With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!
Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth! It is not, nor it cannot come to good;
Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him But break my heart,for I must hold my tongue.
As if increase of appetite had grown
Explanation: This quotation, Hamlets first important soliloquy, occurs in Act I, scene ii (129158). Hamlet speaks these
lines after enduring the unpleasant scene at Claudius and Gertrudes court, then being asked by his mother and
stepfather not to return to his studies at Wittenberg but to remain in Denmark, presumably against his wishes. Here,
Hamlet thinks for the first time about suicide (desiring his flesh to melt, and wishing that God had not made self-
slaughter a sin), saying that the world is weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable. In other words, suicide seems like a
desirable alternative to life in a painful world, but Hamlet feels that the option of suicide is closed to him because it is
forbidden by religion. Hamlet then goes on to describe the causes of his pain, specifically his intense disgust at his
mothers marriage to Claudius. He describes the haste of their marriage, noting that the shoes his mother wore to his
fathers funeral were not worn out before her marriage to Claudius. He compares Claudius to his father (his father was
so excellent a king while Claudius is a bestial satyr). As he runs through his description of their marriage, he
touches upon the important motifs of misogyny, crying, Frailty, thy name is woman; incest, commenting that his
mother moved [w]ith such dexterity to incestuous sheets; and the ominous omen the marriage represents for
Denmark, that [i]t is not nor it cannot come to good. Each of these motifs recurs throughout the play.

2. Give thy thoughts no tongue, Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
Nor any unproportiond thought his act. But not expressd in fancy; rich, not gaudy:
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar. For the apparel oft proclaims the man;
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, And they in France of the best rank and station
Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel; Are most select and generous chief in that.
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Neither a borrower nor a lender be:
Of each new-hatchd, unfledgd comrade. Beware For loan oft loses both itself and friend;
Of entrance to a quarrel; but, being in, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
Beart that the opposed may beware of thee. This above all,to thine own self be true;
Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice: And it must follow, as the night the day,
Take each mans censure, but reserve thy Thou canst not then be false to any man.
judgment.
Explanation: This famous bit of fatherly advice is spoken by Polonius to Laertes shortly before Laertes leaves for
France, in Act I, scene iii (5980). Polonius, who is bidding Laertes farewell, gives him this list of instructions about
how to behave before he sends him on his way. His advice amounts to a list of clichs. Keep your thoughts to yourself;
do not act rashly; treat people with familiarity but not excessively so; hold on to old friends and be slow to trust new
friends; avoid fighting but fight boldly if it is unavoidable; be a good listener; accept criticism but do not be judgmental;
maintain a proper appearance; do not borrow or lend money; and be true to yourself. This long list of quite normal
fatherly advice emphasizes the regularity of Laertes family life compared to Hamlets, as well as contributing a
somewhat stereotypical father-son encounter in the plays exploration of family relationships. It seems to indicate
that Polonius loves his son, though that idea is complicated later in the play when he sends Reynaldo to spy on him.

3. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

Explanation: This line is spoken by Marcellus in Act I, scene iv (67), as he and Horatio debate whether or not to follow
Hamlet and the ghost into the dark night. The line refers both to the idea that the ghost is an ominous omen for
Denmark and to the larger theme of the connection between the moral legitimacy of a ruler and the health of the
state as a whole. The ghost is a visible symptom of the rottenness of Denmark created by Claudiuss crime.
4. I have of late,but wherefore I know not,lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed, it goes
so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most
excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave oerhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden
fire,why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work
is man! How noble in reason! how infinite in faculties! in form and moving, how express and admirable! in action
how like an angel! in apprehension, how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to
me, what is this quintessence of dust?
Explanation: In these lines, Hamlet speaks to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in Act II, scene ii (287298), explaining the
melancholy that has afflicted him since his fathers death. Perhaps moved by the presence of his former university
companions, Hamlet essentially engages in a rhetorical exercise, building up an elaborate and glorified picture of the
earth and humanity before declaring it all merely a quintessence of dust. He examines the earth, the air, and the
sun, and rejects them as a sterile promontory and a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors. He then describes
human beings from several perspectives, each one adding to his glorification of them. Human beings reason is noble,
their faculties infinite, their forms and movements fast and admirable, their actions angelic, and their understanding
godlike. But, to Hamlet, humankind is merely dust. This motif, an expression of his obsession with the physicality of
death, recurs throughout the play, reaching its height in his speech over Yoricks skull. Finally, it is also telling that
Hamlet makes humankind more impressive in apprehension (meaning understanding) than in action. Hamlet
himself is more prone to apprehension than to action, which is why he delays so long before seeking his revenge on
Claudius.

5. To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?To die,to sleep,
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to,tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wishd. To die,to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream:ay, theres the
rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: theres the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressors wrong, the proud mans
contumely,
The pangs of despisd love, the laws delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would these fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscoverd country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns,puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied oer with the pale cast of thought;
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard, their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

Explanation: This soliloquy, probably the most famous speech in the English language, is spoken by Hamlet in Act III,
scene i (5890). His most logical and powerful examination of the theme of the moral legitimacy of suicide in an
unbearably painful world, it touches on several of the other important themes of the play. Hamlet poses the problem
of whether to commit suicide as a logical question: To be, or not to be, that is, to live or not to live. He then weighs
the moral ramifications of living and dying. Is it nobler to suffer life, [t]he slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
passively or to actively seek to end ones suffering? He compares death to sleep and thinks of the end to suffering,
pain, and uncertainty it might bring, [t]he heartache, and the thousand natural shocks / That flesh is heir to. Based
on this metaphor, he decides that suicide is a desirable course of action, a consummation / Devoutly to be wished.
But, as the religious word devoutly signifies, there is more to the question, namely, what will happen in the afterlife.
Hamlet immediately realizes as much, and he reconfigures his metaphor of sleep to include the possibility of dreaming;
he says that the dreams that may come in the sleep of death are daunting, that they must give us pause.

He then decides that the uncertainty of the afterlife, which is intimately related to the theme of the difficulty of
attaining truth in a spiritually ambiguous world, is essentially what prevents all of humanity from committing suicide
to end the pain of life. He outlines a long list of the miseries of experience, ranging from lovesickness to hard work to
political oppression, and asks who would choose to bear those miseries if he could bring himself peace with a knife,
[w]hen he himself might his quietus make / With a bare bodkin? He answers himself again, saying no one would
choose to live, except that the dread of something after death makes people submit to the suffering of their lives
rather than go to another state of existence which might be even more miserable. The dread of the afterlife, Hamlet
concludes, leads to excessive moral sensitivity that makes action impossible: conscience does make cowards of us
all. . . thus the native hue of resolution / Is sicklied oer with the pale cast of thought.

In this way, this speech connects many of the plays main themes, including the idea of suicide and death, the difficulty
of knowing the truth in a spiritually ambiguous universe, and the connection between thought and action. In addition
to its crucial thematic content, this speech is important for what it reveals about the quality of Hamlets mind. His
deeply passionate nature is complemented by a relentlessly logical intellect, which works furiously to find a solution
to his misery. He has turned to religion and found it inadequate to help him either kill himself or resolve to kill Claudius.
Here, he turns to a logical philosophical inquiry and finds it equally frustrating.

Study Questions

1. Shakespeare includes characters in Hamlet who are obvious foils for Hamlet, including, most obviously,
Horatio, Fortinbras, Claudius, and Laertes. Compare and contrast Hamlet with each of these characters. How
are they alike? How are they different? How does each respond to the crises with which he is faced?

Horatios steadfastness and loyalty contrasts with Hamlets variability and excitability, though both share a love of
learning, reason, and thought. Claudiuss willingness to disregard all moral law and act decisively to fulfill his appetites
and lust for power contrasts powerfully with Hamlets concern for morality and indecisive inability to act. Fortinbrass
willingness to go to great lengths to avenge his fathers death, even to the point of waging war, contrasts sharply with
Hamlets inactivity, even though both of them are concerned with avenging their fathers. Laertes single-minded,
furious desire to avenge Polonius stands in stark opposition to Hamlets inactivity with regard to his own fathers
death. Finally, Hamlet, Laertes, and Fortinbras are all in a position to seek revenge for the murders of their fathers,
and their situations are deeply intertwined. Hamlets father killed Fortinbrass father, and Hamlet killed Laertes father,
meaning that Hamlet occupies the same role for Laertes as Claudius does for Hamlet.

2. Many critics take a deterministic view of Hamlets plot, arguing that the princes inability to act and tendency
toward melancholy reflection is a tragic flaw that leads inevitably to his demise. Is this an accurate way of
understanding the play? Why or why not? Given Hamlets character and situation, would another outcome
of the play have been possible?

The idea of the tragic flaw is a problematic one in Hamlet. It is true that Hamlet possesses definable characteristics
that, by shaping his behavior, contribute to his tragic fate. But to argue that his tragedy is inevitable because he
possesses these characteristics is difficult to prove. Given a scenario and a description of the characters involved, it is
highly unlikely that anyone who had not read or seen Hamlet would be able to predict its ending based solely on the
character of its hero. In fact, the plays chaotic train of events suggests that human beings are forced to make choices
whose consequences are unforeseeable as well as unavoidable. To argue that the plays outcome is intended to
appear inevitable seems incompatible with the thematic claims made by the play itself.

3. Throughout the play, Hamlet claims to be feigning madness, but his portrayal of a madman is so intense and
so convincing that many readers believe that Hamlet actually slips into insanity at certain moments in the
play. Do you think this is true, or is Hamlet merely play-acting insanity? What evidence can you cite for either
claim?
At any given moment during the play, the most accurate assessment of Hamlets state of mind probably lies
somewhere between sanity and insanity. Hamlet certainly displays a high degree of mania and instability throughout
much of the play, but his madness is perhaps too purposeful and pointed for us to conclude that he actually loses
his mind. His language is erratic and wild, but beneath his mad-sounding words often lie acute observations that show
the sane mind working bitterly beneath the surface. Most likely, Hamlets decision to feign madness is a sane one,
taken to confuse his enemies and hide his intentions.

On the other hand, Hamlet finds himself in a unique and traumatic situation, one which calls into question the basic
truths and ideals of his life. He can no longer believe in religion, which has failed his father and doomed him to life
amid miserable experience. He can no longer trust society, which is full of hypocrisy and violence, nor love, which has
been poisoned by his mothers betrayal of his fathers memory. And, finally, he cannot turn to philosophy, which
cannot explain ghosts or answer his moral questions and lead him to action.

With this much discord in his mind, and already under the extraordinary pressure of grief from his fathers death, his
mothers marriage, and the responsibility bequeathed to him by the ghost, Hamlet is understandably distraught. He
may not be mad, but he likely is close to the edge of sanity during many of the most intense moments in the play, such
as during the performance of the play-within-a-play (III.ii), his confrontation with Ophelia (III.i), and his long
confrontation with his mother (III.iv).
Suggested Essay Topics

Think about Hamlets relationship with Ophelia. Does he love her? Does he stop loving her? Did he ever love
her? What evidence can you find in the play to support your opinion?
Consider Rosencrantz and Guildensterns role in the play. Why might Shakespeare have created characters like
this? Are they there for comic relief, or do they serve a more serious purpose? Why does the news of their
deaths come only after the deaths of the royal family in Act V, as if this news were not anticlimactic? Is it
acceptable for Hamlet to treat them as he does? Why or why not?
Analyze the use of descriptions and images in Hamlet. How does Shakespeare use descriptive language to
enhance the visual possibilities of a stage production? How does he use imagery to create a mood of tension,
suspense, fear, and despair?
Analyze the use of comedy in Hamlet, paying particular attention to the gravediggers, Osric, and Polonius.
Does comedy serve merely to relieve the tension of the tragedy, or do the comic scenes serve a more serious
thematic purpose as well?
Suicide is an important theme in Hamlet. Discuss how the play treats the idea of suicide morally, religiously,
and aesthetically, with particular attention to Hamlets two important statements about suicide: the O, that
this too too solid flesh would melt soliloquy (I.ii.129158) and the To be, or not to be soliloquy (III.i.5688).
Why does Hamlet believe that, although capable of suicide, most human beings choose to live, despite the
cruelty, pain, and injustice of the world?

Compiled by Kainat Tufail

English Literature and Linguistics Instructor

Drama - A