In the aftermath of Old Hamlet’s demise, Hamlet cannot think of anything other than death, and over the course of the play he considers it from various points of view. The inquiry of his own death plagues Hamlet as he constantly considers whether or not...
Harold Bloom asserts that “Our ideas as to what makes the self authentically human owe more to Shakespeare than ought be possible…” (15). If this is true, then the Prince of Denmark himself in Shakespeare’s Hamlet is the epitome of humanity in his perceptions of...
Hamlet begins at the open mouth of the Void. Barnardo and Francisco call out to each other and into darkness; they stand atop a guard platform that is naked to the open air and to the night. Every character’s entrance is marked by a series...
Ophelia’s situation in Shakespeare’s Hamlet not only invokes pity in the reader but also provides an example of the nature of men and women and accentuates Hamlet’s tragic flaws. Shakespeare so beautifully links the female with the liquid, insanity, and frailty through this character that...
In his powerful play, “Hamlet,” William Shakespeare utilizes the theme of playacting as a medium through which Hamlet can make political statements, as well as shield himself in supposed madness. Hamlet uses plays to not only inform Claudius that someone knows his secret, but also...
Alone in his childhood home, his father buried and his mother married to another man, Hamlet laments, “O that this too too sullied flesh would melt, thaw and resolve itself into dew” (1.2.129-30). Hamlet brings up suicide early in Act I and ponders it throughout...
Hamlet’s soliloquy in Act 1 Scene II is his first of the play and, as a consequence, allows the audience to see his inner thoughts for the first time. The subjects of this soliloquy are numerous: his father’s death, his mother’s response to this death,...
In the plays of Shakespeare, readers can find several issues of human nature addressed. In Othello, Shakespeare addresses jealously and racism. In King Lear, he addresses pride and love. In Romeo and Juliet, he examines fate. In The Tempest and Hamlet in particular, he seems...
Critic Northrup Frye has evaluated Hamlet as a play without catharsis, a tragedy in which everything noble and heroic is smothered under ferocious revenge codes, treachery, spying and the consequences of weak actions by broken wills. While the play deviates from the traditional definition of...
Antithesis is a rhetorical device in which two contrasting words or concepts are juxtaposed within a parallel grammatical structure (literarydevices.com). In this case, the repeated use of this literary convention and the balanced structure it employs is meant to highlight the irony of the fact...
Introduction Past critics have deemed Ophelia an insignificant and marginal character in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, functioning only to further define Hamlet. One such critic, Jacques Lacan, interprets Ophelia as a mere object of Hamlet’s sexual desire: she is essential only because she is inextricably linked to...
Shakespeare’s tragedy Hamlet is actually a conglomeration of many subtragedies. One of these smaller tragedies within the story of Hamlet is the mental evolution of Prince Hamlet, to the point where he acted king-like and would have made a great king. Throughout the story there...
In the introduction for Hamlet in William Shakespeare: A Textual Companion, Gary Taylor writes that “of all the two-text plays, Hamlet comes closest to Lear in the scale and complexity of the textual variation apparently resulting from authorial revision” (401). Indeed, Hamlet’s three earliest texts...
In his famous speech, “I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth[…]” (II.ii.280), Hamlet illustrates an Elizabethan fusion of medieval and humanist ideas, perhaps lost on Rosencrantz and Guildenstern but not on E.M.W. Tillyard. Tillyard, in The Elizabethan World Picture,...
“The hallmark of the psychopath is the inability to recognize others as worthy of compassion.” Made-to-order essay as fast as you need it Each essay is customized to cater to your unique preferences + experts online Get my essay -Shirley Lynn Scott, What Makes Serial...
When Hamlet’s father orders him to kill Claudius, Hamlet’s reaction is one of questioning and disbelief. While he feels strongly about the murder of his father and yearns to discover the killer, he harbors suspicions about the truth behind the ghost’s jarring indictment of his...
Deception is a critical component of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Its appears most significantly in Claudius concealing murder and Hamlet concealing knowledge of the same. Hamlet also feigns madness in order to misguide others and attempt to prove Claudius guilty. Others characters, including Polonius, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern...
“Like sweet bells jangled, out of time and harsh” Hamlet’s trust is betrayed by the people who are dearest to his heart (III.i.87). The theme of betrayal takes root before Shakespeare’s tragedy begins, when Hamlet’s uncle murders his father and marries his mother. These enormous...
Women living in Elizabethan times, although more liberated than medieval women, were still expected to do their husband’s will and obey at all times. In William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Queen Gertrude begins the play acting as a typical Elizabethan woman. She sits beside her new husband,...