Hamlet by Shakespeare

Hamlet is a play written by Shakespeare William. It is one of the most criticized literature works and most reviewed plays in the world today. The protagonist in the play is Hamlet. Shakespeare uses his characters very well to represent specific areas of human nature. In Hamlet, Shakespeare creates vivid and in-depth view of his characters that they clearly represent some area of the human nature. Shakespeare uses Hamlet and Ophelia to represent the theme of madness in the play. Ophelia was really mad where her madness originated from the circumstances she faced in her life whereas Hamlet was not really mad but feigned his madness in order to go through with his revenge. Hamlet started feigning his madness after hearing from his father’s ghost that he was murdered.

Hamlet is a very complicated character in the play. Her speech and actions makes it very easy for the reader to depict the part of human nature she represents. Hamlets resentment and desire for his father’s death compels his actions in all through the play. The need for revenge and his hatred later on drives him to his death in the play. Hamlet was so obsessed with revenge and this destroyed his logic affecting his thought process thus making him mad. His father was murdered and this drove him into madness because he was thirsting for revenge by killing his step father and his madness convinced him that it was right to kill his step father. In the beginning of the play it is very evident that Hamlet feigns his insanity. His father’s ghost appeared to him telling him that he was murdered by his brother and it became very clear that he was planning his next move to take revenge and so he pretended that it was madness. Hamlet followed what the ghost told him about his...

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...is compelling. Hamlet uses his feigned insanity to cover the people and to further his agenda of revenge. Conversely, Ophelia is a victim whose insanity resulted from the tragedies she had to go through. Shakespeare brings dual insanity in his play making it very interesting.

Works Cited

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. New York. Washington Square Press. 1958.

Bevington, David, Twentieth century interpretations of Hamlet; a collection of critical essays, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice-Hall, 1968.

Ferguson, Margaret W. "Hamlet: Letters and Spirits," Shakespeare and the Question of Theory, Patricia Parker and Geoffrey Hartman, eds., New York: Routledge, 1985.

Greenblatt, Stephen, Hamlet in Purgatory, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001.

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. No Fear Shakespeare: Hamlet. Ed John Crowther. New York: Spark, 2003. Print