A Passage from Hamlet
Hamlet is probably the best known and most popular play of William Shakespeare, and it is natural for any person to question what makes Hamlet a great tragedy and why it receives such praises. The answer is in fact simple; it effectively arouses pity and fear in the audiences’ mind. The audience feels pity when they see a noble character experiencing a regrettable downfall because of his innate tragic flaw, and they fear that the same thing might happen to them. Hamlet’s speech (III, iv, 139-180) contributes to producing this feeling of pity and fear. First it explains the thought with particular emotional effectiveness. Second it conveys Hamlet’s character, both virtue and tragic fear. Lastly, it marks the beginning of the tragic discovery and Hamlet’s downfall, answering the question “why does Hamlet delay?” Observing the beginning of Hamlet’s downfall and tragic discovery in this passage, which happens despite his many virtues, maximizes the pity and fear at the same time.
The first contribution is that this passage conveys Hamlet’s thoughts with poetic and emotional effectiveness. Hamlet denies his madness and urges Gertrude not to make his madness an excuse for her faults. He asserts that excuses would only cover the superficial faults and the soul would be corrupted deep within. He further asks Gertrude not to commit any more sins that make past faults even worse and to confess herself to heaven. After all, Hamlet sarcastically begs her pardon for his reproach. Hamlet explains that during the extremely rotten time, Hamlet, who is good and of virtue, must beg pardon to and get permission from Gertrude, who represents vice by committing many sins, to do good things such as urging her to repent. As a method for salvation, Hamlet asks her not to go to Claudius’ bed. Then he apologizes for the death of Polonius and admits his own fault. However, he insists that Polonius and he both are punished because God has made him the agent to punish Polonius with him and him with Polonius. He takes the responsibility, and explains Gertrude that he is cruel only to be kind to her and warns that worse things are yet to come.
Through out the passage, imageries are used to add poetic emotion to Hamlet’s thought. One example is “unction” in Hamlet’s speech “Lay not that flattering unction to your soul…It will but skin and film the ulcerous place whiles rank corruption, mining all within, infects unseen.
Hamlet Soliloquy Act 1, Scene 2. The play opens with the two guards witnessing the ghost of the late king one night on the castle wall in Elsinore. The king at present is the brother of the late king, we find out that king Claudius has married his brother’s wife and thus is having an incestuous relationship with her, and her love. We also learn that Claudius has plans to stop.
This soliloquy by Hamlet is where he first devises the plan of the “Mouse Trap” (Act III, scene 2). It begins with Hamlet describing how he has heard that people can be overcome with guilt and remorse of their “malefactions” that they openly proclaim them, when viewing a scene of a play similar to that of their crime. As a result of this Hamlet resolves to set a trap for Claudius, in which he will watch a play that has a scene closely resembling the murder of Old King Hamlet. Hamlet reasons that upon viewing this scene, if Claudius is indeed guilty of Old King Hamlets murder, he will surely show some visible sign. And so Hamlet will “observe his looks … tent him to the quick”. The meaning of these two lines is that Hamlet will watch his uncle closely, and probe his conscious to see if he flinches. By gauging Claudius’ reaction, Hamlet will be able to determine whether or not he is guilty, if this is the case Hamlet states “I know my course.” Hamlet will avenge the murder of his father by killing Claudius. Hamlet then proceeds to describe how the spirit he has seen may be the devil trying to trick him into doing its work. Hamlet concludes that he will “have grounds more relative than this [the spirit]” and that “The play’s the thing” that he will use to “catch the conscience of the king.”
The interpretation of Hamlet’s, To Be or Not to Be soliloquy, from the Shakespearean classic of the same name, is an important part of the way that the audience understands an interpretation of the play. Although the words are the same, the scene is presented by the actors who portray Hamlet can vary between versions of the play. These differences no matter how seemingly miniscule affect the way in which someone watching the play connects with the title character.
William Shakespeare is widely known for his ability to take a sad story, illustrate it with words, and make it a tragedy. Usually human beings include certain discrepancies in their personalities that can at times find them in undesirable or difficult situations. However, those that are exemplified in Shakespeare’s tragedies include “character flaws” which are so destructive that they eventually cause their downfall. For example, Prince Hamlet, of Shakespeare’s tragedy play “Hamlet,” is seemingly horrified by what the ghost of his father clarifies concerning his death. Yet the actions executed by Hamlet following this revelation do not appear to coincide with the disgust he expresses immediately after the ghost alerts him of the true cause of his death. Thus, it is apparent that the instilled self doubt of Prince Hamlet is as the wand that Shakespeare uses to transform an otherwise sad story to an unfortunate tragedy.
She lives her life on her own terms than that of the views of society. She is the minority in her way of thinking that is okay not to have love and life figured out by the time she is 30 years of age. All her aspirations are laughed at by her friend Lucy, whom puts her down for trying make a better life for herself instead of following with the etiquettes of society. “Forgive my plainness, Eliza. It is the task of friendship, sometimes to tell disagreeable truths. I know your ambition is to make a distinguished figure in first class society; to shine in the gay circle of fashionable amusements..(Foster 27). Instead of encouraging Eliza, Lucy dashes her
Shakespeare’s most famous play Hamlet resonates with the hearts and minds of audiences through the dramatic treatment of struggle and disillusionment. Author, John Green commented, “Hamlet struggles because he is human.” It is these human characteristics and behaviors that have kept an audience transfixed through the years. Hamlet’s disillusionment with women, introduce modern day themes of love and marriage. His inability to act introduces his disillusionment with his uncle. Lastly his disenchantment with himself brings about questions of self-doubt and philosophical ideals of death.
In the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, Hamlet the king of Denmark is murdered by his brother, Claudius, and as a ghost tells his son, Hamlet the prince of Denmark, to avenge him by killing his brother. The price Hamlet does agree to his late father’s wishes, and undertakes the responsibility of killing his uncle, Claudius. However even after swearing to his late father, and former king that he would avenge him; Hamlet for the bulk of the play takes almost no action against Claudius. Prince Hamlet in nature is a man of thought throughout the entirety of the play; even while playing mad that is obvious, and although this does seem to keep him alive, it is that same trait that also keeps him from fulfilling his father’s wish for vengeance
roughout Hamlet's soliloquy in Act II scene ii, he expresses his true inner conflict. Since he found out the truth about his father's death, Hamlets only goal has been to get revenge on Claudius, but he feels that he has done nothing. Hamlet judges himself harshly which we see in the first line when he says, “O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!” (II, ii. I 520). In self-conflict, Hamlet degrades himself for being too hesitant in pursuing his plot of revenge. He feels he isn't the man that he or his father would want him to be, and thus is useless. Shakespeare's primary goal of Hamlet's speech is to reveal Hamlet's true feelings. To show this, Shakespeare creates a foil, the actor, of Hamlet that embodies everything that Hamlet is not. “Could force his soul so to his own conceit / That from her working all his visage wann'd, / Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspect, / A broken voice, and his whole function suiting / With forms to his conceit?
As the play’s tragic hero, Hamlet exhibits a combination of good and bad traits. A complex character, he displays a variety of characteristics throughout the play’s development. When he is first introduced in Act I- Scene 2, one sees Hamlet as a sensitive young prince who is mourning the death of his father, the King. In addition, his mother’s immediate marriage to his uncle has left him in even greater despair. Mixed in with this immense sense of grief, are obvious feelings of anger and frustration. The combination of these emotions leaves one feeling sympathetic to Hamlet; he becomes a very “human” character. One sees from the very beginning that he is a very complex and conflicted man, and that his tragedy has already begun.
Aristotle, as a world famous philosopher, gives a clear definition of tragedy in his influential masterpiece Poetics, a well-known Greek technical handbook of literary criticism. In Aristotle’s words, a tragedy is “an imitation of an action that is serious, complete, and of a certain magnitude, language embellished with each kind of artistic ornament, the several kinds being found in separate parts of the play, the form of action, not of narrative, through pity and fear effecting the proper purgation of these emotions”(Aristotle 12). He believes that a tragedy should be serious and complete in appropriate and pleasurable language; the plot of tragedy should be dramatic, whose incidents will arouse pity and fear, and finally accomplish a catharsis of emotions. His theory of tragedy has been exerting great influence on the tragedy theories in the past two thousand years. Shakespeare, as the greatest dramatist in western literature, also learnt from this theory. Hamlet is one of the most influential tragedies written by Shakespeare. The play vividly focuses on the theme of moral corruption, treachery, revenge, and incest. This essay will first analyze Shakespeare’s Hamlet under Aristotle’s tragedy theory. Then this essay will express personal opinion on Aristotle’s tragedy theory. The purpose of this essay is to help the reader better understand Aristotle’s theory of tragedy and Shakespeare’s masterpiece Hamlet.
Hamlet is a scholar, speaker, actor, and prince. For some reason, Hamlet is not able to avenge his father's death without considerable delay. There is one major flaw in Hamlet's character which causes him to postpone the murder of Claudius. I believe that this flaw is Hamlet's idealism. While his idealism is a good trait, in this case, Hamlet's environment and his...
From this play we learn of the difficulty associated with taking a life as Hamlet agonises as to how and when he should kill Claudius and furthermore whether he should take his own life. Hamlet being a logical thinker undergoes major moral dilemma as he struggles to make accurate choices. From the internal conflict that the playwright expresses to us it is evident that it can kill someone, firstly mentally then physically. The idea of tragedy is explored in great detail through conflict where the playwright’s main message is brought across to the audience; Shakespeare stresses to his audience the point that conflict be it internal or external it can bring upon the downfall of great people and in turn have them suffer a tragic fate. It is Shakespeare’s aim to show us the complexity of man and that moral decisions are not easily made.
Hamlet is the best known tragedy in literature today. Here, Shakespeare exposes Hamlet’s flaws as a heroic character. The tragedy in this play is the result of the main character’s unrealistic ideals and his inability to overcome his weakness of indecisiveness. This fatal attribute led to the death of several people which included his mother and the King of Denmark. Although he is described as being a brave and intelligent person, his tendency to procrastinate prevented him from acting on his father’s murder, his mother’s marriage, and his uncle’s ascension to the throne.
Hamlet is one of the most often-performed and studied plays in the English language. The story might have been merely a melodramatic play about murder and revenge, butWilliam Shakespeare imbued his drama with a sensitivity and reflectivity that still fascinates audiences four hundred years after it was first performed. Hamlet is no ordinary young man, raging at the death of his father and the hasty marriage of his mother and his uncle. Hamlet is cursed with an introspective nature; he cannot decide whether to turn his anger outward or in on himself. The audience sees a young man who would be happiest back at his university, contemplating remote philosophical matters of life and death. Instead, Hamlet is forced to engage death on a visceral level, as an unwelcome and unfathomable figure in his life. He cannot ignore thoughts of death, nor can he grieve and get on with his life, as most people do. He is a melancholy man, and he can see only darkness in his future—if, indeed, he is to have a future at all. Throughout the play, and particularly in his two most famous soliloquies, Hamlet struggles with the competing compulsions to avenge his father’s death or to embrace his own. Hamlet is a man caught in a moral dilemma, and his inability to reach a resolution condemns himself and nearly everyone close to him.
The perfection of Hamlet’s character has been called in question - perhaps by those who do not understand it. The character of Hamlet stands by itself. It is not a character marked by strength of will or even of passion, but by refinement of thought and sentiment. Hamlet is as little of the hero as a man can be. He is a young and princely novice, full of high enthusiasm and quick sensibility - the sport of circumstances, questioning with fortune and refining on his own feelings, and forced from his natural disposition by the strangeness of his situation.