Comparing Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead

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The tragic play "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" by Tom Stoppard were retold from the story of William Shakespeare famous play "Hamlet". The two insignificant characters in Shakespeare's "Hamlet" are Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and Hamlet is the main character. Whereas in Stoppard's play, "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" Hamlet is a minor character and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are the protagonists. The author's different perspective of Shakespeare's two minor characters made the audience realize that being controlled by Hamlet might have led them to their deaths. Throughout "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead", Hamlet's presence affected the protagonists' lives.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were never in control of their situations. At the beginning, after flipping the coin and meeting the players, the stage suddenly took Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to Elsinore Castle when Hamlet and Ophelia entered together. The author stage directions state, "ROS and GUIL have frozen. GUIL unfreezes first. He jumps on ROS" (25). This indicates that as Hamlet walked on the stage; the audience felt the protagonists had no control over their situations. Both felt puzzled after seeing Hamlet, Ophelia, the King …show more content…

After finding Hamlet, the two protagonists finally fixed the puzzle of Hamlet's madness. Rosencrantz said, "Which is another thing –he could have been a sane mane pretending to be mad or a mad man pretending to be sane" (68). At the same moment, Guildenstern said, "Or a mad man who –didn't know he was mad but was pretending to be mad nevertheless" (68). Both protagonists came to realize that Hamlet might be pretending to be mad and there has to be a serious reason behind it. They start to connect his father's death, mother getting married to his uncle and the unrequited love adds up to one mad man, Hamlet. For Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, the mystery is close to being

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