It is evident that death and violence lead to important scenes in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet. With envy, jealousy, and obsession of power, violence has been manifested within the character’s heart, ultimately leading to revenge and death of loved ones within the play. Had it not been for these feelings within the characters, the progression of the characters’ development would not have been as intense, possibly changing the course of the story, and the fate of each character as a whole. Some of Shakespeare’s plays consist of tragedies. A tragedy is an event that ultimately kills of one or more characters in a tragic event leading to destruction, and suffering whether it was on purpose or by a serious accident. As discussed before, William …show more content…
O most wicked speed, to post
With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!
It is not nor it cannot come to good,
But break, my heart, for I must hold my tongue”
As discussed early, Prince Hamlet is upset, that his mother was so quick to be in bed with his uncle. Prince Hamlet used the word “incestous” to describe the relation between both Claudius and Gertrude herself. Even though Prince Hamlet knows what disaster can come out of it, he is not allowed to bring to other attention. All of this is happening before Prince Hamlet finds out the death of his father was by his uncle. The feeling of anger, disgust, and hate will soon come to a climax once the information of his father’s death is revealed to him. This leads to the journey that will create meaning within the whole play. One of the most important scene in the play, before Prince Hamlet becomes “Hamlet”, is 1.5 with the ghost, also King Hamlet. This was the first tragedy that was in the play, which was the death of the father. In 1.5 the ghost said:
“With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial,
And in the porches of my ears did pour
The leperous distilment, whose effect
Holds such an enmity with blood of man
That swift as quicksilver it courses
When Hamlet confronts Gertrude, Gertrude said “O, what a rash and bloody deed is this!” And Hamlet replies, “A bloody deed! Almost as bad, good mother, as kill a king, and marry with his brother”(Shakespeare 178). Hamlet here is talking about the fact that his mother had helped in a way murder his father, whether she knew about it or not, and her act of marrying her brother-in-law is much
In the beginning of the play, Hamlet's father comes to him as a ghost from the grave. He tells Hamlet of his uncle's betrayal of him and tells Hamlet that he must kill Claudius to set things right. Through this event, Hamlet...
”(Act I, Scene V lines10-12) While Hamlet can only utter, “Alas, poor ghost,” at the suffering he is “ bound to hear” from the voice he once knew as that of his father. As the ghost begins to retell how, “.[his] custom always of the afternoon, upon his secure hour [Prince Hamlet’s] uncle stole, with juice of cursed hebona in a vial, and in the purches of [his] ears did pour the leprous distillment, whose effect holds such an enmity with blood of man that swift quicksilver it courses through the natural gates of the body.” and thus sent him to his untimely death, Hamlet can only swear that he shall never (Act I, Scene V lines 60-7) Hamlet vows to “.wipe away all trivial fond records, all saws of books, all forms, all pressures past that youth and observation copied there.” so that “[his father’s] commandment all alone shall live.within the book and volume of [his] brain, unmixed with baser matter.
Beginning with the Greeks, tragedy has been an essential form of entertainment. Although it has changed slightly over time due to different religious and social values, it is still written and performed to this day. Perhaps the most well known tragedy of all time is Shakespeare's Hamlet. Hamlet is perhaps the epitome of all tragedy. Not only does the tragic hero Hamlet meet his demise, but all the main characters in the play at some point due to some flaw in their character, or some fatal decision, also meet the same fate. It is because of their character flaw and/or their fatal decision at some time during the play that their death can be justified.
In Act 1 Scene 5, the ghost of Hamlet’s father says. GHOST “I am thy father's spirit. Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night. And for the day confined to fast in fires. Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature Are burnt and purged away.”
In William Shakespeare’s play “Hamlet” there are many different events throughout the play that affect and shape the main character Hamlet. The biggest event being when Hamlet meets the ghost of his father, the king, who then proceeds to tell him that his uncle murdered him. This event will lead Hamlet to madness with sanity while plotting his revenge on his uncle which will ultimately end in his, his uncle and several other’s deaths at the end of the play.
The Shakespearean play of Hamlet captures the audience with many suspenseful and devastating themes including betrayal. Some of the most loved characters get betrayed by who they thought loved them most. The things these characters do to the people they love are wrong, hurtful and disappointing. These examples lead to the destruction of many characters physically and emotionally. The characters in the play who committed the act of betrayal end up paying for what they have done in the form of death, either from nature, their selfishness, disloyalty and madness. The act of betrayal truly captures and displays the play of Hamlet as a sad tragedy.
In 1600, William Shakespeare composed what is considered the greatest tragedy of all time, Hamlet, the tragedy of the Prince of Denmark. His masterpiece forever redefined what tragedy should be. Critics have analyzed it word for word for nearly four hundred years, with each generation appreciating Hamlet in its own way. While Hamlet conforms, without a doubt, to Aristotle's definition of a tragedy, one question still lingers. Did Shakespeare intend for the reader or viewer of Hamlet to feel greater sympathy for Hamlet, or for Ophelia, Hamlet's lover? Both characters tug at the heartstrings throughout the play, but it is clear that 'the tragedy of the Prince of Denmark' is a misrepresentation of Shakespeare's true intention.
all the events which form the play's framework are reduced to a symbolic representation, to an internal unrest which no action will resolve, and no decision will quell. The deepest theme, masked by that of vengeance, is none other than human nature itself, confronted by the metaphysical and moral problems it is moulded by: love, time, death, perhaps even the principle of identity and quality, not to say 'being and nothingness'. The shock Hamlet receives on the death of his father, and on the remarriage of his mother, triggers disquieting interrogations about the peace of the soul, and the revelation of the ghost triggers vicious responses to these. The world changes its colour, life its significance, love is stripped of its spirituality, woman of her prestige, the state of its stability, the earth and the air of their appeal. It is a sudden eruption of wickedness, a reduction of the world to the absurd, of peace to bitterness, of reason to madness. A contagious disease which spreads from man to the kingdom, from the kingdom to the celestial vault':
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’s mourning about the death of his father and the remarriage of his mother drives him to madness. This is the main characters inner tragedy that Shakespeare expresses in the play. First he considers suicide but the ghost of King Hamlet sends him on a different path, directing him to revenge his death. Shakespeare uses Hamlet to articulate his thoughts about life, death and revenge. Being a moral character he must decide if revenge is the right thing to do. Shakespeare relays many scenarios of reasoning to the audience about mankind His hero sets the wrongs on mankind right again.
Thus, the first appearance of ghost in front of hamlet is a huge impact and sets the action in motion for the entire plot. The appearance becomes the most important scene in the play. To Hamlet, Hamlet really admired his father, and his father’s death entirely affected his emotion and life. As Hamlet knew that the ghost was the symbol of his father and the unnatural murder. The nightmare...
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 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.
Like all Shakespearean tragedies, Hamlet’s ending is no different in end-result. Hamlet’s separation from society and his self-imposed confusion caused by over-thinking results in the unnecessary deaths of most of the major characters. In turn, Hamlet’s pre-occupation with factors inessential to his mission of revenge slows down his action. It is this internal struggle that illustrates the intensity and complexity of Shakespeare’s revenge tragedy, something that is often looked at from a psychological perspective.