Hamlet Soliloquy Essay

Soliloquies express character’s inner emotions so that the audience is able to better relate to the situation. They allow for the reader to have a deeper insight into the author’s main message and to understand what is happening during the play. Hamlet’s “O, that this too too solid flesh would melt” soliloquy happens right after Claudius calls Hamlet’s grieving unmanly, and later states that going back to school is against his and Gertrude’s wishes. Hamlet wants to disappear, and questions if life is worth living after seeing his father die and his mother remarry quickly. In this soliloquy, Hamlet’s mood changes from melancholy to anger after he states, “How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, / Seem to me all the uses of this world” (Ⅰ.ⅱ. 135-136)! Hamlet contemplates life then remembers his father’s life and death, and how his mother moved on quickly. He compares his mother to Niobe, a woman in Greek mythology who had cried over the loss of her children, except for in Hamlet’s mind Niobe would have mourned longer. Later, Hamlet claims “O, most wicked speed, to post / With such dexterity to inscestuous sheets” (Ⅰ.ⅱ. 158-159)! He calls his mother’s new marriage incest and states that nothing good can come from their marriage.

Hamlet states “So excellent a king; that was, to this, / Hyperion to a satyr” (Ⅰ.ⅱ. 141-142). He praises his father by comparing him to the Greek god of manly beauty, then criticizes Claudius by calling him a goatlike spirit. Through these references to Greek mythology, comparisons are made between characters by using similes. Hamlet later compares himself, Claudius, and king Hamlet claiming, “My father’s brother, but no more like my father / than I to Hercules” (Ⅰ.ⅱ. 154-155). With allusions and similes, Hamlet reveals how long the king has been dead, what has happened within that time, and allows the reader to create an opinion about each