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Anger and revenge essay in hamlet
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Hamlet's Anger and Morality in William Shakespeare's Hamlet
In Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hamlet is faced with emotional and physical hardship. The suffering that he endures causes his character to develop certain idiosyncrasies. Morality has a significant importance to Hamlet. At the beginning of the play, Hamlet possesses a strong sense of morality. A sense that is stronger than all other characters. Hamlet's actions and feelings are controlled by his morality. His morality grows weaker as the play progresses. Hamlet's opinions toward the characters within the play are determined by his moral standpoint. As the play goes on, Hamlet's tendency of thinking too much causes him to become mad. Hamlet's focal problem is his madness.
As the play progresses, Hamlet's moral perspective on life begins to alter. The first change in his morality occurred following Hamlet's first visit from the ghost. Hamlet is told by the ghost to avenge his father's murder. If Hamlet's morality was as strong as it was in the beginning of the play, he would have immediately opposed the ghost. However, he did not oppose the thought of murdering his father's murderer. Hamlet will have a continuous struggle whether to carry out the ghost's deed or to act morally throughout the play. If, throughout, Hamlet is prevented from enacting his revenge by the discomforting ratios that his literary imitations generate, he is equally prevented from repudiating his revenge by his inability to emancipate himself from his father, to be other than an imitation of what has generated him(Kastan 204).
Toward the end of the play, Hamlet has abandoned the strong sense of morality that he once possessed. He no longer debated the morality of his every action. His true ...
... middle of paper ...
...aertes killed him
physically.
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Kastan, David Scott, ed. Critical Essays on Shakespeare's Hamlet. New York: G.K. Hall, 1995. Chapter: "Hamlet and the Imitation of Revenge"
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Throughout the play, Hamlet thinks about the moral consequences of revenge, and as a result his revenge is delayed. Morality is the quality of being in accord with the standards of right or good conduct. In Hamlet, Hamlet struggles morally to accomplish his fathers’ ghost demand of revenging for him. A great example of Hamlet acting morally, is when as he was heading to his mother, who asked for him, he sees the king in church praying to God for forgiveness. When he sees the king praying, he thought it will be better if he killed him now in order to end his struggle. But as he was approaching the king to revenge his fathers’ death, he is he...
Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 1995. http://www.chemicool.com/Shakespeare/hamlet/full.html
Mack, Maynard. "The World of Hamlet." Yale Review. vol. 41 (1952) p. 502-23. Rpt. in Shakespeare: Modern Essays in Criticism. Rev. ed. Ed. Leonard F. Dean. New York: Oxford University P., 1967.
Bristol, Michael D. “The Customary and the Ethical: Understanding Hamlet’s Bad Habits.” Shakespeare Studies 40 (2012): 70–76. Web. 24 Apr. 2014.
Theater audiences and literary enthusiasts are not spared of Shakespeare’s astonishing ability to capture the human spirit in his play Hamlet. The story of the tormented prince who desires revenge but is unable to take action delves deep into the human mind than plays before it. While some uninformed readers may write off Hamlet’s behavior to poor writing, it is clear that the Oedipus complex is the true driving force of Hamlet’s actions when delaying his revenge.
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.
Corum, Richard. Understanding Hamlet: A Student Casebook to Issues, Sources, and Historical Documents. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1998. Print.
Hamlet is one of Shakespeare’s most well-known tragedies. At first glance, it holds all of the common occurrences in a revenge tragedy which include plotting, ghosts, and madness, but its complexity as a story far transcends its functionality as a revenge tragedy. Revenge tragedies are often closely tied to the real or feigned madness in the play. Hamlet is such a complex revenge tragedy because there truly is a question about the sanity of the main character Prince Hamlet. Interestingly enough, this deepens the psychology of his character and affects the way that the revenge tragedy takes place. An evaluation of Hamlet’s actions and words over the course of the play can be determined to see that his ‘outsider’ outlook on society, coupled with his innate tendency to over-think his actions, leads to an unfocused mission of vengeance that brings about not only his own death, but also the unnecessary deaths of nearly all of the other main characters in the revenge tragedy.
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.