Hamlet written by William Shakespeare illustrates the thoughts and feelings of the main character Hamlet as he tries to avenge the death of his father, King Hamlet. The death of Hamlet’s father first starts as an accidental death, but the ghost of King Hamlet who is still in purgation tells Hamlet that it was not accidental. The ghost or King Hamlet tells his son, Hamlet, that his murder is actually foul play and that he was actually murdered by his brother Claudius by the use of poison. After finding out the truth about his father’s death, Hamlet is given three injunctions by the ghost/his father in order to avenge his death, these include: remove the incest from the crown, leave your mother to god and her own guilt, and do not taint your …show more content…
Hamlet’s tragic flaw expressed throughout the play is that he has an inability to act. Throughout the play, there are times where Hamlet must act in order to help continue his revenge plot, but his tragic flaw of the inability to act proves too much to overcome in three main areas: his inability to believe the ghost/his father right away, his inability to commit suicide, and his inability to kill King Claudius while he’s praying. The character of Hamlet illustrates his tragic flaw of his inability to act when he can’t decide if the ghost/his father is telling the truth or not. At first, when the ghost first comes in to talk to Hamlet, he asks Hamlet to do privately. After going away, the ghost tells Hamlet that it is actually his father still in purgation, but he was actually murdered. Hamlet then presumes to have a conversation with the ghost/his father, and the ghost tells Hamlet three injunctions that he must complete in order to …show more content…
Throughout the play, the character of Hamlet has many soliloquies where he contemplates suicide, but he is never able to fully commit to commiting suicide. Throughout these constant thoughts, his inability to act on actually committing suicide come from reasons such as: it’s a sin in Christianity, and he’s scared of the unknown. An example of one of these reasons comes from the quotation: “His canon ‘gainst {self-slaughter!} Oh God, God, / How {weary,} stale, flat, and unprofitable / Seem to me all the uses of this world” (1.2.136-138). In this quotation, Hamlet is in one of his soliloquies, and he is stating that his life has gone stale and pointless. He doesn’t see any reason to be alive anymore, but God has created a law against suicide. Although Hamlet’s life has lost meaning, he can’t commit suicide because it is forbidden by God and Christianity. Therefore, this is another area where Hamlet’s inability to act is demonstrated. Hamlet wants to commit suicide because he sees no point in life anymore, but it’s forbidden by God, so he refuses to act on committing suicide or not. Another area where suicide demonstrates Hamlet’s tragic flaw is in his “To be or not to be” soliloquy. In this soliloquy, Hamlet talks about committing suicide again, but he is unable to act again. Hamlet is not able to act on this because he is
Hamlets self responsibilities add to his isolation throughout the play. Hamlet feels his own responsibility is to carry on, and keep on going. He says in his first soliloquy: “O, that this too too-solid flesh would melt, thaw, and resolve itself into a dew! Or that the Everlasting had not fix’d his canon ‘gainst self-slaughter! God! O God!” (1.2 129-32). Hamlet wishes to be dead, he thinks it is the easy way out. It is his responsibility to not kill himself, because it is a sin. Hamlet does not decide to kill himself, to save his soul. This causes him isolation, because he wishes he was dead and away from it all. Hamlet is following his responsibility to not commit suicide, although he still wishes to be dead. This attitude of wanting to die, keeps Hamlet isolated from everyone else, because Hamlet does not want to be around everything.
Throughout the play Hamlet is in constant conflict with himself. An appearance of a ghost claiming to be his father, “I am thy father’s spirit”(I.v.14) aggravates his grief, nearly causing him to commit suicide and leaving him deeply disgusted and angered. Upon speaking with his ghost-father, Hamlet learns that his uncle-stepfather killed Hamlet the King. “The serpent that did sting thy father’s life Now wears his crown”(I.v.45-46) Hamlet is beside himself and becomes obsessed with plotting and planning revenge for the death of his father.
Suicidal tendencies play a huge role in Hamlet by forming character relationships, adding suspense to the plot and storyline. “Ah, I wish my dirty flesh could melt away into a vapor, or that God had not made a law against suicide. Oh God, God! How tired, stale, and pointless life is to me” (Hamlet 1.2.130-134). This quote by Hamlet Junior in act 1 really embodies the
In these lines Hamlet says that he would like to commit suicide, but cannot because of the way suicide is looked upon in god's eyes. More of Hamlet's depression can be seen in Act III scene I lines 56-61 when Hamlet says:
The way we see ourselves is often reflected in the way we act. Hamlet views himself as different to those young nobles around him such as Fortinbras and Laertes. This reality leads us to believe that over time he has become even more motivated to revenge his father's death, and find out who his true friends are. How can you be honest in a world full of deceit and hate? His seven soliloquies tell us that while the days go by he grows more cunning as he falls deeper into his madness. This fact might have lead Hamlet to believe that suicide is what he really wants for his life's course.
Coleridge mentions this, stating, “In Hamlet [Shakespeare] seems to have wished to exemplify the moral necessity of a due balance between our attention to the objects of our senses, and our meditation on the workings of our minds,- an equilibrium between the real and the imaginary worlds” (344). It is this equilibrium that Hamlet is unable to achieve as he strays passionately into the real world then falls back into the realm of the mind, usually due to moral or philosophical speculation. In his first soliloquy, Hamlet is extremely depressed, and speaks very passionately about his wish to commit suicide. However, he realizes that the law of God has forbidden “self-slaughter” (1.2.136) and consequently he cannot bring himself to violate his own moral code by taking action and killing himself. Later in Act One, after hearing the Ghost’s revelation that he was murdered, Hamlet promises to take his revenge as quickly as he can.
Hamlet’s anger and grief- primarily stemming from his mother’s marriage to Claudius- brings him to thoughts of suicide, which only subside as a result of it being a mortal and religious sin. The fact that he wants to take his own life demonstrates a weakness in his character; a sense of cowarness, his decision not to kill himself because of religious beliefs shows that this weakness is balanced with some sense of morality. Such an obvious paradox is only one example of the inner conflict and turmoil that will eventually lead to Hamlet’s downfall.
1.5 The ghost tells Hamlet that he is the spirit of his father and that
”(William Shakespeare, 1717.) Because of some factors, life events, Hamlet can lose his mind as well as commit a suicide. Moreover, warning signs such as changes in behavior, nightmares along with hopelessness “How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world!” ( William Shakespeare, 1717) indicate that intention.
Hamlet's fatal flaw is his delay in avenging his father's death. Hamlet is still devastated by his father's death when the ghost appears to him, and he is unable to carry through with his reprisal until the end of the play. Hamlet's delay in killing Claudius not only causes his own death, but the deaths of everyone else in his life except for Horatio and Fortinbras.
In Hamlet's own speeches lie the indications for the methods we should use for its interpretation. & nbsp; Hamlet's reason for suicide is the death of his father, the late King Hamlet - or at least this is what he tells the world. He claims his father's death as the reason in his first soliloquy (1.2.133-164), but we are led towards other reasons by the evidence he gives. In the famous "to be or not to be" soliloquy, he says: "For who would bear. the pangs of despised love. when he himself might his quietus make/with a bare bodkin?"
In “Hamlet” there were three different occasion where Hamlet suffers from his flaw. The first time was Hamlet’s failure to commit suicide. In his famous soliloquy “To be, or not to be” (3.1.57-89) Hamlet is debating the thought of suicide, saying his life has lost all meaning but he ends up not killing himself because he fears the unknown after death and knows that it is forbidden in his religion. Next, was when Hamlet put on the play “Mousetrap”. The reason Hamlet put on this play was when his father’s ghost told him that Claudius murdered him, and Hamlet needed to avenge his death.
Hamlet’s tragic flaw was shown to him in a dream by the ghost of his father. His father tells him that he was murdered by his uncle, Claudius. In this scene, the tragic flaw was transferred and manifested itself in Hamlet’s actions. His obsession with revenge and death is all he can think about. He needs to act quickly and decisively but finds himself procrastinating about what to do. In Act III, Hamlet holds the knife over the head of his uncle, Claudius, but cannot strike the fatal blow. Instead, he writes a play about the same scenario to study the reaction of Claudius as to a clue of his guilt. After he decides Claudius is guilty of murdering his father, he still relents from taking his revenge. He says, “Haste me to know ‘t, that I, with wings as swift As meditation or the thought of love May sweep to my revenge.
When Hamlet meets with the ghost that he believes is his father, he is given instruction to, “...leave your mother/ Let heaven deal with her.”(Act 1, scene 4, lines 73-74). However, Hamlet has an urge to take revenge upon both Claudius and Gertrude, for killing his father physically and in dignity, respectively. When confronting her he coaches himself that, “I will speak daggers to her, but use none/ My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites…”(Act 3, scene 2, lines 39-40). Despite fully believing himself that he should do something to his mother, the voice of his father lead his actions. Going back and forth between his wants and his orders Hamlet, “...Would quake to look on.
Hamlet's next problem is that of morality. He needs to morally justify the murder of Claudius because Hamlet is restrained by his conscience. He could not satisfy himself that avenging his father's death was the right thing to do. Although Hamlet does not act on instinct, he does understand what the ghost is telling him to do. He expresses no doubt if the ghost is an honest one, but his morality clearly stands in the way of action.