How Does Shakespeare Present Grief In Hamlet

William Shakespeare’s Hamlet is a tragic play. Set after the deplorable murder of powerful King Hamlet, the play makes the audience analyze the characters, such as the son of the slain king. The son, Hamlet, is faced with grave decisions and hardships. Amongst other things, not only has his father been murdered by his uncle, but also his mother has married this uncle. These dilemmas and challenges shape the man he transforms into at the commencement and culmination of the play. Hamlet becomes fanatical over his father’s death, furious due to his mother’s hasty marriage, and fooled by his deranged imagination.

The play, Hamlet, is set some time after the king’s death. Though it seems that the majority of the people have gotten over this death, Hamlet has yet to recover. He makes this clear proclaiming:

Seems, madam! nay it is; I know not ‘seems.’ 'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother, Nor customary suits of solemn black, Nor windy suspiration of forced breath, No, nor the fruitful river in the eye, Nor the dejected havior of the visage, Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief, That can denote me truly: these indeed seem, For they are actions that a man might play: But

He has been consumed by this feeling so much that he imagines seeing the ghost of his dead father. After this imagined encounter of this ghost, Hamlet becomes fixated on avenging his father, “…that I, with wings as swift as meditation or the thoughts of love, May sweep to my revenge” (I, V, 31-37). From when he plots to “catch the conscience” of the king with the play, The Murder of Gonzago, to when he murders Polonius, Hamlet is consumed by this obsession (II, II, 534). In the end, Hamlet even dies for this quest of revenge. If he had not been blinded by his grief and desire, he might have lived on to tell stories of his father. However, his fanatical behavior over his father’s death propelled him to his own