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Pros and cons of revenge
Pros and cons of revenge
Pros and cons of revenge
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Shakespeare! One of the best Old English writers in the world. He wrote a very famous play and it is known everywhere. This play is called, Hamlet. Hamlet is a sad story and a weird one too. It is about this man whose father was killed by his own uncle. The uncle wanted to be king so that is why he killed King Hamlet. Hamlet wants revenge but he kind of hurts a lot of people while he is on the path of revenge. This essay will be talking about how revenge is very bad and is defiantly one of the worst things you can do. Revenge can get you feeling bitter and angry and depressed. Those three emotions are one of the worst you can have for your self. Hamlet felt all of those emotions at the same time but he did not know how to deal with them. …show more content…
He tells her that he does not love her and he can not focus on her now. That is just one of the things that Hamlet does while he is trying to get revenge with his bitter heart. He tells Horatio, which is his best friend. One of Claudius' friend Polonius wants to spy and try to see why Hamlet wants to kill his uncle. His uncle found out and he is praying and feelings guilty. Hamlet did a show that made Claudius feel guilty. Hamlet loved Claudius but Hamlet was too much on the side of bitterness and hatred that he wanted to kill his own uncle. While he is on his path of revenge his kills Polonius. Even though Polonius did not do anything. Laertes finds out and tells Hamlet that he knows that Hamlet killed Polonius. Hamlet admits and says, "Give my your parson, sir. I've done you wrong; but pardon't as your are a gentleman." ( Hamlet 116) When Ophelia finds out that her dad, Polonius, was dead she goes into deep depression and drowns herself. Hamlet already killed two people already when all he wanted to do was only to kill Claudius. But then now he wants to kill two more people because he thinks those two people are one Claudius's side. That's how much revenge can take control of you and your
They decided to invite some of his college friends to watch over him. The Queen offered many thanks for their decision to watch him. “For the supply and profit of our hope, / Your visitation shall receive such thanks / As fits a king’s remembrance.” (2.2.24-26). Claudius asked Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to get answers out of him, making them seem more like spies than helpful friends. When Hamlet shows up to Ophelia’s house, seemingly mentally disturbed, Ophelia tells her father. Polonius decides to tell the King of Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship that he thinks that may be the source of his problems. The King and Polonius set up a meeting between the two. Seeming to know he is being watched, Hamlet acts very wildly, leading them to believe Ophelia was not the cause of his insanity. The King is not impressed at Polonius. “Love! His affections do not that way tend, / Nor what he spake, though it lacked form a little, / Was not like madness. There’s something in his soul” (3.1.170-72). At this point, Hamlet has started his drastic decline in his mental stability. When he is called by the Queen for a talk, he over hears something behind the draped curtains and stabs through it, killing Polonius. His reaction is not what one would expect, as he does not feel any remorse. Hamlet simply states it was for the best and his bad luck. “Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell. / I took thee for thy
This, of course, causes a landslide of tragedy in the play. Claudius exiles Hamlet to England and sends sealed letters to the King of England telling him to kill Hamlet upon his arrival. Ophelia goes insane. Laertes, Hamlet's brother, returns from France with an army, demanding to know why Polonius was killed. Claudius enlists Laertes to kill Hamlet. Ophelia commits suicide. Hamlet and Laertes duel at her funeral; both of them are mortally wounded, Gertrude kills herself and Hamlet kills Claudius.
Hamlet is first tormented by the death of his father, the king of Denmark. Then he is cast into utter agony when Gertrude, the mother he loves dearly is hastily married to his uncle, Claudius. Through a ghostly revelation, Hamlet learns that his suspicions that Claudius murdered his father are true. He becomes incensed and wants to enact revenge upon the guilty party. From this point on, Hamlet struggles with his plan for revenge that conflicts with his opposite contemplative nature.
Polonius starts to question Hamlet’s sanity and soon enough, Hamlet begins to display this behavior more often and towards more people. Hamlet’s odd demeanor affects Polonius, when he later taunts Polonius by giving vague answers to his questions. For example, when Polonius asks Hamlet about what he reads, Hamlet responds saying “words, words, words” (2.2.210). Hamlet finds other ways to taunt him, such as calling him an old fishmonger, as well as indirectly insulting Ophelia by saying “your daughter may conceive, friend, look to ‘t” (2.2.202-203), meaning Ophelia, his daughter, could be pregnant. Besides Hamlet, other characters possess obvious facades. Claudius also exhibits a fake appearance towards his court and even Hamlet. Near the beginning of the play, Claudius addresses the court, saying how he marries his sister-in-law and how he feels sorrowful for “[his] dear brother’s death” (1.2.1). Claudius presents a facade when he reveals that he holds responsibility for King Hamlet’s death. Nevertheless, Claudius acts innocent and covers up his crime. Hamlet discovers Claudius’s guiltiness after watching the play; Claudius prays and asks for forgiveness for murdering his
Revenge is such an enormous part of a being human. It is something that no matter how much you try to avoid part of you will persistently lust for it. When you are hurt in any way your natural instinct will always tell you to make the one who hurt you feel just as bad if not worse as how you felt. It is such a natural and powerful feeling, that when revenge is incorporated into a story it makes it so much stronger. Revenge will make you see so many more sides of characters and make them seem much more complex. Revenge can give fictional characters a more human quality. That is why so many writers use it as their theme.
Polonius takes this opportunity to spy on Hamlet and informs Gertrude that he will hide behind a tapestry and eavesdrop on their conversation. During their conversation Hamlet forces his mother in front of a mirror as to literally reflect on herself and the betrayal she’s caused him to feel. He tells her that he wants to reveal the figurative inmost part of her, but she takes this literally and thinks that he means he is going to murder her. She cries out for help which causes Polonius to cry out as well. Hamlet, thinking that the voice of the man who had just cried out for help belonged to his uncle, stabs Polonius through the curtain and kills him. Gertrude laments the murder of Polonius calling it a bloody deed and Hamlet retorts, “A bloody deed! Almost as bad, good mother, As kill a king and marry with his brother” (Shakespeare 1862). In this scene, Hamlet reaps revenge on Gertrude by emotionally torturing her so she may feel the utmost guilt for betraying her son and husband. Then, Hamlet’s unremorseful character is revealed in his ability to murder Polonius when he thought it was Claudius he had heard behind the curtain. Hamlet then justifies his murdering Polonius by equating it to Gertrude’s sin of marrying the man, her brother in law, who killed her
It is the idea of revenge that sends a cool shiver down the spines of justly men when they begin to question as to why someone would stoop to such a level. But yet it is still more than an idea for revenge has been carried out in various forms along all the eras of history side-by-side of that of novels and tragedies. Even so, revenge is still a dark scheme; an evil plague of the mind per se. It is such a plague that will turn even the greatest persons of the brightest, optimistically capable of minds into lowly, as well as lonely, individuals. Thus, revenge will, and can, only end in despair and agony of the mind. Therefore, provided that all that has been said is true, revenge would appear quite unseemly to the observant onlooker. However, taking an in-depth insight into revenge you can uncover quite a compelling feature, which is best summed up into one word. Pride. Pride is the one clear motivational proprietor needed to push a protagonist into the downward spiral of personal vendetta. Without pride, revenge is no more than a mindless massacre of flesh and bone ending in the obliteration of any hope for reconciliation.
Revenge is a major theme throughout William Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet. This theme provides motivation for characters to murder each other throughout the play, whether or not characters seek revenge for themselves. Because Laertes and Hamlet are so absorbed with wanting to exact revenge upon certain people, they ultimately cause the deaths of all of the main characters in the play. Revenge is the main root of evil in this play.
Throughout Shakespeare’s play, revenge intertwines to bring about the deaths of most of the main characters. Hamlet’s course of revenge initiates the first fatality when Polonius gets caught spying on him and Gertrude (III. iv. 24-25). By pursuing revenge, Hamlet killing Polonius paves the way for more lives to be lost. Claudius sees the murder as an opportunity to eliminate Hamlet, because Laertes’s obsession with revenge leaves him vulnerable. Laertes’s and Hamlet’s revenge lead to the deaths of Gertrude, Laertes, Claudius, and finally Hamlet (V. ii. 287-357). The revenge of each character ironically ended their own life. By acting upon revenge and having inimical intentions, the individuals brought fatalities that were unnecessary.
Revenge has caused the downfall of many a person. Its consuming nature causes one to act recklessly through anger rather than reason. Revenge is an emotion easily rationalized; one turn deserves another. However, this is a very dangerous theory to live by. Throughout Hamlet, revenge is a dominant theme. Fortinbras, Laertes, and Hamlet all seek to avenge the deaths of their fathers. But in so doing, all three rely more on emotion than thought, and take a very big gamble, a gamble which eventually leads to the downfall and death of all but one of them. King Fortinbras was slain by King Hamlet in a sword battle. This entitled King Hamlet to the land that was possessed by Fortinbras because it was written in a seal'd compact. "…our valiant Hamlet-for so this side of our known world esteem'd him-did slay this Fortinbras." Young Fortinbras was enraged by his father’s murder and sought revenge against Denmark. He wanted to reclaim the land that had been lost to Denmark when his father was killed. "…Now sir, young Fortinbras…as it doth well appear unto our state-but to recover of us, by strong hand and terms compulsative, those foresaid lands so by his father lost…" Claudius becomes aware of Fortinbras’ plans, and in an evasive move, sends a message to the new King of Norway, Fortinbras’ uncle.
Revenge is a recurring theme in Hamlet. Although Hamlet wants to avenge his father’s death, he is afraid of what would result from this. In the play Hamlet, Hamlet’s unwillingness to revenge appears throughout the text; Shakespeare exhibits this through Hamlet’s realization that revenge is not the right option, Hamlet‘s realization that revenge is the same as the crime which was already committed, and his understanding that to revenge is to become a “beast” and to not revenge is as well (Kastan 1).
Hamlet procrastinated only because of his fear of intimacy with his mother, knowing that Claudius was the only person separating he and Gertrude. Although Hamlet has a pious duty to avenge his father’s murder, his desire for his mother is too strong for him to leave an open pathway to her. He tries to find excuses to postpone his killing Claudius. First, he tries to discover whether or not Claudius really did kill King Hamlet, which gives him some time. After he has convinced himself that Claudius is to blame, he attempts to murder him just twice. The first time, he finds Claudius praying, and uses that as a scapegoat so he can again put off his pious duty. Later when he is alone with Gertrude, he thinks that Claudius is behind the curtains, and kills the man there. Unfortunately, Polonius becomes the victim of Hamlet’s dagger.
While Claudius is praying, Hamlet has an opportunity to slay him but doesn’t because if he kills him in his prayers he will make him go to heaven instead of hell. Another minor reason for Hamlet’s revenge against his uncle is his affection towards his mother. As the play progresses, we are able to determine that Hamlet’s relationship with his mom is close to incest status. With this information, we are able to imply that Hamlet is jealous of his Uncle Claudius for marrying his mother.... ... middle of paper ...
His father was killed by Hamlet and his sister was driven insane due to the series of events that took place because of Hamlet. Like Hamlet, Laertes wants to avenge his father by killing the man who killed Polonius. As described earlier, Hamlet is slow to act. Laertes, on the other hand, acts quickly and with precision, wasting no time in acquiring his target and formulating a plan. Robert Palfrey Utter, Jr., puts it best, Hamlet and Laertes both come to the same conclusion that murder must be carried out, but Hamlet reaches that conclusion only “after he has had a few minutes to think it over.” (140) Once Laertes finds out that the man who killed his father was Hamlet he is ready to charge in and kill him as soon as possible. He is only stopped by Claudius, who advises him on a more subtle approach. Straight off the bat it is clear how efficient Laertes is compared to Hamlet. Hamlet wastes a large amount of time scheming up complex ideas on how to get a confession out of Claudius and how to kill him. Laertes on the other hand wastes no time in getting a straight and to the point plan that he can execute immediately. After spending more than half the play watching Hamlet squirm around on the stage getting almost nothing accomplished, the audience would be acutely aware of the stark difference between Hamlet and Laertes even though they share the same motivations. Laertes has his speed but he shares in Hamlets lack of critical thinking when he gets hot headed. He is in such a blind rage that he doesn’t think on what he is agreeing to do with Claudius. Just like Hamlet, his brash actions cost those around him his life. In carrying out the plan, the King, the Queen, Hamlet, and he all die to the poison that was used in the duel. Hamlet was slow and reckless while Laertes was quick and reckless. Wilds sums up the relationship between Hamlet and Laertes perfectly, “Laertes and Hamlet have been foils to each other
The psychological aspect of Hamlet which is most prominently displayed is his melancholy. This condition is rooted in the psyche and the emotions, the former causing the latter to go awry. Lily B. Campbell in “Grief That Leads to Tragedy” emphasizes ...