Suicide in Hamlet

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Hamlet contemplates death and suicide - what Hamlet wants to do and the fear of the consequences of his actions, “O, that this 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! (I. ii. 129 – 132).We receive the image of suicide as a juxtaposition between the desire for death in contrast with a desire to live, “To be or not to be – that is the question” (III.i.56). Almost from Hamlet’s first appearance, we reveal a major underlying concept in the tragedy, the contrast of death and morality made evident through the sonic opposition between in and out, order and disorder. Both soliloquies exemplify a man, bewildered and wracked by inconsolable grief - desiring revenge – however, unable to know how to go about responding to what has happened. Hamlet is not simply suicidal, nor is he simply melancholic to his father’s murder. Rather the language of the play alludes to a man but driven to desperation, philosophically posing the conundrum of wanting to leave his life behind while possessing the respon...

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