Willian Shakespeare's Hamlet

1005 Words3 Pages

How would you deal with an insane, irrational nephew who is travelling down a path of destruction? William Shakespeare’s Hamlet was written in 1589. The renowned play has been performed thousands of times, and captivated audiences since the early 1600’s. Hamlet features a deranged prince, Hamlet, in his attempt to avenge his father’s death. During a night watch on top of the castle, Hamlet encounters the ghost of his father. The ghoul states that he was killed by his own brother Claudius, and that Hamlet must seek revenge. Throughout the play, Hamlet’s sanity is questioned and he is often portrayed as being trapped in his own mind. Despite his mental drawback, he synthesizes an elaborate plan to uncover the truth about his Uncle, Claudius. Claudius inherits the throne upon King Hamlet’s death, and makes many rash decisions when trying to deal with Hamlet and his antics. These poor decisions on Claudius’ part lead to his downfall. To rid of Hamlet, Claudius opted to publicly poison him, which ended up backfiring on Claudius. Instead of jumping right into a plan to kill Hamlet, Claudius should have slowed down and thought through the decision-making process. Should Claudius had used the decision making process and chosen a wiser method of dealing with Hamlet, he would have avoided his own death.
Upon the realization of the need to get rid of Hamlet, Claudius should have come to a conclusion that if Hamlet were to simply vanish, suspicion would surely arise. Hamlet’s stunt at the play along with Claudius’ reaction likely instilled questions of King Hamlet’s death into the minds of the citizens in attendance of the play. If any of those citizens recognized Hamlet as a hero for exposing King Claudius, they’d be very curious i...

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...emise, and rid of Hamlet at the same time. Hamlet’s unstable mental state and irrational actions led King Claudius to the conclusion that something must be done to rid of Hamlet. Working through the steps of the decision-making process would have enlightened Claudius on three things: citizens would be suspicious if Hamlet was to vanish, Hamlet’s image must be ruined in order to prevent citizens suspecting Claudius to be responsible, and the fact that Hamlet won’t be very easy to expel. After this information was considered, Claudius would be able to synthesize an effective plan to rid of Hamlet. Being aware of the fact that Hamlet is rather smart and likely hard to corner, Claudius would have arrived at a solution; an elaborate plan to kill Hamlet that gives him no time to counter the attack. No suspicion, no more nice-guy Hamlet, no thinking time, no problem.

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