Hamlet is a play written by the famous Shakespeare, and it most
definitely falls under the genre of tragedy. In Hamlet, tragedy can be seen as
a theme because Shakespeare has a clear ending to the story. In "The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark," Shakespeare ends the play with Hamlet's
death, ending the revenge cycle. The theme, primarily tragedy, is how
Shakespeare clarifies that this story does not end up as a happily ever after,
but instead ends tragically for everyone involved.
Hamlet is primarily a tragedy of revenge. The entire play focuses on Hamlet's quest for revenge against his father’s death which dominates the beginning of the space; one could easily say that Hamlet is a tragedy of indecision. Still, it quickly becomes evident that Hamlet is only indecisive because he is mainly preoccupied with his thirst for revenge.
In the first act, we see Hamlet as an indecisive character who spends much if not all of his time alone with his thoughts. He indeed spends much if not all of his time thinking about how he can avenge his father’s untimely death. Still, it becomes evident in the second act that this mania for revenge has begun to dominate Hamlet’s life and make him lose sight of other essential things. It seems as though Hamlet starts to become histrionic, which would indicate that revenge has begun to destroy him.
The pursuit of revenge almost entirely dominates the second act.
This act contains the famous “to be or not to be” soliloquy,
in which Hamlet contemplates suicide because he cannot muster the courage to
act on his desire for revenge.
One of the best scenes in this play is Act III, scene I When
Hamlet feigns madness to hide original plans from Polonius. He says, “I am
but north-north-west. When the wind is southerly, I know a hawk from a handsaw”
(ll 14-16). This quote is an example of how Shakespeare
uses humor to emphasize Hamlet by pretending to be mad.
Unfortunately, on closer inspection, Hamlet does not seem like
he is contemplating suicide because of indecision; instead, it looks like he
wants to quit life altogether so that he can no longer live with the torment of
having killed Polonius by mistake and put his beloved Ophelia in such grave
danger.
After this incapacitating mistake, Polonius’s son Laertes seeks
revenge against Hamlet for killing his father and puts a plan in motion to get
back at him. We see here that the death of Polonius is just another way for
Hamlet to become devoured by his quest for revenge, and it becomes evident that
Hamlet is no longer acting with a sense of discernment almost seems as though
he wants Laertes to kill him and that he wants to die now that revenge looks
out of his reach.
In the end, we see that Hamlet has accomplished this task: He
has killed Claudius, and he dies himself. We could say that Hamlet here tricks
the king into drinking the poison instead of him, but this would be unfair to
Hamlet's character; it would show that he was genuinely preoccupied with
revenge because he could have poisoned Claudius himself. Instead, we see that
even though it might not be his immediate goal anymore, revenge is still very
much the purpose of Hamlet’s life, and it consumes him until his very last
breath.
Thus, we can see that even though Hamlet starts as a tragedy
of indecision, revenge quickly takes over and ensures that this becomes a
tragedy of revenge above all else.
In particular, Hamlet is faced with several situations that
prevent him from seeking revenge as he intends to. These may be categorized as
some real and some imagined barriers.
Real barriers:
● Claudius' precautions against assassination.
● His mother's grief.
● His father's ghost forbids revenge to ensure that Hamlet does
not become a murderer himself.
Imagined barriers:
● Hamlet's moral scruples about killing Claudius in church.
● He is also afraid that if he kills Claudius, he will go to
heaven and not hell.
Hamlet is the protagonist of "Hamlet"; this means that
his actions drive the plot forward. He goes from indecision to action. Hamlet's
hesitation over whether it is right to kill the king leads him first to try to
prove himself insane and unable to act and later leads him into many schemes
that fail because of bad luck on his part.
Hamlet's lack of action can also be seen as a result of the playwright
William Shakespeare, who does not put words in Hamlet's mouth to manipulate the
plot. While this makes Hamlet a more realistic man, it also frustrates his
efforts to seek revenge. The playwright has been accused of leaving too much
for the audience to interpret or not providing enough clues about what is going
on in "Hamlet."
In contrast, Hamlet's uncle, Claudius, actively moves to
consolidate his power. He sends Hamlet to England to get rid of him, and he
also brings Rosencrantz and Guildenstern from school to court as spies for
Gertrude. These facts about Claudius make him far more proactive than the
protagonist.
Since the playwright leaves much for the audience to interpret,
it can be said that what Shakespeare says about Hamlet is that his actions
drive the plot forward, and he goes from indecision to action.
To conclude, "Hamlet" Shakespeare, the greatest of all
tragedians has drawn a character as perfect as can be found in the literature.
Hamlet, as a play, is a central component of a tragedy. Hamlet, as a
protagonist, follows the main traits of tragic heroes. He belongs to a noble
family; a tragic flaw causes his downfall and the audience's feelings of pity
and fear for him.
Shakespeare was not attempting to justify the ways of God to men
… He was writing a tragedy, and tragedy would not be a tragedy if it were not a
painful mystery. (A. C.
Bradley, 1904)
This article is written by Madiha Naz, one of the contributors at the School of Literature.
