Indecision, Hesitation and Delay in Shakespeare’s Hamlet
To fully understand Hamlets inaction, it is important to look at revenge. In Richard III revenge is not exacted until Richard is dead and his fowl deeds found out. In Othello, Iago will not be revenged until Othello is completely destroyed. In Merchant of Venice Shylock wants to humiliate and then kill Antonio. Thus revenge is not exacted until the evil deeds of the offender are revealed and the public knows the truth. Only then does the thought of death come into revenge. Under this light, Hamlet cannot kill Claudius until he can prove that he poisoned the late king. Thus the first two acts are not only for the reader to understand Hamlet, but to allow Hamlet to gather needed evidence against his uncle.
Some critics attribute Hamlets inability to act to an Oedipus complex . These proponents say that Hamlet, in his subconscious mind, has a desire to do exactly what his uncle has done; that is, get rid of the husband so that he can have Gertrude for himself. If this is true, Hamlet cannot act because he is fighting against his subconscious; he knows he wants something that is entirely evil, and if he were to go through with it, he would be no better than Claudius.
Still other critics believe that Hamlet simply thinks too much. He wants the murder of the King to be perfect. Claudius has to go to hell. The people have to know about the murderer Claudius. Hamlet spends too much time planning and not enough time doing; thus, making the King’s murder more complicated than other murders he has orchestrated. Also, he has to be careful around Claudius after the play because it revealed his sanity to the King as it reveled the guilt of Claudius to Hamlet. After the play within a play, Hamlet has proof and still cannot act. Not until everybody is dying, including himself, does he realizes that he should not have waited so long. He understands the consequences of his delay, all of his pent-up rage explodes, and he murders the King; getting the revenge he was after from the beginning.
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Hamlet and Revenge
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What is arguably Shakespeare 's greatest play, "Hamlet," is often understood to be a revenge tragedy, but it is quite an odd one at that. It is a play driven by a protagonist who spends most of the play contemplating revenge rather than exacting it.
Hamlet’s inability to avenge the murder of his father drives the plot and leads to the deaths of most of the major characters , including Polonius, Laertes, Ophelia, Gertrude, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. And Hamlet himself is tortured by his indecision and his inability to kill his father's murderer, Claudius, throughout the play.
When he finally does exact his revenge and kills Claudius, it is too late for him to derive any satisfaction from it; Laertes has struck him with a poisoned foil and Hamlet dies shortly after. Take a closer look at the theme of revenge in Hamlet.
Action and Inaction in Hamlet
To highlight Hamlet’s inability to take action, Shakespeare includes other characters capable of taking resolute and headstrong revenge as required. Fortinbras travels many miles to take his revenge and ultimately succeeds in conquering Denmark; Laertes plots to kill Hamlet to avenge the death of his father, Polonius.
Compared to these characters, Hamlet’s revenge is ineffectual. Once he decides to take action, he delays any action until the end of the play. It should be noted that this delay is not uncommon in Elizabethan revenge tragedies. What makes "Hamlet" different from other contemporary works is the way in which Shakespeare uses the delay to build Hamlet’s emotional and psychological complexity. The revenge itself ends up being almost an afterthought, and in many ways, is anticlimactic.
Indeed, the famous "To be or not to be" soliloquy is Hamlet's debate with himself about what to do and whether it will matter. Though the piece begins with his pondering suicide, Hamlet's desire to avenge his father becomes clearer as this speech continues. It's worth considering this soliloquy in its entirety.
To be, or not to be- that is the question: Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing end them. To die- to sleep- No more; and by a sleep to say we end The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to. 'Tis a consummation Devoutly to be wish'd. To die- to sleep. To sleep- perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub! For in that sleep of death what dreams may come When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause. There's the respect That makes calamity of so long life. For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, Th' oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The pangs of despis'd love, the law's delay, The insolence of office, and the spurns That patient merit of th' unworthy takes, When he himself might his quietus make With a bare bodkin? Who would these fardels bear, To grunt and sweat under a weary life, But that the dread of something after death- The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn No traveler returns- puzzles the will, And makes us rather bear those ills we have Than fly to others that we know not of? Thus conscience does make cowards of us all, And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought, And enterprises of great pith and moment With this regard their currents turn awry And lose the name of action.- Soft you now! The fair Ophelia!- Nymph, in thy orisons Be all my sins rememb'red.
Over the course of this eloquent musing on the nature of self and death and what actions he should take, Hamlet remains paralyzed by indecision.
How Hamlet's Revenge is Delayed
Hamlet’s revenge is delayed in three significant ways. First, he must establish Claudius’ guilt, which he does in Act 3, Scene 2 by presenting the murder of his father in a play. When Claudius storms out during the performance, Hamlet becomes convinced of his guilt.
Hamlet then considers his revenge at length, in contrast to the rash actions of Fortinbras and Laertes. For example, Hamlet has the opportunity to kill Claudius in Act 3, Scene 3. He draws his sword but is concerned that Claudius will go to heaven if killed while praying.
After killing Polonius, Hamlet is sent to England making it impossible for him to gain access to Claudius and carry out his revenge. During his trip, becomes more headstrong in his desire for revenge.
Although he does ultimately kill Claudius in the final scene of the play , it's not due to any scheme or plan by Hamlet, rather, it is Claudius’ plan to kill Hamlet that backfires.
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Khambay's Words, Words, Words
Words, words, words… well said Hamlet! A little blog to go off on tangents within the worlds of history and literature that interest me. From the Tudors to Tom Hardy's Tess, or from the Wars of the Roses to Wuthering Heights, feel free to browse through my musings to pick up extra ideas and points for discussion!
Why does Hamlet delay his revenge?
Critic Kenneth Muir is right in saying that there are ‘many different explanations’ for Hamlet’s procrastination in avenging his father. Hamlet is delayed by others and delayed by himself, as he grapples with his own conscience in his quest to avenge his fathers’ ‘foul and most unnatural murder.’
Hamlet is clearly grieving for his father. In his ‘inky cloak,’ he chastises his mother for suggesting that he looks on Denmark (Claudius) as a ‘friend,’ and goes on to say that the black that he wears does indeed ‘denote’ him. He tells Gertrude that his demeanour indicates that he is grieving, but it is what is ‘within’ that is the truth, and the truth is that he is bereaved. It is clear to the audience that early on in the play, Hamlet is consumed by grief. Claudius and Gertrude appear insensitive, as Claudius declares that Hamlet’s grief is ‘unmanly.’ it is understandable that Hamlet feels isolated, as those who are supposed to care for him instead patronise him, and do not display empathy. This is in part why Hamlet delays his revenge. Hamlet must be solely focused on avenging his father, as he later realises, but in order to be focused on this task he has to make peace with his bereavement. Before he has done this he is tasked with revenge, and he delays this act so he can come to terms with his loss, and clear his mind to make way for the vengeful act. The true extent of Hamlet’s grief is revealed in his soliloquy in act one scene two, in which he hails his father as ‘excellent,’ and compares him to ‘Hyperion’ who in Greek mythology was the human embodiment of the Sun. His idolisation of his father intensifies his grief, and delays his revenge further as it becomes more difficult to come to terms with. The love that he bears for his father leads to a comparison of his father to Claudius, in which he muses that Claudius is ‘no more like my father, than I to Hercules.’ As well as his grief it appears that Hamlet has an underlying anger towards Claudius as he has replaced his father in every way, and he is not worthy of such a position. With these emotions running around in his head, it is clear that Hamlet is addled.
The Ghost confuses Hamlet further, and causes him to descend into hysteria, in which he swears to ‘remember.’ Hamlet’s initial trusting of the ghost dwindles however, as Hamlet then doubts that the Ghost even existed. It is also this doubt that delays Hamlet’s act of revenge, and it begins with Horatio’s fear that the Ghost may draw Hamlet into ‘madness.’ Hamlet tries to adopt the ideas and mindset of Horatio and accept that the Ghost ‘may be the devil.’ Hamlet assesses the idea, and concludes that this could be the case, and that he was taken advantage of due to his ‘weakness and melancholy.’ Hamlet’s moral compass can be seen here, as he does not want to kill Claudius unjustly, and at first seeks to discover whether the Ghost is truly real. The idea also displays Hamlet’s rationality and intelligence. In the Elizabethan age, ghosts were seen to be an ill omen, and Hamlet acknowledges this and thinks seriously before he allows the ghost to ‘damn’ him, if that is the intention of the Ghost. This doubt leads to a detour in the plot, through the deployment and formation of ‘The Mousetrap.’ A great deal of time is spent on the play, with the soul purpose of catching the ‘conscience of the King.’ If Hamlet was certain of the Ghosts’ existence, and had remained in such an impassioned state, it is conceivable to believe that Hamlet would have avenged his father a lot sooner. Hamlet grapples with the idea of seeming, and being, as the Ghost appears real to him, yet may not be. In the closet scene, the idea is looked into further, as only Hamlet can see the Ghost. This casts doubt over the Ghosts’ existence for the audience, yet it is too late for Hamlet to revoke on what he believes he has seen. It can be argued that, following his grief, this doubt is what truly hinders Hamlet’s revenge, as in the scene after the play, act three scene three, Hamlet appears closer to avenging his father than ever before.
After the Dumb Show Claudius finds it difficult to conceal his guilt. This culminates in a confession, which ultimately condemns the ‘rank’ actions of Claudius, and presents Hamlet with an opportunity to kill Claudius. Hamlet comes close to killing Claudius, but does not carry out the deed. After discovering that Claudius did in fact murder his father in the previous act, Hamlet seems more prepared than ever to kill him, but decides to delay again to ensure that there is ‘no relish of salvation in’t,’ ensuring that Claudius does not go to ‘heaven.’ It appears that Hamlet wants to seek justice for his father at the expense of Claudius, leading him to delay the revenge further. This delay however is different, as it is clear that Hamlet does intend to avenge his father. Hamlet appears to plan his revenge, and wants to slay Claudius in ‘rage’ or in ‘th’incestuous pleasure of his bed.’ Due to his intense planning, one can argue that Hamlet was always going to kill Claudius but could not, as he was unsure of the Ghosts existence and did not trust it’s words. Hamlet’s decision to kill Claudius when he is committing an immoral act is likened to the death of his father, who was killed in the ‘blossoms of my sin.’ Now that Hamlet believes the Ghost, he knows that without the Last Rites, Claudius’ soul too will be ‘doomed’ to burn in ‘fires.’ In Elizabethan England, the sacrament of the Last Rites was a core belief in the Roman Catholic Church, and without it, it was believed that souls could be confined to purgatory. This acts as an incentive for Hamlet, as he wishes for Claudius to be punished for murdering his father, and as he has accepted the word of the Ghost, he knows that Claudius will be. Hamlet’s true anger and feelings towards Claudius are conveyed here, and his desperation for Claudius’ suffering provides the reason for the delay in Hamlet’s revenge, as he wants to ensure that Claudius’ soul has the greatest chance of going to hell.
Hamlet’s feelings towards his mother also play a part. During the closet scene, Hamlet’s outburst of anger towards Gertrude delays his revenge in that moment, but whether this is an overarching theme in the play is questionable to an extent. Hamlet does chastise his mother especially in relation to her ‘o’erhasty marriage.’ In addition to his grief, and doubt over the Ghosts’ existence, Hamlet deals with the repercussions of his mothers’ marriage to his uncle. Hamlet’s many emotions appear to delay his revenge and make him appear indecisive, and one of these emotions is his conflicting hatred and love towards Gertrude. He is angered that she has been ‘stained,’ by Claudius, but also angered that she even accepted him, stating that she has his ‘father much offended.’ The pinnacle of Hamlet’s vexation is exposed in act three scene four, as he clearly cannot understand why Gertrude would marry a ‘murderer and a villain.’ This question is key to Hamlet, and without it’s answer, the idea poses another threat to the carrying out of revenge, as it is another obstacle Hamlet must overcome. His view and respect towards Gertrude has dramatically decreased, as she claims that her marriage vows to King Hamlet are now rendered ‘false,’ as she has married the ‘mildewed ear.’ His exasperation aimed at his mother and his confusion over her decision to marry Claudius weighs on his mind, and temporarily distracts him from obtaining his revenge, as the Ghost agrees. The Ghost tells Hamlet that the conversation has a ‘blunted purpose,’ insinuating that clearly, in this scenario, Hamlet’s release of inner anger towards his mother has directly delayed his act of revenge and is pointless.
However, when trying to decipher the reason for Hamlet’s delay in killing Claudius, one could argue that the answer is simple. Many critics agree, including Goethe, that Hamlet is of a ‘pure, noble and most moral nature’ suggesting the idea that revenge is not in the nature of Hamlet. In act two scene three, even Hamlet himself notes that he is ‘pigeon-liver’d,’ and that his actions lack ‘gall.’ He appears to be stuck in a situation of inaction, and in one instance comes close to killing Claudius, but still does not. In contrast, Laertes is certain that he will have his revenge. Upon hearing of his fathers death and witnessing the madness of his sister, Laertes swears that his ‘revenge will come.’ From act four scene five Laertes’ aim is made clear, and remains clear until the end of the play, unlike Hamlet’s wavering feelings. In this respect, it appears that Hamlet’s indecisiveness and moral compass hinder him from exacting his revenge, and give him the impression that he is not cut out for such an act, unlike Laertes. This could lead one to believe that Laertes looks at the issue of honour differently, and more seriously than Hamlet, as the reason for Laertes’ revenge seeking is because his honour ‘stands aloof.’ As Laertes feels his honour is under attack, he immediately acts to reclaim his dignity, unlike Hamlet. This could suggest that Hamlet delays his revenge as he is not the correct person to carry out such an act, and as he does not take honour so seriously enough as to kill a man for it. Although Laertes displays the positive attitude of decisiveness, one could argue that killing another man as he has threatened ones honour displays irrationality. Laertes appears to follow the ancient Roman religion of Fame. This prized family honour above all things, and as a man’s reputation was all that lived after him, it was imperative that justice was done. It fell to his son to take the law into his own hands, and Laertes can be seen to do this by agreeing to avenge his father. Laertes’ pure motivation to avenge his father is due to his damaged pride, which although Hamlet does mention this, it appears that Hamlet seeks to ensure that his father is justly avenged (ensuring that Claudius goes to hell). When discussing Hamlet in relation to Laertes, it can be said that in comparison, Hamlet delays his revenge, as he is not the correct person to carry out due to his lack of decisiveness and drive. His wish to ensure Claudius’ condemnation also delays him, whereas the issue of Laertes’ dignity being restored means that his revenge can be carried out in any situation, unlike Hamlet’s.
As Hamlet has more weighing on his mind than other characters, and has many more character traits, the reason for his delay in avenging is apparent. In contrast to Laertes, his distinct decisiveness and high regard of honour pushes him to plot to kill Hamlet, but Hamlet’s wish to ensure that Claudius suffers delays him. Shakespeare appears to be unfair to Hamlet, as if Hamlet did not have to manage his grief, along with his feelings about Claudius, Gertrude and the existence of the Ghost, his revengeful act may have occurred a lot sooner. [1]
[1] All quotes from:
William Shakespeare, Hamlet , ed. by Ann Thompson and Neil Taylor (London: Arden Shakespeare, 2016).
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Literary , Literature
Why Hamlet Delays His Revenge
Written by: Gacee Ezekiel
Perhaps one of the most debated questions in modern-day literature is why Hamlet took so much time to avenge his father. As he struggles with his suicidal despair, Hamlet cannot make up his mind, a situation that portrays him as the ultimate procrastinator. Nonetheless, some interpret Hamlet’s delay as resulting from a myriad of reasons among them the possibility that his father’s ghost could be a misrepresentation of his dead father’s wishes, further adding to his speculation that he shouldn’t do it.
So firmly was Shakespeare trying to carry out the idea of Hamlet being reluctant to slay the king least his soul went to heaven. Hamlet was perpetually putting off killing the king because he thought that it was not the right time to do it. He felt that he should wait up to the time when he decided to strike the king; his soul would go to hell rather than heaven. Hamlet questions the idea of hitting the king from behind and questions the rationale of slaying the enemy from behind.
From the onset, it is evident that Hamlet’s father’s ghost sent him on a difficult mission, a situation that might explain his reluctance to avenge his father’s death. As much as he wanted revenge, his most significant concern is the moral standing behind killing a man who had no idea that he was about to be killed. Away from his indecisiveness, there are various schools of thought regarding why Hamlet procrastinated in vengeance.
Hamlet’s indecisiveness comes from the literary representation of the ghost world. Ideally, the ghost world is associated with bad luck and evil; this means that the idea to avenge his father’s death was not from Hamlet but rather his visitation by his father’s ghost. Hamlet significantly questioned the visitation’s timing by his father’s ghost, which was merely a symbol of invisible power. In his capacity, he felt that executing his father’s murderer would send his soul to heaven. He, therefore, perceived it better that he waits for the king’s soul to be at the door of hell, allowing Hamlet to push the door open.
Another possible reason why Hamlet delayed to avenge his father was the accidental murder of Polonius. It is evident that after the accident happened, Hamlet would deliberately procrastinate anything unpleasant, and in this case, avenging his father. Hamlet appears to be a person who always makes excuses, but when confronted with reality, he can act fast.
When he ran through Polonius, he had no time to think or even consider the repercussions of his actions rather than think everything through; according to Alsaif, (132) is why his scrupulous conscience takes over his ability to make decisions. The little sophistries regarding the consequences of killing the king are why Hamlet could not differentiate the thin line between being drawn into sin and not fulfilling an obligation as required. Both scenarios have their consequences.
Alsaif, (132), states that by killing the king, Hamlet would become a murderer, but in a real sense, he already was. On the other hand, not fulfilling his father’s ghost wishes would have meant that he had failed to fulfill his duties as a son. To an extent, Hamlet feels that his father’s ghost could be the devil trying to trick him into the murder but wonders what would happen to him if it turns out that his late father wanted vengeance.
After his exile, Hamlet feels the need to go back to Denmark and kill his father’s murderer. During his return, he proclaims that “ from this time forth my thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth “( Hamlet [IV, 4). It assumes that after such a declaration, Hamlet would have no trouble avenging his father’s death. However, their graveside scene where Hamlet experiences his morbid fixation about death rekindles the earlier notion that he feels no urgency to kill Claudius.
After Ophelia’s death, Hamlet becomes aware that his destiny is to avenge his father; this is evident from the poem when he says that If it is now, it’s not to come if it is not to come, it will be now….the readiness is all “( Hamlet [II, 2). It becomes clear that Hamlet will undoubtedly kill Claudius, which is a major shift from his earlier reluctance to use murder as a way of avenging his father. Hamlet also has a change of heart regarding committing a crime believing that he is doing God’s work as it is evident from his statement, “it’s not a perfect conscience to quit him with this arm ? And isn’t to be damned to let this canker of our nature come in further evil? ” ( Hamlet [III, 2)
Hamlet’s confusion traces from when he states that “ I do not know why yet I live to say this thing’s to do “However, the main interwoven reasons as to why he is reluctant to avenge his father’s death are:
Hamlet’s Personality.
From the beginning, Hamlet appears as a man of reason and a critical thinker; this is why he is slow to act on so many things happening around him. His soliloquies for his failures to act are almost evident immediately he is directed by his father’s ghost to kill Claudius when he laments “ The time is out of joint, o cursed spite, that ever I was born to set it right “( Hamlet [I, 2).
Religious background.
Hamlet appears to be a very religious person at the time he denounces his mother’s sinful ways (“ o most wicked speed to post with such dexterity to incestuous sheets “( Hamlet [I, 2). It is these believes that ultimately have him questioning the true intentions of the ghost (“ the spirit that I have seen maybe the devil and perhaps abuses me to damn me “).
Hamlet’s love for his mother.
Hamlet’s love for his mother is rather unconditional despite her sinful ways; this is why he goes out to seek her confession after the Mousetrap before deciding on whether to kill Claudius (“I’ll take the ghost’s word for a thousand pound “). By seeking his mother’s confession, Hamlet ends up delaying his revenge but gives his desire to save his mother’s soul the priority “ confess [herself] to heaven, repent what’s past, avoid what is to come . ”
His fear of Claudius’ powers.
Hamlet is openly afraid of challenging Claudius despite him being the heir to the throne- (“ It is not nor it cannot come to good but break my heart for I must hold my tongue “) until he is sure that Claudius is guilty (“I’ll have grounds more relative than this. The play’s the thing wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King “( Hamlet [II, 2). This reluctance is part of his greatest fear of going against God. Hamlet is fully aware that if he kills Claudius and turns out that the latter was innocent, he will have sinned against God by spilling innocent blood. In addition to this, killing Claudius could throw the kingdom into turmoil, let alone depriving his mother of the man she loves.
His quest for justice. Hamlet has so many opportunities to kill Claudius but fails to do so; this is particularly evident from the Prayer scene when he stumbles upon Claudius, who is unarmed. Despite the perfect opportunity to avenge his father, Hamlet is reluctant to kill Claudius based on the assumption that by killing Claudius, who was praying, Claudius’ soul would gain eternity, meaning that the king would have escaped justice. Hamlet intends to see Claudius punished when he says that Claudius “ soul may be as damned and black as hell whereto he goes “( Hamlet [III, 2)
Circumstances.
“Hamlet is a victim of circumstances in every aspect” (Gopinath and Dolphy 6). Worse still is the fact that he had so many opportunities that the audience would have expected him to kill Claudius, but he fails to do so. However, his impulsive rage leads him to kill Polonius even when he thought that he was shooting his intended target. After Polonius’ murder, Hamlet now becomes a real threat to Claudius, which is the main reason why he left England to live in exile. Hamlet will have little or no opportunity to be in the same room with Claudius since he is considered a threat to the king.
Whether Hamlet is intentionally delaying avenging his father or is a procrastinator is subject to a heated debate in modern literature. His personality points out to a man who is very indecisive and slow to act upon things. In other scenes, he appears to seize the moment only to go wrong just when he has the perfect opportunity to fulfill his responsibility. From the play, it is evident that Hamlet is frustrated about not killing Claudius. However, the conflict of not actualizing his plan whenever he has the opportunity is what makes Hamlet a complex character to understand and play an intriguing piece of literature.
Works Cited
Alsaif, Omar Abdulaziz. “The significance of religion in Hamlet.” International Journal of English and Literature 3.6 (2012): 132-135.
Demastes, William W. “Hamlet in his world: Shakespeare anticipates/assaults Cartesian dualism.” Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism 1 (2005): 27-42.
Gopinath, Mohan, and Dolphy Abraham. “THE ROLE OF GUILT IN HAMLET: LEADERSHIP IMPLICATIONS.” The EFL Journal 6.1 (2015).
Shakespeare, William. The tragedy of Hamlet . University Press, 1904.
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Literary Theory and Criticism
Home › Drama Criticism › Analysis of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet
Analysis of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet
By NASRULLAH MAMBROL on July 25, 2020 • ( 2 )
With Shakespeare the dramatic resolution conveys us, beyond the man-made sphere of poetic justice, toward the ever-receding horizons of cosmic irony. This is peculiarly the case with Hamlet , for the same reasons that it excites such intensive empathy from actors and readers, critics and writers alike. There may be other Shakespearean characters who are just as memorable, and other plots which are no less impressive; but nowhere else has the outlook of the individual in a dilemma been so profoundly realized; and a dilemma, by definition, is an all but unresolvable choice between evils. Rather than with calculation or casuistry, it should be met with virtue or readiness; sooner or later it will have to be grasped by one or the other of its horns. These, in their broadest terms, have been—for Hamlet, as we interpret him—the problem of what to believe and the problem of how to act.
—Harry Levin, The Question of Hamlet
Hamlet is almost certainly the world’s most famous play, featuring drama’s and literature’s most fascinating and complex character. The many-sided Hamlet—son, lover, intellectual, prince, warrior, and avenger—is the consummate test for each generation’s leading actors, and to be an era’s defining Hamlet is perhaps the greatest accolade one can earn in the theater. The play is no less a proving ground for the critic and scholar, as successive generations have refashioned Hamlet in their own image, while finding in it new resonances and entry points to plumb its depths, perplexities, and possibilities. No other play has been analyzed so extensively, nor has any play had a comparable impact on our culture. The brooding young man in black, skull in hand, has moved out of the theater and into our collective consciousness and cultural myths, joining only a handful of comparable literary archetypes—Oedipus, Faust, and Don Quixote—who embody core aspects of human nature and experience. “It is we ,” the romantic critic William Hazlitt observed, “who are Hamlet.”
Hamlet also commands a crucial, central place in William Shakespeare’s dramatic career. First performed around 1600, the play stands near the midpoint of the playwright’s two-decade career as a culmination and new departure. As the first of his great tragedies, Hamlet signals a decisive shift from the comedies and history plays that launched Shakespeare’s career to the tragedies of his maturity. Although unquestionably linked both to the plays that came before and followed, Hamlet is also markedly exceptional. At nearly 4,000 lines, almost twice the length of Macbeth , Hamlet is Shakespeare’s longest and, arguably, his most ambitious play with an enormous range of characters—from royals to gravediggers—and incidents, including court, bedroom, and graveyard scenes and a play within a play. Hamlet also bristles with a seemingly inexhaustible array of ideas and themes, as well as a radically new strategy for presenting them, most notably, in transforming soliloquies from expositional and motivational asides to the audience into the verbalization of consciousness itself. As Shakespearean scholar Stephen Greenblatt has asserted, “In its moral complexity, psychological depth, and philosophical power, Hamlet seems to mark an epochal shift not only in Shakespeare’s own career but in Western drama; it is as if the play were giving birth to a whole new kind of literary subjectivity.” Hamlet, more than any other play that preceded it, turns its action inward to dramatize an isolated, conflicted psyche struggling to cope with a world that has lost all certainty and consolation. Struggling to reconcile two contradictory identities—the heroic man of action and duty and the Christian man of conscience—Prince Hamlet becomes the modern archetype of the self-divided, alienated individual, desperately searching for self-understanding and meaning. Hamlet must contend with crushing doubt without the support of traditional beliefs that dictate and justify his actions. In describing the arrival of the fragmentation and chaos of the modern world, Victorian poet and critic Matthew Arnold declared that “the calm, cheerfulness, the disinterested objectivity have disappeared, the dialogue of the mind with itself has commenced.” Hamlet anticipates that dialogue by more than two centuries.
Like all of Shakespeare’s plays, Hamlet makes strikingly original uses of borrowed material. The Scandinavian folk tale of Amleth, a prince called upon to avenge his father’s murder by his uncle, was first given literary form by the Danish writer Saxo the Grammarian in his late 12th century Danish History and later adapted in French in François de Belleforest’s Histoires tragiques (1570). This early version of the Hamlet story provided Shakespeare with the basic characters and relationships but without the ghost or the revenger’s uncertainty. In the story of Amleth there is neither doubt about the usurper’s guilt nor any moral qualms in the fulfillment of the avenger’s mission. In preChristian Denmark blood vengeance was a sanctioned filial obligation, not a potentially damnable moral or religious violation, and Amleth successfully accomplishes his duty by setting fire to the royal hall, killing his uncle, and proclaiming himself king of Denmark. Shakespeare’s more immediate source may have been a nowlost English play (c. 1589) that scholars call the Ur – Hamlet. All that has survived concerning this play are a printed reference to a ghost who cried “Hamlet, revenge!” and criticism of the play’s stale bombast. Scholars have attributed the Ur-Hamle t to playwright Thomas Kyd, whose greatest success was The Spanish Tragedy (1592), one of the earliest extant English tragedies. The Spanish Tragedy popularized the genre of the revenge tragedy, derived from Aeschylus’s Oresteia and the Latin plays of Seneca, to which Hamlet belongs. Kyd’s play also features elements that Shakespeare echoes in Hamlet, including a secret crime, an impatient ghost demanding revenge, a protagonist tormented by uncertainty who feigns madness, a woman who actually goes mad, a play within a play, and a final bloodbath that includes the death of the avenger himself. An even more immediate possible source for Hamlet is John Marston’s Antonio’s Revenge (1599), another story of vengeance on a usurper by a sensitive protagonist.
Whether comparing Hamlet to its earliest source or the handling of the revenge plot by Kyd, Marston, or other Elizabethan or Jacobean playwrights, what stands out is the originality and complexity of Shakespeare’s treatment, in his making radically new and profound uses of established stage conventions. Hamlet converts its sensational material—a vengeful ghost, a murder mystery, madness, a heartbroken maiden, a fistfight at her burial, and a climactic duel that results in four deaths—into a daring exploration of mortality, morality, perception, and core existential truths. Shakespeare put mystery, intrigue, and sensation to the service of a complex, profound epistemological drama. The critic Maynard Mack in an influential essay, “The World of Hamlet ,” has usefully identified the play’s “interrogative mode.” From the play’s opening words—“Who’s there?”—to “What is this quintessence of dust?” through drama’s most famous soliloquy—“To be, or not to be, that is the question.”— Hamlet “reverberates with questions, anguished, meditative, alarmed.” The problematic nature of reality and the gap between truth and appearance stand behind the play’s conflicts, complicating Hamlet’s search for answers and his fulfillment of his role as avenger.
Hamlet opens with startling evidence that “something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” The ghost of Hamlet’s father, King Hamlet, has been seen in Elsinore, now ruled by his brother, Claudius, who has quickly married his widowed queen, Gertrude. When first seen, Hamlet is aloof and skeptical of Claudius’s justifications for his actions on behalf of restoring order in the state. Hamlet is morbidly and suicidally disillusioned by the realization of mortality and the baseness of human nature prompted by the sudden death of his father and his mother’s hasty, and in Hamlet’s view, incestuous remarriage to her brother-in-law:
O that this too 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! O God! God! How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable Seem to me all the uses of this world! Fie on’t! ah, fie! ’Tis an unweeded garden That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature Possess it merely. That it should come to this!
A recent student at the University of Wittenberg, whose alumni included Martin Luther and the fictional Doctor Faustus, Hamlet is an intellectual of the Protestant Reformation, who, like Luther and Faustus, tests orthodoxy while struggling to formulate a core philosophy. Brought to encounter the apparent ghost of his father, Hamlet alone hears the ghost’s words that he was murdered by Claudius and is compelled out of his suicidal despair by his pledge of revenge. However, despite the riveting presence of the ghost, Hamlet is tormented by doubts. Is the ghost truly his father’s spirit or a devilish apparition tempting Hamlet to his damnation? Is Claudius truly his father’s murderer? By taking revenge does Hamlet do right or wrong? Despite swearing vengeance, Hamlet delays for two months before taking any action, feigning madness better to learn for himself the truth about Claudius’s guilt. Hamlet’s strange behavior causes Claudius’s counter-investigation to assess Hamlet’s mental state. School friends—Rosencrantz and Guildenstern—are summoned to learn what they can; Polonius, convinced that Hamlet’s is a madness of love for his daughter Ophelia, stages an encounter between the lovers that can be observed by Claudius. The court world at Elsinore, is, therefore, ruled by trickery, deception, role playing, and disguise, and the so-called problem of Hamlet, of his delay in acting, is directly related to his uncertainty in knowing the truth. Moreover, the suspicion of his father’s murder and his mother’s sexual betrayal shatter Hamlet’s conception of the world and his responsibility in it. Pushed back to the suicidal despair of the play’s opening, Hamlet is paralyzed by indecision and ambiguity in which even death is problematic, as he explains in the famous “To be or not to be” soliloquy in the third act:
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, Th’ oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely, The pangs of despis’d love, the law’s delay, The insolence of office, and the spurns That patient merit of th’ unworthy takes, When he himself might his quietus make With a bare bodkin? Who would these fardels bear, To grunt and sweat under a weary life, But that the dread of something after death— The undiscover’d country, from whose bourn No traveller returns—puzzles the will, And makes us rather bear those ills we have Than fly to others that we know not of? Thus conscience does make cowards of us all, And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought, And enterprises of great pith and moment With this regard their currents turn awry And lose the name of action.
The arrival of a traveling theatrical group provides Hamlet with the empirical means to resolve his doubts about the authenticity of the ghost and Claudius’s guilt. By having the troupe perform the Mousetrap play that duplicates Claudius’s crime, Hamlet hopes “to catch the conscience of the King” by observing Claudius’s reaction. The king’s breakdown during the performance seems to confirm the ghost’s accusation, but again Hamlet delays taking action when he accidentally comes upon the guilt-ridden Claudius alone at his prayers. Rationalizing that killing the apparently penitent Claudius will send him to heaven and not to hell, Hamlet decides to await an opportunity “That has no relish of salvation in’t.” He goes instead to his mother’s room where Polonius is hidden in another attempt to learn Hamlet’s mind and intentions. This scene between mother and son, one of the most powerful and intense in all of Shakespeare, has supported the Freudian interpretation of Hamlet’s dilemma in which he is stricken not by moral qualms but by Oedipal guilt. Gertrude’s cries of protest over her son’s accusations cause Polonius to stir, and Hamlet finally, instinctively strikes the figure he assumes is Claudius. In killing the wrong man Hamlet sets in motion the play’s catastrophes, including the madness and suicide of Ophelia, overwhelmed by the realization that her lover has killed her father, and the fatal encounter with Laertes who is now similarly driven to avenge a murdered father. Convinced of her son’s madness, Gertrude informs Claudius of Polonius’s murder, prompting Claudius to alter his order for Hamlet’s exile to England to his execution there.
Hamlet’s mental shift from reluctant to willing avenger takes place offstage during his voyage to England in which he accidentally discovers the execution order and then after a pirate attack on his ship makes his way back to Denmark. He returns to confront the inescapable human condition of mortality in the graveyard scene of act 5 in which he realizes that even Alexander the Great must return to earth that might be used to “stop a beer-barrel” and Julius Caesar’s clay to “stop a hole to keep the wind away.” This sobering realization that levels all earthly distinctions of nobility and acclaim is compounded by the shock of Ophelia’s funeral procession. Hamlet sustains his balance and purpose by confessing to Horatio his acceptance of a providential will revealed to him in the series of accidents on his voyage to England: “There’s a divinity that shapes our ends, / Roughhew them how we will.” Finally accepting his inability to control his life, Hamlet resigns himself to accept whatever comes. Agreeing to a duel with Laertes that Claudius has devised to eliminate his nephew, Hamlet asserts that “There’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ’tis not to come. If it be not to come, it will be now. If it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all.”
In the carnage of the play’s final scene, Hamlet ironically manages to achieve his revenge while still preserving his nobility and moral stature. It is the murderer Claudius who is directly or indirectly responsible for all the deaths. Armed with a poisonedtip sword, Laertes strikes Hamlet who in turn manages to slay Laertes with the lethal weapon. Meanwhile, Gertrude drinks from the poisoned cup Claudius intended to insure Hamlet’s death, and, after the remorseful Laertes blames Claudius for the plot, Hamlet, hesitating no longer, fatally stabs the king. Dying in the arms of Horatio, Hamlet orders his friend to “report me and my cause aright / To the unsatisfied” and transfers the reign of Denmark to the last royal left standing, the Norwegian prince Fortinbras. King Hamlet’s death has been avenged but at a cost of eight lives: Polonius, Ophelia, Rosencranz, Guildenstern, Laertes, Gertrude, Claudius, and Prince Hamlet. Order is reestablished but only by Denmark’s sworn enemy. Shakespeare’s point seems unmistakable: Honor and duty that command revenge consume the guilty and the innocent alike. Heroism must face the reality of the graveyard.
Fortinbras closes the play by ordering that Hamlet be carried off “like a soldier” to be given a military funeral underscoring the point that Hamlet has fallen as a warrior on a battlefield of both the duplicitous court at Elsinore and his own mind. The greatness of Hamlet rests in the extraordinary perplexities Shakespeare has discovered both in his title character and in the events of the play. Few other dramas have posed so many or such knotty problems of human existence. Is there a special providence in the fall of a sparrow? What is this quintessence of dust? To be or not to be?
Hamlet Oxford Lecture by Emma Smith
Analysis of William Shakespeare’s Plays
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- > ‘Hamlet, Revenge!’: The Uses and Abuses of Historical Criticism
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- The Reception of Hamlet
- ‘Hamlet, Revenge!’: The Uses and Abuses of Historical Criticism
- Revision by Excision: Rewriting Gertrude
- Gazing at Hamlet, or the Danish Cabaret
- ‘He’s Going to his Mother’s Closet’: Hamlet and Gertrude on Screen
- Shakespeare Rewound
- Freud’s Hamlet
- ‘Pray you, undo this button’: Implications of ‘Un-’ in King Lear
- Marx and Shakespeare
- Peter Street, 1553–1609: Builder of Playhouses
- Shakespeare Performances in England 1990–1
- Professional Shakespeare Productions in the British Isles, January–December 1990
- 1 Critical Studies
- 2 Shakespeare’s Life, Times, and Stage
- 3 Editions and Textual Studies
- Books Received
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2007
For more than two centuries critics of Hamlet were in agreement that Hamlet is morally obligated to take revenge on Claudius. It is only in our time that many historical critics have asserted that Elizabethans would not have readily accepted the ghost's injunction as a command that Hamlet must in all conscience obey and that we, if we are to be true to Shakespeare, must respond in the same manner. It is rare that there has been so sharp a reversal of general critical opinion.
It is fascinating to survey the major historical criticism on the subject of Hamlet's revenge and on such ancillary matters as the reasons for Hamlet's delay, the nature of the ghost, and the significance of the play's conclusion. The fray on the critical battlefield has its peculiar interest, as we observe interpretations advanced and disputed, errors made and refuted. For historical criticism is, of course, no magic talisman. Critics using the historical method can go wildly wrong, just as critics who rely only on their acumen can have insights that are corroborated by historical scholarship. But, in spite of the confusion of the fray, something approaching a substantial body of opinion has emerged from it - there can never be total assent - that has superseded the previous predominant body of opinion.
So convinced were the critics of the nineteenth century that Hamlet has a duty to kill Claudius that the favourite critical question was 'Why does Hamlet delay?' Like the ghost of the earlier Hamlet that was Shakespeare's source, which, said Thomas Lodge, cried like an oyster-wife, 'Hamlet, revenge!', they called repeatedly for him to take action. Men who spent their lives in their studies, where the greatest violence they committed was the slitting open of envelopes with paper knives, charged him with being an irresolute intellectual or with being of too delicate a sensibility to do the thing he had to do.
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- By Paul N. Siegel
- Edited by Stanley Wells , University of Birmingham
- Book: Shakespeare Survey
- Online publication: 28 March 2007
- Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL0521420555.002
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The general design of the play must be worked out and a specific conclusion drawn as to Hamlet's impelling motive in delaying his revenge. This is deductive reasoning. Assuming that Hamlet is abnormal in some phase of his being is manifestly unfair, as we have seen, because all evidence when assembled is overwhelmingly against such supposition.
After the play within a play, Hamlet has proof and still cannot act. Not until everybody is dying, including himself, does he realizes that he should not have waited so long. He understands the consequences of his delay, all of his pent-up rage explodes, and he murders the King; getting the revenge he was after from the beginning.
Hamlet's revenge is delayed in three significant ways. First, he must establish Claudius' guilt, which he does in Act 3, Scene 2 by presenting the murder of his father in a play. When Claudius storms out during the performance, Hamlet becomes convinced of his guilt. Hamlet then considers his revenge at length, in contrast to the rash ...
Hamlet is delayed by others and delayed by himself, as he grapples with his own conscience in his quest to avenge his fathers' 'foul and most unnatural murder.'. Hamlet is clearly grieving for his father. In his 'inky cloak,' he chastises his mother for suggesting that he looks on Denmark (Claudius) as a 'friend,' and goes on to ...
Why Hamlet Delays His Revenge. Date: August 2, 2020 Author: Orphic 1 Comment. Written by: Gacee Ezekiel. Perhaps one of the most debated questions in modern-day literature is why Hamlet took so much time to avenge his father. As he struggles with his suicidal despair, Hamlet cannot make up his mind, a situation that portrays him as the ultimate ...
Summary: Hamlet's delay in seeking revenge stems from his deep moral and philosophical contemplation. He grapples with the ethical implications of murder, doubts the ghost's authenticity, and ...
Whether comparing Hamlet to its earliest source or the handling of the revenge plot by Kyd, Marston, or other Elizabethan or Jacobean playwrights, what stands out is the originality and complexity of Shakespeare's treatment, in his making radically new and profound uses of established stage conventions.Hamlet converts its sensational material—a vengeful ghost, a murder mystery, madness, a ...
Some readers have long censured Hamlet for his supposed "delay" in taking revenge, and indeed many essays and books have been written trying to explain the reasons for that delay. On the other ...
It is fascinating to survey the major historical criticism on the subject of Hamlet's revenge and on such ancillary matters as the reasons for Hamlet's delay, the nature of the ghost, and the significance of the play's conclusion. The fray on the critical battlefield has its peculiar interest, as we observe interpretations advanced and disputed ...
The word "excessive" is more significant than the word "pride" from the perspective of a theory of tragic excess. In this theory, hamartia is not simply an "error," "mistake," or "flaw.". It is an act or habit of excessively displaying a trait that, if employed moderately, would be perfectly fine.
An Excuse for Doing Nothing: Hamlet's Delay. Hamlet's father's ghost sent him on a difficult errand, and he always tried to go, resolving, re-resolving, and ending the same. It was not that he was unfaithful, and did not want to go, but that he had never finished thinking the matter out. The moment he was about to do the work, up came a new ...
to the effects (not necessarily to the author's intentions) of an attentive reading. aa fine poem, novel, or play. The "good hour" between patient and. analysis, then, is "good" for many of the same reasons that hold true when. mind meets poet's mind, when poet's mind meets reader's mind in a text.
The play within a play is one of many tactics Hamlet employs over the course of the play to delay the revenge and therefore avoid his own death. In his essay Shakespeare's Hamlet, Chikako Kumamoto defends Hamlet's waffling as the impasse that results when a moral man becomes charged with an immoral act, in this case, murder. Kumamoto points ...
If there was no delay, Hamlet would have acted in a whole different way. As soon as he was told that his father had been killed by his uncle, he would have taken out his sword and simply killed the new king of Denmark. There would not have been much delay and self-doubt then. Hamlet's act of revenge is fulfilled a couple hundred pages and ...
Claudius appears guilty of killing his own brother, young Hamlet's father. After Hamlet gets the reaction he was seeking from Claudius, he delays in killing Claudius. While Claudius is praying ...
Hamlet is a revenge tragedy, but it is unique to the genre. The obstacles in place of Hamlet carrying out his revenge are of his own making. And, the reason that he places those obstacles there is because Hamlet, unlike most revenge play protagonists, has a conscience. Works Cited. Ardolino, Frank. Apocalypse & Armada in Kyd's Spanish Tragedy.
In my opinion, Hamlet delay his revenge is because his inner cowardice. Although all Hamlet's actions show us that he is trying to avenging his father's death. In act 1, the ghost told Hamlet the truth of his father's death. But the first thing that Hamlet want to do is find out whether the ghost tell him the truth of his father's death ...
In this case Hamlet considers not only killing a man, but a man from his own family. This makes him even more confused and uncertain of his deeds. Fear of society's reaction and reaction of his own mother has also influence on prince's actions. Next dilemma is a consequence of royal position.
Hamlet is a perfect example of duality of human nature. He wants to take revenge on the murderer of his loving father, but at the same time his morality and sensibility as well as his egoistic and selfish needs prevent him from doing it. He wants to perform an act, which is at variance with his nature. Bibliography:
Hamlet's delay. Summary: Hamlet's delay in action is attributed to his moral conscience and rational thinking. In the "To be or not to be" soliloquy, Hamlet reflects on how "conscience makes ...
Hamlet is attracted to his mother Gertrude but the presence of Claudius condenses the possibility of intimacy with his mother. Even though Hamlet believes in the vengeance of his father's death by executing Claudius, he is afraid that the void that would be left would inevitably lead to a mutual closeness between him and his mother.
Hamlet is more parallely than other texts. Fortinbras, Hamlet, and Laertes have their fathers murdered, then seek revenge. Brothers King Hamlet and King Claudius mirror brothers Old Norway and Old Fortinbras. Hamlet and Ophelia both lose their fathers, go mad, but there's a method in their madness, and become suicidal.