Claudius Essay On Poison

King Claudius is Hamlet’s father/uncle. He is a wise and ambitious man. He knew how to manipulate certain characters. For example, “The other motive why to a public count I might not go Is the general gender bear him…” (Ⅳ.i.18-20).

  In the first three acts of the play Hamlet, King Claudius go through a subtle, but defined change in character.  Claudius role in the play begins as the newly corrinated king of Denmark.  The former king, King Hamlet, was poisoned by his brother, Claudius, while he was asleep.  Claudius, however, made it known to everyone that the king died of a snakebite in the garden, and thus no one knew of the murder that had just taken place making his murder the perfect crime.  The only problem that Claudius must deal with now is his conscience.

Hamlet aids, if not casts, Ophelia into insanity. She becomes torn between two men, her father and Hamlet. Her father believes that Hamlet would use her. He believes Hamlet would taint her and not marry her. Ophelia, with a dashing prince batting his eyes at her is convinced that Hamlet loves her, though he swears he never did. To Hamlet she is a sexual entity, a whim for him to indulge momentarily in (Chapman). Hamlet vowed to Ophelia that he never loved her, but he did so with the intentions of Polonius and Claudius getting wind of it. Ophelia not knowing this began going mad. No man would love her and she was torn between the men she loved. To top it all off the man she intimately loves kills her father. Such a heinous act, thought unintentional, crosses a line far too dreadful to even approach. Now she must choose between Hamlet, her father’s murderer and her father, the man disapproving of her love life.

Although Hamlet loves Ophelia, as he clearly indicates when he bursts out at her grave and exclaims, “I loved Ophelia,” he confuses her with harsh comments. When Hamlet encounters Ophelia with the knowledge that someone is watching, he acts cruelly, telling Ophelia “I loved you not.” Hamlet’s emotional games with her, regardless of whether he intends to hurt her, create conflict and feelings of heartbreak in Ophelia. Moreover, Hamlet’s killing of Polonius amplifies his negative effect on Ophelia, leading to her descent into madness and eventual death. Comparatively, Polonius and Laertes affect Ophelia less directly, but they still influence her negatively by contributing to her emotional struggle regarding her relationship with Hamlet.

King Claudius expresses, “Welcome, dear Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Moreover that we much did long to see you, the need we have to use you did provoke our hasty sending.” (2.2.1-4) He addresses them in what is seemingly a sincere manner, proclaiming the supposed yearning he has had. However, these so-called sincere actions towards Hamlet’s childhood friends are just to convince them to take on the role of spying on Hamlet’s actions and reporting them back to Gertrude and Claudius. He continues to mask his true motives by saying, “To draw him on to pleasures and to gather...you may glean..to us unknown, afflicts him thus that, opened, lies within our remedy.” (2.2.15-19) King Claudius’ choice of words convey an inkling to the audience that he cares for Hamlet because of how he expresses his need to find out Hamlet’s condition, and fix it. This also presents Gertrude with the idea that Claudius has Hamlet’s best interests at heart. This, in King Claudius’ favor, solidifies his honorable, yet selfless stature with his contriving

Ophelia experiences alienation throughout Hamlet, although she ends her life with suicide, unlike Hamlet. The queen places blame on Ophelia for Hamlet's madness and states: "...for your part, Ophelia, I do wish that your good beauties be the happy cause for Hamlet's madness..." (Shakespeare 140). The queen lightens her feelings of guilt for the murder and places the guilt upon Ophelia. Gertrude, the queen, knows that she has committed something wrong with the plot of killing Old Hamlet and therefore finds an outlet through Ophelia. Also, to try to discover Hamlet's cause of insanity, Claudius and Polonius use Ophelia to get closer to him and find out that perhaps they could conclude that his

In the play Hamlet, there are several tragic deaths caused by poison. There are people that see the poison as only an easy way Claudius used to kill people, but the poison could have also been symbolic. The only characters to not be killed by poison are Polonius and Ophelia, they had a different way of dying .Throughout the book Poison is used to murder characters and to symbolize something important. There had to be a reason for Shakespeare to bring up poison so much throughout the book.

The plot thickens and Hamlet's mind begins to ponder the possibilities of a confession by the king. His love for Ophelia is also strongly noticed by all. The nobles of Elsinor also notice the love he shows and they begin to realize the possibility that Hamlet love for Ophelia would benefit them all. When Polonius reads from one of Hamlet's love letter's to Ophelia, in which he says to her "But that I love thee best, O most best, believe it." (2.2.121-122). Queen Gertrude wishes to use Ophelia's love to bring her only son out of madness. Claudius wishes to do the same. His reason, however, is to end the threat of his own life. Once the king and queen realize this remedy they quickly act to use it by persuading Ophelia to talk to Hamlet.

Hamlet kills Polonius and Gertrude becomes scared as to what is going to happen with Hamlet. Claudius betrays her trust by taking advantage of it and takes matter into his own hands. Claudius solution to the problem is to have Hamlet sent to England, where he is going to be safe from the law and will not have to deal with any consequences for his actions. " O Gertrude, come away! The sun no sooner shall the mountains touch. But we will ship him hence, and this vile deed. We must, with all out majesty and skill, Both countenance and excuse" (4.1.28-32). Claudius makes Gertrude believe he is setting this up because he wants to protect Hamlet. But even though the audience knows the real reason as to why he is doing this. He is sending Hamlet to England to be killed. " By letters congruing to that effect, The present death of Hamlet" (4.3.66-67).

In the play Hamlet, Claudius is known as the villain of the play. He is the lead antagonist who is characterized as a cunning, incestuous, and vile, usurper. Many readers and critics of the play do not dispute this perception, especially after reading how Claudius became the King of Denmark; He steals the throne by poisoning his brother, the previous king, and quickly marrying Queen Gertrude his widowed sister in law (1.5.42, 60-74). The general reading of Claudius’s character paints him to be a corrupt, cowardly politician, in addition to being Hamlet’s (the protagonist) foe. This portrait engages first-time readers to judge Claudius immediately and although this perspective of his personality is proven to be true, it is limited. Claudius

Hamlet's surrounding are increasingly affected by his flaw. Hamlet begins to forget all important obligations in his life and neglects his responsibilities, causing other problems. One very important commitment Hamlet has which he lets go is his relationship with Ophelia. Ophelia becomes very confused and hurt. Hamlet hurts her in a couple of ways. First, he neglects her, and second, he insults her. "Ha, ha! Are you honest??Are you fair??That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty. ?I loved you not? Get thee to a nunnery." Then Hamlet kills Polonius, Ophelia's father, which in turn makes her go mad and in her madness she commits suicide. Hamlet loses objectivity. He does not respect the King nor his mother's feelings. Hamlet meets with his mother and insults her. He calls her a whore and a sinner for marrying a murderer. Since he knows that the King is a murderer, he attempts

Shakespeare's drama Hamlet has become a central piece of literature of Western culture. It is the story of a prince named Hamlet, who lost his father. Soon after that he has to confront multiple obstacles and devises a series of situations to defend the new king's royalty. Furthermore, he had to prove that King Claudius, who was the prince's uncle, had killed Hamlet's father. This story has remained among the most popular and the most controversial plays around the world. It generates controversy for all the doubts that this play leaves with the readers. One of the most questioning situations in the play is the delay of Hamlet in avenging Claudius' for his father's death. As a reader this

The concept of poison is all around society: poisonous people, poisonous ideas, and poisonous environments; however, the poison in society cannot be avoided, it’s inevitable some would say. As Michael Uhl once put it “you’ve got to pick your poison”, and hope for the least of the evils, which unfortunately is not always the case. In Shakespeare 's Hamlet, the motif of poison functions to be the symbol of corruption throughout the play that highlights the theme of death, madness, and the power of language.

His use of poison shows that he is a coward because he uses it at a means to kill without having to confront his enemies. Additionally, the times that poison is used in the show represents something else. The use of poison at only the beginning and end of the play can be interpreted as a circle plot. When Claudius killed King Hamlet at the beginning of the show, he starts a new era in Denmark, and when Hamlet, Gertrude, and Claudius, and Laertes are all killed by poison at the end of the novel, creating another new era in

Two months have elapsed since Hamlet swore to avenge his father; but he has not yet moved “with wings as swift/as meditation or the thoughts of love”(I, v, 29-30). Hamlet is very emotional because Claudius is still alive. This emotional balance has become risky, is shown when he encounter’s with Ophelia. When Hamlet enter Ophelia closet while she is sewing. She is very frightened, and rushes to her father to tell him what happened. She says, “Lord Hamlet with his doublet all unbraced; no hat upon his head; his stockings foul’d, ungarter’d and down- gyved to his ancle; pale as his shirt; his knees knocking each other; and with a look so piteous in purport as if he had been loosed out to hell to speak of horrors, (II, i, 78-83). She describes Hamlet’s strange behavior to her father Polonius. Polonius begins to wonder that there may be an explanation to his strange behaviors, and this led Polonius to believe: “This is very ecstasy of love; whose violent property fordoes itself and leads the will to desperate undertakings, as oft as any passion under heaven that does afflict our natures” (II, i, 102-106). Polonius is certain that Hamlet is having these behaviors due to the fact that he loves Ophelia. This is due to the fact that Ophelia has followed her father’s instruction to stay away from Hamlet, causing him to be mad. Polonius hopes are strengthened when he reads the note that Hamlet has