Hamlet Character Analysis

Hamlet and Laertes both contribute to the play main theme, revenge. Both characters dearly loved their fathers, thats the reason for revenge. But, their love has been distorted and all they feel now is a need for revenge for their fathers’ deaths. But they cope with it differently. Hamlet knows who killed his father, but does not take immediate action. Laertes is a little unclear on who is responsible for his fathers death, but he takes immediate action to avenge him. "To hell, allegiance! vows, to the blackest devil! Conscience and grace, to the profoundest pit! I dare damnation: to this point I stand, that both worlds I give to negligence, let come what comes; only I'll be revenged most thoroughly for my father." Laertes Act 4 Scene 5.

Many Shakespearean plays reflect views of the time in which they were written. They convey this through common themes. These themes often define a character's specific personality and characteristics. In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Laertes serves as a foil for Hamlet in which their contrast presents pivotal themes that reveal Hamlet’s character. While the play has many themes, morality, revenge, and honor specifically relate to the contrast between Laertes and Hamlet, consequently resulting in Laertes purpose as a foil for Hamlet.

2always has to make sure he thinks things over before he does anything. Laertes wants to get back at Hamlet for killing his father. “How came he dead? I'll not be juggled with. To hell, allegiance! Vows, to the blackest devil! Conscience and grace, to the profoundest pit! I dare damnation. To this point I stand. That both the worlds I give to negligence. Let come what comes, only I'll be revenged. Most thoroughly for my father”. Act 4 Scene 5. Laertes tires to figure out what happened and how it happened, he is trying to figure out why he was killed and by who. He wants his father to have a proper burial, but he can not find the body because Hamlet hid it in another room. Hamlet and Laertes is so different in so many ways. Hamlet wanted to talk things out and make everyone happy at the end.

Laertes loses his family because of Hamlet’s actions. His father is killed by him and his sister kills herself because of her grief. Laertes and King Claudius begin to plot Hamlet’s murder, planning to poison him, by drink or wound, whichever comes first. However, the plan backfires on the both of them and Laertes dies from his own blade, but not before saying “The King, the King’s to blame.”

The final way that Laertes acts as a foil to Hamlet occurs once again when Claudius and Laertes are discussing Laertes’ actions to achieve his vengeance. Claudius gives Laertes advice saying, “That we would do/ we should do when we would; for this ‘would’/ changes” (4.7.134-136). Claudius is warning Laertes that if he waits long enough, he will probably end up not doing anything at all and will not achieve his goal of vengeance. This quote spoken by Claudius is quite similar to when King Hamlet’s ghost meets with Hamlet earlier in the play to warn him about how he was killed by Claudius and that he must get revenge. King Hamlet’s ghost also warns Hamlet saying, “Taint not thy mind” (1.5.92), telling him to not over think his plan because otherwise he will not pursue his vengeance. After Claudius warns Laertes to not get side tracked, the audience is reminded of King Hamlet’s ghost telling Hamlet to not over think because then their plans will not be pursued. This scene acts as a foil towards Hamlet because soon after the conversation, Laertes does pursue his plan of seeking vengeance, whereas Hamlet has been working on his plan the whole play, and has still not started to execute it.

In modern society humans stand up and fight for what they think is right and fair. Human beings have the desire to avenge what they think is wrong. The theme of revenge has a major effect in the play Hamlet and is a constant throughout the play, it underlies almost every scene. In the play Hamlet, William Shakespeare examines the theme of revenge through the erratic thoughts and actions of the characters Hamlet, Laertes, and Fortinbras. The main revenge plots in the play is Hamlet’s aim to avenge his father, Hamlet Sr, Laertes’ aim to avenge the murder of his father, Polonius, and Fortinbras’ aim to avenge the death of his father, Fortinbras. Having lost their fathers, Hamlet, Laertes and Fortinbras take vengeance on the people that killed them. These plots play a major role in the play presenting the theme of revenge to the audience.

In “Hamlet” however, this clear symmetry is replaced with a more muddled intertwinement. Rather than maintaining two relatively separate plot threads in the journeys of Lear and Gloucester, Shakespeare opts to interweave the motivations and fates of Laertes and Hamlet, using their conflict as the central dynamic, while their parallels take a reduced role. In this sense, while King Lear is driven solely by the dualism of the story, Hamlet relies on the clash of the two plots to suggest injustice. This injustice, through conflict, is shown most prominently in Hamlet’s and Laertes’ duel at the end of the play. Hamlet, describing Laertes as a “a very noble youth.” (5.1.231), reveals a respect towards his foe that suggests that it is circumstance, not choice, that forces his hand. Similarly, Laertes’ singular goal, “To this point I stand, that both the worlds I give to negligence, let come what comes, only I’ll be revenged most thoroughly for my father.” (4.5.151-154) shows that his wrath is fueled solely by duty, such that his pursuit of revenge imparts upon him a single-minded myopia that drives him inexorably towards the final conflict. Ironically, upon meeting Claudius after hearing of his father’s death, Laertes asks “How came he

This interaction alone sets in place the course of events which would lead to revenge being a method of downfall to prince Hamlet and Laertes for seeking and attaining revenge for their father’s deaths.

While Laertes is an individual who demands revenge immediately, Hamlet on the other hand is a prince with morals. In Act 5 scene 2, lines 81-84, “ That to Laertes I forgot myself, / For by the image of my cause I see / The portraiture of his. I’ll court his favors. / But sure the bravery of his grief did put me / into a towering passion.” This quotation explains how Hamlet comes to a realization that he feels sorry for the way he acted because they both are in the same scenario. But unlike Hamlet, Laertes accepts the frustration to build up which causes him to have a bigger urge to avenge his father's

Both Laertes and Hamlet experience similar events in their lives. Both men lose their father to murder. Both men know who murdered their father, and both men desire revenge. Laertes exclaims that he will “be revenged / Most throughly for [his] father.” (4.5.153-154).

The reflections of each character demonstrate the contrasting ideas of sanity and the corruption of minds. Hamlet appeared to be a more dubious and introspective main character while Laertes was thought out to be an agile and confrontational foil character. The disparity between Hamlet’s thought processes when coping with news of his father’s murderer and Laertes’ discovery of his father’s death

Hamlet vs. Laertes: A Powerful Revenge Duo Hamlet, a revenge tragedy from the Elizabethan age, can be identified as a plot involving many revengeful individuals. The two main characters that will be put on display, are Hamlet and Laertes. Both of these men had reasons to seek revenge in this play, because of the misfortunes both of their fathers had experienced. Hamlet's father had been killed by King Claudius before his ascension to the throne, while Laertes' father had been killed by Hamlet for spying on him under the command of King Claudius. These two young men seeked the same kind of revenge, but went about avenging it in two completely different ways.

The reaction Hamlet and Laertes had from the killing/murder of their fathers differed from one another, but were both executed in a reprehensible matter. Hamlet is a young man who decides to take his time getting answers about his fathers death before acting upon it, but his time spent searching may have lead to his downfall, and more importantly, his death. Laertes is an impulsive, spontaneous young man whose decision to quickly act upon the realization of his fathers murder in addition to other poor choices, may have contributed to his major downfall as well, therefore making it a wrong choice.

Laertes serves a foil to Hamlet, although they are not similar in birth, they are similar in that they both have a dear father murdered. Using this parallel, Shakespeare uses Laertes to show what Hamlet should be doing, contrasting Laertes’s words of action to Hamlet’s own words of action. We see this most clearly when Laertes is talking with Claudius and he says that he will “cut [Hamlet’s] throat i' th' church” to avenge his father, this contrasts directly with Hamlet who decides not to kill a praying Claudius when he has the chance (4.7.144). Laertes also serves as external conflict as he challenges Hamlet to a fight and is convinced by Claudius to kill Hamlet with a poisoned sword. Without this fight, who knows if Hamlet would have gotten around to kill Claudius? But when we really look at Laertes’ words and consequent action, we see another similarity with Hamlet, both are rash and passionate. This is significant because

Within the play Hamlet, Shakespeare utilizes Hamlet’s foil, Laertes, by comparing him to Hamlet in multiple aspects of their plans for revenge, to develop the theme of righteous revenge versus personal revenge. Shakespeare begins with contrasting their ideology about their deed by giving Hamlet a positive and righteous mindset about his future task while Laertes has a personal and rash mindset.