Hamlet Drama Exam
1)Shakespeare’s revenge tragedy, “Hamlet,” critiques the society of Denmark using powerful mononlogues and dramatic action. On the other hand, Wilde’s comic drama pokes fun at the high morality of Victorian Society. One serious theme that I noticed in “The Importance of being Ernest” was the consistent act of deception throughout the entire play. However this lack of honesty was not lonesome for insightful comedy and a visible foreshadowing of upcoming events accompanied it. Meaning that the play was cleverly written with humor and provided us with an obvious chain of facts that would lead up to us unraveling the end of the play. This play critiques the need to lie or exaggerate the truth, in order to “fit in”
…show more content…
This he does by killing Claudius at the end of the play. However it is clear that the theme of vengeance is merely a vehicle used by Shakespeare in order to articulate a whole series of themes central to humanity:
 relationships between father and son, mother and son, and Hamlet and his friends
 love relationships
 power wielding
 madness, feigned madness, dissembling
All these themes, as well as others, are found in Hamlet. However, it is important to remember that Hamlet himself is at the centre of everything, and it is on him that all the great themes are focused. There is no other character in literature so rich, so complex, so enigmatic, at once so opaque and transparent.
3) In plays, characters are developed, in part, by mononlogues, dialogues, and actions. However, characters are also developed be choices made by directors, actors, and set designers. These elements all play into the way that we, as an audience perceive the characters, and the play as a whole. Of course, Shakespeare can live or die on the strength of the cast. Mel Gibson, in the lead, was a very pleasant surprise. I don't mean to put down Gibson with this, as he has been excellent elsewhere before. Yet I was still caught unawares by the strength of his work here: he gives a very empathetic performance that remains coherent despite the Prince's erratic and inscrutable behaviour. Alan Bates and Ian Holm (as
Hamlet: one of the most analyzed tragic heroes in all of literature. Hamlet, the main character in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, is conflicted throughout the whole play. He obsesses over avenging his father’s death, and this leads to rash, irresponsible actions that cause others to suffer, as well. He plans to kill Claudius, his uncle, for murdering his father and then marrying his mother. In an act of outrage, Hamlet unknowingly kills Polonius, the King’s assistant, instead. This creates even more problems because now someone else’s father is dead. Hamlet is somewhat of an inconsistent character; he’s different almost every time we see him. Hamlet displays characteristics of depression, irony, timidity, and being hurt.
The tragedy of Hamlet by William Shakespeare brilliantly recounts the tale of feigned and true madness as it delves into themes of betrayal, incest, revenge, moral corruption, and death. The play, set in the kingdom of Denmark, gives an account of how Prince Hamlet seeks exact revenge on his uncle Claudius, for murdering his own brother and Prince Hamlet’s father. After assassinating King Hamlet, Claudius succeeds the throne and becomes joined in holy matrimony to King Hamlet’s widow and Prince Hamlet’s mother, Queen
How does the use of comic relief best contrast the tragedy of Hamlet? In great works of literature a comic relief is used as contrast to a serious scene to intensify the overall tragic nature of the play or to relieve tension. As illustrated in Shakespeare’s tragedy Hamlet, intense scenes are joined with character’s banter and vacuous actions as to add a comic relief. In Hamlet, Polonius acts as a comic relief by his dull and windy personality, Hamlet uses his intelligence and his negativity toward the king and queen to create humor, while on the other hand Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are a comic relief by their senseless actions and naïve natures. Polonius, Hamlet, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are all used as a comic relief to
Hamlet decides to get more information / prove what the ghost was saying before doing
Hamlet’s personality is especially contrasted by three other main male figures of the play being
Hamlet fascinates many readers and the first thing to point out about him is that he is mysterious. Shakespeare's work demonstrates Hamlet's dilemma as the role of revenger showing a man of thought forced to be a man of action. Hamlet is extremely philosophical and introspective. He is particularly drawn to difficult questions or questions that cannot be answered with any certainty. Faced with evidence that his uncle murdered his father, Hamlet becomes obsessed with proving his uncle's guilt before trying to act. He is equally overwhelmed with questions about the afterlife, about the wisdom of suicide, and about what happens to bodies after they die.
When you think of William Shakespeare, Hamlet is the first thing most people think of, as his work. Hamlet is also a classic example of a tragedy. In all tragedies the hero suffers, and usually dies at the end. All good pieces of literature written way back when, are usually tragedies.
The definition of philosophical, existentialist, point of view “is a specified or stated manner of consideration, an attitude how one sees or thinks of something, as in "from my personal point of view" philosophy, a point of view is a specified or stated manner of consideration, an attitude how one sees or thinks of something, as in "from my personal point of view"” “Point of View (Philosophy).” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 2 Dec. 2017. Hamlet is the focused topic on this point of view due to his actions. Instead of immediately killing or accusing the king, Claudius, he designs a play to bring out guilt of the murder. He needs probable cause to be able to take action in revenge of his father's murder.
What is Hamlet about? Maybe a summary of the plot could answer this question but it wouldn’t do it justice. However it’s impossible to narrow down any of William Shakespeare’s work to one theme. The fact is, that all of Shakespeare’s plays are about many things. There are many ways to look at a Shakespearean play, and none are wrong of course, but it is not entirely true to say that one theme is the most important. Some of the more common and dominate themes that can be found in any of Shakespeare’s works are: conflict, appearance and reality, order and disorder, and change.
Hamlet is one of the most well-known and renown plays in the history of theatrics. It’s known for its ethical issues, gender discrimination and many other themes throughout the play. In fact it’s filled with themes such as Morality, Revenge, Deceit, and Family. Hamlet is such a great play because of how its many themes are intricately woven into the plot creating a fabulous storyline filled with tragedy.
as these lines relate back to the development of Ophelia’s character, as well as play an important role in the plot of the play, and a major conflict that is portrayed.
will.” ( III I, 179-181) The fear of what will happen after death deters him.
A lot about a character shows when that character steps back and says what they are thinking aloud. This is the case for Prince Hamlet. William Shakespeare’s play “Hamlet” features Prince Hamlet, who is depressed about his father’s death and his mother remarrying so soon. Hamlet is visited by the ghost of his father and is ordered to get revenge for his father’s death. Hamlet devotes himself to the task, but because of his nature,he enters deep melancholy and even apparent madness. Throughout the play, Hamlet can be seen being very noble but indecisive at the same time. Hamlet’s soliloquies reveal a lot about his character. However, they mainly show the readers how he can be noble but is indecisive. He can also be viewed as someone in a deep state of depression. These values are shown through his actions of insulting himself for not acting upon what he believes in and continuously reassuring himself that what he does is correct, as well as his word choice and feelings that are expressed out loud to himself during the seven soliloquies.
“To be, or not to be: That is the question”(3.1.58). This is probably the most famous quote in all of Shakespearean literature and was uttered by the main character, Hamlet, of the play “Hamlet” written by Shakespeare. It demonstrates his instability and suicidal thoughts. Throughout the play he comes off as a very unpredictable and complex character. He makes many rash decisions, but at the same time often takes a lot of time to contemplate many of his choices. Through Hamlet’s language and voice, we can examine what type of character Shakespeare created. Hamlet acts differently towards people in contrast to his actual thoughts, which are projected through his soliloquies. Due to the insanity
It would be hard to argue the fact that William Shakespeare is one of the greatest contributors to modern English as we know it, his plays and sonnets have been turned into movies, books, and music as well as translated into virtually every language. With that being said, one of his most famous plays is Hamlet. Many movies were based off of this play and a very popular one is Hamlet directed by Franco Zeffirelli. This drama film was produced on December 19th, 1990 and was around 134 minutes long. This movie based off of Shakespeare’s most famous work was a hit, raking in approximately $20.7 million in the box office. Zeffirelli’s motive in making the movie was to make Shakespeare available and interesting to younger viewers. Franco Zeffirelli was successful in recreating the play Hamlet, as the movie added extreme depth to the play making it appealing to all viewers.