Hamlet Soliloquy Rhetorical Devices

Shakespeare's Hamlet is the home of Hamlet’s “to be or not to be” soliloquy. In this soliloquy Hamlet is pondering whether it is better to be or not to be- to be alive or to be dead. In Hamlet’s eyes he has no power while alive- he is at the mercy of all the misfortune life brings. Alternatively death is something to be desired- it is escape from everything life throws his way. Death comes in the form of sleep. Hamlet comes to the conclusion that life is a passive, powerless state, compared to death which he believes is an empowering, and active state that he averts due to the unknown.

In Hamlet’s soliloquy in act IV scene iv, he brings up the question of “what is a man?” Hamlet does this while looking upon the over powering army that is lead by Fortinbras. His army was passing through Denmark to fight over an insignificant piece of land in Poland. Hamlet then thinks about his lack of action with his mission to kill Claudius. While he is seeing this massive army marching, going to war over something so insignificant he realizes that he must try to make his “thoughts bloody” (4.4.64). In this soliloquy, we learn that through Hamlet’s inaction he sees himself no better than a beastly animal where he should see himself as a man that takes action into his own hands which, makes him as the same level as the gods.

In Hamlet's third soliloquy, many of his personal thoughts are expressed, while allowing the audience to have more insight into his spinning mind. Hamlet contrasts his character with the player who reads the lines about Hecuba. He appreciates the emotion and grief the player displayed. Hamlet is overwhelmed with his thoughts and feelings during this soliloquy and has many internal struggles with himself. He feels he is a coward and with the information he has been given about his father, he needs to act. Hamlet feels he needs to act like the man his father taught him to be. Furthermore, as the audience we are able to see the dramatic purpose behind this soliloquy. Hamlet’s character is further developed through his deep words, and we are able to hear about what’s to come in the play. Lastly,

Hamlet is dissatisfied with his inability to kill Claudius, thus allowing him time to rewrite his wrongs. Unable to muster up the courage to carry out his envisions of murdering Claudius, Hamlet calls himself “a dull and muddy-mettled rascal” (2.2.526) that is “unpregnant of [his] cause”. (2.2.527) In both the soliloquies Hamlet stands around dreaming of completing the act, but pushes aside his outraged feelings toward Claudius. Hamlet is mad at himself as he pretends he is unaware of the treason. The soliloquy “what is a man” starts out with “how all occasions do inform against me, and spur my dull revenge!” (4.4.31-32) By “spur my dull revenge” Hamlet is stalling and much like a dull revenge a dull knife would do little to help achieve a stout revenge. This soliloquy also ties in with the

In Shakespeare’s “How all occasions do inform against me” soliloquy, Hamlet contemplates how his actions measure up to his thoughts after seeing Fortinbras army near Elsinore. Fortinbras acts quickly, pondering the consequences of his actions much less than Hamlet who tends to think but not act. Hamlet comes to the realization that his thoughts are worthless without the actions to back them and sitting around thinking about what could be is a waste of time when he could be avenging his father.

In the play, Hamlet (1603), William Shakespeare creates a character, Hamlet, that feels overwhelmed by the weight he puts on himself while seeking vengeance for his father’s murder. Shakespeare is able to illustrate Hamlet’s fragileness through the use of vivid imagery, negative attitude, and aggressive diction. Shakespeare’s purpose in this piece is to show Hamlet during his lowest time in order to reveal a significant portion of his character.

Throughout the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, many of the most impactful scenes are portrayed in the form of soliloquies. A number of these soliloquies give great insight into the minds of different characters. Hamlet's soliloquy in Act 3, Scene 3, is one of the most important soliloquies in the play because it takes place just before the actual climax and reveals a lot about both Hamlet and Claudius’s mental states. These revelations act as great build up for what is to come later in the play.

When analyzing Shakespeare's Hamlet through the deconstructionist lens various elements of the play come into sharper focus. Hamlet's beliefs about himself and his crisis over indecision are expounded upon by the binary oppositions created in his soliloquies.

Hamlet essentially feels betrayed because his mother is now with a subordinate man. Hamlet not only thinks she married someone of lesser worth, but he thinks she herself is of lesser worth now too because, according to Hamlet’s mentality, since she is no longer with a virtuous husband, she too is no longer virtuous. Hamlet doesn’t understand how Gertrude could ruin the consecrated bond she shared with the late king; he rhetorically asks her who could have possibly tricked her. Hamlet would have never thought that Gertrude would consider marrying Claudius because her late husband was, according to him, much better in many aspects. Hamlet questions his mother and the decision she makes because he can’t accept or even comprehend that his mother

Coming immediately after the meeting with the Ghost of Hamlet’s father, Shakespeare uses his second soliloquy to present Hamlet’s initial responses to his new role of revenger. Shakespeare is not hesitant in foreboding the religious and metaphysical implications of this role, something widely explored in Elizabethan revenge tragedy, doing so in the first lines as Hamlet makes an invocation to ‘all you host of heaven’ and ‘earth’. Hamlet is shown to impulsively rationalize the ethical issues behind his task as he views it as a divine ordinance of justice, his fatalistic view reiterated at the end of scene 5 with the rhyming couplet ‘O cursed spite,/That ever I was born to set it right’. These ideas are

Hamlet, one of Shakespeare’s tragic plays, portrays the story of a young man’s quest to avenge his murdered father and his quest to find his true identity. In his soliloquies, Prince Hamlet reveals to the readers his personal perceptions of the events that take place in his homeland, Denmark, and of which are either indirectly or directly tied to his father’s murder. Many critics and scholars agree that while Hamlet’s soliloquies reveal the search of his identity and true character, his soliloquies universally illustrate man’s search for his true identity.

I Hamlet's second soliloquy, we face a determined Hamlet who is craving revenge for his father. “Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat/ In this distracted globe. Remember thee!” Hamlet feels sorry for his father who was unable to repent of his sins and is therefore condemned to a time in purgatory. He promises his father that in spite of his mental state (he is distracted, confused and shocked) he will avenge his death. He holds him in the highest regards because he sees his father as a role model. “Yea, from the table of my memory/ I’ll wipe away all trivial fond records,”. He’ll erase all prior Knowledge and experience and leave only his father’s “commandment”. He will engrave it in the front of his mind to show his

allow anyone to act in this way. It is God who rules the universe and

In hamlet soliloquies he often talks about whether or not he should kill Claudius and get often stuck in an indecisive argument with himself.

Over the years, many different directors have tackled the action packed film Hamlet, each adding their own special twists to the story line. Most importantly, the famous To be or not to be soliloquy. Throughout this scene, Hamlet is struggling with the idea of suicide and is contemplating if life is worth all the pain he has been facing and is working up the courage to avenge his father's unkindly death. Of the three versions studied, Kenneth Branagh’s was superior in expressing the overall intentions of this soliloquy.