Social Norms In Hamlet

   When reading Shakespeare's Hamlet, one becomes involved with a number of relationships involving Hamlet (the tragic protagonist) and the main characters supporting the play. The characters involved include, but are not limited to, Hamlet (the ghost), former King of Denmark and deceased father to the protagonist; Horatio, friend to Hamlet; Gertrude, Queen of Denmark and mother to Hamlet; and Ophelia, daughter of Polonius and romantic interest to Hamlet. Although all of the relationships are complex, encompassing a wide range of varying emotions as the plot advances, there is a recurring theme of love threaded throughout the play. This theme of love takes on a number of faces which we may observe through the

Hamlet is very private with his grief. His mourning for his father is long and drawn out. He mulls over how he is going to act and defers action until a perfect moment.

This shows that he is exploring the possibility that he may also be killed in his search for revenge. It almost sounds as if he is foreshadowing his own death because he says that ending the “heartache” is something he desires. Therefore, Hamlet seriously questions whether he should remain loyal to his father, because he takes

In William Shakespeare’s tragedy Hamlet, death is an essential motif in the play. By Hamlet grieving the loss of his noble father, King Hamlet, Hamlet throughout the play seeks to find meaning, in what he now perceives to be, a meaningless world. After the death of Hamlet’s father, Hamlet is revisited by his father’s spirit who has now become a ghost seeking vengeance. The ghost narrates the account of his death to Hamlet and informs him that he was heinously murdered by his brother, Claudius, in which “the serpent that did sting thy father’s life now wears his crown” (1.5.46-47) and has robbed him of his life, crown, and queen. Throughout the play, one can see the role that death plays in shaping Hamlet’s life in which it results in Hamlet contemplating his existence, finding the purpose in his life, and results in him having a discontentedness attitude towards which only be fulfilled by avenging his father’s death.

Hamlet is arguably one of the greatest dramatic characters to be created. As he learns of his father’s death, he starts to over analyze ever little detail causing him to create scenarios in his mind that give me anxiety. His mother notices his anger, but Hamlet makes it known that the distress he is feeling over-powers his actions. He says, “Together with all the forms, moods, shapes of grief… for they are the actions that a man might play; but I have that within which passes show, these but the trappings and the suits of woe” (ACT I, ii). He is angry at his mother because she remarried that same man that killed his father. Hamlet starts to see his father’s ghost and she cannot. She then starts to tell Hamlet how he has offended his father, as in Claudius. When Hamlet is defending

The role of women has varied depending on the time period. In the Roman times, women were valuable members of society, owning land and taking care of the finances. The 1950’s brought about the concept of the domestic “housewife.” Each of these ideas is drastically different, but there are still similarities despite the differences of societal norms. Throughout the texts of Beowulf and Hamlet, the roles of their women vary depending on each character, and the time period. The main females in Hamlet and Beowulf are different in their own ways, yet similar in terms of responsibilities and character development throughout the course of each text.

Progressing through the play, Hamlet continually experiences existential thoughts, as Hamlet’s logic and sanity slowly unravel scene by scene, revealing snippets of Hamlet’s emotion and feeling. As Hamlet’s thoughts actions become increasingly erratic and his inability to cope with his father’s death worsen, Hamlet dives deeper into the realm of existentialism. As he is continually provoked by others telling him to cope with his father’s death, he utters, “Now I am alone. O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I! (2.2. 48).” Hamlet reaches his pinnacle of despondency; he begins to lose hope. As Hamlet delves deeper into the story of his father’s murder and the correlation of Claudius and the murder, his actions become more wild. Contemplating death and the immorality of the world, Hamlet then utters his famous speech “To bee or not to be… To die to sleep… That makes calamity of so

After the death of Hamlet's father Hamlet is obsessed with the idea of death. He ponders both the spiritual aftermath of death, embodied in the ghost, and the physical remainders of the dead, such as by Yorick’s skull and the decaying corpses in the cemetery. The question of his own death plagues Hamlet as well, as he repeatedly contemplates whether or not suicide is a morally legitimate action in an unbearably painful world.

It is clear that the death of his father and his mother 's remarriage has taken an enormous mental toll on him and that he desires death to free himself of the burden laid upon him by the ghost. He romanticizes it, saying that suicide is the brave and courageous option akin to “[taking] arms” against troubles. However, he can’t commit to the idea of death, saying “To sleep, perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub / For in that sleep of death what dreams may come” (III, i, 66-67). He craves death, which would allow him to escape all the “natural shock / that flesh is heir to” (III, i, 63-64) but the more he ponders it, the further he is from reaching a decision. Ironically, the argument within his mind about how he should free himself of the ghostly burden — murder, or death — is impeding him from carrying out any action on it. At the end of his most famous soliloquy, Hamlet hasn’t made any decisive choice and therefore is in limbo regarding death due to his overarching rationale. His inaction proves “[his] endless reasoning and hesitation and the way in which the energy of his resolutions evaporates in self-reproaches” (Morgan 259). Moreover, Hamlet tackles the decision of interpreting what is real and what is false when he questions the ghost’s true nature. At first, Hamlet is certain

Taboos have long been placed by customs in our society that we believe certain things should be forbidden. Throughout the play Hamlet, Shakespeare targeted topics and situations that would otherwise violate the social norms of our present day thinking. As we follow Hamlet through his journey, he becomes angered by his mother’s decision to marry his uncle after his father’s death. Hamlet cannot come to terms with the fact that his mother committed incest and is hence driven to anger as he loses faith in the concept of loving someone. The depiction of Ophelia’s virginity is also demonstrated to be a taboo in society as women who aren’t married must be virgins to be wholesome and feminine.

Hamlet can not let go of the fact that his father is dead, as he still yearns for him. However, Hamlet is able to meet with the ghost of his father, where the ghost tells he died via a “murder most

The Ghost’s appearance troubles Hamlet again in a different way at the end of Act Two, when Hamlet questions whether or not the apparition he has seen is really the ghost of his father. He believes that it is likely that what he saw was really an evil spirit trying to trick him into sinning, for, as he says, “the devil hath power / T’assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps…abuses me to damn me” (2.2.628-32). His concern is legitimate; however, it causes him to delay further due to his worries about sin and what could happen to him should he decide to take action if the Ghost is in fact evil. When Hamlet attempts to work himself into a frenzy by insulting himself and climactically cursing Claudius with caustic epithets, he is incapable of maintaining his emotion and he orders his brains to turn about, bringing himself back down to logic and reason. He feels that he cannot act without some sort of proof of the truth of what the Ghost has said, and therefore he arranges to “catch the conscience

On William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, after the assassination of his father, Hamlet thinks he is living in a world full of corruption and deceit, where everything is falling apart and everyone is against him. An imminent, exaggerated, and passionate love for his mother is his main feature. Although others argue that Hamlet’s obsession to murder Claudius is strictly to claim revenge for his father’s death, it is Hamlet’s obsessive desire to possess his mother in an unhealthy and, perhaps incestuous, relationship. Hamlet also appears jealous of Claudius, his father-uncle, jealous of him for having Gertrude and for owning the crown. He lives a love-hate relationship with his mother. He is full of anger towards her, but at the same time he

A maternal and paternal relationship can create some of the strongests bonds that may even be called friendship. In “Hamlet” it is revealed that he was close to both his father and mother, but after her marriage to Claudius, Hamlet begins to feel bitter and displays animosity to his mother. Because of their close relationship, Hamlet feels betrayed and views her mother as a whore for remarrying so quickly. This hatred towards his mother is displayed because he once looked up towards his mother and see the remarriage as an act of betrayal. In Hamlet’s point of view, his world is corrupted and Gertrude is the centre of it.

Hamlet recognizes that suicide is a sin in the eyes of God, so consequently wishes that he could simply cease to exist. In doubting that life is worth all the hardships one must face, Hamlet briefly relishes in the concept of death, equating it to nothing more than a sleep wherein one can be rid of the “heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks” of physical life (III.i.70). Though immediately thereafter Hamlet acknowledges the startling unknown, and the fact that one does not know what comes after death. Hamlet feels a great deal of uncertainty, which surely enhances his overall frustration. Herein lies Hamlet’s reservations in regards to committing suicide: it is a sin, and the afterlife may prove to be more unpleasant than life itself.