The Ghost Of Hamlet By William Shakespeare

What is madness? Is someone considered mad or insane simply because they are different, and they, in turn, see the rest of the world as insane? William Shakespeare 's play Hamlet is about a complex protagonist, Hamlet, who plays the role of a tragic hero. He encounters several misfortunes from experiencing his beloved father’s death, witnessing his mother 's incestuous remarriage to his uncle, and seeing his father’s ghost. Due to all of this, Hamlet falls into a deep depression. Hamlet begins his journey by seeking revenge against Claudius after discovering that his noble father was murdered by his own uncle. Hamlet is a character whose actions and emotions may seem like one of an insane person, however, in the beginning of the play, it is clear that he decides to fake madness in order to gain an advantage over Claudius. This would aid in him in accomplishing his revenge. Hamlet is sane throughout the play: he only shows signs of insanity in front of certain people whom he does not trust. However, even they believe that his madness is not sheer madness but has a reason to it. Hamlet’s character is sane as in the play his rationality is shown through the logic and intelligence he uses in his plots. He usually calculates his movements and his impulsive acts are justified. While there are reasons to believe that many of the hardships could have driven Hamlet to the point of insanity, his display of intelligence and rational thinking throughout the play proves his sanity.

In this play “Hamlet” written by William Shakespeare, there are many soliloquies that are said by Hamlet to depict various meanings of his thoughts, feelings, and actions that are inside of him. More specifically the soliloquy in Act 3, Scene 1, in lines 57-91 starts off with the famous saying known as “To be, or not to be”. Throughout this soliloquy, Hamlet is asking himself the question of whether it is better to live or not to live. In life, we are faced with many situations where we feel the need to give up our life and not face the problems. Only by facing all the troubles, will a person become stronger and more courageous to handle anything in life. By believing in one’s self, can man have the courage to follow what they think is right. Killing yourself or giving up is never a solution in life. This soliloquy reveals Hamlet’s fearful personality by showing that his decision-making process is slow and that he fears risks or uncertainty. These character traits are depicted thoroughly by Hamlet throughout the play.

The male characters in Hamlet continually abuse both Ophelia and Gertrude, physically and psychologically, as a pathetic attempt to gain power and control over the situation. One of the greatest examples of psychological abuse comes from the harrowing scene where Hamlet and Ophelia have their final conversation before Hamlet leaves for England. During this rage-induced altercation, Hamlet refuses to accept Ophelia’s returning of the gifts previously given to her from him, saying “I never gave you aught” (3.1.97). Ophelia is appalled as Hamlet continues to insult her and laugh in her face. In the climax of the argument, Hamlet tells Ophelia that she “should not have believed me; for virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it: I loved you not” (3.1.117-119). The immense amount of psychological damage received by Ophelia between the addition and removal of love by Hamlet and her father’s death is enough to drive anyone to madness. David M. Smith recounts this as Hamlet’s necessity “to genuine outsideness because of the danger of being co-opted by love” (Smith, 1). However, Hamlet no longer needed to protect himself in his situation. His actions from this scene were not only uncalled for, but added to the slow mental demise of his sweet Ophelia. Hamlet’s next scene of abuse come shortly after this when he goes to speak to Gertrude about her participation in the murder of Old Hamlet. His rage, yet again, takes over, but this time he adopts physical abuse

A ghost is a spiritual being that is said to be a spirit of a deceased person. They are something that most people fear, don’t believe in, or think they are an evil being. Different religions have different views on ghosts and along with those views come different stories. One story that involves a ghost is Hamlet. Hamlet has recently lost his father and thinks he is being surrounded by his father’s ghost. However, Hamlet is at first unsure about the ghost’s state. He does not know if it is the devil or if it is actually his father’s spirit coming to tell him something. His decision could be based off of religion and what he believes. Protestants believe that all ghosts are evil and come in the form of the devil.

Almost every story involves a conflict between hero and villain. In some stories, there is a plot twist where the hero is also the villain—but in Hamlet, there are no heroes and many villains. In Hamlet, every character has lied, kept secrets or is seeking revenge that leads to a tragic ending at every corner, but what we fail to see is who the true villain is. Looking at the character of Hamlet throughout the play, it is easier to spot his many dishonorable actions than his few honorable ones.

The ghost reveals that King Hamlet was murdered by Claudius; Hamlet swears to avenge this deed. With the ghost’s exhortation, Hamlet ironically “is not to be allowed simply to endure a rotten world, he must also act in it” (Mack 258); the one who least wants to be part of the world must engross himself fully with the things of the world in order to validate the ghost’s accusation and then carry out his wish. In his essay, “Reforming the Role,” Mark Rose discusses the irony involved with the ghost’s appearance:

Hamlet, a play written by William Shakespeare, is all about revenge. All is not well in Denmark where a king is murdered and his son is out to avenge him. The only two females in the play, Gertrude and Ophelia, are completely overlooked. The two have little role in the story and are only present when talking to one of the men. Gertrude lost her first husband and quickly remarried to his brother, Claudius. Her son, Hamlet, greatly despises her for it. Ophelia believes that she and Hamlet are in love and she is the cause of his madness. None of the men pay much attention to them unless they are being scolded or used in a plan. Ophelia and Gertrude have many similarities like how they do as they are told and are victims of Hamlet’s madness, yet are different like how they love Hamlet and how they react to death of a loved one.

In the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, the character Hamlet must deal with both external and internal conflict. Hamlet encounters many struggles and has trouble finding a way to deal with them. With so many corrupt people in his life, Hamlet feels as if there is no one that he can trust and begins to isolate himself from others. A result from this isolation leads Hamlet to become melancholy. Hamlet struggles with suicidal thoughts, wants to kill King Claudius, and is distraught over his mother’s hasty marriage with his uncle Claudius.

In William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, King Hamlet is killed by Claudius, Prince Hamlet’s uncle. The late king returns as what is suspected to be a ghost or spirit and gives Prince Hamlet orders to seek revenge on Claudius and murder him. This causes Hamlet to intensely consider whether honor or logic is more important. Although Shakespeare only directly refers to one ghost, there are many more ghosts behind the scenes. In the tragedy by Shakespeare, Hamlet as well as all the characters have their own underlying ghosts and subconsciouses of anxiety, insanity, and dependency that result in death.

During the time of Shakespeare, women had a limited role within society. Even though a female monarch ruled England, women had no control over their own lives, and females were completely dominated by a patriarchal society. Ophelia’s role in Hamlet, written by Shakespeare in 1603 was a perfect example of a female who, despite her own feelings and desires, had to adhere to society’s construction of a submissive female. Her love for Hamlet ultimately was the reason for her destruction, because it caused her to become a pawn for her father, Polonius, and her love interest, Hamlet. Since Ophelia’s role was as a pawn, she constantly received mixed messages from her father, who was the man who controlled her entire life, as well as from the man she loved, Hamlet. The burden of double messages she received from the men in the play, lead her to question the duplicity of love, man, and society, and ultimately culminated in her madness and death; through her madness she was finally able to express how she felt because she was no longer required to behave in a way that was deemed acceptable by society, but because she rejected society’s rules, she had to come to a tragic end.

The play Hamlet, written by William Shakespeare, is set in an anti-feminist era. Women traditionally have been seen inferior to men. This was an intellectual as well as a physical issue. Women were to raise a family, cook, clean, be pretty and not be smarter than any man. The main characters Ophelia and Gertrude are both depicted with these characteristics as powerless and frail people. This illustration of helpless women affects one's understanding of what their true selves could be.

William Shakespeare’s ravishing play Hamlet was performed at the Elgin and Winter Garden Theatre on November 18th, 2014. To recap what went on in the play: Claudius had killed Hamlet’s father, the King of Denmark. Hamlet’s mother Gertrude then married Claudius two months after the death of her husband’s murder, but she did not know. The guards of the castle saw the ghost of Hamlet’s father. Hamlet was told by his father’s ghost that he was killed by Claudius, and that is when Hamlet lost it. The King and Queen thought that Hamlet went crazy because of his love for Ophelia. They tested his opinion of her by putting them in a room together. After he was mean to her, Claudius, his uncle knows the only reason Hamlet could be mad was because he knew Claudius killed his father. Ophelia on the other hand went crazy and ended up drowning herself because Hamlet said he didn’t love her. Her brother Laertes blamed Hamlet for Ophelia’s death and challenged him to a duel. At the fight, Claudius planted poison in a glass of wine and on the tip of the swords because he wanted to kill Hamlet. Gertrude, the Queen, drank the wine by mistake and died. Hamlet and Laertes both stabbed one another with the poisoned swords and both died, but before dying, Hamlet killed the king.

Shakespeare writes in a way that is difficult to understand for anyone that speaks the modern language. His story Hamlet is understood through the emotions felt by his characters. Hamlet is the main character who is conflicted with revenge and conspiring friendships. Hamlet returns home from Germany for his father’s funeral only to find far more troubling things. Hamlet is a conflicted character but that doesn’t stop him from knowing what he wants. Revenge is the main cause of his confliction but with great reason, which is important to understand about this play because it helps explain all the betrayal and tragedy.

The play Hamlet is a fable of how the ghost of a slain king comes to haunt the living with disastrous consequences. A rancorous ghost and a brother 's murder, lead the gloomy setting of Hamlet 's Denmark. Hamlet story opens with an encounter between young Hamlet, his dad 's ghost as well as the prince of Denmark. The ghost reveals to Hamlet that its murderer was his brother Claudius, who then rapidly wedded his widowed queen, Gertrude. As a result, the ghost presses Hamlet to seek vengeance on the man who stole his throne as well as his queen to which Hamlet consents.

This story begins on a cold night in Denmark Elsinore Castle when Hamlet’s trusted friend Horatio, and some guards see a ghost, the ghost of King Hamlet to be exact. The philosophical and complicated yet socially popular young Prince of Denmark, Hamlet, is busy fuming at his uncle Claudius who married his mom two days after his father's death. Hamlet suspects that they conspired to kill his father, and he even contemplates suicide. His hopes are lifted when he hears about the ghost.