The Tragedy Of Hamlet By William Shakespeare

     Hamlet, by William Shakespeare, is a complex play, filled with layers of meaning. These are often revealed through the madness of the characters and the theme of madness throughout the play. Although Hamlet and Ophelia are the only characters thought to be so afflicted, the reactions of other characters to this madness mirrors their own preoccupations.

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

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.

Every play has its own psychology and every author is a psychologist. Like many other plays, Hamlet is a very complex one. It includes various families and portrays their problems to one another. Some of these families with problems are: Hamlet and Claudius, Ophelia and Hamlet and Laertes and Hamlet. I am mentioning Hamlet in all of them, because Hamlet is the source of all the troubles that those families encounter. The problems the characters encounter can be real and the solutions are not practical but yet, many people in the world we live in today will go to extremes just to solve a problem One example of a problem which we can see many of times and is really common is the death of loved one, this tragic event can lead us to depression, and if it was murder, it can lead to revenge and madness which is the same thing that happened to Hamlet, or to Ophelia which caused her to suicide. Some psychologists such as Alfred Adler, Sigmund Freud and Elisabeth Kübler Ross have tried finding ways to understand the human mind in the way of pleasure, pain, and many other emotions. These psychologist have developed many tools for literary critics to use and try to get in the head of patients, but in my case I will use their theories which I have studied carefully to explain them, and then be able to apply them successfully to the work of Hamlet.

The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark is one of Shakespeare’s most tragic plays. Most of the characters in this play suffered a heartbreaking death, although, all of the characters faced anger, regret, madness or distress. Madness was a reoccurring theme in this play, two characters portrayed this more than others. Ophelia and Hamlet faced similar fates, with similarities and differences along the way, all to do with their madness.

In William Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, the protagonist suffers from struggles with major characters, especially with the women in his life. While reading the play Hamlet, Hamlet appears to be a disillusioned man. Throughout the play, Shakespeare has only casted two females: Gertrude and Ophelia. Gertrude is defined to be incestuous, naïve and cold-hearted. On the other side, Ophelia is characterized to be ignorant, innocent and fearful. After the quick marriage of his mother and evil uncle, Hamlet’s views on women has completely changed and he begins to define all women to be weak yet manipulative. During the play, we see that Gertrude places a significant influence on Hamlet and his understandings. We can see that as the audience, Hamlet has a hatred for women. Shakespeare often reflects the English Renaissance stereotypes of women and their various roles and responsibilities in society. His understandings on how women were treated and considered during the Elizabethan era (Jane Dall, 2000) are combined through the eyes of Hamlet, nonetheless opposite views are created by Gertrude and Ophelia, towards the end of the play, changing the perceptions created by the audience.

In Shakespeare’s play “Hamlet,” we are introduced to the sorrow and tragic character of Ophelia. In spite of a comparatively marginal role throughout the play, Ophelia actually has quite a substantial impact on our understanding of the main character, Hamlet. With Ophelia’s highly controversial and often debated death, we are left to ponder about what truly constitutes action, attempting to make meaning of actions with relation to context. Specifically, through examining Gertrude’s description of Ophelia’s death, while also taking into consideration the character’s history and experiences, we can forge a connection between our understanding of Ophelia’s actions, and Hamlet’s dilemma with his own actions.

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.

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.

Somewhere between the years of 1599 and 1602, William Shakespeare wrote his longest, most influential and powerful tragedy, The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. Set in the Kingdom of Denmark, the play stages the revenge that a young prince seeks against his uncle for murdering his father, inheriting the throne, and subsequently marrying his mother.

In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the main character Hamlet is believed to have gone insane after the death of his father. There is much evidence in the play that causes one to believe that Hamlet is in fact crazy. However, there are also indications to the contrary, Hamlet only feigns madness for the purpose of carrying out his mission. He rehearses his pretend madness first with Ophelia for even if he fails to convince her , that failure would not cause him any harm. The language he uses is clearly not that of an insane person, he is lucid and succinct when he speaks proving that he knows exactly what he is doing. .

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.

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.

William Shakespeare is an English Poet known for his famous dramatized writings. Shakespeare was born in the United Kingdom in April. Here are some of his legendary texts: “Macbeth”, “Julius Caesar”, and “Hamlet”. “The Tragedy of Hamlet” was written during the sixteenth century and was performed in 1609. Shakespeare writes this tragedy to reveal the roles of women during the Middle Ages. Back then females were referred as noblewomen and were expected to do the following: run households, take care of children, and aid her husband with finances of the estate. Moreover, Shakespeare develops Hamlet to expose women with his harsh judgements and stereotypes. Gertrude and Ophelia are restricted from their rights and are conducted by the men that

Thirdly, Hamlet feigned madness was another cause of delay to his avenging his father’s death. He feigned madness to enable him to buy time to make a decision and plan on how to kill Claudius. Although people like Grenadier believed that Hamlet was really mad by saying “This is no mock-madness, to see it as such is to miss the power of the central theme of the play, Hamlet walks alone within the prison of mental death” (Grenadier 70). These does not help him much because Claudius does not believe that he is actually mad that is why he sent for Guildenstern and Rosencrantz Hamlet long time friend’s to spy on him and found out the reason for his behavior. Hamlet himself does not completely act insane, the only scene where madness may be inferred is when Hamlet killed Polonius, and Hamlet killing Polonius might be an accident, probably he thought he was Claudius, but even if he presume him to be Polonius, he equally dislike him by calling him a “fish mugger” (Act 11, scene 2 ). This means he does not trust him. Polonius is dishonest than a fish mugger. His killing of Polonius reversed roles for Hamlet and Claudius. It is now the prince who becomes the pursued and the king who become the pursuer. Claudius, certain now of Hamlets being a threat to his safety, is able to hustle the prince off to England and remove him from the place where alone he can pursue his task of vengeance, precisely when he has established the basis for a just revenge, Hamlet actually loses