essay questions about the hamlet

353 Hamlet Essay Topics & Ideas

• Icon Calendar 18 May 2024
• Icon Page 3220 words
• Icon Clock 15 min read

Hamlet essay topics delve into the deep, convoluted world of Shakespearean tragedy, focusing on various themes, such as revenge, mortality, madness, and moral corruption. These topics provide a rich exploration of Hamlet’s internal struggles and existential crises, his complex relationships with characters, like Ophelia, Gertrude, and Claudius, and his philosophically profound soliloquies. They also invite analysis of the play’s symbolism, motifs, and underlying social and political commentary. Delving into these subjects, students can contrast Hamlet’s contemplative nature with the impulsive behavior of other characters, scrutinize the impact of the supernatural, or dissect the tragic elements that lead to Hamlet’s downfall. From examining the ambiguity of characters’ actions to questioning the meaning of life and death, Hamlet essay topics offer many critical lenses through which students can understand and interpret this famous work of literature.

Best Hamlet Essay Topics

• Exploring the Concept of Revenge in Hamlet
• Uncertainty in Decision Making: A Deep Dive Into Hamlet’s Indecisiveness
• Madness as Portrayed in Hamlet: Real or Feigned?
• Polonius as a Catalyst in the Tragedy of Hamlet
• Interpreting the Significance of Ophelia’s Death
• Hamlet and the Oedipus Complex: Analyzing Freudian Themes
• Claudius’ Manipulation Techniques in Power Consolidation
• Betrayal in Hamlet: Who Betrays Whom and Why?
• A Comparative Study: Hamlet and the Elizabethan Era
• Unpacking the Metaphor of Yorick’s Skull
• Aesthetic Symbolism in the Mousetrap Play Within Hamlet
• Laertes and Hamlet: A Study in Contrasts
• Death and the Afterlife: How Does Hamlet Approach Existential Questions?
• Soliloquies in Hamlet: Window Into the Prince’s Soul
• Shakespeare’s Hamlet: A Feminist Interpretation
• Hamlet’s Paralysis of Action: Causes and Consequences
• Exploring Misogyny and Power Structures in Hamlet
• Existential Crisis in Hamlet: A Modern Interpretation
• Supernatural Elements in Hamlet: Apparition as a Narrative Device
• Shakespeare’s Use of Foils in Hamlet: Purpose and Effectiveness

Easy Hamlet Essay Topics

• Hamlet’s Tragic Flaw: Procrastination and Its Consequences
• Understanding the Ghost of Hamlet’s Father
• Analysis of King Claudius as Hamlet’s Adversary
• Significance of the Play-Within-a-Play in Hamlet
• Examining Hamlet’s Relationship With Gertrude
• The Portrayal of Love and Relationships in Hamlet
• Major Themes in Hamlet: A Comprehensive Review
• A Closer Look at Hamlet’s Soliloquies
• Character Analysis: Is Polonius Truly Wise?
• Duplicity and Deception in Hamlet’s Denmark
• Hamlet’s View on Life and Death
• Comparing Hamlet and Laertes: A Study of Similarities
• Symbolism in Hamlet: An In-Depth Study
• Fortinbras as a Parallel Character to Hamlet
• Fate vs. Free Will in Hamlet’s Narrative
• Decoding the Importance of Dreams in Hamlet
• Understanding the Tragic Ending of Hamlet
• Guilt and Regret: Claudius’s Secret Torment
• Hamlet’s Friendship With Horatio: An Analysis

Interesting Hamlet Essay Topics

• Unraveling the Mystery of Hamlet’s Madness
• Deconstructing the Hamartia in Hamlet’s Character
• Dualism in Hamlet: Appearance vs. Reality
• Disease and Decay: A Recurring Imagery in Hamlet
• Analyzing Hamlet’s Misogyny: A Feminist Perspective
• Deciphering the Cryptic Nature of Hamlet’s Soliloquies
• Ophelia’s Descent Into Madness: A Psychological Interpretation
• Insight Into Hamlet’s Melancholic Nature
• Existentialism in Hamlet: A Philosophical Analysis
• Analyzing the Significance of Fortinbras in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Foreshadowing in Hamlet’s Narrative
• Comparative Analysis: Hamlet and Macbeth
• Decoding the Dramatic Irony in Hamlet
• Morality and Ethics in Hamlet’s Denmark
• A Closer Look at Hamlet’s Tragic Redemption
• Significance of the Sea Imagery in Hamlet
• Familial Relationships in Hamlet: An In-Depth Analysis
• Closet Scene in Hamlet: A Turning Point
• Understanding Hamlet Through His Soliloquies
• Exploring the Underlying Theme of Madness in Hamlet

List of Hamlet Essay Topics to Start With

• Understanding Hamlet’s State of Mind: A Psychological Analysis
• Consequences of Revenge in Hamlet’s Story
• Analyzing the Relationship Dynamics Between Ophelia and Hamlet
• Shakespeare’s Usage of Dramatic Irony in Hamlet
• Influence of Supernatural Elements in Hamlet
• Tragic Elements in Hamlet: A Detailed Study
• Unpacking the Concept of Death in Hamlet
• Existential Dilemmas Faced by Hamlet
• Imagery and Metaphors: A Study in Hamlet
• Insights Into the Ghost of King Hamlet
• Shakespeare’s Perspective on Morality in Hamlet
• Tracing the Theme of Deception in Hamlet
• Characters in Hamlet: A Comparative Analysis
• The Portrayal of Power Dynamics in Hamlet
• Feminine Characters in Hamlet: An Analytical Review
• Hamlet and His Tragic Hero Attributes
• King Claudius: An In-Depth Character Study
• Disguise and Deceit in the Court of Denmark
• Exploring the Theme of Loyalty in Hamlet
• Decoding the Symbolism in Hamlet’s Soliloquies

Hamlet Argumentative Essay Topics

• Deconstruction of the Ghost in Hamlet: A Derridean Perspective
• Analyzing Hamlet through Lacanian Psychoanalysis
• The Portrayal of Existentialist Philosophy in Hamlet
• Hamlet’s Madness: A Rorschach Test for Audiences and Readers
• The Politics of Power and Subterfuge in Hamlet
• Ophelia: An Early Feminist Icon or Victim of Patriarchy?
• Applying Carl Jung’s Theory of Archetypes to Characters in Hamlet
• Hamlet’s Tragic Paradox: Intellectual Acumen vs. Emotional Impulsivity
• Closet Scene: Freudian Psychoanalysis of Gertrude and Hamlet’s Relationship
• Justice and Retribution: A Postmodern Reading of Hamlet
• Analyzing Hamlet Using Judith Butler’s Theory of Gender Performativity
• Meta-Theatrical Elements in Hamlet: A Performance Theory Approach
• Hamlet’s Existential Crisis: A Nietzschean Perspective
• Decoding Hamlet’s Tragic Flaw Through Aristotelian Lens
• Hamlet and the Divine Right of Kings: A Political Analysis
• Concept of ‘Delay’ in Hamlet: A Study in Elizabethan Context
• Application of Julia Kristeva’s Intertextuality: Hamlet and Its Sources
• Absurdism in Hamlet: A Comparative Analysis With Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot
• Hamlet: An Eco-Critical Interpretation
• Hamlet’s Soliloquies: A Bakhtinian Dialogic Analysis

Hamlet Research Paper Topics

• Subjectivity and the Self in Hamlet: A Lacanian Analysis
• Hamlet’s Delay: Procrastination or Philosophical Deliberation?
• Gender Dynamics and Power Structures in Hamlet’s Denmark
• Interpretation of Religious Themes in Hamlet
• Understanding Madness in Hamlet: From a Foucauldian Perspective
• Postcolonial Reading of Hamlet: Center and Periphery in Denmark
• Tragic Ambiguity: A Comparative Study of Hamlet and Oedipus Rex
• Interpreting Hamlet’s Indecision Through Sigmund Freud’s Psychoanalysis
• Metafiction in Hamlet: A Study of the Play Within the Play
• Deconstructing the Use of Irony in Hamlet
• Exploring Notions of Honor and Social Hierarchy in Hamlet
• Decoding Hamlet’s Relationship With Ophelia: A Freudian Perspective
• Ethical Dilemmas in Hamlet: A Kantian Interpretation
• Existential Dread in Hamlet: A Study Through Kierkegaard’s Philosophy
• Hamlet’s Soliloquies: A Study in Self and Society
• Revenge Tragedy Elements in Hamlet: A Comparative Study With Spanish Tragedy
• Interpreting the Paradox of Hamlet’s Character: A New Historicist Approach
• Characterization in Hamlet: A Study in Contrast
• The Intertwining of Politics and Morality in Hamlet

Hamlet Essay Questions Examples

• How Does the Character of Hamlet Reflect the Freudian Theory of Psychoanalysis?
• Exploring the Power Dynamics in Hamlet: A Foucauldian Analysis
• Does Hamlet’s Madness Symbolize an Individual’s Struggle Against Society?
• Can Hamlet’s Tragic Flaw Be Seen as a Reflection of His Intelligence?
• How Do Hamlet’s Soliloquies Contribute to the Development of His Character?
• What Makes Hamlet a Tragic Hero in Shakespeare’s Hamlet?
• Interpreting the Theme of Revenge in Hamlet: What Are Its Consequences?
• Is Ophelia a Victim or a Manipulator in Hamlet?
• How Does the Ghost of Hamlet’s Father Influence the Course of the Play?
• To What Extent Does the Theme of Mortality Drive the Narrative of Hamlet?
• Can We Consider Hamlet as a Commentary on the Nature of Acting?
• How Does Hamlet Conform to or Subvert the Conventions of a Revenge Tragedy?
• How Does Hamlet Explore the Idea of the Individual vs. Society?
• In What Ways Do the Other Characters Serve as Foils to Hamlet?
• How Does the Play Within the Play Contribute to the Meta-Theatrical Aspects of Hamlet?
• How Do the Concepts of Honor and Loyalty Manifest in Hamlet?
• What Is the Significance of the Oedipal Complex in Hamlet’s Relationship With Gertrude?
• How Does Hamlet’s Relationship With Ophelia Reflect His Attitude towards Women?
• What Role Does Polonius Play in the Tragedy of Hamlet?
• Can Hamlet Be Seen as an Exploration of the Human Condition?

The Theme of Modern Society for Hamlet Essay Ideas

• Hamlet’s Indecision: A Reflection of Modern-Day Analysis Paralysis
• Relevance of Hamlet’s Existential Crisis in the 21st Century
• Interpreting the Tragic Hero: Hamlet in a Modern Context
• Unpacking the Theme of Surveillance in Hamlet and Its Echoes in Today’s Society
• Interpreting Hamlet’s Madness: A Lens to View Mental Health Stigma in Contemporary Society
• Deception and Duplicity in Hamlet: A Comparison With Modern-Day Politics
• Hamlet’s Struggle With Moral Dilemmas: Parallels in the Modern World
• Tragic Outcomes of Revenge in Hamlet and Its Reflections on Modern Conflicts
• Misogyny in Hamlet: A Dialogue on Current Gender Inequality
• Exploring the Theme of Death in Hamlet: A Contemporary Perspective
• Analyzing the Decay of Political Systems in Hamlet and Its Modern Reflections
• Ophelia’s Madness: A Commentary on Societal Treatment of Women’s Mental Health
• The Role of Conscience in Hamlet and Its Place in Modern Society
• Authority and Power in Hamlet: A Mirror to Modern Political Structures
• Father-Son Relationships in Hamlet and Its Reflections on Contemporary Society
• Hamlet’s Soliloquies: An Exploration of Individualism in the Modern World
• Corruption in Hamlet’s Denmark: Parallels With Contemporary Societies
• Decoding the Concept of Honor in Hamlet and Its Resonance Today
• Hamlet’s Tragic Paradox: Relevance in the Age of Information Overload

Hamlet Essay Topics on Themes and Motifs

• Deconstructing the Motif of Revenge in Hamlet
• Interpreting Death and Mortality in Hamlet: A Comprehensive Analysis
• Unmasking the Theme of Madness in Hamlet
• Tracing the Motif of Disease and Corruption in Hamlet
• Exploring the Theme of Betrayal in Hamlet
• Examining the Recurring Motif of Incest in Hamlet
• Analyzing the Theme of Appearance vs. Reality in Hamlet
• Decoding the Motif of Hesitation and Delay in Hamlet
• Fate and Destiny in Hamlet: A Thematic Exploration
• Understanding the Theme of Action vs. Inaction in Hamlet
• Exploring the Motif of Theatricality in Hamlet
• Analyzing the Theme of Love and Relationships in Hamlet
• Tracing the Motif of Suicide in Hamlet
• Hamlet’s Fear of the Afterlife: A Thematic Study
• Unraveling the Theme of Honor and Reputation in Hamlet
• Identifying the Motif of Ears and Hearing in Hamlet
• The Theme of Loyalty in Hamlet: A Detailed Analysis
• Analyzing the Recurring Motif of Ghosts and the Supernatural in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Theme of Deception and Lies in Hamlet
• Decoding the Motif of Metaphysical Uncertainty in Hamlet

Hamlet Essay Topics on Character Analysis

• Character Study: Hamlet as an Anti-Hero
• Exploring the Contradictions in Hamlet’s Character
• Analysis of Ophelia: Victim or Manipulator?
• Claudius: A Villain or a Tragic Figure?
• Understanding Gertrude: A Complex Character Study
• Fortinbras: A Contrast to Hamlet
• Polonius: Folly or Wisdom?
• Laertes: Revenge, Honor, and Contrast to Hamlet
• Horatio: Friendship and Loyalty Personified
• The Ghost of King Hamlet: More than an Apparition?
• Interpreting the Character of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
• Gravediggers in Hamlet: Humor amid Tragedy
• Marcellus and Bernardo: Gatekeepers of the Supernatural
• Ophelia’s Madness: A Character Analysis
• Hamlet’s Foils: A Study of Laertes and Fortinbras
• Exploring the Character of Reynaldo in Hamlet
• Decoding the Character of Francisco in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Character of Voltemand in Hamlet
• Understanding the Character of Cornelius in Hamlet

Shakespearean Language and Style for Hamlet Essay Topics

• Metaphysical Imagery in Hamlet: An Analysis
• Exploring the Use of Soliloquies in Hamlet
• Decoding the Symbolism in Hamlet’s Monologues
• Shakespearean Puns in Hamlet: A Study of Linguistic Humor
• Figurative Language in Hamlet: An In-Depth Analysis
• Interpreting the Blank Verse and Prose in Hamlet
• Rhyme and Rhythm in Hamlet: A Study of Shakespeare’s Poetic Style
• Hamlet’s Language: An Indicator of His Madness?
• The Role of Foreshadowing in Hamlet
• Wordplay in Hamlet: A Comprehensive Study
• Analyzing the Use of Irony in Hamlet
• Tracing the Recurring Motifs in Hamlet Through Language
• Analyzing the Use of Alliteration in Hamlet
• Exploring the Use of Paradox in Hamlet
• Deciphering the Cryptic Language of the Ghost in Hamlet
• The Use of Similes and Metaphors in Hamlet
• Understanding the Role of Iambic Pentameter in Hamlet
• Analyzing the Language Patterns of Ophelia in Hamlet
• Exploring the Use of Pathos in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Imagery of Death and Decay in Hamlet

Hamlet Essay Topics on Literary Devices

• Exploring Foreshadowing in Hamlet: A Comprehensive Analysis
• Analyzing Irony in Hamlet: Dramatic, Situational, and Verbal
• Understanding the Significance of Soliloquies in Hamlet
• Tracing the Use of Metaphors and Similes in Hamlet
• Decoding the Role of Allusion in Hamlet
• Dramatic Structure in Hamlet: Freytag’s Pyramid Applied
• Analyzing the Use of Hyperbole in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Use of Symbolism in Hamlet
• Understanding the Significance of Metadrama in Hamlet
• Analyzing the Use of Antithesis in Hamlet
• Exploring the Role of Foils in Hamlet
• Decoding the Use of Puns and Wordplay in Hamlet
• Understanding the Significance of Anaphora in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Use of Synecdoche in Hamlet
• Understanding the Role of Juxtaposition in Hamlet
• Hamlet’s Language: A Study in Oxymoron and Paradox
• The Use of Euphemism in Hamlet: An Analysis
• Exploring the Use of Dramatic Monologue in Hamlet
• Analyzing the Significance of Alliteration in Hamlet

Hamlet Topics on Historical and Cultural Contexts

• Contextualizing Hamlet: Understanding Elizabethan Tragedy
• Hamlet and the Historical Context of the Protestant Reformation
• Exploring the Influence of Renaissance Humanism in Hamlet
• Interpreting Hamlet in the Light of Jacobean Political Intrigue
• Hamlet in Context: The Question of Regicide in Elizabethan England
• Understanding the Influence of Greek Tragedy on Hamlet
• Shakespeare’s Hamlet: An Examination of Renaissance Machiavellian Politics
• The Influence of Medieval Danish History on Hamlet
• Hamlet and the Influence of Elizabethan Views on Madness
• Understanding the Socio-Cultural Context of Ghosts in Hamlet
• Hamlet: A Critique of Courtly Politics in the Elizabethan Era?
• Analyzing the Influence of Elizabethan Gender Norms in Hamlet
• Understanding the Elizabethan Concept of Honor in Hamlet
• Interpreting Hamlet in the Context of Early Modern Attitudes Toward Death
• Hamlet and the Influence of Renaissance Philosophy
• Decoding the Influence of Elizabethan Revenge Tragedy Conventions in Hamlet
• Understanding the Historical Perception of Madness in the Context of Hamlet
• Interpreting the Cultural Symbolism of the Skull in Hamlet
• The Influence of Classical Tragedy on the Structure of Hamlet
• Hamlet and the Question of Loyalty in Elizabethan Society

Themes of Tragedy and Revenge for Hamlet Essay Topics

• Hamlet: Tragedy or Revenge Play?
• Understanding the Concept of Revenge in Hamlet
• Unraveling the Tragic Hero in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Cycle of Revenge in Hamlet
• Analyzing Hamlet as a Tragic Figure
• Exploring the Destructive Nature of Revenge in Hamlet
• The Tragedy of Action vs. Inaction in Hamlet
• Decoding the Link Between Madness and Revenge in Hamlet
• Understanding the Tragic Flaw in Hamlet
• Revenge and Its Consequences in Hamlet
• Tragic Consequences of Deception in Hamlet
• Analyzing the Role of Revenge in Driving the Plot of Hamlet
• Exploring the Impact of Revenge on the Characters of Hamlet
• Understanding the Transformation of Revenge Into Tragedy in Hamlet
• Analyzing the Role of Supernatural in Inciting Revenge in Hamlet
• Exploring the Intersection of Revenge and Madness in Hamlet
• Understanding the Dichotomy of Revenge and Justice in Hamlet
• Hamlet’s Procrastination: The Tragic Delay in Revenge
• Tragic Elements in the Subplot of Hamlet

Hamlet Topics on Feminist Criticism and Gender Roles

• Hamlet: A Feminist Critique
• Exploring the Feminine in Hamlet: Character Analysis of Ophelia
• Understanding Gertrude: A Feminist Perspective
• Hamlet and the Patriarchal Society: A Feminist Reading
• Interpreting Hamlet Through the Lens of Gender Performativity
• Analyzing the Role of Female Agency in Hamlet
• Feminist Criticism of Female Objectification in Hamlet
• Unraveling the Feminine Mystique in Hamlet
• Understanding the Subjugation of Women in Hamlet
• Decoding the Binary Oppositions of Gender in Hamlet
• Unraveling the Silence of Women in Hamlet
• Hamlet: A Study in Gender and Power Relations
• Analyzing the Influence of the Male Gaze in Hamlet
• Understanding the Construction of Femininity in Hamlet
• Exploring the Stereotypes of Madness and Female Weakness in Hamlet
• Unraveling the Madonna-Whore Dichotomy in Hamlet
• Gender and Mortality in Hamlet: A Feminist Study
• The Role of Women in Hamlet: Victims or Villains?
• A Feminist Reading of the Tragic Women in Hamlet
• Analyzing the Role of Virginity and Purity in the Characterization of Ophelia

Hamlet Topics on Mental Health and Illness

• Hamlet and the Spectrum of Madness: A Comprehensive Analysis
• Interpreting Ophelia’s Madness in the Context of Elizabethan Society
• Hamlet’s Melancholia: An Analysis Through Freudian Lens
• Exploring the Representation of Mental Illness in Hamlet
• Depiction of Grief and Loss in Hamlet: A Psychological Perspective
• Hamlet: Tragic Hero or a Victim of Mental Illness?
• Understanding the Representation of Psychosis in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Mental Breakdown of Ophelia: A Psychological Study
• Hamlet’s Soliloquies: Insight Into His Mental State
• Exploring the Impact of Hamlet’s Faked Insanity on His Mental Health
• Analyzing the Theme of Madness and Mental Instability in Hamlet
• Hamlet: A Study of Paranoid Personality Disorder
• Interpreting the Theme of Despair in Hamlet
• Understanding the Depiction of Depression in Hamlet
• Madness Real and Feigned: A Study of Hamlet
• Hamlet: A Case Study in the Stigmatization of Mental Illness
• Ophelia’s Descent Into Madness: A Psychological Analysis
• Understanding the Tragic Consequences of Ignoring Mental Health in Hamlet

Hamlet Topics on the Role of Ghosts

• Hamlet’s Ghost: Messenger or Manipulator?
• Interpreting the Significance of Ghosts in Hamlet
• Ghostly Apparitions and Their Function in Hamlet
• Hamlet and the Supernatural: Analyzing the Ghost’s Influence
• Deciphering the Ghost in Hamlet: A Study of Supernatural Elements
• Understanding the Ethereal: The Ghost’s Existence in Hamlet
• Exploring the Intersection of Supernatural and Reality in Hamlet
• Hamlet: A Study in Spectral Ambiguity
• Interrogating the Ghost’s Veracity in Hamlet
• Hamlet’s Ghost: Symbol of Revenge or Remorse?
• The Ghost in Hamlet: An Embodiment of Fear and Guilt?
• Deconstructing the Role of Ghosts in Shaping Hamlet’s Actions
• Understanding the Narrative Function of the Ghost in Hamlet
• The Ghost as a Catalyst for Tragedy in Hamlet
• Purgatorial Representations: The Ghost in Hamlet
• How the Ghost Alters the Course of Events in Hamlet
• Ghosts and Revenge: Unraveling the Connection in Hamlet
• Investigating the Existential Dread Created by the Ghost in Hamlet
• The Ghost as a Symbol of Unresolved Issues in Hamlet
• Influence of the Ghost on Hamlet’s Perception of Death

Symbolism of Objects and Settings for Hamlet Essay Topics

• Significance of Yorick’s Skull in Hamlet: A Symbolic Analysis
• Interpreting the Symbolism of the Ghost in Hamlet
• Understanding the Role of Denmark’s Court as a Symbol in Hamlet
• Exploring the Symbolism of the Poisoned Sword in Hamlet
• Hamlet’s Soliloquy: Symbolic Representation of His Inner Turmoil
• The Garden Imagery in Hamlet: Symbolizing Corruption and Decay
• Reading the Symbolism in Ophelia’s Flowers in Hamlet
• Decoding the Symbolism of Death and Mortality in Hamlet
• Understanding the Role of Theater in Hamlet: A Symbolic Study
• The Symbolism of Madness in Hamlet: A Thorough Examination
• The Metaphor of the Unweeded Garden in Hamlet: A Symbolic Analysis
• Significance of the Ghostly Apparitions in the Setting of Hamlet
• The Symbolism of the Sea and Voyages in Hamlet: A Detailed Study
• Elucidating the Role of the Graveyard Scene in Hamlet
• Symbolism in Hamlet’s Clothing: A Comprehensive Analysis
• Decoding the Symbolism in the Monarchic Power Struggle in Hamlet
• Interpreting the Symbolic Use of Ophelia’s Death in Hamlet
• The Symbolism of Revenge in Hamlet: An Analytical Study
• Decoding the Symbolic Representation of Power and Betrayal in Hamlet
• The Symbolic Function of the Play-Within-a-Play in Hamlet

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Discussion Questions

Hamlet is deeply concerned with questions of truth and falsehood. What role does truthfulness play in the events of the story, and how is truthfulness shown to be more complex than it might at first seem? 

In the middle of Hamlet, we watch a play within a play, “The Mousetrap.” But first, we hear Hamlet’s opinions on theater: The stage should hold up a mirror to nature. What role does “The Mousetrap” play in Hamlet ’s examination of the nature of reality?

Hamlet’s lines, particularly when he is pretending to be mad, are riddled with puns and wordplay. What does the play have to say about the slipperiness of language?

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Jeffrey R. Wilson

Essays on hamlet.

Written as the author taught Hamlet every semester for a decade, these lightning essays ask big conceptual questions about the play with the urgency of a Shakespeare lover, and answer them with the rigor of a Shakespeare scholar. In doing so, Hamlet becomes a lens for life today, generating insights on everything from xenophobia, American fraternities, and religious fundamentalism to structural misogyny, suicide contagion, and toxic love.

Prioritizing close reading over historical context, these explorations are highly textual and highly theoretical, often philosophical, ethical, social, and political. Readers see King Hamlet as a pre-modern villain, King Claudius as a modern villain, and Prince Hamlet as a post-modern villain. Hamlet’s feigned madness becomes a window into failed insanity defenses in legal trials. He knows he’s being watched in “To be or not to be”: the soliloquy is a satire of philosophy. Horatio emerges as Shakespeare’s authorial avatar for meta-theatrical commentary, Fortinbras as the hero of the play. Fate becomes a viable concept for modern life, and honor a source of tragedy. The metaphor of music in the play makes Ophelia Hamlet’s instrument. Shakespeare, like the modern corporation, stands against sexism, yet perpetuates it unknowingly. We hear his thoughts on single parenting, sending children off to college, and the working class, plus his advice on acting and writing, and his claims to be the next Homer or Virgil. In the context of four centuries of Hamlet hate, we hear how the text draws audiences in, how it became so famous, and why it continues to captivate audiences.

At a time when the humanities are said to be in crisis, these essays are concrete examples of the mind-altering power of literature and literary studies, unravelling the ongoing implications of the English language’s most significant artistic object of the past millennium.

Publications

Why is Hamlet the most famous English artwork of the past millennium? Is it a sexist text? Why does Hamlet speak in prose? Why must he die? Does Hamlet depict revenge, or justice? How did the death of Shakespeare’s son, Hamnet, transform into a story about a son dealing with the death of a father? Did Shakespeare know Aristotle’s theory of tragedy? How did our literary icon, Shakespeare, see his literary icons, Homer and Virgil? Why is there so much comedy in Shakespeare’s greatest tragedy? Why is love a force of evil in the play? Did Shakespeare believe there’s a divinity that shapes our ends? How did he define virtue? What did he think about psychology? politics? philosophy? What was Shakespeare’s image of himself as an author? What can he, arguably the greatest writer of all time, teach us about our own writing? What was his theory of literature? Why do people like Hamlet ? How do the Hamlet haters of today compare to those of yesteryears? Is it dangerous for our children to read a play that’s all about suicide? 

These are some of the questions asked in this book, a collection of essays on Shakespeare’s Hamlet stemming from my time teaching the play every semester in my Why Shakespeare? course at Harvard University. During this time, I saw a series of bright young minds from wildly diverse backgrounds find their footing in Hamlet, and it taught me a lot about how Shakespeare’s tragedy works, and why it remains with us in the modern world. Beyond ghosts, revenge, and tragedy, Hamlet is a play about being in college, being in love, gender, misogyny, friendship, theater, philosophy, theology, injustice, loss, comedy, depression, death, self-doubt, mental illness, white privilege, overbearing parents, existential angst, international politics, the classics, the afterlife, and the meaning of it all. 

These essays grow from the central paradox of the play: it helps us understand the world we live in, yet we don't really understand the text itself very well. For all the attention given to Hamlet , there’s no consensus on the big questions—how it works, why it grips people so fiercely, what it’s about. These essays pose first-order questions about what happens in Hamlet and why, mobilizing answers for reflections on life, making the essays both highly textual and highly theoretical. 

Each semester that I taught the play, I would write a new essay about Hamlet . They were meant to be models for students, the sort of essay that undergrads read and write – more rigorous than the puff pieces in the popular press, but riskier than the scholarship in most academic journals. While I later added scholarly outerwear, these pieces all began just like the essays I was assigning to students – as short close readings with a reader and a text and a desire to determine meaning when faced with a puzzling question or problem. 

The turn from text to context in recent scholarly books about Hamlet is quizzical since we still don’t have a strong sense of, to quote the title of John Dover Wilson’s 1935 book, What Happens in Hamlet. Is the ghost real? Is Hamlet mad, or just faking? Why does he delay? These are the kinds of questions students love to ask, but they haven’t been – can’t be – answered by reading the play in the context of its sources (recently addressed in Laurie Johnson’s The Tain of Hamlet [2013]), its multiple texts (analyzed by Paul Menzer in The Hamlets [2008] and Zachary Lesser in Hamlet after Q1 [2015]), the Protestant reformation (the focus of Stephen Greenblatt’s Hamlet in Purgatory [2001] and John E. Curran, Jr.’s Hamlet, Protestantism, and the Mourning of Contingency [2006]), Renaissance humanism (see Rhodri Lewis, Hamlet and the Vision of Darkness [2017]), Elizabethan political theory (see Margreta de Grazia, Hamlet without Hamlet [2007]), the play’s reception history (see David Bevington, Murder Most Foul: Hamlet through the Ages [2011]), its appropriation by modern philosophers (covered in Simon Critchley and Jamieson Webster’s The Hamlet Doctrine [2013] and Andrew Cutrofello’s All for Nothing: Hamlet’s Negativity [2014]), or its recent global travels (addressed, for example, in Margaret Latvian’s Hamlet’s Arab Journey [2011] and Dominic Dromgoole’s Hamlet Globe to Globe [2017]). 

Considering the context and afterlives of Hamlet is a worthy pursuit. I certainly consulted the above books for my essays, yet the confidence that comes from introducing context obscures the sharp panic we feel when confronting Shakespeare’s text itself. Even as the excellent recent book from Sonya Freeman Loftis, Allison Kellar, and Lisa Ulevich announces Hamlet has entered “an age of textual exhaustion,” there’s an odd tendency to avoid the text of Hamlet —to grasp for something more firm—when writing about it. There is a need to return to the text in a more immediate way to understand how Hamlet operates as a literary work, and how it can help us understand the world in which we live. 

That latter goal, yes, clings nostalgically to the notion that literature can help us understand life. Questions about life send us to literature in search of answers. Those of us who love literature learn to ask and answer questions about it as we become professional literary scholars. But often our answers to the questions scholars ask of literature do not connect back up with the questions about life that sent us to literature in the first place—which are often philosophical, ethical, social, and political. Those first-order questions are diluted and avoided in the minutia of much scholarship, left unanswered. Thus, my goal was to pose questions about Hamlet with the urgency of a Shakespeare lover and to answer them with the rigor of a Shakespeare scholar. 

In doing so, these essays challenge the conventional relationship between literature and theory. They pursue a kind of criticism where literature is not merely the recipient of philosophical ideas in the service of exegesis. Instead, the creative risks of literature provide exemplars to be theorized outward to help us understand on-going issues in life today. Beyond an occasion for the demonstration of existing theory, literature is a source for the creation of new theory.

Chapter One How Hamlet Works

Whether you love or hate Hamlet , you can acknowledge its massive popularity. So how does Hamlet work? How does it create audience enjoyment? Why is it so appealing, and to whom? Of all the available options, why Hamlet ? This chapter entertains three possible explanations for why the play is so popular in the modern world: the literary answer (as the English language’s best artwork about death—one of the very few universal human experiences in a modern world increasingly marked by cultural differences— Hamlet is timeless); the theatrical answer (with its mixture of tragedy and comedy, the role of Hamlet requires the best actor of each age, and the play’s popularity derives from the celebrity of its stars); and the philosophical answer (the play invites, encourages, facilitates, and sustains philosophical introspection and conversation from people who do not usually do such things, who find themselves doing those things with Hamlet , who sometimes feel embarrassed about doing those things, but who ultimately find the experience of having done them rewarding).

Chapter Two “It Started Like a Guilty Thing”: The Beginning of Hamlet and the Beginning of Modern Politics

King Hamlet is a tyrant and King Claudius a traitor but, because Shakespeare asked us to experience the events in Hamlet from the perspective of the young Prince Hamlet, we are much more inclined to detect and detest King Claudius’s political failings than King Hamlet’s. If so, then Shakespeare’s play Hamlet , so often seen as the birth of modern psychology, might also tell us a little bit about the beginnings of modern politics as well.

Chapter Three Horatio as Author: Storytelling and Stoic Tragedy

This chapter addresses Horatio’s emotionlessness in light of his role as a narrator, using this discussion to think about Shakespeare’s motives for writing tragedy in the wake of his son’s death. By rationalizing pain and suffering as tragedy, both Horatio and Shakespeare were able to avoid the self-destruction entailed in Hamlet’s emotional response to life’s hardships and injustices. Thus, the stoic Horatio, rather than the passionate Hamlet who repeatedly interrupts ‘The Mousetrap’, is the best authorial avatar for a Shakespeare who strategically wrote himself and his own voice out of his works. This argument then expands into a theory of ‘authorial catharsis’ and the suggestion that we can conceive of Shakespeare as a ‘poet of reason’ in contrast to a ‘poet of emotion’.

Chapter Four “To thine own self be true”: What Shakespeare Says about Sending Our Children Off to College

What does “To thine own self be true” actually mean? Be yourself? Don’t change who you are? Follow your own convictions? Don’t lie to yourself? This chapter argues that, if we understand meaning as intent, then “To thine own self be true” means, paradoxically, that “the self” does not exist. Or, more accurately, Shakespeare’s Hamlet implies that “the self” exists only as a rhetorical, philosophical, and psychological construct that we use to make sense of our experiences and actions in the world, not as anything real. If this is so, then this passage may offer us a way of thinking about Shakespeare as not just a playwright but also a moral philosopher, one who did his ethics in drama.

Chapter Five In Defense of Polonius

Your wife dies. You raise two children by yourself. You build a great career to provide for your family. You send your son off to college in another country, though you know he’s not ready. Now the prince wants to marry your daughter—that’s not easy to navigate. Then—get this—while you’re trying to save the queen’s life, the prince murders you. Your death destroys your kids. They die tragically. And what do you get for your efforts? Centuries of Shakespeare scholars dumping on you. If we see Polonius not through the eyes of his enemy, Prince Hamlet—the point of view Shakespeare’s play asks audiences to adopt—but in analogy to the common challenges of twenty-first-century parenting, Polonius is a single father struggling with work-life balance who sadly choses his career over his daughter’s well-being.

Chapter Six Sigma Alpha Elsinore: The Culture of Drunkenness in Shakespeare’s Hamlet

Claudius likes to party—a bit too much. He frequently binge drinks, is arguably an alcoholic, but not an aberration. Hamlet says Denmark is internationally known for heavy drinking. That’s what Shakespeare would have heard in the sixteenth century. By the seventeenth, English writers feared Denmark had taught their nation its drinking habits. Synthesizing criticism on alcoholism as an individual problem in Shakespeare’s texts and times with scholarship on national drinking habits in the early-modern age, this essay asks what the tragedy of alcoholism looks like when located not on the level of the individual, but on the level of a culture, as Shakespeare depicted in Hamlet. One window into these early-modern cultures of drunkenness is sociological studies of American college fraternities, especially the social-learning theories that explain how one person—one culture—teaches another its habits. For Claudius’s alcoholism is both culturally learned and culturally significant. And, as in fraternities, alcoholism in Hamlet is bound up with wealth, privilege, toxic masculinity, and tragedy. Thus, alcohol imagistically reappears in the vial of “cursed hebona,” Ophelia’s liquid death, and the poisoned cup in the final scene—moments that stand out in recent performances and adaptations with alcoholic Claudiuses and Gertrudes.

Chapter Seven Tragic Foundationalism

This chapter puts the modern philosopher Alain Badiou’s theory of foundationalism into dialogue with the early-modern playwright William Shakespeare’s play Hamlet . Doing so allows us to identify a new candidate for Hamlet’s traditionally hard-to-define hamartia – i.e., his “tragic mistake” – but it also allows us to consider the possibility of foundationalism as hamartia. Tragic foundationalism is the notion that fidelity to a single and substantive truth at the expense of an openness to evidence, reason, and change is an acute mistake which can lead to miscalculations of fact and virtue that create conflict and can end up in catastrophic destruction and the downfall of otherwise strong and noble people.

Chapter Eight “As a stranger give it welcome”: Shakespeare’s Advice for First-Year College Students

Encountering a new idea can be like meeting a strange person for the first time. Similarly, we dismiss new ideas before we get to know them. There is an answer to the problem of the human antipathy to strangeness in a somewhat strange place: a single line usually overlooked in William Shakespeare’s play Hamlet . If the ghost is “wondrous strange,” Hamlet says, invoking the ancient ethics of hospitality, “Therefore as a stranger give it welcome.” In this word, strange, and the social conventions attached to it, is both the instinctual, animalistic fear and aggression toward what is new and different (the problem) and a cultivated, humane response in hospitality and curiosity (the solution). Intellectual xenia is the answer to intellectual xenophobia.

Chapter Nine Parallels in Hamlet

Hamlet is more parallely than other texts. Fortinbras, Hamlet, and Laertes have their fathers murdered, then seek revenge. Brothers King Hamlet and King Claudius mirror brothers Old Norway and Old Fortinbras. Hamlet and Ophelia both lose their fathers, go mad, but there’s a method in their madness, and become suicidal. King Hamlet and Polonius are both domineering fathers. Hamlet and Polonius are both scholars, actors, verbose, pedantic, detectives using indirection, spying upon others, “by indirections find directions out." King Hamlet and King Claudius are both kings who are killed. Claudius using Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to spy on Hamlet mirrors Polonius using Reynaldo to spy on Laertes. Reynaldo and Hamlet both pretend to be something other than what they are in order to spy on and detect foes. Young Fortinbras and Prince Hamlet both have their forward momentum “arrest[ed].” Pyrrhus and Hamlet are son seeking revenge but paused a “neutral to his will.” The main plot of Hamlet reappears in the play-within-the-play. The Act I duel between King Hamlet and Old Fortinbras echoes in the Act V duel between Hamlet and Laertes. Claudius and Hamlet are both king killers. Sheesh—why are there so many dang parallels in Hamlet ? Is there some detectable reason why the story of Hamlet would call for the literary device of parallelism?

Chapter Ten Rosencrantz and Guildenstern: Why Hamlet Has Two Childhood Friends, Not Just One

Why have two of Hamlet’s childhood friends rather than just one? Do Rosencrantz and Guildenstern have individuated personalities? First of all, by increasing the number of friends who visit Hamlet, Shakespeare creates an atmosphere of being outnumbered, of multiple enemies encroaching upon Hamlet, of Hamlet feeling that the world is against him. Second, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are not interchangeable, as commonly thought. Shakespeare gave each an individuated personality. Guildenstern is friendlier with Hamlet, and their friendship collapses, while Rosencrantz is more distant and devious—a frenemy.

Chapter Eleven Shakespeare on the Classics, Shakespeare as a Classic: A Reading of Aeneas’s Tale to Dido

Of all the stories Shakespeare might have chosen, why have Hamlet ask the players to recite Aeneas’ tale to Dido of Pyrrhus’s slaughter of Priam? In this story, which comes not from Homer’s Iliad but from Virgil’s Aeneid and had already been adapted for the Elizabethan stage in Christopher Marlowe’s The Tragedy of Dido, Pyrrhus – more commonly known as Neoptolemus, the son of the famous Greek warrior Achilles – savagely slays Priam, the king of the Trojans and the father of Paris, who killed Pyrrhus’s father, Achilles, who killed Paris’s brother, Hector, who killed Achilles’s comrade, Patroclus. Clearly, the theme of revenge at work in this story would have appealed to Shakespeare as he was writing what would become the greatest revenge tragedy of all time. Moreover, Aeneas’s tale to Dido supplied Shakespeare with all of the connections he sought to make at this crucial point in his play and his career – connections between himself and Marlowe, between the start of Hamlet and the end, between Prince Hamlet and King Claudius, between epic poetry and tragic drama, and between the classical literature Shakespeare was still reading hundreds of years later and his own potential as a classic who might (and would) be read hundreds of years into the future.

Chapter Twelve How Theater Works, according to Hamlet

According to Hamlet, people who are guilty of a crime will, when seeing that crime represented on stage, “proclaim [their] malefactions”—but that simply isn’t how theater works. Guilty people sit though shows that depict their crimes all the time without being prompted to public confession. Why did Shakespeare—a remarkably observant student of theater—write this demonstrably false theory of drama into his protagonist? And why did Shakespeare then write the plot of the play to affirm that obviously inaccurate vision of theater? For Claudius is indeed stirred to confession by the play-within-the-play. Perhaps Hamlet’s theory of people proclaiming malefactions upon seeing their crimes represented onstage is not as outlandish as it first appears. Perhaps four centuries of obsession with Hamlet is the English-speaking world proclaiming its malefactions upon seeing them represented dramatically.

Chapter Thirteen “To be, or not to be”: Shakespeare Against Philosophy

This chapter hazards a new reading of the most famous passage in Western literature: “To be, or not to be” from William Shakespeare’s Hamlet . With this line, Hamlet poses his personal struggle, a question of life and death, as a metaphysical problem, as a question of existence and nothingness. However, “To be, or not to be” is not what it seems to be. It seems to be a representation of tragic angst, yet a consideration of the context of the speech reveals that “To be, or not to be” is actually a satire of philosophy and Shakespeare’s representation of the theatricality of everyday life. In this chapter, a close reading of the context and meaning of this passage leads into an attempt to formulate a Shakespearean image of philosophy.

Chapter Fourteen Contagious Suicide in and Around Hamlet

As in society today, suicide is contagious in Hamlet , at least in the example of Ophelia, the only death by suicide in the play, because she only becomes suicidal after hearing Hamlet talk about his own suicidal thoughts in “To be, or not to be.” Just as there are media guidelines for reporting on suicide, there are better and worse ways of handling Hamlet . Careful suicide coverage can change public misperceptions and reduce suicide contagion. Is the same true for careful literary criticism and classroom discussion of suicide texts? How can teachers and literary critics reduce suicide contagion and increase help-seeking behavior?

Chapter Fifteen Is Hamlet a Sexist Text? Overt Misogyny vs. Unconscious Bias

Students and fans of Shakespeare’s Hamlet persistently ask a question scholars and critics of the play have not yet definitively answered: is it a sexist text? The author of this text has been described as everything from a male chauvinist pig to a trailblazing proto-feminist, but recent work on the science behind discrimination and prejudice offers a new, better vocabulary in the notion of unconscious bias. More pervasive and slippery than explicit bigotry, unconscious bias involves the subtle, often unintentional words and actions which indicate the presence of biases we may not be aware of, ones we may even fight against. The Shakespeare who wrote Hamlet exhibited an unconscious bias against women, I argue, even as he sought to critique the mistreatment of women in a patriarchal society. The evidence for this unconscious bias is not to be found in the misogynistic statements made by the characters in the play. It exists, instead, in the demonstrable preference Shakespeare showed for men over women when deciding where to deploy his literary talents. Thus, Shakespeare's Hamlet is a powerful literary example – one which speaks to, say, the modern corporation – showing that deliberate efforts for egalitarianism do not insulate one from the effects of structural inequalities that both stem from and create unconscious bias.

Chapter Sixteen Style and Purpose in Acting and Writing

Purpose and style are connected in academic writing. To answer the question of style ( How should we write academic papers? ) we must first answer the question of purpose ( Why do we write academic papers? ). We can answer these questions, I suggest, by turning to an unexpected style guide that’s more than 400 years old: the famous passage on “the purpose of playing” in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet . In both acting and writing, a high style often accompanies an expressive purpose attempting to impress an elite audience yet actually alienating intellectual people, while a low style and mimetic purpose effectively engage an intellectual audience.

Chapter Seventeen 13 Ways of Looking at a Ghost

Why doesn’t Gertrude see the Ghost of King Hamlet in Act III, even though Horatio, Bernardo, Francisco, Marcellus, and Prince Hamlet all saw it in Act I? It’s a bit embarrassing that Shakespeare scholars don’t have a widely agreed-upon consensus that explains this really basic question that puzzles a lot of people who read or see Hamlet .

Chapter Eighteen The Tragedy of Love in Hamlet

The word “love” appears 84 times in Shakespeare’s Hamlet . “Father” only appears 73 times, “play” 60, “think” 55, “mother” 46, “mad” 44, “soul” 40, “God" 39, “death” 38, “life” 34, “nothing” 28, “son” 26, “honor” 21, “spirit” 19, “kill” 18, “revenge” 14, and “action” 12. Love isn’t the first theme that comes to mind when we think of Hamlet , but is surprisingly prominent. But love is tragic in Hamlet . The bloody catastrophe at the end of that play is principally driven not by hatred or a longing for revenge, but by love.

Chapter Nineteen Ophelia’s Songs: Moral Agency, Manipulation, and the Metaphor of Music in Hamlet

This chapter reads Ophelia’s songs in Act IV of Shakespeare’s Hamlet in the context of the meaning of music established elsewhere in the play. While the songs are usually seen as a marker of Ophelia’s madness (as a result of the death of her father) or freedom (from the constraints of patriarchy), they come – when read in light of the metaphor of music as manipulation – to symbolize her role as a pawn in Hamlet’s efforts to deceive his family. Thus, music was Shakespeare’s platform for connecting Ophelia’s story to one of the central questions in Hamlet : Do we have control over our own actions (like the musician), or are we controlled by others (like the instrument)?

Chapter Twenty A Quantitative Study of Prose and Verse in Hamlet

Why does Hamlet have so much prose? Did Shakespeare deliberately shift from verse to prose to signal something to his audiences? How would actors have handled the shifts from verse to prose? Would audiences have detected shifts from verse to prose? Is there an overarching principle that governs Shakespeare’s decision to use prose—a coherent principle that says, “If X, then use prose?”

Chapter Twenty-One The Fortunes of Fate in Hamlet : Divine Providence and Social Determinism

In Hamlet , fate is attacked from both sides: “fortune” presents a world of random happenstance, “will” a theory of efficacious human action. On this backdrop, this essay considers—irrespective of what the characters say and believe—what the structure and imagery Shakespeare wrote into Hamlet say about the possibility that some version of fate is at work in the play. I contend the world of Hamlet is governed by neither fate nor fortune, nor even the Christianized version of fate called “providence.” Yet there is a modern, secular, disenchanted form of fate at work in Hamlet—what is sometimes called “social determinism”—which calls into question the freedom of the individual will. As such, Shakespeare’s Hamlet both commented on the transformation of pagan fate into Christian providence that happened in the centuries leading up to the play, and anticipated the further transformation of fate from a theological to a sociological idea, which occurred in the centuries following Hamlet .

Chapter Twenty-Two The Working Class in Hamlet

There’s a lot for working-class folks to hate about Hamlet —not just because it’s old, dusty, difficult to understand, crammed down our throats in school, and filled with frills, tights, and those weird lace neck thingies that are just socially awkward to think about. Peak Renaissance weirdness. Claustrophobicly cloistered inside the castle of Elsinore, quaintly angsty over royal family problems, Hamlet feels like the literary epitome of elitism. “Lawless resolutes” is how the Wittenberg scholar Horatio describes the soldiers who join Fortinbras’s army in exchange “for food.” The Prince Hamlet who has never worked a day in his life denigrates Polonius as a “fishmonger”: quite the insult for a royal advisor to be called a working man. And King Claudius complains of the simplicity of "the distracted multitude.” But, in Hamlet , Shakespeare juxtaposed the nobles’ denigrations of the working class as readily available metaphors for all-things-awful with the rather valuable behavior of working-class characters themselves. When allowed to represent themselves, the working class in Hamlet are characterized as makers of things—of material goods and services like ships, graves, and plays, but also of ethical and political virtues like security, education, justice, and democracy. Meanwhile, Elsinore has a bad case of affluenza, the make-believe disease invented by an American lawyer who argued that his client's social privilege was so great that it created an obliviousness to law. While social elites rot society through the twin corrosives of political corruption and scholarly detachment, the working class keeps the machine running. They build the ships, plays, and graves society needs to function, and monitor the nuts-and-bolts of the ideals—like education and justice—that we aspire to uphold.

Chapter Twenty-Three The Honor Code at Harvard and in Hamlet

Students at Harvard College are asked, when they first join the school and several times during their years there, to affirm their awareness of and commitment to the school’s honor code. But instead of “the foundation of our community” that it is at Harvard, honor is tragic in Hamlet —a source of anxiety, blunder, and catastrophe. As this chapter shows, looking at Hamlet from our place at Harvard can bring us to see what a tangled knot honor can be, and we can start to theorize the difference between heroic and tragic honor.

Chapter Twenty-Four The Meaning of Death in Shakespeare’s Hamlet

By connecting the ways characters live their lives in Hamlet to the ways they die – on-stage or off, poisoned or stabbed, etc. – Shakespeare symbolized hamartia in catastrophe. In advancing this argument, this chapter develops two supporting ideas. First, the dissemination of tragic necessity: Shakespeare distributed the Aristotelian notion of tragic necessity – a causal relationship between a character’s hamartia (fault or error) and the catastrophe at the end of the play – from the protagonist to the other characters, such that, in Hamlet , those who are guilty must die, and those who die are guilty. Second, the spectacularity of death: there exists in Hamlet a positive correlation between the severity of a character’s hamartia (error or flaw) and the “spectacularity” of his or her death – that is, the extent to which it is presented as a visible and visceral spectacle on-stage.

Chapter Twenty-Five Tragic Excess in Hamlet

In Hamlet , Shakespeare paralleled the situations of Hamlet, Laertes, and Fortinbras (the father of each is killed, and each then seeks revenge) to promote the virtue of moderation: Hamlet moves too slowly, Laertes too swiftly – and they both die at the end of the play – but Fortinbras represents a golden mean which marries the slowness of Hamlet with the swiftness of Laertes. As argued in this essay, Shakespeare endorsed the virtue of balance by allowing Fortinbras to be one of the very few survivors of the play. In other words, excess is tragic in Hamlet .

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Lesser, Zachary. Hamlet after Q1: An Uncanny History of the Shakespearean Text . Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015.

Levin, Harry. The Question of Hamlet . New York: Oxford UP, 1959.

Lewis, Rhodri. Hamlet and the Vision of Darkness . Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017.

Litvin, Margaret. Hamlet's Arab Journey: Shakespeare's Prince and Nasser's Ghost . Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2011.

Loftis, Sonya Freeman, and Lisa Ulevich. “Obsession/Rationality/Agency: Autistic Shakespeare.” Disability, Health, and Happiness in the Shakespearean Body , edited by Sujata Iyengar. Routledge, 2015, pp. 58-75.

Marino, James J. “Ophelia’s Desire.” ELH 84.4 (2017): 817-39.

Massai, Sonia, and Lucy Munro. Hamlet: The State of Play . London: Bloomsbury, 2021.

McGee, Arthur. The Elizabethan Hamlet . New Haven: Yale UP, 1987.

Megna, Paul, Bríd Phillips, and R.S. White, ed. Hamlet and Emotion . New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.

Menzer, Paul. The Hamlets: Cues, Qs, and Remembered Texts . Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2008.

Mercer, Peter. Hamlet and the Acting of Revenge . Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1987.

Oldham, Thomas A. “Unhouseled, Disappointed, Unaneled”: Catholicism, Transubstantiation, and Hamlet .” Ecumenica 8.1 (Spring 2015): 39-51.

Owen, Ruth J. The Hamlet Zone: Reworking Hamlet for European Cultures . Newcastle-Upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars, 2012.

Price, Joeseph G., ed. Hamlet: Critical Essays . New York: Routledge, 1986.

Prosser, Eleanor. Hamlet and Revenge . 2nd ed. Stanford: Stanford UP, 1971.

Rosenberg, Marvin. The Masks of Hamlet . Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1992.

Row-Heyveld, Lindsey. “Antic Dispositions: Mental and Intellectual Disabilities in Early Modern Revenge Tragedy.” Recovering Disability in Early Modern England , ed. Allison P. Hobgood and David Houston Wood. Ohio State University Press, 2013, pp. 73-87.

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet . Ed. Neil Taylor and Ann Thompson. Revised Ed. London: Arden Third Series, 2006.

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet . Ed. Robert S. Miola. New York: Norton, 2010.

Stritmatter, Roger. "Two More Censored Passages from Q2 Hamlet." Cahiers Élisabéthains 91.1 (2016): 88-95.

Thompson, Ann. “Hamlet 3.1: 'To be or not to be’.” The Cambridge Guide to the Worlds of Shakespeare: The World's Shakespeare, 1660-Present, ed. Bruce R. Smith (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016): 1144-50.

Seibers, Tobin. “Shakespeare Differently Disabled.” The Oxford Handbook of Shakespeare and Embodiement: Gender, Sexuality, and Race , ed. Valerie Traub (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016): 435-54.

Skinner, Quentin. “Confirmation: The Conjectural Issue.” Forensic Shakespeare (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014): 226-68.

Slater, Michael. “The Ghost in the Machine: Emotion and Mind–Body Union in Hamlet and Descartes," Criticism 58 (2016).

Thompson, Ann, and Neil Taylor, eds. Hamlet: A Critical Reader . London: Bloomsbury, 2016.

Weiss, Larry. “The Branches of an Act: Shakespeare's Hamlet Explains his Inaction.” Shakespeare 16.2 (2020): 117-27.

Wells, Stanley, ed. Hamlet and Its Afterlife . Special edition of Shakespeare Survey 45 (1992).

Williams, Deanne. “Enter Ofelia playing on a Lute.” Shakespeare and the Performance of Girlhood (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014): 73-91

Williamson, Claude C.H., ed. Readings on the Character of Hamlet: Compiled from Over Three Hundred Sources .

White, R.S. Avant-Garde Hamlet: Text, Stage, Screen . Lanham: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2015.

Wiles, David. “Hamlet’s Advice to the Players.” The Players’ Advice to Hamlet: The Rhetorical Acting Method from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020): 10-38

Wilson, J. Dover. What Happens in Hamlet . 3rd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1951.

Zamir, Tzachi, ed. Shakespeare's Hamlet: Philosophical Perspectives . Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018.

100+ Hamlet Essay Topics

Table of Contents

What is a Hamlet Essay?

A Hamlet essay is an analytical piece that delves into the themes, characters, plot, motifs, or historical context of William Shakespeare’s iconic tragedy, “Hamlet”. This play, often touted as one of the greatest pieces of literature ever written, is rife with profound topics and subtle nuances. When writing an essay on “Hamlet”, students explore these intricacies, shedding light on the play’s enduring relevance and its multifaceted layers.

Choosing the Right Topic for Your Hamlet Essay: A Quick Guide

In choosing a Hamlet essay topic, consider what aspect of the play intrigues you the most. Is it the psychological torment of Hamlet, the play’s exploration of existentialism, or perhaps its political undertones? Reflect on the themes that resonate with you. Review the play and take notes on pivotal scenes or dialogues. Your passion will come through in your writing, making your essay more engaging. Moreover, ensure your topic is not too broad; narrowing it down will allow for a deeper analysis.

Hamlet Essay Topics to Spark Your Imagination

Character analysis.

• Hamlet : A Study in Paralysis and Procrastination
• Ophelia’s Descent into Madness
• The Dual Nature of King Claudius
• Gertrude: Victim or Villain?
• Horatio: Hamlet’s Constant in a Chaotic World

Thematic Concerns

• The Play Within the Play: Exploring Metatheatre in Hamlet
• Madness vs. Sanity: A Thin Line in Elsinore
• Revenge and Its Consuming Nature
• Death and Decay: Imagery and Symbolism
• Betrayal and Loyalty: Conflicting Values

Symbolism and Motifs

• The Significance of Yorick’s Skull
• The Poisoned Sword and Cup: Instruments of Fate
• The Role of the Ghost in Driving the Plot
• Flowers in Ophelia’s Hands: More Than Just Bloom
• The Omnipresent Notion of Eavesdropping

Historical and Contextual Analysis

• Elizabethan Beliefs About Madness as Reflected in Hamlet
• Hamlet and the Renaissance Man
• The Influence of Greek Tragedy on “Hamlet”
• Political Strife and Its Reflection in Elsinore
• “Hamlet” in the Lens of Protestant Reformation

Comparative Studies

• “Hamlet” and “Oedipus Rex”: Tragedies of Fate
• The Role of Women in “Hamlet” vs. “Macbeth”
• How Film Adaptations Have Interpreted Hamlet’s Soliloquies
• Modern Interpretations of “Hamlet” in Popular Culture
• “Hamlet” and “Lion King”: From Denmark to Pride Rock

Character Exploration

• Hamlet : The Complexity of His Avenging Mission
• Ophelia: Between Love and Loyalty
• The True Intentions of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
• Laertes: The Counterpart to Hamlet’s Revenge Quest
• Polonius: The Manipulative Councilor

Themes and Philosophical Inquiries

• The Ubiquity of Death in “Hamlet”
• Exploring Existentialism in Hamlet’s Soliloquies
• The Consequences of Deception and Secrets
• The Tragedy of Miscommunication in Elsinore
• Corruption and Moral Degradation in the Danish Court

Symbolism and Literary Devices

• The Role of Ghosts in Elizabethan Drama and “Hamlet”
• The Significance of the Play-within-a-Play Scene
• The Use of Mirrors and Reflections in Character Dynamics
• Gardens as Symbols of Decay and Corruption
• The Sea and its Symbolic Representations

Structural Analysis

• The Role and Impact of Soliloquies in “Hamlet”
• The Use of Foreshadowing in the Tragedy’s Climax
• The Dramatic Ironies that Pervade the Play
• The Significance of Off-Stage Actions in “Hamlet”
• The Role of Acts and Scenes in Pacing the Drama

Comparative Analyses

• Contrasting “Hamlet” with Other Shakespearean Tragedies
• “Hamlet” and “Othello”: Exploring Jealousy and Betrayal
• A Comparative Study of “Hamlet” and its Sources
• The Transformation of the “Hamlet” Story Through Time
• “Hamlet” vs. “Romeo and Juliet”: Love in the Midst of Tragedy

Modern Interpretations and Adaptations

• “Hamlet” in Today’s Pop Culture References
• Cinematic Interpretations of “Hamlet”: From Olivier to Branagh
• “Hamlet” in Non-English Theater: A Global Perspective
• Updating “Hamlet”: The Challenges and Rewards
• The Influence of “Hamlet” on Modern Dramatic Writing

Feminist Perspectives

• The Role and Representation of Women in “Hamlet”
• Gertrude: Passive Queen or Calculative Player?
• Ophelia’s Voice and Silence: A Feminist Reading
• The Paternal Controls Over Ophelia and Gertrude
• Women’s Agency in “Hamlet”: A Critical Exploration

Historical and Contextual Insights

• The Influence of Shakespeare’s Life Events on “Hamlet”
• “Hamlet” and the Elizabethan Worldview on Ghosts and the Supernatural
• Political Undertones in “Hamlet”: The State of Denmark
• Elizabethan Theater and its Reflection in “Hamlet”
• “Hamlet” and the Reflection of Renaissance Humanism

Psychological Angles

• Hamlet’s Oedipal Complex Explored
• The Mental State of Characters: Who’s Truly Mad?
• The Psychological Effects of Grief and Loss in “Hamlet”
• Fear, Paranoia, and Suspicion: A Psychological Dive into Elsinore’s Inhabitants
• Analyzing “Hamlet” Through the Lens of Freudian Psychoanalysis

Miscellaneous Topics

• The Role of Fate vs. Free Will in “Hamlet”
• The Ethical Implications of Revenge in “Hamlet”
• Exploring Religion and Morality in “Hamlet”
• The Concept of Honor in “Hamlet”
• The Nature of True Friendship in the Play

Narrative Techniques and Structure

• The Role of the Chorus in “Hamlet”: Absence and Implication
• Non-linear Storytelling in “Hamlet”: Flashbacks and Memories
• The Significance of Interludes and Their Impact on the Main Plot
• Parallel Plots in “Hamlet”: Subplots and Their Relation to the Central Narrative

Cultural Perspectives

• “Hamlet” from an Eastern Philosophical Perspective
• “Hamlet” in the Context of African Oral Traditions
• Exploring “Hamlet” from a Postcolonial Point of View
• The Play’s Universality: Why “Hamlet” Resonates Globally

Philosophical and Ethical Discussions

• “To Be or Not To Be”: Hamlet’s Exploration of Nihilism
• The Dichotomy of Action vs. Inaction in “Hamlet”
• Ethical Ambiguities: Is Hamlet Justified in His Actions?
• Determinism and Free Will in “Hamlet”

Performance and Stagecraft

• The Evolution of “Hamlet” Stage Productions Over the Centuries
• Modern Theatrical Interpretations of “Hamlet” and their Relevance
• Challenges of Portraying Hamlet: An Actor’s Perspective
• The Role of Stage Directions in Shaping “Hamlet’s” Performances

Secondary Characters and Their Significance

• Fortinbras: The Silent Counterpart to Hamlet
• Gravediggers in “Hamlet”: Humor Amidst Tragedy
• Osric: A Reflection of Elsinore’s Decaying Morality
• Marcellus and Bernardo: The Unsung Heroes of Elsinore

Get Writing Help

Struggling with your “Hamlet” essay? At writeondeadline.com , we offer top-tier essay writing services tailored to your needs. Allow our expert writers to bring your insights to life, delivering a masterpiece worthy of Shakespeare himself. Order your essay now!

Useful References

• William Shakespeare’s Hamlet – Full Text
• Royal Shakespeare Company’s Guide to Hamlet
• Shakespeare Online: Hamlet Essays
• BBC’s In-Depth Look at Hamlet

by William Shakespeare

Hamlet study guide.

The story of the play originates in the legend of Hamlet (Amleth) as recounted in the twelfth-century Danish History, a Latin text by Saxo the Grammarian. This version was later adapted into French by Francois de Belleforest in 1570. In it, the unscrupulous Feng kills his brother Horwendil and marries his brother's wife Gerutha. Horwendil's and Gerutha's son Amleth, although still young, decides to avenge his father's murder. He acts the fool in order to avoid suspicion, a strategy which succeeds in making the others think him harmless. With his mother's active support, Amleth succeeds in killing Feng. He is then proclaimed King of Denmark. This story is on the whole more straightforward than Shakespeare’s adaptation. Shakespeare was likely aware of Saxo's version, along with another play performed in 1589 in which a ghost apparently calls out, "Hamlet, revenge!" The 1589 play is lost, leading to much scholarly speculation as to who might have authored it. Most scholars attribute it to Thomas Kyd, author of The Spanish Tragedy of 1587. The Spanish Tragedy shares many elements with Hamlet , such as a ghost seeking revenge, a secret crime, a play-within-a-play, a tortured hero who feigns madness, and a heroine who goes mad and commits suicide.

The Spanish Tragedy was one of the first and most popular Elizabethan "revenge tragedies," a genre that Hamlet both epitomizes and complicates. Revenge tragedies typically share a few plot points. In all of them, some grievous insult or wrong requires vengeance. Often in these plays the conventional means of retribution (the courts of law, generally speaking) are unavailable because of the power of the guilty person or persons, who is often noble if not royal. Revenge tragedies also emphasize the subjective struggle of the avenger, who often fights (or feigns) madness and generally wallows in the moral difficulties of his situation. Finally, revenge tragedies end up with a dramatic bloodbath in which the guilty party is horribly and often ritualistically killed. Hamlet is not Shakespeare's first revenge tragedy - that distinction belongs to Titus Andronicus , a Marlovian horror-show containing all of the elements just mentioned. But Hamlet is generally considered the greatest revenge tragedy, if not the greatest tragedy, if not the greatest play, ever written.

The central reason for the play's eminence is the character of Hamlet. His brooding, erratic nature has been analyzed by many of the most famous thinkers and artists of the past four centuries. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe described him as a poet - a sensitive man who is too weak to deal with the political pressures of Denmark. Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud viewed Hamlet in terms of an “Oedipus complex,” an overwhelming sexual desire for his mother. This complex is usually associated with the wish to kill one’s father and sleep with one’s mother. Freud points out that Hamlet's uncle has usurped his father's rightful place, and therefore has replaced his father as the man who must die. However, Freud is careful to note that Hamlet represents modern man precisely because he does not kill Claudius in order to sleep with his mother, but rather kills him to revenge his father’s death. Political interpretations of Hamlet also abound, in which Hamlet stands for the spirit of political resistance, or represents a challenge to a corrupt regime. Stephen Greenblatt, the editor of the Norton Edition of Shakespeare, views these interpretive attempts of Hamlet as mirrors for the interpretation within the play itself - many of the characters who have to deal with Hamlet, including Polonius , Claudius, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern , also develop theories to explain his behavior, none of which really succeeds in doing so. Indeed, nothing sure can be said about Hamlet except that it has been a perennial occasion for brilliant minds to explore some of the unanswerable questions of human existence.

Hamlet Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Hamlet is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Closely examine Hamlet’s most famous soliloquy on page 137 (lines 57-91). Summarize the arguments he is contemplating in this speech.

What act and scene are you referring to?

Describe Fortinbras based on what Horatio says.

Do you mean in Act 1? Based upon Horatio's description, young Fortinbras is bold, inexperienced, and willing to do anything to regain his father's lost lands.

Why is a clock mentioned in Hamlet. There weren’t any clock’s in Hanlet’s time.

Yes I've heard this question before. This is called an anachronism. It is an inconsistency in some chronological arrangement. In this case, there were clocks in Shakespeare’s time but not in Hamlet's. Shakespeare wrote it in because he thought it...

Study Guide for Hamlet

Hamlet study guide contains a biography of William Shakespeare, literature essays, a complete e-text, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About Hamlet
• Hamlet Summary
• Hamlet Video
• Character List

Essays for Hamlet

Hamlet essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of Hamlet by William Shakespeare.

• Through Rose Colored Glasses: How the Victorian Age Shifted the Focus of Hamlet
• Q to F7: Mate; Hamlet's Emotions, Actions, and Importance in the Nunnery Scene
• Before the Storm
• Haunted: Hamlet's Relationship With His Dead Father
• Heliocentric Hamlet: The Astronomy of Hamlet

Lesson Plan for Hamlet

• About the Author
• Study Objectives
• Common Core Standards
• Introduction to Hamlet
• Relationship to Other Books
• Bringing in Technology
• Notes to the Teacher
• Related Links
• Hamlet Bibliography

E-Text of Hamlet

The Hamlet e-text contains the full text of the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare.

• List of Characters

Wikipedia Entries for Hamlet

• Introduction

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Jekyll and Hyde: A* Grade / L9 Essay Example (Tension and Mystery)

Subject: English

Age range: 14-16

Resource type: Unit of work

Last updated

8 September 2024

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This is a student essay that was written outside of timed conditions. It received an A* grade at GCSE, for the AQA English Literature syllabus. Typos and grammatical errors have been left in, to show that even a top grade is achievable with minor errors.

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A MEGA REVISION 'JEKYLL AND HYDE' BUNDLE! (Digital + Printable PDFs, PPTs and worksheets!)

This bundle contains everything you need to teach or study Stevenson's novella 'The Strange case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde' in the form of digital and printable PDF documents. It’s perfect for students aged 14+. **This bundle is currently available at a 50% discount! ** Preview this document for free, to check whether the whole bundle is right for you [Jekyll and Hyde: Character Breakdown / Analysis](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110830) With this bundle, students will be able to: * Understand the structural elements and key moments of the plot * Deepen their knowledge of characters, including understanding the deeper messages behind each one * Integrate the significance of the setting into their analyses and interpretations of the play as a whole * Memorise a range of carefully chosen key quotations for use in essays and analysis * Develop their language, structure and form analysis skills, with guided support and examples * Identify and analyse the thematic and contextual details * Learn approaches to a range of essay question types: discursive, argumentative, close reading * Become confident with extract interpretation and analysis * Develop their knowledge of tragic conventions and apply them to the novella * Expand their critical aptitude via exposure to key critical frameworks and critics’ quotations (for higher-level students) * Write their essays on Jekyll and Hyde, after support with planning help and example A* / top grade model answers Reasons to love this bundle: * Downloadable PDF documents, graphically designed to a high level, PowerPoints (ppts) and worksheets * Visual aids (photographs and drawings) to support learning * Organised categories that simplify the text for students * Print and digital versions - perfect for any learning environment * The unit has everything you need to start teaching or learning - starting with the basic story summary, going right up to deep contextual and critical wider readings * Lots of tasks and opportunities to practice literary analysis skills - students will be guided through writing a literary analysis response to the novella -This is what you’ll get with this bundle: (each document includes digital + printable revision guide + PowerPoint + worksheet)- THE COMPLETE JEKYLL AND HYDE COURSE: 1. [Character Analysis / Breakdown](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110830) 2. [Plot Summary / Breakdown](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110836) 3. [Context Analysis](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110842) 4. [Genre](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110856) 5. [Key Quotations](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110868) 6. [Narrative Voice](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110978) 7. [Setting](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110874) 8. [Themes](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110893) 9. [Critical Interpretation / Critics' Quotations](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110848) 10. [Essay Help](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110934) 11. [Essay Planning](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110950) 12. [PEE Paragraph Practise](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110997) 13. [Essay Practise (Gothic Atmosphere)](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110962) 14. [L9 / A* Grade vs L7 / A Grade Example Essays + Feedback (Frightening Outsider)](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110990) 15. [L9 / A* Grade Essay Example (Tension and Mystery)](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110904) 16. [L8 / A Grade Essay Example + Feedback (Unnatural and Threatening)](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110972) 17. [L6 / B Grade Essay Example + Feedback (Suspicious Atmosphere)](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110984) 18. [L4 / C Grade Essay Example (Secrecy and Reputation)](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110923) 19. [Study Questions / Exercises](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13110884) 20. [Essay Questions + Passage-based Questions](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/resource-13111001) Please review our content! We always value feedback and are looking for ways to improve our resources, so all reviews are more than welcome. Check out our [shop](https://www.tes.com/teaching-resources/shop/Scrbbly) here.

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Hamlet Is More Resilient Character Than King Oedipus Essay

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Both Hamlet and Oedipus are known as overwhelmingly tragic literary figures who eventually had to face their demise due to their tragic flaws. Guided by a strong motivation, both characters demonstrate significant resilience in pursuit of their goals. However, despite Oedipus’ willingness to face the terrible truth told by the prophet, Hamlet’s resilience is infinitely more powerful since, unlike Oedipus, Hamlet is not a champion or crusader for the truth in his nature. Since Hamlet completing his plan to reveal Claudius’ betrayal is much more uncharacteristic of him than Oedipus’ fleeing from the truth, nor is it morally ambiguous, Hamlet should be recognized as a more resilient character.

To compare the resilience of the two characters, scrutinizing their nature and core characteristics will be required first. Hamlet might be considered melancholy and cynical, yet he is nothing short of determined and brave. For instance, he does not hesitate to talk to a ghost despite the menacing presence of tee latter: “Be thy intents wicked or charitable,/Thou com’st in such a questionable shape/That I will speak to thee” (Shakespeare lines 47-49). Likewise, hamlet does not hesitate to confront Claudius, whom being naïve in his nature, he previously discarded as a murderer of the king: “Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane,/Drink off this potion. Is thy union here?/Follow my mother” (Sophocles 358). The willpower and insistence that Hamlet demonstrates by setting a trap for Claudius and the queen and implementing his plan prove that Hamlet’s resilience is outstandingly strong.

In comparison, Oedipus lacks willpower of a similar caliber, preferring to run away from his fate rather than face it directly. As soon as the notorious prophecy of him murdering his father and marrying his mother is made aware to him, Oedipus runs away from his foster parents, being under the assumption that they are his likely victims: “Children, the seed, the sower and the sown,/Shame to his mother’s blood, and to his sire/Son, murderer, incest-worker” (Sophocles 27). Therefore, Oedipus’ resilience wavers in the situation that requires him to confront his fears. Thus, Oedipus can be regarded as a less resilient character.

One could argue that Oedipus’ decision to continue living while bearing the brunt of shame and disgrace after blinding himself represents greater resilience than the one shown by Hamlet. To a certain extent, Hamlet’s decision to part with his life could be defined as having a lesser degree of stubbornness and inner strength to face the consequences of his actions. Eventually, Hamlet chooses to die by drinking the poison: “As th’art a man,

Give me the cup. Let go; by Heaven, I’ll have’t./O good Horatio, what a wounded name,/Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind me” (Shakespeare lines 312-313). Therefore, Hamlet’s resilience is impressively high as he continues to pursue the goal that is against his nature in order to honor his father’s name and avenge his death.

In contrast, Oedipus does not resort to suicide as a means of escaping responsibility and decides to live with the consequences that he has inflicted upon himself. As soon as the outcomes of his reckless actions are revealed to him, he prefers to blind himself instead of embracing the moral reprehensibility of his actions; “His voice rose, and again, again, the strong/And stabbing hand fell, and the massacred/And bleeding eyeballs streamed upon his beard” (Sophocles p. 27). The decision to blind himself, while seemingly being the indication of the sheer depth of his pain, also demonstrates his inability to manage this pain. Instead, he uses blindness as a means of buying himself some solace in exchange for the physical pain and maiming himself: “Agony./Delusion, Death, Shame, all that eye or ear/Hath ever dreamed of misery, is here.” (Sophocles 27). Thus, Oedipus’ resilience falters in the specified scene.

Admittedly, Oedipus also demonstrates impressive resilience when facing difficulties emerging in his path. However, most of the obstacles that he chooses to overcome, as well as the means that he selects to address them, are primarily physical in nature. For example, apart from choosing to gouge his eyes out, which represents a physical injury as a response to his emotional turmoil, he also confronts other challenges in a similar manner. The described approach to opposing the challenges that arise in front of him is opposed to the one that Hamlet undertakes in order to address his conflict. For instance, to make Claudius confess to the murder of his father, Hamlet creates an elaborate play that is supposed to help reveal the murderer (Shakespeare). In turn, Oedipus physically detaches himself from his family when being under the false assumption that he poses a threat to his parents (Sophocles). Thus, the extent of Oedipus’ resilience is lower than that of Hamlet.

The described difference in characters’ willingness to pursue their goals can be attributed to their design and nature. For the most part, Hamlet is portrayed as melancholic and inert to the point of being passive: “Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer/The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” (Shakespeare lines 65-66). The specified character trait suggests that maintaining resilience and insisting on his intention to avenge his father requires a significant effort from him. In turn, Oedipus is depicted being in action: “I will, wife. I have more regard for thee/Than these. – Thy brother plots to murder me” (Sophocles p. 41). Thus, the instances in which Oedipus does demonstrate resilience do not produce the same effect since they show lesser character growth. Despite being more proactive and passionate, Oedipus also falters significantly in regard to essential choices, such as the need to face his fate, which makes him overall less resilient than Hamlet.

Due to the nature of Hamlet’s stubbornness and resilience, which are entirely out of character for him, as well as the morally correct stance that he takes compared to Oedipus, Hamlet should be considered a more resilient character. Hamlet’s insistence on avenging his father demands that Hamlet should overcome personal limitations and seek action, which stands in contrast to Oedipus, who, instead, betrays his character by choosing the comfort of denial. Moreover, from an ethical perspective, the choice that Hamlet makes is infinitesimally nobler, which suggests that Hamlet must make an effort to do0 the right thing as opposed to choosing the easier path. Therefore, while Oedipus might seem more persistent in his attempt to remain oblivious to the fate predicted for him, his resilience has an undeniably passive nature. In turn, Hamlet chooses to act and makes a substantial effort to do so since the specified choice disagrees with his very nature. For these reasons, Hamlet should be regarded as a more resilient character than Oedipus.

Works Cited

Shakespeare, William. (1870). “ Hamlet .” Project Gutenberg , 1870. Web.

Sophocles. “ Oedipus , King of Thebes .” Project Gutenberg, ca. 430 B.C. Web.

• Resilience of Protagonists in Shakespeare's Hamlet and Sophocles' Oedipus Plays
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IvyPanda. (2024, September 11). Hamlet Is More Resilient Character Than King Oedipus. https://ivypanda.com/essays/hamlet-is-more-resilient-character-than-king-oedipus/

"Hamlet Is More Resilient Character Than King Oedipus." IvyPanda , 11 Sept. 2024, ivypanda.com/essays/hamlet-is-more-resilient-character-than-king-oedipus/.

IvyPanda . (2024) 'Hamlet Is More Resilient Character Than King Oedipus'. 11 September.

IvyPanda . 2024. "Hamlet Is More Resilient Character Than King Oedipus." September 11, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/hamlet-is-more-resilient-character-than-king-oedipus/.

1. IvyPanda . "Hamlet Is More Resilient Character Than King Oedipus." September 11, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/hamlet-is-more-resilient-character-than-king-oedipus/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Hamlet Is More Resilient Character Than King Oedipus." September 11, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/hamlet-is-more-resilient-character-than-king-oedipus/.

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