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Empathy In Hamlet

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Castillo 1 Eric Castillo Professor Korsen English 1B 18th May, 2018 Hamlet In William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Claudius, the King of Denmark murders his brother in cold blood and takes his crown. In doing so, he hastily marries his brother’s wife Gertrude and tries to kill Hamlet, his nephew. Claudius is obviously unfit to be a king due to his lack of empathy as well as judgment and loyalty. Hamlet however, would have made an outstanding king if he were to have survived the outcome of the events that transpired. Although Hamlet does meet his fate by the end of the play, he did show numerous traits and qualities …show more content…

Hamlet is no exception to that story line. Claudius is a mad king who kills his brother and takes his throne and lacks any integrity and morality. Hamlet, however, does poses these qualities. Towards the end of the play, Laertes is dying, and he apologizes to Hamlet. Hamlet willfully accepts his apologies even though it is revealed that Laertes was trying to kill him for the indirect deaths of Polonius and Ophelia, his father and sister. Laertes states, “He is justly serv’d; It is a poison tempere’d by himself. Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet.” In which Hamlet replies: “Make thee free of it!” (V.II.295). We can assume from this exchange that Hamlet can forgive those who have done him wrong. In the end of the play, we also see that Hamlet only wants what is best for Denmark. In his final minutes, Hamlet says that the country will be in good hands under Fortinbras and in return, Fortinbras admits that Hamlet would have made a fine king as …show more content…

When Hamlet pretends to act insane, this throws everyone off and makes it seem like he is not conspiring to kill Claudius. He even tells Horatio that no matter how insane and crazy he might look, it is indeed an act. Hamlet also uses his intelligence to formulate a genius plot to make Claudius feel guilty for killing his brother. During a play, the actors reenact a scene where the king is sleeping in the garden and he is poisoned by who appears to be none other than Claudius. Other examples of his intellect can be seen in the ways he manipulates and talks to others, as well as the complexities of his thoughts during his soliloquys. Hamlet had been on leave from Wittenberg, a university and was only back due to the death of his father. This makes us believe that he is using techniques such as manipulating and guilting those he knows that he might have learned from higher education. Lastly, Hamlet shows high levels of intelligence ultimately shapes the outcome of the play. He outsmarts everyone around him and even though he does die in the end, he succeeds in killing the people that had conspired to either his father or him. Hamlet’s cleverness and high levels of intelligence would have helped him become a good

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