“Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” (1.5.100) As it is hinted in the first scenes and then explicitly stated by Marcellus, the country is undergoing a change that is not purely natural. The fifth scene in act one, lines 29-54 of Shakespeare's Hamlet (1603), supports this idea by focusing on the corruption that has taken over Denmark due to Claudius' actions. The new king, though not present is that passage, is essentially the main topic of Hamlet and the Ghost’s conversation. One of much importance, since it allows the apparition to fuel Hamlet’s desire for revenge by portraying Claudius as evil. The old Hamlet look-alike explains the odd circumstances of his death and the events that followed. His demand of revenge happens after …show more content…
His plea of revenge is followed by a focus on the unusual and violent part of his death. In other words, his speech depicts one of the effects of Claudius’ crime : physical corruption. The Ghost reveals the severity of the regicide through an alliteration of the sound “m”, which accentuates the words “most” and “murder” (1.5.31-34). Those are also repeated multiple times. In the same way, the use of the superlative “most” and the enumeratio “most foul, strange and unnatural” highlights the significance and the strangeness of King Hamlet’s death by pounding the same words and making use of different ways to describe the same feeling of abnormality. Moreover, this type of corruption also takes into account the fake story that was released so that Claudius' crime would stay hidden. It was disclosed to the state of Denmark that “a serpent stung [the king]”, and the alliteration of "s" in "'Tis given out that, sleeping in my orchard, / a serpent stung me" (1.5.43) makes the line sound like a snake slithering closer and closer. Similarly, an assonance of the "i"s in "The serpent that did sting thy father's life" (1.5.46) may remind the reader of the animal's quick bite. In any case, the reader can perceive the physical impact of King Hamlet’s murder through various figures of speech that address a particular sense: the