ipl-logo

Hamlet Madman Or Revenge-Seeking Genius

1029 Words5 Pages

Is Hamlet an madman or a revenge-seeking genius? There are many conflicting ideas on this topic. This essay is divided into three analytic sections beginning with Hamlet’s madness, and a possibility of why it occurred. Then, an analysis of why Hamlet delays revenging his father¹s death. Then, Hamlet¹s incestuous acts with his mother are explained, in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet. In the act one, Hamlet seems to be perfectly sane throughout all five scenes. It is in the second scene where Hamlet starts to have a change in his character. Ophelia meets with her father Polonius, and discusses the last meeting she had with Hamlet. Ophelia tells her father that Hamlet came to her in a broken state of mind, speaking of horrors.(Act 2 Scene 2 line 94). Polonius instantly believes that Hamlet is Mad for thy love? (Act 2 Scene 2 line 95). Ophelia answers a question asked by her father, she says that she had told Hamlet that she could not …show more content…

Hamlet¹s procrastination of in avenging his father¹s death is the next situation. Hamlet learns of his father¹s death in act one scene five, where he follows the ghost (Ghost of King Hamlet) and the ghost tells him, he is the soul of Hamlet¹s father, and that he was poisoned and murdered by Claudius. This took place at the start of the play and Hamlet delayed it until the end of the play to avenge his father¹s murder. The play within a play in act three scene two, confirms that Claudius is the murderer of Hamlet¹s father. Hamlet stages the Murder of Gonzago, and has the actor who is playing the part of the king , to be murdered the same way that Claudius killed Hamlet¹s father. Right after the moment that the actor playing as the king is killed, Claudius hops from his seat and storms out of the theater. This angered action by the king gives Hamlet joy, now he knows for sure that it truly was Claudius who murdered his father. Hamlet is slowly getting closer to avenging his fathers

Show More
Related
1262 Words | 6 Pages

In the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, the dead king’s son Hamlet avenges his father’s murder, but his madness and indecision takes its toll on everyone. Hamlet’s father, the King Hamlet, was murdered by Claudius because he was ambitious for the throne and Queen Gertrude. In Act 3 of the play, Hamlet begins to test Claudius for any sign of guilt in the murder of his father. After watching a play disguised as a reenactment of the murder of King Hamlet, Claudius begins to confess his sins to God. In Claudius’ confession soliloquy, Shakespeare reveals Claudius’ inner duel between his rational desire to act virtuously by relieving his guilt and his gravitation toward material gain and selfishness by following his ambitions through the use of

Read More
1967 Words | 8 Pages

When Hamlet discovered that it was King Claudius that had killed his father, Hamlet maps out a process in which he would go about the death of Claudius. He ponders and thinks of the repercussions that may arise in every situation. At times, he inadvertently lets his emotions get the best of him. For example, his plan of revealing Claudius’s guilt through the observation of the self-reflecting play called “Mousetrap” works as Hamlet had intended. However, Hamlet’s impatience overcomes his control, allowing Claudius to realize the motives of Hamlet.

Read More
713 Words | 3 Pages

William Shakespeare’s Hamlet depicts how emotions can control you ultimately leading into a psychological war with himself. Shakespeare shows how the truth leads to insanity. Hamlet’s character develops from a depressed state to mentally incapable of controlling his actions. He feels this dramatic weakness after hearing about his father’s death but shows no remorse for the murders he has committed. Hamlet is a reckless yet cautious character, making him smarter than those around him.

Read More
1174 Words | 5 Pages

Lastly, Claudius, the man responsible for the death of Hamlet’s father, is eventually killed because Hamlet was flushed with rage by the murder and by the lack of remorse from Claudius. After being betrayed, Hamlet seeks a type of revenge towards these individuals, whether it results is their death, or verbally abusing

Read More
1153 Words | 5 Pages

Introduction At this point in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, he uses insanity to express one’s feelings when they’re in distress. Ophelia shows the most insanity throughout the play. In this scene, she is expressing her sadness to the Queen and King after her father just died. The Queen isn’t looking forward to speaking with Ophelia after Polonius. Ophelia’s opinion is overlooked and they don’t take it into consideration.

Read More
1758 Words | 8 Pages

In this show, the players enact a scene in which the king is poisoned in his sleep and dies, the exact same thing that the ghost of his father said happened to him. Upon seeing this, the king is seething with rage, and storms out of the room, now aware that Hamlet knows what he did. This thickens the plot because now not only has Hamlet confirmed that his uncle killed his father but now Claudius wants Hamlet dead because he

Read More
1552 Words | 7 Pages

He soon makes his insanity known to all his peers who think the reason he is crazy is because he is “crazy in love” with Ophelia who is Polonius, the Lord Chamberlain’s, daughter. Hamlet starts talking erratically and when he speaks to Polonius he calls him names like “fishmonger” and “old fool.” Instead of getting upset, Polonius pushes it to the side because he believes that it is simply Hamlets “crazy” talking. This is one of the ways that Hamlet uses his madness to his advantage. “He seems to use it as a tool or a veneer to act irrationally and assert his opinion about matters without being made accountable for them” (Bali 83-84).

Read More
931 Words | 4 Pages

Furthermore, he strategically plans when to put on his act depending on who he is surrounded by. In Act 3, Scene 2, Hamlet requests that Horatio observe Claudius during the performance to find any signs of guilt. The play that the family intends to watch tells the story of a king who is betrayed by his nephew, who decides to assassinate him for the crown. The moment Claudius, Ophelia, and Gertrude arrive, Hamlet returns to his normal self. Fortunately, their plan works out well, because Claudius abruptly falls into a fit of rage after finding out the king’s nephew had killed the king in the play.

Read More
882 Words | 4 Pages

He tells her “ get thee to a nunnery “. He criticized women for making men behave like monsters. Hamlet then left in a angry rush and Ophelia is only left to thing that he really is mad. Claudius and Polonius come out from behind the curtain and the king states that Hamlet’s strange behavior is not for the love Ophelia furthermore his speech did not seem crazy at all. Claudius started fearing that Hamlet would soon start doing something bad to him.

Read More
734 Words | 3 Pages

To test Claudius’s guilt, Hamlet adds a scene reenacting the murder of Hamlet’s father. Claudius abruptly leaves the play, and afterward, tries to pray. When Claudius is praying, Hamlet is considering killing him, but decides not to because he wants to kill him in sin so that he does not get a chance at last confession. They also all end up dying later in the story due to a sword fight and poison.

Read More
332 Words | 2 Pages

During Act 2.2: lines 541-567 Hamlet at first was mourning and growing, and grieving over his father's death. To find himself mad not knowing what to do and wanting to get revenge on who killed his father. To realising that him standing around cursing is not going to get him anywhere, and that he needs to change his actions and do something about it. Then he came up with the brilliant idea that if his uncle, the murderer was able to see the play re enactment of him murdering his father, it would affect him so much would be driven to admit his crimes outloud.

Read More
451 Words | 2 Pages

Hamlet decides to kill Claudius because he knows that Claudius killed his dad. He needs to find proof that he did commit

Read More
1018 Words | 5 Pages

“Hamlet”: the development of insanity of the main character Hamlet is the protagonist of the play The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (or simply Hamlet) written by William Shakespeare. The man finds out his father was killed by own brother, who wanted to take the throne. Hamlet decided to take vengeance on for the former king. His actions led to the death of all main characters, including the prince himself. During the play readers can see changes in Hamlet’s behavior.

Read More
1457 Words | 6 Pages

In the play, Hamlet, William Shakespeare reflects the common early modern beliefs and perspectives about madness by using the character development of the protagonist who feigns madness throughout the play. Given Hamlet 's status as a prince, current knowledge of madness during the time period, and the contrast of the different types of madness of other characters in the play, Elizabethan audiences would have found it plausible that Hamlet feigns madness as part of his plot to avenge his father 's death. This new historicist perspective steers the modern reader away from anachronistic psychological interpretations of the play. Hamlet’s status as a prince gives the character certain roles and expectations to fulfill, such as avenging his father’s

Read More
749 Words | 3 Pages

The story of a young man by the name of Hamlet has been told since it was first written in the early 1600s. The timeless classic tells the tale of Prince Hamlet, who discovers that his mother had wed his uncle, two months prior to his father’s passing. He visits the throne in Denmark because he is disgusted at the act of incest, where the ghost of his deceased father confronts him, insisting that he was murdered by Claudius, the new king. Hamlet is enraged, and he becomes obsessed with the idea of proving the crime so that he can obtain revenge against Claudius (Crowther). Despite the myriad of themes that circulate throughout the Shakespearean play, many do not realize one hidden yet extensive theme: actions and their consequences.

Read More

More about Hamlet Madman Or Revenge-Seeking Genius

Open Document