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Hamlet Tragic Hero Research Paper

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The Tragic Hero and the Inevitable Misfortune that Follows Them
The tragic flaw ultimately brings about the downfall of the tragic hero, although this flaw is usually the hero’s greatest strength. In the play, Oedipus the King by Sophocles, the character Oedipus is seen as the tragic hero with many tragic flaws that lead to misfortune for him and the people around him. In the play, Hamlet by William Shakespeare, the character Hamlet is seen as the tragic hero whose many tragic flaws brings about the misfortune of multiple characters, including himself. In both texts, the tragic heroes are led to their demise due to the decisions and actions they make throughout their lives. The tragic flaw of making and performing impulsive and ignorant decisions …show more content…

When Hamlet discovered that his uncle Claudius was the murderer of his father, he recklessly pursued revenge by promising to strike his uncle dead whenever he had the chance. During a heated conversation with his mother Gertrude in her bedchambers, a noise sounds behind the arras in the room. Thinking it was Claudius, Hamlet struck his rapier through the arras, killing Polonius. Hamlet quickly asks Gertrude, “…is it the king?” (Shakespeare, 3.4.26) This shows Hamlet blindly chasing the revenge of his father against Claudius and how it led to the tragedy of Polonius’ death. In addition, as Laertes recklessly pursued his revenge against Hamlet for murdering his father, he challenges Hamlet to a duel. Laertes ends up striking Hamlet with a poison-tipped rapier but also being struck by Hamlet with the poison-tipped rapier. Before his death, Laertes reveals Claudius’ wrongs to Hamlet and Hamlet strikes Claudius before ironically pouring poison down his throat. Hamlet exacts his revenge by viciously stating, “then, venom, to thy work,” (5.2.315). He then kills Claudius by pouring poison down his throat and stating, “drink off this poison” (5.2.319). In the end, Hamlet getting the truth and revenge from Laertes and Claudius led to nothing but death and tragedy. This ultimately proves how Hamlet hated Claudius for killing his father, but his revenge against Claudius led him to become Claudius, a murderer who caused the deaths of

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Claudius expresses his thoughts on Hamlet to many people including Gertrude: “His liberty is full of threats to us all” (iv.i.14). Hamlet makes attempts to expose Claudius for murdering his father by putting on a play that mirrors the murder and he shames his mother for marrying Claudius. After seeing the play and hearing of Polonius' murder, Claudius felt even stronger about Hamlet being a threat. In order to prevent Hamlet from convincing everyone Claudius should not be king. He tells the people around him that Hamlet has gone mad and must leave.

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This hunger for revenge encapsulates Hamlet in a casket of anger and hatred for Claudius who struck Hamlet’s father down in cold blood soon after Hamlet converses with the ghost of his father, the late King Hamlet. Through this dialogue, Hamlet learns that Claudius played a key role in the slaying of King Hamlet and had kept it from the view of the public. After this revelation occurs, Hamlet then commits to dispersing all life from the body of Claudius, quickly following the newly discovered, heinous actions of the suspected tyrant. However, Hamlet’s anger and fury clouded his judgement and heavily influenced the monumental decisions that he made during the poem to be, less than adequate as a whole. The story of Hamlet signifies the theme of revenge in a manner that defines how it can corrupt and destroy a person both, emotionally and physically.

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During the duel, Hamlet realizes what Claudius and Laertes have done, forcing Laertes to exchange swords with him. Hamlet, as well as Laertes, are both fatally stabbed during the battle, consequently resulting in both being poisoned from the sword. Before dying, however, Hamlet finally gets his revenge by killing Claudius. The story of Hamlet ends in his tragic demise and although he does not live to see it, he achieves his goal of killing

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He threatens to kill whoever had a hand in his father's death. He was so angry that “he succumbs to Claudius' temptation to use fraud in gaining his revenge” (Salem Press). He did not think twice about the consequences or Claudius' true motives for wanting Hamlet

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Certainly, the regicide of King Hamlet is motivated by Claudius's desire for power and position. Then, too, he obviously has lusted after Queen Gertrude, for he marries his brother's wife after killing him. Worried that the king's son may seek to disrupt his reign as king, Claudius plots to rid Denmark of Prince Hamlet by manipulating his former schoolmates, the courtiers, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to do away with him. When this effort fails, Claudius then convinces Laertes to kill Hamlet in a duel so that he may continue his reign as king. However, his cupidity and evil designs turn upon himself and Claudius dies at the hands of Hamlet.

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As a result, secrets are also impelling behind Hamlet which makes him angry. Hamlet is very angry how his life got when his mother married Claudius, which leads Hamlet to start his revenge on King Claudius. For example, when Hamlet was talking to himself he says,” ...there she was marrying my uncle… that's not good, and no good can come of it either,” (Shakespeare 29). Hamlet does not like his mother and Claudius together because he knows something terrible will come from it. It leads Hamlet into finding out that his uncle, King Claudius, killed his father King Hamlet.

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Claudius trusted a selected few and still ended up being killed by Hamlet. Even though Hamlet got revenge for his father's murder he was too late. This combat scene between Laertes and Hamlet have the readers at the edge of their seats. Hamlet’s quick temper and clouded judgement cost him his life. Although this scene is primarily seen as one of disappointment and sadness, it could also be seen as one of relief or even hope.

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King Claudius is a character who has always been envious of his brother’s success, King Hamlet, and therefore, is willing to do anything in order to acquire that power. He does so by pouring poison into the King’s ear in his sleep, thus resulting in King Hamlet’s death. However, Claudius declares that the King died of a snakebite in the garden, and thus no one knew of the murder that had just taken place. The outcome of his actions is long suppressed guilt which he only shows later in the play when he is trying to pray but is unable to after knowing Hamlet knows about his father’s death, “O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven. /

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As Laertes speaks, Hamlet’s anger continues to grow and after Hamlet finds out what happened and find out the plan Laertes slowly suffer from the wound and died. Soon after the incident of Laertes, Hamlet decided that he should go ahead and kill the king since he is dying. He is also making a comment on how horrible of a king Claudius is and how disgusting he feels that he was lied to behind his back and as all of this is going on the people who was watching the fight was seeing this event happening. When Hamlet was limping to the king and when he was saying all of the quote Hamlet took his pointed sword and through the torso area Clausius was stabbed by Hamlet and then reaching for the cup he poured every last bit of the liquid into Claudius mouth and he instantly died.

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His willingness to conspire with Claudius and deceive Hamlet into thinking that it is a fair fight. Eager to get his revenge, Laertes “[dips] a knife in” the poison so that nothing “can save [Hamlet] from death,” demonstrating the damaging consequences of acting on desires for revenge through deception (IV, vii, 159). In the end, Laertes does end up wounding and therefore killing Hamlet, however, “Laertes, as he himself admits, ‘is justly killed by [his] own treachery’ (5.2.297),” by also getting stabbed by the same poisoned blade

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This behavior caused disrespect and cruelness. While the king is sleeping like he is in heaven Claudius took that from him and sent him into purgatory. This made Hamlet feel even more angry against his uncle and wants to put him to an end. As a result,Hamlet wants to destroy Claudius for every wrong deed he did. Canales 3 Hamlet is severely motivated into killing for his actions.

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He is angry about his father’s death, which later leads to him leading his army into a revolution, but the king uses the skills he has in speaking to change Laertes’s mind so he can stop the revolution. This makes him want to kill Hamlet. Because of the adversity between Laertes and Hamlet, they have a duel. During the duel, Claudius and Laertes want to use poison to kill Hamlet. However, in the end Laertes feels that he should not kill Hamlet, but unfortunately, he and Hamlet both get stabbed by the poison sword.

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What everyone else did not know though is that Laertes has poisoned the tip of his sword so if he so much as scratches Hamlet he will die, and just in case Claudius had poisoned a cup just for Hamlet. Hamlet decides not to drink the cup of wine, so his mother does, it all goes south from there. Hamlet’s mother is slowly dying after drinking the poison and Hamlet has been sliced by the poisoned blade of Laertes. Once hamlet discovers his mother has been poisoned by Claudius and him himself has been too, he goes out with a bang killing both Laertes and Claudius, successfully avenging his father’s

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A tragic hero is a character who makes a judgment error that inevitably leads to his/her own destruction. A tragic hero always has a tragic flaw which is the problem that causes a character's downfall or death. Hamlet's tragic flaw is indecisiveness. Hamlet is one of the most typical examples of a tragic

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A tragic hero is a multifaceted, admirable character with a tragic flaw that turns his life from glory into suffering. Hamlet is an example. ‘Born’ personality, shifting mentality, and inevitable fate leads to its tragedy which eventually triggers audience’s pity. Unlike other tragedies where tragic heros discover the truths by their own actions at the end of the story, realizing that the reversal was brought by their own actions. Hamlet begins differently by knowing the truth from things happening to him.

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