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Insanity In Shakespeare's Hamlet Soliloquy Essay

846 Words4 Pages

‘ “To be or not to be” -- “that is the...” soliloquy. “Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to...” agree, the question that no one knows. To think or know, to know perchance to understand, the truth behind all the madness. Was or was not Hamlet faking his insanity, was he really suffering, or did he perhaps even do both. Insanity; insanity is acting abnormal, but being unaware of the behavior. It is also when you are affected by a lot of stress causing you to not be able to think clearly. Hamlet wasn’t completely insane, if he was, it wouldn’t make sense. Let me get this straight, I’m not suggesting Hamlet faked this whole thing. Obviously, having your father murder is bad enough, but to have your mother within a month, marry your uncle, who …show more content…

However, there is some logic behind this quote. North being straight ahead or up, which means normal. By saying “north-by-northwest,” he means that he is only insane slightly off to the side. Hamlet acts as he seems to be somewhere along the line of southwest, meaning really crazy, (south being the opposite direction of north, hence the opposite direction of normal). Since he states this, its evidence he can’t be truly insane if he’s aware how insane he is. Also the way that he went from character to character exploiting his insanity, being very careful going to this person first then to another, and acting insane in front of them, all to make everyone think he was insane, including the most important character, Claudius. Once Claudius thought Hamlet was insane, he thought he was safe, and that he could carry out the rest of his plan. With the soliloquy, “To be...” Hamlet knew that the King was overhearing him, henceforth continuing on with his insane act. A great example is Hamlet’s “To be...” speech, when he was talking to Ophelia. He knew the King was listening to him, and that it was his chance to make an attempt to show the King that he was insane. The way he acted around Claudius, the madness of his act, how he kept insisting, “...get thee to a nunnery...” That it’s mad to say to the woman you love. The reasoning of Hamlet only acting insane around certain people, leads to another example. Hamlet’s private conversations with his true friend, Horatio. When speaks to him he sounds sane, because Horatio knew everything, and did nothing. I’m now going to contradict myself about Hamlet becoming at all crazy from seeing the ghost because it did definitely affect him but didn’t make him mad. See, if Hamlet saw the ghost, and went insane from that, don’t you think that Horatio and the guards would’ve gone insane from seeing the ghost as well? I really doubt that Hamlet

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