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Shakespeare's Use Of Pretending In Hamlet

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Charles Levy Dr. Gabri English: Shakespeare Febuary 17, 2023 Hamlet and the Use of Pretending Hamlet, by William Shakespeare, is a play in which Hamlet is visited by his father as a ghost and is ordered to kill the king as revenge. Uncertain about what to do, Hamlet becomes insane. He can either continue to appease the King or he can choose to appease his father by murdering the king. In a speech that Hamlet questions why he can’t take action against the king, he compares himself to a prostitute. Hamlet compares himself to a prostitute because in the same way that they act like they love the men that they have sex with to get paid Hamlet has to pretend to want to avenge his father, ultimately suggesting that Hamlet feels he is like a prostitute …show more content…

In order to make money and survive, a prostitute must pretend to want to have sex with men when she does not want to. Hamlet feels that he is forced to pretend that he wants to murder Claudius as he does not want to. Left with only the option to kill Claudius or to appease Claudius, Hamlet is completely torn as he must appease either his father or Claudius. Throughout the entirety of Hamlet, Hamlet is forced to do acts that he does not want to do and has very little autonomy. Hamlet initially uses the simile of him being like a prostitute to create a comparison between their need to act to gain autonomy. Showing frustration at his inability to have conviction for the murder of Claudius, Hamlet reveals that he does not truly want to kill Claudius. The simile of a prostitute is able to apply a second time to Hamlet’s situation as he has to pretend that he wants to kill Claudius when he does not want to, similar to how a prostitute must pretend to want to have sex with men. Shakespeare uses this simile to complicate our understanding of whether Hamlet’s insanity is legitimate by showing that Hamlet is being torn apart by his father and Claudius, revealing that his insanity could be

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