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The Deceit In Hamlet

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In The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by William Shakespeare the reader is brought into a story of a heartbroken son and a kingdom that is filled with deceit every which way. Focusing primarily on the deceit brought about by Prince Hamlet and the reasoning behind using so many lies and plots towards those around him. Hamlet can be described as having untrust for people and to even lead to his actions being seen as “madness” to others. For the people closest to him question whether his emotions and his motives for doing certain things are all just an act or if he truly has lost it after his father’s death. These continues behaviors and dishonesty throughout the story carry a certain motive that contributes a great meaning to the work as …show more content…

The event of another major deception is created by Claudius first deceiving Rosencrantz and Guildenstern by making them believe that Hamlet has truly lost his mind through this tragic event and to keep the public safe Hamlet should be sent off to England. But, in this deceit there lies an even greater one for Claudius doesn’t have any intentions of sending Hamlet off for safety reasons but to have him assassinated away from the castle. Our sovereign process, which imports at full,/ By letters congruing to that effect,/The present death of Hamlet. (4.3.64-6) The plot thickens even more when Hamlet learns of what is to come of him from a warrant for his death.
Hamlet's actions after learning this information shoes truly how unforgiving, steadfast, and has lost all care for even those he once called friends by changing his name in the warrant to the names of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. This deceit made by Hamlet upon his friends was
Huff 3 intended to keep himself alive and could be in a way, sending a message to Claudius that he’ll do whatever is necessary in order to stay alive and kill him.
All of these events that transpire throughout the story all derive from the one lie …show more content…

Claiming that he never truly did love her and proving that her father was right about him, “You should not have believ’d me, for virtue cannot/ so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it/ i lov’d you not.” (3.1.117-19) Hamlet’s motives for doing this could be to keep Ophelia out of everything and to not bring her anymore pain if anything was to happen to him as he went through with his plans. It could also be that he is still acting out as the anger/sadden son and that he needs to keep up with the act of seeming crazy to the onlookers. This action also connects to multiple other hasty and rash doings by hamlet that in a way is cutting of ties to his “old life” before he was visited by his father’s ghost and that thinking to himself, that if he’s going to succeed after everything he’s already done, he’ll need to cut ties to anybody that he could at one point had attachments to. There are hints in the line that
Hamlet says to Ophelia after saying they need to make themselves clean of this relationship and cut all ties they had with each other from the past. At the same time saying that they shall
“relish” in the memories which mean bring great joy to themselves thinking about how much

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