Theme Of Fear In Hamlet

Throughout the play Hamlet feels angry, scared and of course vengeful when planning out his revenge on his uncle and it brings him to stall in going through with it. “ Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer/ The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,/ Or to take arms against a sea of troubles/ And, by opposing, end them”( III.i.65-8 ). Hamlet is expressing his fear in getting his revenge. He knows that he is angry but he is scared to go through with it for the fear of dying and drifting into a place of nothingness. For he doesn’t really know what lies ahead. He goes back and forth on if it is something he is willing to risk yet in his life. His infamous “To be or not to be” soliloquy . If Hamlet attacks his uncle/new step-father he

“Save yourself , my lord/ The ocean overpeering of his list/ Eats not the flats with more impiteous haste/ Than young Laertes,in a riotous head”(IV.v.180-11). Laertes comes bursting into the castle furious wanting to know what had happened to his family concerned for his father to find out that he is dead. After learning this he demands to know who killed him and to have his revenge. He doesn’t care about the consequence he has to face. He was one hundred percent willing to kill the king to avenge his father. With Hamlet being gone Laertes doesn't know who to take his rage on, nor does he know how to let it out making him bottle it up, giving him no control over his own actions. His rage convinces him that the king is right and that it is okay to poison Hamlet in an unfair fight where he doesn't know it's to the death. Leading not only to his death but those all around them. “Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia!/ O heavens,is’t possible a young maid’s wits/ Should be as mortal as (an old) man’s life?/ (Nature is fine in love, and, where ‘tis fine,/ It sends some precious instance of itself/ After the thing it loves.)”( IV.v.182-87). Ophelia has gone insane in the eyes of her brother. She is singing every time she speaks only to talk about the death of her father and she can't talk to the man who murdered him, the man she loves. How is she supposed to react,

“On Fortunes cap. We are not the very button/ Nor the soles of her shoe?/ Neither, my lord/ Then you live about her waist, or in the middle of her Favors?” (II.ii.247-51). Everyone has their place in the mind of fate. It isn't changeable. Some have good luck which means they are on the top of or on “fortunes cap” while others who have bad luck would be the bottom or “the soles of her shoe”. Fate makes it's own rules and there is nothing you can do about it. You put yourself there and fate has made it's choice on whether or not it is meant “to be or not to be”. The issue with fate being the greatest power is that fate is decided by our choices and/or actions we take, our emotions are what control our actions proving that our emotions are stronger than fate itself. “Thy mother’s poisoned./ I can no more. The King, the King’s to blame” (V.ii.344-45). On Laertes death bed he is completely regretting his choices to trust Claudius the king. He knew that he had made the wrong decision and put his emotions of anger and revenge before his intelligence. If he hadn't chosen to team up with Claudius then he knows not everyone would of died maybe even none of them especially the queen. You can tell he has regret about it because he comes out and tells the truth. With his dying breath he tries to make it right in hopes that it will maybe change his fate