Hamlet

In Hamlet, Shakespeare presents a tragedy for his audience, laying out the story of young Prince Hamlet. In the beginning of the play Hamlet is forced to return from his studies in Wittenberg to the royal house at Denmark to lament his father’s death and take part in the coronation of his uncle Claudius and his marriage to his mother, Gertrude only a month later. His loyal friends report to him that they saw a ghost of the now deceased king Hamlet and Hamlet decides to meet it. When the Ghost arrives, Hamlet is told the truth of the whole event, how Claudius had killed old Hamlet. Henceforth, Hamlet consistently looks for the opportunity to avenge his father’s death by killing Claudius, continuously ruminating on the act and whether and how he should do it. His obsession with revenge turns him against his love Ophelia, giving the impression to Polonius, the king’s right-hand man, and Claudius that Hamlet is insanely in love with Ophelia and is thus heavily affected due to her withdrawal of her love for him. Claudius decides to send Hamlet away to England to be killed after Hamlet frightens him with a play telling a story of the true events. After returning from England, contrary to the king’s plan to get rid of Hamlet, Hamlet agrees to a duel with Laertes, Ophelia’s brother, because Laertes believes Hamlet to be the cause of Ophelia and Polonius's deaths. In the end, everyone is killed one way or another, leaving a question mark on the purpose of their lives.

  The theme can be mostly seen from Hamlet's rambling soliloquies. The whole series of events that occur throughout the play culminate in developing the theme of uncertainty and human curiosity and inquisitiveness where the human character is constantly faced with new situations that give way to more questions than answers, developing character to understand ourselves and view the world in a different light.

In Hamlet, even though the point of view of the characters differs based on their dispositions as portrayed by Shakespeare, the general perspective is one of longing to understand the complexities of nature and human society. Especially through Hamlet’s character, Shakespeare conveys inquisitiveness about what life constitutes and questions the purpose of man. The tone of the play relates closely to the point of view, demonstrating a questioning attitude that leads the reader to analyze the situation more closely and recognize an almost dragging outlook. Shakespeare incorporates a very dark and contemplative tone into Hamlet. A lot of this gets set up in the very first scene that takes place in the middle of the night as the watchmen and Horatio discuss all the strange events in Denmark. We see the contemplative tone come out during Hamlet's long soliloquies as he constantly tries to figure out what to do but ends up spending too much time thinking. We, as an audience of a play, are forced to decipher the events of the play due to Hamlet's unreliability as a narrator and even that becomes more confusing after Hamlet's madness is added in.

As in any other of his plays, Shakespeare presents a wide range of literary devices such as chiasmus, apostrophe, and many others. These techniques add a certain rhythmic flow to Shakespeare’s writing and give way to a more insightful interpretation of his work. Hamlet also uses symbolism extensively. Starting with the appearance of the ghost, the audience is forced to question Hamlet’s belief in the supernatural and the degree of faith which Hamlet and the audience can place in the ghost’s words. Throughout the play, Hamlet persists on questioning the prevalence and affects delivered by religion, especially in his attempt to kill Claudius as the king is in mid-prayer, opting out of killing him for fear of sending him to heaven. Ophelia’s madness and her flower-giving act is a nice representation of using her character to denote the characterization of the other characters’ dispositions, motivations, and inclinations. Yorick’s skull near the end of the play was another symbol that illuminated Hamlet’s questioning of the purpose of man in light of inevitable death. His careful analysis of the skull offered insight into his deeper consideration of life after death, the role of religion, and the purpose of the human character.

Quotes:
"To be or not to be, that is the question." - Hamlet
      "How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable,/Seem to me all the uses of this world!" - Hamlet

These two quotes show Hamlet and the theme of the play on the purpose of human existence. Hamlet wonders - as he always does - about the reasoning behind actually being alive and how it would be like to die and why people actually stand life when death is there.