Hamlet

• The soliloquy begins with Hamlet's thoughts on how time is running by and he still hasn't done anything. He says:And spur my dull revenge! What is a man,If his chief good and market of his time (Hamlet IV.iv. 32-35)

• In these lines Hamlet is thinking about all the time he has wasted in not taking action. He sees how everything around him is taking shape, all except his own actions. He goes on to say "Sure, he that made us with such large discourse, Looking before and after, gave us not that capability and god-like reason to fust in us unus'd "(36-39) Here Hamlet is saying that every man has reason, and that reason should be put to good use. He also expresses the thought that he has "......cause and will and strength and means to do't" (45-46) but still waits and thinks of taking action instead of taking action.

• After learning of Fortinbras' plan against Poland, Hamlet is disgusted with his inability to avenge his father's murder. He wonders how he has just "let all sleep" even after the killing of his father and the moral death of his mother, (56-59). He is even more ashamed when he thinks of the twenty-thousand men who are willing to go to their deaths for a valueless piece of land that's not even big enough for their gr

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• But Hamlet's essential dilemma is one that has confronted men throughout the ages; and this confrontation -between duty and morality, courage and fear, right and wrong - will assuredly persist for all ages to come. Hutchings, Critical Quarterly 20, 1978). Many of the characters within the play hide behind a mask of falseness. Hamlet had many opportunities to kill Claudius, but did not take advantage of them.

• Claudius the king of Denmark conduct in council gives him the appearance of an Honest and honorable man.

• He is a skilful manipu-lator of others, persuading Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to betray their friendship with Hamlet and succeeding first in calming Laertes and then in inducing him to cooperate in the plot against Hamlet. One example of this is that when he went to England, he was taking a big risk. Hamlet is so determined to do something he does not wish to think about the consequences anymore. Go to, I'll no more on't; it hath made me mad. The clothes take on two separate meanings here, the first of which deals with melancholy.

• The clothes that Hamlet wears during the opening scenes indicate both his state of mind and also his perception of his mother and Claudius. And he is a superman because he has walked and held converse with Death, and his consciousness works in terms of Death and the Negation of Cynicism

• He has seen the truth, not alone of Denmark, but of humanity, of the universe: and the truth is evil.

Approximate Word count = 5080
Approximate Pages = 20 (250 words per page double spaced)

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