In William Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hamlet feigns madness in order to carry out his plan of revenge. Hamlet is a play, about a prince, (Hamlet) whose uncle, (Claudius) takes the throne when he marries Hamlet's mother (Gertrude), and Hamlet's father dies. At the beginning of the play, we find out that Hamlet sees a vision of what appears to be his father's ghost, which tells him that he was actually murdered by Claudius, with poison. The ghost asks him to seek revenge on Claudius and Hamlet spends the remaining four acts of the play taking his time doing just that.
             Hamlet would have much reason to actually be "mad". His father just died and then his mother married his uncle, his father's brother, less than a month later. As a result of this, Hamlet cannot return to school and he does not get his rightful seat at the "throne". That could make one go a little crazy, however; there is no evidence that Hamlet is acting anything but severely depressed, until the ghost appears and tells him that he needs to avenge his death. It is immediately following this meeting that Hamlet tells Horatio and Marcellus that, "As I perchance hereafter shall think meet put an antic disposition on "(1.5.171-172) He is saying to them that he will only be pretending to be a lunatic and even if though they will know this and be aware of it, that they please, in friendship not let anyone know that it is all an act. It is only after these events take place and Hamlet makes this statement indicating he is about to be faking his "crazy" state of mind that he actually begins to act crazy and do crazy things.
             When Gertrude says that she would like to see Hamlet in the bedroom, to tell him that he has offended Claudius, she says "Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended." (3.4.10) Gertrude is referring to Claudius, but Hamlet uses this as an opportunity to turn things around on ...