NOTES ON HAMLET

Shakespeare has written about the tragedy of Hamlet not only to tell a story but also to represent society.

The protagonist of the tragedy is the adolescent Hamlet. Hamlet the king had died and his brother Claudius has succeeded him. “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark” and the natural order has been broken. Hamlet the prince’s father’s ghost has asked him to revenge his death: Hamlet had to kill his uncle. Hamlet could not control the situation: thought too much.

The audience or the readers can learn about Hamlet’s mind and thought through his soliloquies.
In the famous monologue from Act III Scene I : “To be or not to be”, to live or not to live expresses Hamlet’s inner conflict. If you live you can take arms against an “outrageous fortune” and try to contrast or differently you can have a survey (a biological life) and accept your destiny. It follows that it is better to put an end to life that means to commit suicide. In Shakespeare’s times death was compared to perennial sleep: if you sleep you do not feel any pain and nothing hurts.
On a second thought Hamlet thinks that when you sleep you can dream but a dream can be either positive or negative. It goes without saying that a dream may turn into a nightmare too. Indeed a man does not know what happens after death. The fear of the unknown prevents him/her to commit suicide. The “sea of troubles ”, all the evils of the life are nothing if compared to the fear of what we do not know.

In conclusion Hamlet is scared he is not a hero. Hamlet is the stereotype of humanity: Hamlet and all men are coward in front of what they fear. Shakespeare uses Hamlet’s characters to display human fragility: in front of the unknown they prefer to accept negative fortune rather than discovering the unknown.