Hamlet: An In-depth Analysis by Litcharts

Introduction to Hamlet

Brief Biography of William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was born in 1564. His father was a glove- maker and assemblyman in Stratford-upon-Avon, and his mother was the daughter of a well-to-do landowner. At 18, Shakespeare wed a woman eight years his senior, Anne Hathaway; just six months after their marriage, Hathaway gave birth to a daughter. She later bore two more children-one of whom, Hamnet, died at the age of 11. There is a gap in the historical record between the birth of Shakespeare's twins and his first recorded appearance on the London theater scene in 1592. His theatrical career likely began in the mid-1580s, and between then and 1613, he composed such works as Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Hamlet, The Henriad, Julius Caesar, Othello, and many more. In 1609, he published a book of sonnets, and released other long poems in the mid-1590s when London's theaters were closed due to the plague. Shakespeare died in 1616 of a rumored "fever" just a month after creating a will in which he declared himself to be in good health. His surviving writings include nearly 40 plays and over 150 sonnets, and his body of work is widely performed, analyzed, studied, and reinterpreted to this day.

Historical Context of Hamlet

Hamlet is in many ways a product of the Reformation-a religious revolution in which Protestants broke away from the Catholic Church-as well as the skeptical humanism of the late Renaissance, which held that there were limits on human knowledge. Hamlet's constant anxiety about the difference between appearance and reality, as well as his difficulties with religion (the sinfulness of suicide, the unfairness that killing a murderer while the murderer is praying would result in sending the murder to heaven) can be seen as directly influenced by humanist thought. In the centuries since it was first written, Hamlet has been staged and set in different eras of history, from the late Middle Ages to the confines of a modern-day psych ward. Truncated and full-text versions alike have been produced on stage and screen, and 20th and 21st-century casts and directors have launched interpretations of the text which examine Hamlet as an Oedipal figure, as an individual suffering from mental illness, and even as the illegitimate son of King Claudius.

Related Literary Works to Hamlet

The story of Hamlet is based on a Danish revenge story first recorded by Saxo Grammaticus in the 1100s. In these stories, a Danish prince fakes madness in order to take revenge on his uncle, who had killed the prince's father and married his mother. Many scholars believe that Shakespeare was not the first person to adapt this story-Thomas Kyd, one of Shakespeare's contemporaries, is largely believed to have written a play known as the Ur-Hamlet. Though the text has been lost, scholars believe Shakespeare was directly inspired by Kyd's work. Tom Stoppard's 1966 play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead reimagines the world of Hamlet with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern-Hamlet's doomed courtiers-as the main characters. Their own existential discussions, which take place "in between" the scenes of the original text (which are briefly interwoven throughout the play) rival Hamlet's discursive monologues. Hailed as an absurdist tragicomedy, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern is widely regarded as one of the greatest plays of the 20th century and has been adapted for radio and film, with Gary Oldman and Tim Roth leading the 1990 movie adaptation.

Key Facts about Hamlet

• Full Title: The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
• When Written: Likely between 1599 and 1902
• Where Written: Stratford-upon-Avon or London, England
• When Published: First Quarto printed 1603; Second Quarto printed 1604; First Folio printed 1623
• Literary Period: Renaissance
• Genre: Tragic play; revenge play
• Setting: Elsinore Castle, Denmark, during the late Middle Ages
• Climax: After seeing Claudius's emotional reaction to a play Hamlet has had staged in order to make Claudius face a fictionalized version of his own murder plot against the former king, Hamlet resolves to kill the Claudius without guilt.
• Antagonist: Claudius
• Point of View: Dramatic

Extra Credit: The Role of a Lifetime

The Role of a Lifetime. The role of Hamlet is often considered one of the most challenging theatrical roles ever written, and has been widely interpreted on stage and screen by famous actors throughout history. Shakespeare is rumored to have originally written the role for John Burbage, one of the most well-known actors of the Elizabethan era. Since Shakespeare's time, actors John Barrymore, Laurence Olivier, Ian Mckellen, Jude Law, Kenneth Branagh, and Ethan Hawke are just a few actors who have tried their hand at playing the Dane. When Daniel Day-Lewis took to the stage as Hamlet in London in @2021 LitCharts LLC 1.007 www.LitCharts.com Page 1IlIl LitCharts Get hundreds more LitCharts at www.litcharts.com 1989, he left the stage mid-performance one night after reportedly seeing the ghost of his real father, the poet Cecil Day-Lewis, and has not acted in a single live theater production since.

Shakespeare or Not?

Shakespeare or Not? There are some who believe Shakespeare did not actually write many-or any-of the plays attributed to him. The most common "Anti-Stratfordian" theory is that Edward de Vere, the Earl of Oxford, wrote the plays and used Shakespeare as a front man, as aristocrats were not supposed to write plays. Others claim Shakespeare's contemporaries such as Thomas Kyd or Christopher Marlowe may have authored his works. Most contemporary scholarship, however, supports the idea that the Bard really did compose the numerous plays and poems which have established him, in the eyes of many, as the greatest writer in history.

Plot Summary of Hamlet

A ghost resembling the recently-deceased King of Denmark stalks the ramparts of Elsinore, Denmark's royal castle, over the course of several nights, setting all the castle's guardsmen on edge. The terrified sentinels Marcellus, Francisco, and Barnardo convince a skeptical nobleman, Horatio, to watch along with them one night. When Horatio sees the ghost, he decides they should tell prince Hamlet-his closest friend and the dead king's son. Hamlet is also the nephew of the present king, Claudius, who not only assumed his dead brother's crown but also married the king's widow, Gertrude. Claudius seems to be an able king, easily handling the threat of the Norwegian prince Fortinbras, who is seeking to take back the lands his own father lost in battle with Hamlet's father. Hamlet, however, cannot accept his uncle's rule, furious as he is about Gertrude's marriage to Claudius, and resentful of both his mother and his uncle for besmirching his father's memory with their union. Hamlet agrees to meet the ghost, and as he speaks with it, it claims to be the spirit of his father. The ghost reveals that he did not die of natural causes, but rather was poisoned by Claudius. Hamlet, newly enraged, quickly accepts the ghost's command to seek revenge.

As the days go by, however, Hamlet is uncertain if what the ghost said is true, and struggles to decide whether he should actually kill his uncle. He delays his revenge and begins to act half-mad, contemplates suicide, and becomes furious at all women. He tells himself that his madness is a front which will allow him to investigate his uncle without the king realizing Hamlet is onto him, but as Hamlet investigates his own existential and moral center, his thoughts begin to tend toward serious distress, if not full-blown madness. The king's obsequious old councilor, Polonius, begins to believe that Hamlet's behavior is tied to his affections for Ophelia, Polonius's daughter. Claudius and Gertrude, unsatisfied with Polonius's assessment, summon two of Hamlet's old school friends, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to try to find out what's wrong with him. As Polonius develops a plot to spy on a meeting between Hamlet and Ophelia-using Ophelia as a knowing pawn-Hamlet develops a plot of his own: to have a recently-arrived troupe of actors put on a play that resembles Claudius's alleged murder of King Hamlet, and watch Claudius's reaction. Hamlet decides that if Claudius reacts in a way that marks him as truly guilty, he will be able to avenge his father's death without any moral doubts-in other words, he'll have no excuse not to act decisively and kill the king.

Polonius and Claudius successfully spy on the meeting between Ophelia and Hamlet, during which Ophelia attempts to return gifts and letters Hamlet has given her over an undetermined amount of time-suggesting that Ophelia and Hamlet have had a romantic and perhaps sexual relationship for a while. Hamlet flies into a rage against women and marriage, claiming that women only breed sinners and ordering Ophelia to get herself to a nunnery and hide herself away from men. Claudius concludes Hamlet neither loves Ophelia, nor is he mad. Seeing Hamlet's increasing instability as a threat, Claudius decides to send him away to England, where he will be less of a nuisance. At the play that night, however, as the actors perform a scene which mirrors the events of King Hamlet's murder, Claudius runs from the room and thus proves his guilt in Hamlet's eyes. Hamlet's mother, Gertrude, angry with Hamlet's embarrassing behavior at the play, summons him to her quarters to talk to him about what's going on. Hamlet nearly gets his chance for revenge when, on the way to see Gertrude, he comes upon Claudius, alone and praying in a chamber. Hamlet holds off, however-if Claudius is praying as he dies, then his soul might go to heaven. Even after determining Claudius's guilt through his intricate plot, Hamlet is unable to take action. In Gertrude's room, Hamlet berates his mother for marrying Claudius so aggressively that she thinks he might kill her. The ghost of Hamlet's father appears to Hamlet again, but Gertrude claims not to be able to see it, and cries out that her son is truly mad. Polonius, who is spying on the meeting from behind a tapestry, calls for help. Hamlet thinks Polonius is Claudius and stabs him through the tapestry, killing him.

Claiming that he wants to protect Hamlet from punishment for killing Polonius, Claudius sends Hamlet to England with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Claudius's real motivation, however, is to have Hamlet killed-he sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern onward with a letter asking the King of England, Denmark's ally, to execute Hamlet on sight. Meanwhile, Polonius's son, Laertes, returns to Denmark from his studies in France to avenge his father's death. He finds that his sister, Ophelia, has gone insane with grief over her father's death (and Hamlet's rejection of her), and watches as she puts on a macabre and yet spellbinding display of singing old nursery rhymes alongside bawdy barroom songs, all the while passing @2021 LitCharts LLC v.007 www.LitCharts.com Page 2