Summary and analysis of Hamlet

Author: William Shakespeare

Setting: Elsinore, a city in Denmark. The action happens within the castle of the King and Queen.

Plot: The play starts out with some guards of the castle and Horatio, Hamlet’s friend, seeing a ghost figure. Horatio knows who the ghost is, and tried to talk to the ghost, but he only wishes to speak to Hamlet. That being said, Horatio runs off and tells Hamlet that he has come see his dead father, and previous King of Denmark. Hamlet is surprised by this piece of information, and goes immediately to speak to the ghost, his dad, that night. While Hamlet and Old Hamlet were talking, the ghost informs Hamlet that Claudius, Old Hamlets brother and now King of Denmark, had murdered him in hopes of taking the throne. Also, Claudius married Old Hamlet’s wife, Gertrude. Old Hamlet wants one thing of Hamlet, to avenge his father and kill Claudius, and Hamlet eagerly accepts this task.

            Hamlet then proceeds to act a little bit crazy, and forces the guards and Horatio to swear upon his sword that they have not seen anything. Hamlet keeps up his crazy spell, and this forces Claudius and Gertrude to recruit some of Hamlet’s old friends from childhood, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to spy on him. When they meet with Hamlet, he immediately can tell that they have been sent by the King and Queen to get information from him, and thus he refuses to tell them anything. Meanwhile we have Ophelia entering the madness of Hamlet. They are ex-lovers, and Ophelia is torn between Hamlet and her dad knowing about their love and greatly disapproving of it. While Ophelia and Hamlet are having a rather physically violent exchange, Hamlet realized that Ophelia’s dad, Polonius, and the King are spying on them. He then confesses that he once did love Ophelia, but he no longer does, and he tells her to go to a nunnery. At this point, we start to see that Hamlet truly has gone mad.

            Next, Hamlet wants evidence that Claudius killed Old Hamlet, so he puts on a play that is an exact replay of all the events that have happened in Elsinore. Hamlet is focused on Claudius’s reaction, and once that part in the play happens where the King dies, Claudius is appalled and stands up in disbelief: he has been caught. Hamlet then goes to kill the King, but doesn’t because he sees that he is praying so he would go to heaven. Then he goes to Gertrude to try to talk to her about it, but Claudius knows the connection between mother and son, so he sends Polonius to spy on their conversation. Hamlet sees the curtain behind which Polonius is standing moves, and believes it to be Claudius, so he instantly went to kill. Too bad it was Polonius instead of the King. Then the ghost appears again, and Hamlet tries to get Gertrude to see it, but she can’t. He is truly going mad.

            The King desperately wants to get rid of Hamlet, but he knows all of the Denmark people love his so it will be hard, so he gets sent to England. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern arranged to have Hamlet killed via letter, so Hamlet interrupts this message to the King and sends a new one saying to kill them instead. Ophelia has then drowned herself in sorrow of crazy Hamlet and the death of her father. Laertes, her brother, finds out about the whole scandal and plans to kill Hamlet. They soon begin to have a battle, where Laertes puts poison on his sword so that Hamlet will instantly get killed. Incase this plan doesn’t work; the King puts poison in a cup that he bet to the winner, aka Hamlet. Hamlet gets stabbed by the poisoned sword, and realizes it was poison so he was dying. Meanwhile, the Queen had just drunk from the poisoned cup, so she was dying. Furious, Hamlet stabs the King with the poisoned sword. So the sword kills Hamlet, Laertes, and the King, and Gertrude is also poisoned. Horatio goes to kill himself, but Hamlet doesn’t allow it. The final thing Hamlet wishes for is Fortinbras to be King, and that soon happens.

Characters:

Hamlet: Prince of Denmark, son to Old Hamlet and Gertrude. He is struggling to avenge his father the entire play by killing Claudius, and he goes crazy. He is slow to take action throughout the entire play.

Ophelia: Hamlets old lover, she is torn between Hamlet and listening to her fathers wishes of staying away from Hamlet since he is up to no good, just royalty. Once her father dies she goes crazy and drowns herself.

Claudius: Brother to Old Hamlet, but he killed Old Hamlet to become King and soon after his death marries Gertrude. He is terrified of Hamlet, and tells Laertes to kill him so he doesn’t have to. We often wonder if he truly loves Gertrude, or if it’s all just an act.

Gertrude: She quickly remarries to Claudius after her husband has been killed. She has a strong connection with Hamlet since he is her son, and she convinces him to stay in Denmark and not go back to school. Soon she ends up turning on Hamlet and siding with the King.

Horatio: Friend of Hamlet. He often helps Hamlet with good decision-making, and he is seen typically as a good character throughout the play with seldom flaws.

Polonius: Father to Ophelia and Laertes. He always gives them advice and he strongly disapproves of Hamlet and Ophelia’s relationship. He is soon killed by Hamlet accidently.

Narrative tone/style:

Since it is a play, we don’t have to worry about the narrator’s opinions throughout it. We can see everything exactly how it is, through each characters perspective. This way we don’t have any biases. The tone of the play is serious, and we get the feeling of this through all of the conflicts between characters and all of the drama that is created. We also get a feel for all of the craziness throughout the play, and those are intensified through Hamlets never-ending monologues, soliloquies, and asides. There are also tones that suggest anger, revenge, and mischief.

Theme: In order to make something happen, there has to be action take, and logical reasoning behind it.

Quotes:

1)   “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark” (Act I, Scene IV)

~ Marcellus says this while Hamlet and Old Hamlet are conversing. It is obvious that this line sets up the rest of the play and foreshadows what is to happen.

2)   “To be, or not to be: that is the question” (Act III, Scene I)

~ This is spoken by Hamlet. Throughout the entire play, a theme is death and contemplation of death by Hamlet. He struggles with this internal problem for a long time, but realizes that is he uncertain of the afterlife, and he fears what can happen.