The Brief Outline Of Shakespeare's Hamlet

Characters

Hamlet: Son of a murdered Danish king (who was also named Hamlet) and
nephew and stepson of the present king, Claudius. Hamlet suffers great
mental anguish over the death of his father, the marriage of his mother to the
suspected murderer (Claudius, the brother of the dead king), and the clash
between his moral sense and his desire for revenge against his father's
murderer. To ensnare the killer, Hamlet pretends madness. Some
Shakespeare interpreters contend that he really does suffer a mental
breakdown. Hamlet is highly intelligent and well-liked by the citizens, although
at times he can be petty and cruel. Hamlet is the protagonist, or main
character. The play centers on him and his effort to avenge the murder of his
father.

Claudius: The new king of Denmark, Hamlet's uncle and stepfather. He

becomes king after Hamlet's father, the previous king, is found dead in his
orchard. Hamlet suspects that Claudius murdered him.
Gertrude: Hamlet's mother and widow of the murdered king. She continues
as queen of Denmark after she marries Claudius. That the marriage took
place within two months after the late king's funeral deeply disturbs Hamlet.

Ghost of Hamlet's Father: An apparition of old King Hamlet.

Polonius: Bootlicking lord chamberlain of King Claudius. A lord chamberlain
managed a royal household.

Ophelia: Daughter of Polonius. She loves Hamlet, but his pretended

madness—during which he rejects her—and the death of her father trigger a
pathological reaction in her.

Horatio: Hamlet's best friend. Horatio never wavers in his loyalty to Hamlet.
At the end of the play, he recites immortal lines: "Good night, sweet prince,
/ and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!" (5.2.304-305).

Laertes: Son of Polonius and brother of Ophelia. Circumstances make him

an enemy of Hamlet, and they duel to the death in a fencing match near the
end the play. As a man who reacts to circumstances quickly, with a minimum
of reflection on the meaning and possible outcome of his actions, Laertes
contrasts sharply with the pensive and indecisive Hamlet and, thus, serves as
his foil.

Rosencrantz, Guildenstern: Courtiers and friends of Hamlet who

attended school with him. They turn against him to act as spies for Claudius
and agents in Claudius's scheme to have Hamlet murdered in England.
Hamlet quickly smells out their deception and treachery.
Marcellus, Bernardo: Officers who are the first to see the ghost of
Hamlet's father.

Francisco: Another officer.

Voltimand, Cornelius, Osric: Courtiers who bear messages for the king.
Osric informs Hamlet of the fencing match arranged for him and Laertes. A
courtier is an attendant at the court of a monarch.

Reynaldo: Servant of Polonius.

Fortinbras: Prince of Norway, who is on the march with an army. In

battlefield combat (referred to in the play but not taking place during the play),
old King Hamlet slew the father of Fortinbras and annexed Norwegian
territory. Fortinbras seeks revenge.

Players: Actors who arrive at Elsinore to offer an entertainment. Hamlet

directs one of them, referred to as the First Player, to stage a drama
called The Mouse-trap, about a throne-seeker who murders a king. Hamlet
hopes the play will cause Claudius to react in a way that reveals his guilt as
the murderer of old King Hamlet. As The Mouse-trap unfolds on a stage at
Elsinore, the actors are referred to as the following:

Prologue: Actor presenting a one-sentence prologue to the play.

Player King: Actor portraying a king (whom Hamlet refers to as Gonzago,
the Duke of Vienna).

Player Queen: Actor portraying the queen (whom Hamlet refers to as

Baptista, the Duchess of Vienna).

Lucianus: Actor portraying the king's nephew and his murderer.

Clowns (Gravediggers): Two peasants who dig Ophelia's grave. The

word clown in Shakespeare's time often referred to a peasant or rustic.

Yorick: Court jester of old King Hamlet. He amused and looked after the
younger Hamlet when the latter was a child. Yorick is dead during the play,
But his skull, which one of the gravediggers exhumes in Act 5, Scene 1,
arouses old memories in Hamlet that provide a glimpse of his childhood. The
skull also feeds Hamlet's morbid preoccupation with death.

Claudio: Man who relays messages for the king and queen from Hamlet

Minor Characters: Ship captain, English ambassadors, lords, ladies,

officers, soldiers, sailors, messengers, attendants
.
Special Character Designations

Protagonist: Hamlet is the protagonist, or main character. The play centers

on him and his effort to avenge the murder of his father.
Antagonists: Claudius is the flesh-and-blood antagonist (an opponent of the
protagonist). He spends much of his time plotting against Hamlet. Another
antagonist is an abstract one: Hamlet's indecisiveness in acting against
Claudius.

Foil of Hamlet: Laertes is the main foil of Hamlet. A foil is a character who
contrasts sharply with another character. Laertes is decisive and even
headstrong whereas Hamlet is indecisive and procrastinating.

Plot Summary

At midnight behind the battlements at the top of Elsinore castle in eastern

Denmark, an officer named Bernardo arrives to relieve Francisco, another
officer who has been standing guard in the frigid air during an uneventful
watch. "Not a mouse stirring" (1.1.13), Francisco reports as he leaves. Two
other men, Horatio and Marcellus, arrive a moment later. Marcellus inquires,
"What, has this thing appeared again to-night?" (1.1.31). The "thing" is a ghost
that Marcellus says has appeared twice on the top of the castle to him and
Bernardo. Horatio doubts the story, believing the specter is a child of their
imaginations.

While Bernardo attempts to convince Horatio of the truth of the tale, the
apparition appears again—a ghost in the form of the recently deceased King
Hamlet, outfitted in the armor he wore when warring against Norway and
slaying its king, Fortinbras. Horatio questions the phantom. But just as quickly
as it appeared, it disappears. Horatio, grown pale with fright, says, "This
bodes some strange eruption to our state" (1.1.85). His words foreshadow all
the tragic action to follow. The ghost reappears, then disappears again.

Prince Hamlet, the son of the late king, learned of the death of his father while
studying at the University of Wittenberg in Germany. When he returns to
Denmark to attend the funeral, grief smites him deeply. The king's brother,
Claudius, has taken the throne, even though Hamlet has a claim on it as the
son of the deceased king. In addition, Claudius has married the late king's
widow, Gertrude—Hamlet's mother—in little more than a month after old
Hamlet died, a development that deeply distresses young Hamlet. In a
soliloquy, Hamlet expresses his opposition to the marriage, his loathing of
Claudius, and his disappointment in his mother:
 A little month, or ere those shoes were old
With which she follow'd my poor father's body,
Like Niobe, all tears:—why she, even she—
O, God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason,
Would have mourn'd longer—married with my uncle,
My father's brother, but no more like my father
Than I to Hercules: within a month:
Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears
Had left the flushing in her galled eyes,
She married. O, most wicked speed, to post
With such dexterity to incestuous sheets! (1.2.151-161)

The words incestuous sheets in line 161 reflect the belief, prevalent in Europe
at and before Shakespeare's time, that marriage between in-laws—Claudius
had been Gertrude's brother-in-law before he married her—was a form of
incest.

As a first priority as king, Claudius prepares to thwart an expected invasion of

Norwegian troops under Prince Fortinbras, the son of a Norwegian king slain
in battle years earlier by old King Hamlet. Fortinbras apparently has a double
goal: to avenge the death of his father (old King Fortinbras) and to win back
territory the Norwegians lost to the Danes.

In the meantime, Hamlet's best friend, Horatio, tells the young prince the
amazing story of the ghost. He says two guards, Bernardo and Marcellus,
have reported seeing on two nights an apparition of old King Hamlet on the
top of the royal castle. On the third night, Horatio says, he accompanied the
guards and himself saw the apparition. ''I will watch to-night,'' Hamlet says
(1.2.260).

Another young man at Elsinore—Laertes, son of the king's lord chamberlain,

Polonius—is preparing to leave for France to study at the University of Paris.
Before debarking, he gives advice to his sister, Ophelia, who has received the
attentions of Hamlet from time to time, attentions that Ophelia apparently
welcomes. Laertes advises her that Hamlet's attentions are a passing fancy;
he is merely dallying with her.

For Hamlet and the trifling of his favour,

Hold it a fashion and a toy in blood,
A violet in the youth of primy nature,
Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting,
The perfume and suppliance of a minute;
No more. (1.3.8-13)

In other words, Laertes says, Ophelia should be wary of Hamlet's courtesies

and flirtations. They are, Laertes maintains, mere trifles that are sweet but not
lasting. Before he debarks for Paris, Laertes receives advice from his father,
Polonius:
Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
 And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to thine ownself be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell: my blessing season this in thee! (1.3.82-88)

After Laertes leaves and day yields to night, Hamlet meets on the castle roof
with Horatio, Marcellus, and Bernardo at his side. By and by, Hamlet sees the
Ghost but is uncertain whether it is the spirit of his father or the devil in
disguise.
Be thou a spirit of health or a goblin damn'd
Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,
Be thy interests wicked or charitable,
Thou comest in such a questionable shape
That I will speak to thee. (1.4.46-50)

When Hamlet questions the Ghost, it says, "I am thy father's spirit, / Doom'd
for a certain term to walk the night" (1.5.16). The Ghost tells him to revenge a
"foul and most unnatural murder" (1.5.31) committed by Claudius. According
to the Ghost's tale, Claudius poured a vial of poison extracted from a plant of
the nightshade family (henbane, also called hemblane) into old King Hamlet's
ear while the king was asleep, robbing him, "of life, of crown, of queen"
(1.5.83). Claudius had committed the murder when King Hamlet had sin on
his soul, the better to send him to the fiery regions of purgatory (in Roman
Catholic theology, a place or state of being in which a soul purges itself of sin
to become eligible for heaven).

Hamlet makes Horatio, Bernardo, and Marcellus swear on the hilt of his sword
(where the handle and a protective bar intersect, forming a cross suitable for
oath-taking) never to reveal what they saw. While attempting to verify the
ghost's story, Hamlet tells the others he will pretend to be mad, putting on an
"antic [clownish; odd; mentally unstable] disposition" (1.5.194).

It is Ophelia, Hamlet's beloved, who first reports that he has been acting
strangely. She tells her father, Polonius, the nosy lord chamberlain, that
Hamlet had burst in upon her while she was sewing. His face white, his eyes
crazed, he took her by the wrist, peered into her eyes, then left the room.
Polonius runs to King Claudius and repeats Ophelia's report. Claudius
suspects there is something sane and threatening behind Hamlet's strange
behavior. So he directs two school acquaintances of Hamlet, Rosencrantz
and Guildenstern, to watch the prince to find out the truth.

When traveling actors come to Elsinore to entertain, Hamlet engages them to

stage a play, which he calls The Mouse-trap. In the play, a throne-seeker
uses poison to murder a ruler named Gonzago. Claudius's reaction to the play
will reveal his guilt, Hamlet believes, "For murder, though it have no tongue,
will speak / With most miraculous organ" (2.2.427-428). Such a revelation
would confirm that the ghost was indeed telling the truth.
 Meanwhile, Fortinbras sends word that he will not make war on Denmark if
King Claudius allows him to march through the country to invade Poland.
Claudius agrees.

After Rosencrantz and Guildenstern fail to fathom the meaning of Hamlet's

"madness," Claudius and Polonius secretly observe Hamlet conversing with
Ophelia. During the conversation, Hamlet rejects and insults Ophelia as his
apparent madness worsens. His words deeply wound her, and there is a
question whether he is transferring to poor, frail Ophelia the loathing and
anger he feels toward his mother for her marriage to Claudius. Claudius,
unsure whether Hamlet pretends insanity to disguise a scheme or is really
mad, decides to rid the court of his unsettling presence by sending him to
England on a contrived political mission. There, while conducting the court's
business, he will be murdered.

While the actors present the play, they stage a murder in which an actor pours
''poison'' into the ear of another actor playing the ruler, Gonzago. The scene
so unnerves King Claudius that he rises and ends the play abruptly. His
reaction convinces Hamlet of Claudius's guilt. Claudius murdered Hamlet's
father; there can be no doubt of it.

Queen Gertrude reproves Hamlet for upsetting Claudius by staging the play.
Hamlet in turn rebukes her for her hasty marriage. Polonius, meanwhile, has
positioned himself out of sight behind a wall tapestry (called an arras) to
eavesdrop. When Hamlet sees the tapestry move, he stabs through it and kills
Polonius, thinking he is Claudius. After Hamlet discovers his fatal mistake, the
ghost reappears to remind Hamlet of his duty. When Hamlet speaks with the
apparition, Gertrude cannot see the ghost and concludes that her son is
indeed insane. Later she tells Claudius that Hamlet, in a fit of madness, killed
Polonius.

Claudius sends Hamlet to England with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, who

carry sealed papers ordering Hamlet's execution after the ship's arrival. At
sea, Hamlet discovers the papers in a sealed packet while Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern are asleep and writes a new commission ordering the deaths of
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, then re-seals the papers and places them in
the packet. The next day, pirates attack the ship. Hamlet escapes and hitches
a ride with them back to Denmark. When Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
arrive in England and present the sealed papers, they are executed.

Meantime, Ophelia, distraught over her father's death and the apparent loss of
Hamlet's love, drowns in a brook—at first floating until her clothing, heavy with
water, pulls her down. She had climbed a tree and crawled out on a limb. The
limb broke, and she fell into the water. The consensus at Elsinore is that she
committed suicide.

Upon his return to Denmark, Hamlet encounters Horatio and they pass
through a cemetery where two men are digging a grave. The first gravedigger
sings as he digs and throws out a skull. Shocked, Hamlet tells Horatio, "That
skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once; how the knave jowls it to the
 ground, as if it were Cain's jaw-bone, that did the first murder!" (5.1.34). The
man continues to dig and throws out another skull. Hamlet says, "May not that
be the skull of a lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets, his cases,
his tenures, and his tricks? why does he suffer this rude knave now to knock
him about . . . ?" (5.1.40). After Hamlet strikes up a conversation with the
gravedigger, the latter tells him that the second skull was that of Yorick, old
King Hamlet's jester when Hamlet was a child. Holding the skull, Hamlet
recites a short speech about Yorick that underscores Hamlet's preoccupation
with death.

A funeral procession approaches. Hamlet is unaware that the body being

borne aloft is Ophelia's. It is she who will be lowered into the grave. When
Hamlet sees her face, and when Laertes sees the face of Hamlet, the two
men grapple, tumbling into the grave. Laertes means to avenge the deaths of
his father, Polonius, and his sister, Ophelia. Attendants part them, and Hamlet
declares,

I loved Ophelia: forty thousand brothers

Could not, with all their quantity of love,
Make up my sum. (5.1.155-157)

Later, in secret, Laertes and Claudius plot against Hamlet and poison the tip
of a sword Laertes is to use against Hamlet in a fencing match designed as
an entertainment. For good measure, Claudius prepares poisoned wine he
will offer Hamlet during the match. Osric, a courtier and messenger of the
king, informs Hamlet of the details of the match. Hamlet is unaware of the
deadly plot against him.

During the competition, Hamlet performs brilliantly, and Claudius offers him
the cup of wine. But Hamlet and Laertes fight on. Meanwhile, Gertrude takes
the cup, telling Hamlet, "The queen carouses to thy fortune" (5.1.224) and,
before the king can stop her, she drinks the wine. Laertes grazes Hamlet with
the poisoned rapier, breaking his skin and envenoming his bloodstream.
Swords wave and poke wildly, and the fencers drop their weapons and
accidentally exchange them. Hamlet then wounds Laertes with the same
poisoned rapier. Both men are bleeding. A short while later, the queen keels
over. To divert attention from the drink and himself, Claudius says Gertrude
has fainted from the sight of blood. But Gertrude, drawing her last breath
before dying, says, "The drink, the drink; I am poison'd." Everyone now knows
that Claudius had offered Hamlet poisoned wine.

Before Laertes dies, he reconciles with Hamlet and implicates Claudius in the
scheme to undo Hamlet. Hamlet then runs Claudius through, killing him. As
Hamlet lies mortally wounded from the poison on the tip of Laertes sword,
Prince Fortinbras arrives at Elsinore with his army after his conquest of
Poland. Hamlet tells Horatio that he wishes the crown of Denmark to pass to
Fortinbras. Then Hamlet dies. Ambassadors from England arrive to report the
deaths of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and Horatio announces that he will
inform the world of the events leading up to the deaths of Hamlet and the
others. While soldiers bear off the bodies in a solemn procession, canons fire
a salute.

Themes

Hesitation
Hamlet has an obligation to avenge his father’s murder, according to the
customs of his time. But he also has an obligation to abide by the moral law,
which dictates, “Thou shalt not kill.” Consequently, Hamlet has great difficulty
deciding what to do and thus hesitates to take decisive action. While
struggling with his conscience, Hamlet time and again postpones carrying out
the ghost's decree. In the meantime, he becomes cynical, pessimistic,
depressed. He tells Rosencrantz and Guildenstern,

I have of late,—but wherefore I know not,—lost all my mirth, forgone all

custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that
this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most
excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o’erhanging firmament, this
majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me
but a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is a
man! How noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form, in moving, how
express and admirable! in action how like an angel! in apprehension how like
a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is
this quintessence of dust? man delights not me; no, nor woman neither. . . .
(2.2.250)

In his famous critiques of Shakespeare’s works, Samuel Taylor Coleridge

(1772-1834) has written:

He [Hamlet] is all dispatch and resolution as far as words and present

intentions are concerned, but all hesitation and irresolution when called upon
to carry his words and intentions into effect; so that, resolving to do
everything, he does nothing. He is full of purpose but void of that quality of
mind which accomplishes purpose. . . . Shakespeare wished to impress upon
us the truth that action is the chief end of existence—that no faculties of
intellect, however brilliant, can be considered valuable, or indeed otherwise
than as misfortunes, if they withdraw us from or rend us repugnant to action,
and lead us to think and think of doing until the time has elapsed when we can
do anything effectually. (Lectures and Notes on Shakspere [Shakespeare]
and Other English Poets. (London: George Bell and Sons, 1904, page 164)
Inherited Sin and Corruption
Humans are fallen creatures, victims of the devil’s trickery as described in
Genesis, the first book of the Bible. Allusions or direct references to Adam,
the Garden of Eden, and original sin occur throughout the play. In the first act,
Shakespeare discloses that King Hamlet died in an orchard (Garden of Eden)
from the bite of a serpent (Claudius). Later, Hamlet alludes to the burdens
imposed by original sin when he says, in his famous “To be, or not to be”
soliloquy, that the “flesh is heir to” tribulation in the form of “heart-ache” and a
“thousand natural shocks” (3.1.72-73). In the third scene of the same act,
Claudius compares himself with the biblical Cain. In Genesis, Cain, the first
son of Adam and Eve, kills his brother, Abel, the second son, after God
accepts Abel’s sacrifice but not Cain’s. Like Cain, Claudius kills his brother
(old King Hamlet). Claudius recognizes his Cain-like crime when he says:

O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven;

It hath the primal eldest curse upon ’t,
A brother’s murder. (3.3.42-44)

In Act 5, the second gravedigger tells the first gravedigger that Ophelia, who
apparently committed suicide, would not receive a Christian burial if she were
a commoner instead of a noble. In his reply, the first gravedigger refers
directly to Adam: "Why, there thou sayest: and the more pity that great folk
should have countenance in this world to drown or hang themselves more
than their even Christian. Come, my spade. There is no ancient gentlemen
but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-makers: they hold up Adam’s profession"
(5.1.13). After the gravedigger tosses Yorick’s skull to Hamlet, the prince
observes: “That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once: how the knave
jowls it to the ground, as if it were Cain’s jaw-bone, that did the first murder!”
(5.1.34). All of these references to Genesis seem to suggest that Hamlet is a
kind of Everyman who inherits “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune”—
that is, the effects of original sin.

Sons Seeking Revenge

Young Fortinbras seeks revenge against Elsinore because King Hamlet had
killed the father of Fortinbras, King Fortinbras. Hamlet seeks to avenge the
murder of his father, King Hamlet, by Claudius, the king’s brother and
Hamlet’s uncle. Laertes seeks revenge against Hamlet for killing his father,
Polonius, the lord chamberlain.

Deception
Deception is a major motif in Hamlet. On the one hand, Claudius pretends to
be cordial and loving toward Hamlet to conceal his murder of Hamlet’s father.
On the other, Hamlet conceals his knowledge of the murder. He also wonders
whether the Ghost is deceiving him, pretending to be old King Hamlet when
he is really a devil. Polonius secretly tattles on Hamlet to Claudius. Hamlet
feigns madness. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern pretend to have Hamlet’s
best interests at heart while attempting to carry out Claudius’s scheme to kill
Hamlet. After that scheme fails, Claudius and Laertes connive to kill Hamlet
during the fencing match. However, that scheme also goes awry when
Gertrude drinks from a poisoned cup secretly prepared for Hamlet.

Ambition

Claudius so covets the throne that he murders his own brother, King Hamlet,
to win it. In this respect he is like Macbeth and Richard III in other
Shakespeare plays, who also murder their way to the throne. Whether
Claudius’s ambition to be king was stronger than his desire to marry Gertrude
is arguable. But both were factors, as he admits to himself in when he reflects
on his guilt: “I am still possessed / Of those effects for which I did the murder,
/ My crown, mine own ambition and my queen. . .” (3.3.60-61).

Loyalty

Hamlet is loyal to his father’s memory, as is Laertes to the memory of his

father, Polonius, and his sister, Ophelia. Gertrude is torn between loyalty to
Claudius and Hamlet. Horatio remains loyal to Hamlet to the end.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, school pals of Hamlet, betray Hamlet and spy
on him.

Mischance and Serendipity

Hamlet “just happens” to kill Polonius. Pirates “just happen” to rescue Hamlet.
Hamlet “just happens” to come across Ophelia’s funeral upon his return to
Denmark. Hamlet and Laertes “just happen” to exchange swords—one of
them with a poisoned tip—in their duel. Gertrude “just happens” to drink from
a poisoned cup meant for Hamlet. Fate, or unabashed plot contrivance, works
its wonders in this Shakespeare play.
Christ-like Hamlet
Hamlet is like Christ, Irish dramatist George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) has
observed, in that he struggles against the old order, which requires an eye for
and eye. Christ preached against revenge.

Madness: Pretended and Real

In his attempt to prove Claudius’s guilt, Hamlet puts on an “antic disposition"
(1.5.194)—that is, he pretends to be mad. In so doing he is able to say and do
things that confuse and perplex others while he conducts his murder
investigation. But, in the process, does he really become mentally
unbalanced? That is a question for debate. But there is no question that he
suffers deep mental anguish characterized by indecision and depression.

Nor is there any doubt that Ophelia suffers a mental breakdown. Like other
young ladies of her time, she has to accept the will of the men around her: her
father, her brother, the king, and of course Hamlet. She is not allowed to have
a mind of her own. Consequently, she does not know what to do after
circumstances isolate her. Laertes goes off to school, Hamlet rejects her, and
then her father dies. Meanwhile, the king centers his attention on ridding
Elsinore of Hamlet. It is Hamlet's rejection of Ophelia and her father's death
that are the biggest blows to her sanity. Hamlet, disgusted with his mother's
marriage (making her, in his mind, a wanton who yields her body to her late
husband's brother), seems to transfer his disgust to delicate Ophelia, telling
her, "Get thee to a nunnery: Why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners?"
(3.1.125). Hamlet is saying that Ophelia is unworthy to marry and bear
children, who would be sinners. Instead, she should enter a nunnery, a
convent for nuns. Nunnery was also used in Shakespeare's time as a slang
term for a brothel. So it could be that Hamlet is telling Ophelia that she is no
better than a common whore or prostitute. Ophelia's presence in the play
helps to reveal Hamlet's thinking, in particular his detestation of women as a
result of his mother's hasty marriage to vile Claudius.

Serpentine Satan

Imagery throughout the play dwells on Satan’s toxic influence on Elsinore and
its inhabitants. Particularly striking are the snake metaphors. It is the venom of
a serpent (in the person of Claudius) that kills old King Hamlet. Claudius,
remember, had poured poison into the king’s ear as reported by the Ghost of
the old king: While “sleeping in mine orchard,” the Ghost says, “A serpent
stung me” (1.5.42-43). It is a sword—a steel snake, as it were—that kills
Polonius, Hamlet, Laertes, and Claudius. (The sword that kills Hamlet and
Laertes is tipped with poison.) Moreover, it is a poisoned drink that kills
Gertrude. As for Ophelia, it is poisoned words that undo her. The
word poison and its forms (such as poisons, poisoner, and poisoning) occur
thirteen times in the play. Serpent occurs twice, venom or envenom six
times, devil nine times, and hell or hellish eleven times. Garden (as a symbol
for the Garden of Eden) or gardener occurs three times. Adam occurs twice.

Ambiguous Spirit World

In Shakespeare’s time, ghosts were thought by some people to be devils
masquerading as dead loved ones and trying to win souls for Satan. It is
understandable, then, that Hamlet is reluctant at first to believe that the Ghost
on the roof of the castle is really the spirit of his father. Hamlet acknowledges
his doubt:

The spirit that I have seen

May be the devil: and the devil hath power
To assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps
Out of my weakness and my melancholy,
As he is very potent with such spirits,
Abuses me to damn me. (2.2.433-438)

Empty Existence

Time and again, Hamlet bemoans the uselessness and emptiness of life. He
would kill himself if his conscience would let him, as his “To be, or not to be”
soliloquy reveals. But as a Roman Catholic, he cannot go against the tenets
of his religion, which forbids suicide.

Further Reading

The Meaning of "To be, or not to be"

Hamlet’s “To be, or not to be” soliloquy (3.1.66) is one of the most famous
passages in English drama and one of the most-often quoted. Its fame lies
partly in the attention it receives from the endless debates it has generated
about what it means. It is currently fashionable to oppose the traditional view
that the passage is a deliberation in which Hamlet is trying to decide whether
to commit suicide. Anti-suicide champions argue that Hamlet is really
deliberating what course of action to take—or not to take—to ravel his sleeve
of woe while retaining life and limb.

Which view is right? Probably the traditional view—that Hamlet is

contemplating suicide with his bare bodkin. However, because Shakespeare
carried ambiguity to the extreme in this passage instead of speaking his mind
plainly, there is plenty of room to argue otherwise. Leading his readers
through the tangled dendrites in Hamlet’s brain, Shakespeare bewilders his
audience. Admittedly, though, it is jolly good fun to try to solve the passage. In
the end, though, it appears that Hamlet is indeed considering suicide in this
passage.

Why Claudius, Not Hamlet, Became King of Denmark

Keen readers and audiences often ask why Claudius acceded to the throne
in Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. Should not the crown have passed to the dead
king’s son, Prince Hamlet?

Not necessarily. In Denmark, the setting of the play, an elective monarchy

held sway until 1660, when a hereditary monarchy replaced it. Therefore,
Shakespeare’s fictional Hamlet, based on a legendary Dane of the Middle
Ages, could not claim the crown as a birthright.

In an elective monarchy, court officials—noblemen in high standing—selected

the new king by vote. The son of a king was, to be sure, the prime candidate
for the royal chair, and usually he won it. But the voting nobles had the right to
reject him in favor of another candidate. And that was precisely what
happened in fictional Elsinore. The nobles approved the king’s brother,
Claudius. In a hereditary monarchy, the king’s oldest son automatically
ascended the throne when his father died. But of course Danish laws do not
explain why the nobles chose Claudius over Hamlet. Shakespeare offers no
explanation of their vote. However, Hamlet refers to the election of Claudius,
saying, “He that hath kill’d my king and whor’d my mother, / Popp’d in
between the election and my hopes” (5.2.71-72). These lines appear in a
passage in which Hamlet—conversing with his best friend, Horatio—is
discussing Claudius’s murder plot against him and his moral right to kill
Claudius. The words “my hopes” may signify that Hamlet expected to succeed
his father. In the same scene of the same act, Hamlet—dying from the wound
inflicted by Laertes’ poisoned-tip sword—again refers to the Denmark
election system when he says Fortinbras should be the new king: “But I do
prophesy the election lights / On Fortinbras: he has my dying voice” (5.2.300-
301).

That Hamlet did not gain accession after the murder of his father could have
been due to one or all of the following reasons: (1) Claudius actively
campaigned for the kingship, winning votes by promising political favors. (2)
Gertrude, eager to remarry and remain queen, campaigned on his behalf. (3)
The nobles perceived Hamlet as too young and callow—and perhaps more
likely to support the views of the common people instead of their views—and
thus denied him succession.