By Fuat ÖZKUL, (March 16, 2006; METU – Ankara)
Hamlet is almost synonymous with Shakespeare and English literature in general. Many consider Hamlet to be the crown jewel of Shakespeare’s literary works. It is also perhaps the best representation of tragedy to be portrayed through theatre. The story of Hamlet forces whoever views it to see how terrible and tragic life can be. It does this by showing all of man’s true failings: a lust for power, a taste for corruption, betrayal and perhaps worst of all, man’s absolute need for vengeance over those who have wronged him. Although Hamlet is a play of revenge, its greatness lies in the unique and thoughtful nature of the prince Hamlet, whose temper is philosophical rather than active. The only flaw that may be attributed to Hamlet is his evasion of the task of revenging his father’s death.
The most fundamental issue in Hamlet, one which opens the door to countless readings of the play, can be stated in one simple question: Why does Hamlet delay taking revenge on Claudius? Various answers can be offered to this question, bu this paper will focus on the inner workings of Hamlet’s mind as the primary cause of his procrastination of the task. His evasion of the task and his realization for the evasion is covered by various psychological defensive mechanisms: deep depression, hopelessness to the value of life, dread of death, self accusations, and desperate attempts to excuse procrastination.
Hamlet’s depressed. In the very beginning, the guards’ dialogue reflects that “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark” (1.4. 90). He has to try to find meaning, direction and a stable identity in the midst of this confusion and corruption. Thus, the imagery of decay is used to help comprehend the depression Hamlet feels in his first soliloquy about suicide. “O that this too sullied flesh would melt, Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew,” (1.2. 129-130) Hamlet is basically communicating that he wishes not to exist in this world anymore. His deep depression resulted from his mother’s wrong deeds and his pain and his yearn for death can be felt by the audience. Hamlet continues to say:
Or that the Everlasting had not fix’d
His canon ’gainst self-slaughter! O God! God!
How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable,
Seem to me all the uses of this world! (1.2. 132-135).
Hamlet is so angry to his mother that he even sees her worse than a beast: “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 (1.2. 150-152). This is because of her forgetting the King hamlet so quickly and making a hasty marriage with “a most wicked speed and with such dexterity to incestious sheets” . 1.2. 157-158).
The first soliloquy reveals the fact that Hamlet’s mother is at the center of the confusion and corruption that disturbs him. Hamlet is quite upset and his anger and depression stem from his mother’s hasty remarriage to his uncle and her incestuous acts. It’s this emotion that drives out Hamlet’s deep suppressed feelings of anger. His confusion and depression can be noticed when he indicates the time that had passed since his father’s death; “two months: death, nay not so much, not two” (1.2.138), and a few lines later he says “A little month, or ere those shoes were old” (1.2.147). Here his confused mind is playing games on him. In addition, he is expressing his depression while comparing his father’s attitudes towards his mother while he was alive and what his mother did after he had passed away and could not justify and accept his mother’s bahaviours. Therefore he accused her of forgetting his Hyperion like father so easily and so quickly and committing incestuous deeds. His heart is broken and he is disappointed by his mother’s deeds, so he tries to avoid thinking about it by stating that “Let me not think on’t—Frailty, thy name is woman!” (1.2.146) Hamlet’s growing awareness of the betrayal of his mother and evil of Claudius leads to a deepening depression and perhaps a real madness.
The colours of Hamlet’s clothing may be seen as a sign of his deep depression as well.When Gertrude tells him “Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off, /And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.” (1.2.68-69) His reply is important for understanding his depression: “Seems, madam! Nay it is; I know not “seems.”/Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,/Nor customary suits of solemn black,/Nor windy suspiration of forced breath, (1.2.76-80). Hamlet tries to tell how he suffers the devastating loss of his father and he seems to change, alter, and ultimately fall into a deep depression.
Here Hamlet states that his outer appeareance reflects his inner situation by saying that “Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief, / That can denote me truly: these indeed seem,” (1.2.82-83). Hamlet, also in the revenge soliloquy, reflects his depression after learning the truth about his father’s death:
Hold, hold, my heart;
And you, my sinews, grow not instant old,
But bear me stiffly up. Remember thee!
Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe (1.5.93-97).
Here, not only the world but also Hamlet’ heart is distracted as well and a few lines later again calls his mother as “O most pernicious woman! /O villain, villain, smiling, damned villain!”(1.5.105-106) showing his anger and disappointment he felt because of her unaccaptable and unjustifiable behaviour.
Hamlet does not value life. In his first soliloquy when he contemplates suicide,he states: “O God! God! / How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, / Seem to me all the uses of this world!” (1.2.132-134). Hamlet has suicidal tendencies here and basically communicating that he wishes not to exist in this world anymore. He wants to die and be apart of the ground when he says: “O that this too sullied flesh would melt, Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew,” (1.2.129-130) His pain and his yearn for death can easily be noticed here. Life is no longer meaningful for him and he cannot survive in this sort of corrupted world.
Hamlet’s hopelessness to the value of life is clearly viewed while he is talking to Rosencrantz and Guildernstern while they are tyring to understand the real reason of his melancholy:
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 (2.2.291-295).
Hamlet here states clearly that he has lost all his joy for life and, the earth seems to him a sterile promontory and has become meaningless for him. “And yet, to me,/what is this quintessence of dust?/ Man delights not me: no, nor woman neither”(2.2.306-308). With these lines, he also expresses his dread of death as well.
Hamlet has a dread of death. In the well-known ‘to be or not to be soliloquy’, he expresses how fear of death prevents people from doing the things they intend to do, by stating that “conscience does make cowards of us all” (3.1.83) and makes them “lose the name of action” (3.1.87). He alsomentions suicide, and how life is a burden for everyone. Therefore he wants to kill himself by saying that “When he himself might his quietus make/With a bare bodkin? ” (3.1.75-76). Because he does not want to continue living in a world that is controlled by “The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely,/ The pangs of despised love, the law’s delay” (3.1.70-72). However, as Hamlet is too conscious, he cannot kill himself. The “dread of something after death”-purgatory, hell, perhaps is what keeps him alive to avenge his father and perhaps what prevents him from committing suicide as well.
Hamlet’s dread of death is also noticed in the graveyard scene when he is talking to the clowns about the owner of the skulls and philosophizing about their previous and present states. He is deeply influenced when he takes the skull that belongs to Yorick whom he used to knew well and tells Horatio: “Now get you to my lady’s chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come; make her laugh at that.”(5.1.182-185) Hamlet later reveals his dread of death directly to Horatio by these lines: “To what base uses we may return, Horatio! /Why may not imagination trace the noble dust of / Alexander, till he find it stopping a bung-hole?” (5. 1.192-194).
Hamlet goes on talking about the great historical figures who have turned into dust like The Great Alexander and Imperious Caesar. His speeches about these important names are significant because they reveal the real reason of Hamlet’s dread of death which is not only the fear of becoming the food for the worms but infact fear of being so easily forgotten by the people. His anger to his mother is also caused by her forgetting the old king so easily and quickly, and getting married to her husband’s brother in two months time.He expresses this idea in the play in the play scene, stating that: “how cheerfully my mother looks, and my father died within these two hours.” (3.2.121-122) when Ophelia corrects him by saying: “Nay, ’tis twice two months, my lord.”(3.2.123). “Die two months ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there’s hope a great man’s memory may outlive his life half a year” (3.2.125-127).
Hamlet accuses himself for not being able to take his father’s revenge.In the Hecuba soliloquy that begins with; “O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!…”(2.2.539) He feels himself guilty because of his inactivity as he even cannot act as well as an actor who acts for Hecuba, so asks What’s Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,/ That he should weep for her? (2.2.548-549) so accuses himself of ‘being dull and muddy-mettled rascal unpregnant of his cause’, even could not act for his king father who was so dear to him:
Yet I,
A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak,
Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause,
And can say nothing; no, not for a king,
Upon whose property and most dear life
A damn’d defeat was made. Am I a coward?(2.2.556-561)
Hamlet struggles with his conscience about actually killing his uncle. At the same time, He
feels guilty that he is not avenging his father’s death and calls himself a coward and “pigeon-liver’d” then goes on insulting his own self with the following sentences:
Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave,
That I, the son of a dear father murder’d,
Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,
Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words,
And fall a-cursing, like a very drab,
A scullion! (2.2.573-578)
Hamlet is being plagued by his low self-image, thus taking no action and contributing even more to his existing problems. He is dissatisfied and angry because of his lack of action as he is in a constant struggle with his conscience and cannot act bravely as the son of a king.However, he chooses the easiest way as usual and goes on talking, as he says unpacking his heart with words.That is, his words speak louder than his actions and this causes frustration and self accusations as he cannot find enough courage to act and take his revenge.
Hamlet keeps finding excuses for his procrastination. After the ghost reveals him the truth about the murder, he reacts immediately as if he would really kill Claudius: “So uncle, there you are. Now to my word/ It is adieu, adieu! Remember me. / I have sworn’t” (1.5.111-113). Hamlet’s decision to avenge his father’s death illustrates his impulsiveness. Later, he is unsure of what the ghost represents “May be devil, and the devil hath power” (3.1.554). Thus he feel depressed and cannot decide what to do, so he wants further evidence of Claudius’ guilt before actually killing him, so he arranges a performance that resembles his father’s murder to check on Claudius’ reaction, “The play’s the thing/ Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King” (3.1.559-560). After the play, he talks to Horatio to get his idea and states: “I’ll take the ghost’s word for a thousand pound. Didst perceive?” (3.2.276) Hamlet feels sure about Claudius guilt and when Claudius is praying, he has the opportunity to kill him;
Now might I do it pat, now he is praying;
And now I’ll do’t. And so he goes to heaven;
And so am I revenged. That would be scann’d:
A villain kills my father; and for that,
I, his sole son, do this same villain send
To heaven. (3.3.73-78)
Here Hamlet thinks his way out of situations, blaming religion, bad timing, etc., rather than himself and he procrastinate his revenge once again so as not to send him to heaven as he is praying.
Hamlet chooses the path of modern man, rather than acting quickly with the passionate fury of anger, deeply analyzing the matter yet to the point of disregarding the action at whole. Despite the fact that all the occasions and events provoke his revenge he still goes on speaking and philosophizing about the nature of man and the meaninglessness of war.“How all occasions do inform against me,/And spur my dull revenge!”(4.4.32-33) However, the time delay caused by Hamlet’s indecision allows Claudius to take precautions that eventually result in more deaths than are necessary to avenge the murder of King Hamlet.
Hamlet is a play that has captured the hearts and minds of its readersthrough its timeless themes and brilliant character portrayal. All the psychological defensive mechanisms Hamlet used in the play; such as his depression, devaluation of life, fear of death, accusing himself, and trying to find excuses desperately for the evasion of his task are still valid and used by the modern people in their procrastinations of the important decisions for their own lives. Because of this reason, Hamlet endures as the object of universal identification because his central moral dilemma transcends the Elizabethan period, making him a man for all ages.
WORK CITED
Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. New York: Washington Square Press, 1998.
