Shakespeare's Hamlet: Prince of Denmark

THE FUNCTION OF HAMLET'S GHOST

The function of Hamlet's ghost is to inform Hamlet (and the audience) of that which he doesn't know; and to provide the plot with its driving force; and that understanding of the Ghost depends on our appreciation of Elizabethan psychology, faith and beliefs. "The Ghost is the linchpin of Hamlet; remove it and the play falls to pieces." (J. Dover Wilson)

At the beginning of the play when the Ghost makes its first appearance, only his murderer knows that Hamlet the elder has been murdered. When the Ghost first visits, Hamlet is tempted by what he hears. Before, Hamlet's character is like a vegetable, with no point and purpose to fulfil. Then the Ghost informs Hamlet, and thus the audience, how he died at the hands of Claudius, providing the details of Claudius's corruption and Gertrude's entanglement. Hamlet's subsequent actions are based on the knowledge he acquires from the Ghost.

The story of ‘Hamlet' is about Hamlet coping with a restless ancestor. The Ghost therefore provides the plot with its driving force and is the mainspring of the action of the play that involves the deaths of eight other characters, all collateral damage of the original murder of Hamlet by Claudius.

This is a play concerned with revenge, but without the Ghost, ‘Hamlet' would become a play centred on adultery. This is often a misconception many readers of ‘Hamlet' make when identifying adultery as the impetus of Hamlet's character. Since Hamlet is a firm protestant, and it is a Catholic belief that one should not marry one's late brother's widow, one can speculate that he had an Oedipus complex, and was jealous of Claudius sleeping with his mother, Gertrude.

Hamlet's ghost needs its death to be avenged before it can go to rest and Hamlet must carry out this illicit deed. The understanding of the Ghost and its plea for revenge depends on an understanding of Elizabethan psychology, faith and beliefs. Elizabethans believed in a world order of the divine right of kings. Murdering a king was a mortal sin and was considered killing God's chosen, thus bringing the wrath of God upon the entire nation. Hamlet's Ghost is unable to go to rest because he was God's chosen who was wrongfully killed. This is the reason for Denmark losing the war. The politics of Denmark is rotten because the king has been killed and the dead king cannot rest. Claudius has therefore disrupted Elizabethan world order. The Ghost fulfilled the expectations of the Elizabethan audience in that it provided the pivotal background information that would motivate its claim for revenge.

Hamlet's initial inability to make up his mind about the Ghost is because of his firm protestant belief and this is a central premise of the plot. His confusion about the Ghost's legitimacy is due to his protestant beliefs clashing with Catholic ideals. Protestants denounce purgatory and all belief in ghosts. However, his plan to add sixteen lines to the play, The Murder of Gonzago, so that it resembles a re-enactment of the murder of King Hamlet - the way the Ghost described it - proves to be one of craftiness and luck, as, even though known only to him and Horatio, Claudius' reaction exposes his guilt.

At the end of the play however, Hamlet endorses that there is a divinity that shapes our ends, which enables him to accept the role of avenging his father's death, not as an assassin, but as an executioner. This Catholic/Protestant conflict would have resonated with Shakespeare's audience since England at the time moved from Catholicism to Protestantism and back at the whim of kings.

The end of the play is a result of Hamlet accepting everything that the Ghost has told him. One can therefore conclude that the Ghost is the dynamo of the action of ‘Hamlet' and without it the play collapses, and cannot function as an Elizabethan vendetta, but is rather an archaic soap opera centred on adultery.

HAMLET - PROCRASTINATOR OR MAN OF ACTION

Is Hamlet a Procrastinator or a man of action? The topic has been debated by literary critics over the centuries and often is found too ambiguous to answer correctly. However, I believe that Hamlet's "hammartia" is his procrastination in seeking revenge, through his careless planning that causes the death of seven innocent lives and his unnecessary delays. In this essay I will substantiate my views by looking at key points in the play.

At the beginning of the first act, Hamlet swears to avenge the ghost before the identification of the murderer is made and the details of the crime are provided. Subsequently, he decides to put an antic disposition on to conceal his plan of action to seek revenge from those around him, except Horatio. In fact, Hamlet reveals his unwillingness to kill Claudius early in the play when, at the end of act one, scene five he says, "Oh cursed spite, That I was born to set it right!"

The second Act begins and two months have passed and he has not yet executed the revenge. His plan of pretended madness has leaded him to doubt the ghost and delayed the enactment of revenge. What one can conclude from two months is that Hamlet has found no conclusive evidence of Claudius's actions and that he is unsure. He is also, by nature an over excessive thinker, as is clear from his several soliloquies, namely the especial "To Be or Not to Be" speech, which one can translate to "To do, or Not to Do". Here he is basically contemplating the task ahead, which lends itself to procrastination. In his overbalance in the contemplative faculty, he loses the power of action.

In act 2, he convinces himself that his plan to add sixteen lines to the The Murder of Gonzago (the "mousetrap") and watch Claudius's reaction, rather than completing his task, is the best plan of action. This is clear when he says "The Play's the thing where I'll catch the conscience of the king". This indicates that he doubted the word of the ghost in the first place. Interestingly, Hamlet fails to kill the king when he does show his guilt during the play. This is most probably because he is sure of his ability to do the deed when he wishes. This again highlights his procrastination.

Further evidence of this is when he fails to kill Claudius while he is praying. Although one could argue that he would have sent his fathers murderer to heaven - "A villain kills my father; and for that, I, his sole son, do the same villain send to heaven" - he clearly shows his further intention on delaying the murder when he says "When he is drunk asleep or in his rage, Or in th' incestuous pleasure of his bed".

The scene many agree defines Hamlet as a man of action is the stabbing of Polonius behind the arras in his mother,Gertrude's bedroom, thinking that it was the king. However, it must have just been wishful thinking, as he just saw the king praying a moment ago. He was merely defending his life, as any sane person would have done.

The consequences of Hamlet's delay are terrible, when he is forced to send the traitors Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to their deaths; and the killing of Polonius with its consequence in the madness and death of Ophelia, also unpremeditated. Further deaths of his mother, Laertes and, himself, could have been prevented, had he developed a swift plan. Therefore, I strongly conclude that Hamlet is indeed a procrastinator.