Hamlet Vs Claudius

Hamlet and Claudius’s characters in Hamlet are portrayed as enemies of one another, but are they really all that different? In many works of literature there is a clear protagonist and antagonist. In this play, however, Shakespeare leaves it to the reader to decide who is good and evil. Neither character is pure and good, but neither character is truly evil. The extent to which each character is good and evil grows and develops throughout the play.
In first scene, Hamlet is confronted by his late father’s ghost, saying that he had been locked into purgatory on account of his untimely murder. In response to the ghost’s request to avenge his own death, Hamlet speaks nobly: “Haste me to know ’t, that I, with wings as swift as meditation or
In the third scene, Hamlet stumbles across Claudius praying, and implies that he is begging forgiveness for his murder. It would have been a perfect moment to seek revenge and strike him down, but for Claudius’s momentary closeness with God. Hamlet decides to do his deed when Claudius is committing a terrible act instead. As the events unfold, however, Hamlet’s nobility becomes questionable, to the point where he is arguably no better than Claudius the incestuous murderer. Hamlet kills Polonius, the king’s advisor in cold blood, thinking he was Claudius. It is understandable that Hamlet assumes a spy in his mother’s bedroom is Claudius, so attacking him makes sense, but his reaction shows his fall from nobility. Hamlet counters his mother’s criticism of the murder, saying “A bloody deed? Almost as bad, good mother, as kill a king and marry with his brother.” (III, iv, 29-30) Rather than feeling regret for killing Polonius, Hamlet’s lines show that he is conflicted by his charge, to the brink of madness. Polonius’s death is the first of many that get caught up in Hamlet and Claudius’s matter. While Claudius is portrayed as just as evil, Hamlet’s goodness is hidden deeply under his actions at this point in the