Hamlet's Emotions

Stephanie Gaitan
Mr. Kennedy
ENG 3U1
23 November 2009
Emotions
In the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, the main character Hamlet is seen as a very emotional person. His emotions change all the time throughout the play so he attempts to act crazy so nobody knows what’s going on with him. When he acts crazy to hide his emotions, it affects everyone else but, Hamlet does not realize it. The emotions that he shows in the play are sorrow, anger and guilt. Hamlet shows sorrow after his fathers death, when his mother re married 2 months after the death of his father and he shows sorrow when he finds out that Ophelia died. In the beginning of the play, you see Hamlet as the only one still grieving over his father while everyone else enjoys the ceremony. The king and Queen do not like him grieving so much so they try to tell Hamlet to move on from it because everyone dies. The Queen confronts Hamlet first and tells him to stop mourning over his father. “Good Hamlet, cast thy knighted colour off… do not for ever with thy vailed lids/ Seek for thy noble father in the dust.” (1.2.69-72) She than tells him that everybody dies. “Thou know’st ‘tis common: all that lives must die/ Passing through nature to eternity.” (1.2.73-74) After everybody leaves the ceremony in the castle, Hamlet is by himself and he talks about his father and how he was an excellent king, and he talks about how quickly his mother re married. “… 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!” (1.2.155-158) Near the end of the play Hamlet finds out that Ophelia died. While hiding in the graveyard, he hears Laertes talking about her and how she will be an angel. Hamlet is shocked and says “What, the fair Ophelia!” (5.1.230) Hamlet later comes out of hiding and talks about how much he loves Ophelia and how he would do anything for her. “ I loved Ophelia. Forty-thousand brothers/ Could not with all their quantity of love/ Make up my sum.” (5.1.262-264) Therefore the Queens actions and death’s of his father and Ophelia bring sorrow to Hamlet. Hamlet shows anger when the ghost that looks like his father told him that Claudius killed him, when he talks to his mother about how wrong it was to move on so quickly and when Laertes chokes him at Ophelia’s funeral. In the beginning of the play Hamlet is told about the ghost that looks like his father so he follows it until they are both alone. The ghost tells Hamlet that his father was poisoned by his uncle. “…’Tis given out that, sleeping in my orchard./ a serpent stung me; so the whole ear of Denmark/ Is by a forged process of my death… The serpent that did sting thy father’s life/ Now wears his crown.” (1.5.40-45) Hamlets response is revenge. He gets angry and seeks revenge on his uncle. “Haste me know’t, that I with wings as swift/ As meditation or the thoughts of love/ May sweep to my revenge.” (1.5.33-35) Also in the beginning, Hamlet talks about his mother in anger. He is angry about how quickly she forgot about his father and how quickly she could be with somebody else. “… Heaven and earth!/ Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him/ As is increase of appetite had grown/ By what it fed on; and yet within a month-/ Let me not think on’t! Frailty, thy name is woman!” (1.2.144-148). Later on in the play Hamlet is alone with his mother and he points out that she is weak and she didn’t see the mistakes she made. “… What devil was’t/ That thus hath cozened you at hoodman-blind/ Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight,/ Ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans all,/ Or but a sickly part of one true sense/ Could not so mope.” (3.4.83.88) Hamlet than talks about how his uncle is disgusting and his father was a better king. “Nay, but to live/ In the rank sweat of an enseamed bed,/ Stewed in corruption, honeying and making love/ Over that nasty sty!” (3.4.100-103) When Hamlet’s in the graveyard, he hides from the Queen, King and Laertes. He listens to that is going on and when Laertes talks about how much he’s grieving for Ophelia. Hamlet gets angry. He comes out of hiding and Laertes chokes him. Hamlet threatens Laertes by saying “Thou pray’st not well./ I prithee take thy fingers from my throat,/ For though I am not spleritive and ras,/ Yet have I in me something dangerous,/ Which let thy wisdom fear hold off thy hand.” (5.1.250-254) Therefore Gertrude, Claudius and Laertes’ actions bring anger to Hamlet. Hamlet shows quilt when he’s on the ship to England, when he apologizes to Laertes and when Horatio tries killing himself. When Hamlet is on the ship to England, he does to speak with the captain and he finds out why they are going to attack a small piece of Poland. When the captain tells Hamlet that they are doing it for honor he starts to feel guilty because he knows he wouldn’t do something like that and he starts to feel guilty about not killing Claudius yet. Hamlet talks to himself after talking to the captain and says, “… Rightly to be great/ Is not to stir without great argument,/ But greatly to find quarrel in a straw/ When honor’s at the stake. How stand I then,/ That have a father killed , a mother stained,/ Excitements of my reason and my blood,/ And let all sleep, while to my shame I see/ The imminent death of twenty thousand men/ That, for a fantasy and trick of fame,/ Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot.” (4.4.55-64) In the final scene, just before Hamlet and Laertes fight, the king comes and makes them hold hands. Hamlet turns to Laertes and gives him a big apology. “Give me your pardon, sir. I have done you wrong;/ But pardon’t as you are gentleman./ This presence knows, and you must needs have heard,/ How I am punished with a sore distraction./ What I have done/ That might your nature, honor and exception/ Roughly awake, here I proclaim madness.” (5.2.216-222) Hamlet asks for forgiveness for everything wrong he has done to Laertes. He accepts his apology but he says “I am satisfied in nature,/ Whose motive in this case should stir me most/ To my revenge.” (5.2.235-237) At the very end of the play, most people die. Horatio finds out that Hamlet id dying so he tries killing himself by trying to get what’s left of the poison in the cup. Hamlet stops him and says “As thou’rt a man/ Give me the cup. Let go, by heaven I’ll have’t./ O god, Horatio, what a wounded name,/ Things standing thus unknown, shall I leave behind me./ If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,/ Absent thee from felicity awhile,” (5.2.354-359) Therefore Laertes, Horatio and not being able to kill Claudius right away brings guilt to Hamlet. In conclusion Hamlet experiences a lot of emotions during the play that were mostly caused by the actions of others. If no one died, than Hamlet wouldn’t have the emotions of sorrow, anger and quilt, he would just be miserable.