Hamlet

5 Pages 1191 Words

Hamlet Essay
Madness is a very interesting thing. It is described by doctors as an “illness” of the
mind. Webster’s College Dictionary defines the state of madness as being mentally
disturbed or deranged. Because madness is not something physical (it is simply a state of
mind or a case where there is something wrong with one’s mind) it is extremely difficult to
tell when someone is mad. There is no definite point where someone crosses the line from
sanity to madness. There is a very large gray area where someone could be considered
either mad or sane. Also, the fact that madness cannot be measured or calculated by some
standardized test (like they use to test for IQ) makes it extremely difficult to discern
whether someone is truly mad or not. Since madness is just a state of mind, it is easy for
someone to fake being mad simply by acting very strange and not like themselves. In
Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, one of the questions central to the plot of the story is whether
Hamlet is truly mad or just acting mad to get revenge for the death of his father. Since
Hamlet is such a complex character, he might actually fool some readers into believing
that he is genuinely mad, but all of the evidence from the play points to the contrary.
In the exposition of the play, Hamlet’s father, King Hamlet, dies. Just over a
month later while Hamlet is still mourning, Hamlet’s mother, Gertrude, remarries with
Hamlet’s uncle, Claudius. The actions of his mother cause Hamlet to feel outrage along
with grief. Others believe that the cause of Hamlet’s madness is that his lover, Ophelia,
ended their relationship. Polonius is so sure that the root of Hamlet’s madness is love that
he sets up an encounter between Hamlet and Ophelia so that Polonius and Claudius can
spy on Hamlet and see if love truly is the cause of his madness. The majority of the people
in Denmark feel that the mixture of a lost lover and...