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Hamlet - Coggle Diagram
Hamlet
the story:
the king of Denmark is dead. The queen Gertrude, has almost immediately married the dead king's brother, Claudius.
the dead King's son Hamlet, prince of Denmark, meets his father's ghost on the battlements of Elsinore Castle;
the ghost tells him that Claudius is guilty of his murder and asks Hamlet to take revenge. Hamlet pretends to be mad in order to again time and observe the behavior of the king and queen
his brilliant, sensitive mind is undecided about what to do and he even contemplates suicide. Hamlet then asks the actors in a court play to insert a scene similar to his father's murder, in order to observe the king's reaction
the king's confusion seems to confirm the ghost's revelation: that Claudius is guilty of murdering Hamlet's father. But Hamlet accidentally kills Polonius, father of Ophelia, Hamlet's lover
Ophelia goes insane and drowns herself. Polonius son, Ophelia's brother Leartes, swears revenge. The king then manipulates him to carry out his own plan to murder Hamlet.
A fencing match is arranged and Laertes, on the king's advice, uses a poisoned foil. In this tragic duel Hamlet in killed as planned, but not before mortally wounding Laertes and stabbing the king. Queen Gertrude mistakenly drinks a poisoned cup intended for Hamlet and also dies.
the play:
Hamlet is Shakespeare's most famous play. The popularity of Hamlet has been constant through the centuries, and the its story is one of the most frequently filmed.
its hero's doubts and indecisions are familiar to modern readers, who are equally tormented by a lack of certainties and an inability to communicate
Hamlet's indecision must be placed against the background of the revenge tragedy, a very popular genre at the time. According to its conventions, Hamlet should have sought revenge with all his force and as sib as possible.
but the does not do so. He is plagued by doubts: in the first place, about his mother's relationship with king Claudius, who he supposes has killed his father; secondly, about himself
in his famous soliloquies he analyzes the meaning of life, and especially the ideas of love and death. Hamlet is the tragedy of will: in it, thought kills action.
To Be, or Not to Be:
This, Shakespeare's most famous soliloquy, takes place at the beginning of Act 3, when Hamlet is already suspected of being mad
the cause of his madness is still unknown. Polonius, believes that Hamlet's melancholy is the result of his unhappy love for Ophelia, Polonius daughter
Polonius and King Claudius then hide themselves to observe Hamlet's behaviour in the presence of Ophelia. It is at this point that Hamlet enters, already talking to himselft
the central dilemma of the passage seems to be the choice between action and inaction but there is more than a personal, practical dilemma involved
two philosophical positions, not reconciled in Hamlet's monologue, are expressed in the first five lines: one is the stoical attitude of enduring life's evils and misfortune at all costs and to the end
the other is the belief that, if necessary, man may end life by suicide. in both cases, however, life is seen as a battle. hamlet choice of words and images shows his profound pessimism
After some general statements on death and life and after listing common human sufferings, he examines the thought of life after death. This is something which nobody really knows anything about and everybody fears
it is this thought that makes men patiently endure life's sufferings and prevents them from committing suicide. It is not clear whether this is the position that Hamlet prefers - he interrupts himself when he realizes Ophelia is present: but his resentment at man's, or his own, incapacity for action is quite obvious in the last lines