Hamlet
Guided Reading Questions
While you do not have to write the answers to these questions, you must be able to
provide an answer if asked. Use the questions and your answers in any way that will help
you to understand and appreciate the play.
These questions and the answers you supply DO NOT take the place of your own active
reading!!
Act I
What happens?
Scene 1
1. What is the mood of the men on watch?
2. Why is Horatio appointed to speak with the Ghost?
3. What political entanglement between Denmark and a neighboring land
contributes to alertness on guard duty?
4. Mentioned in the scene are two Hamlets, father and son, and two Fortinbrases,
father and son. The men on watch call each other by name. Who is referred to by
his title only?
5. To whom do the men say that they owe their loyalty?
6. How has the mood changed by the end of the scene?
Scene 2
1. From the information in Claudius’s opening address, give an account of the
personal life of the royal family and of the affairs of state.
2. How does Hamlet’s feeling about a suitable period of mourning conflict with that
held by Claudius and by Gertrude? How is he distinguished from them—in
clothes, words, and attitude?
3. Why does Claudius want Hamlet to stay in Elsinore?
4. What are Hamlet’s feelings about the world in general and Denmark in particular
before he hears anything about the Ghost?
5. What picture of the Ghost does Hamlet create by his rapid questioning of
Horatio?
Scene 3
1. In the previous scene, Hamlet described himself in relation to Claudius as “more
than kin and less than kind.” How does his relationship with his family compare
to the relationships within the family of Polonius?
2. On what subjects do Laertes and Polonius tend to disagree? On what do they
agree wholeheartedly?
3. What is Ophelia’s dilemma? How does she resolve it?
Scene 4
1. How much time has passed between Scene 1 and Scene 4?
2. What helps Hamlet to overcome his fears and follow the Ghost?
Scene 5
1. Describe the nature of the Ghost’s charge to Hamlet. What responsibilities does
the Ghost entrust to Hamlet?
2. Whom does the Ghost exempt from his call for revenge?
3. How does the Ghost make the King’s crime seem particularly loathsome?
4. What word is repeated urgently many times toward the end of the scene?
5. How does Hamlet’s understanding of his duty at the end of Scene 5 compare with
his mood at the beginning of Scene 2?
6. The object of Hamlet’s plan for vengeance is the King. How might this affect the
state of Denmark?
7. How does Hamlet describe the times in which he lives?
8. Previously, Hamlet told Horatio that men’s features were formed either by
“nature’s livery, or fortune’s star.” What does he say in his final speech that
would make you suspect that he is more influenced by one than by the other?
What Does It Mean?
The Action
1. How does the message given Hamlet by the Ghost reinforce the expectancy and
apprehension of the opening scene on the wall?
2. What meaning beyond the physical actions do you perceive in Hamlet’s
movement from the isolation of his solitary speech in Scene 2 to the fraternal
oath-taking at the end of the act?
3. Marcellus senses that “something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” How can an
entire country be so identified with the death, or even with the murder, of one
man? (Think of Oedipus the King.)
4. Relate Hamlet’s desire for vengeance to his words, “The time is out of joint. Oh,
cursed spite/That ever I was born to set it right!”
5. Working from your conclusions to the above questions, describe the overall
purpose of Act I.
Characters
1. Why is the Ghost correct to call Claudius a “smiling villain”?
2. How does Gertrude deserve the Ghost’s sympathy and concern?
3. Hamlet does not appear to be the man best suited to carry out a plan of revenge.
What instances in his speeches or actions support this view?
4. What qualities in Hamlet’s character as revealed in Act I might prove valuable to
him in his mission of revenge?
5. Hamlet is a young prince whose way to the throne has been usurped by his uncle
Claudius. Explain his statements and movements accordingly. Does Hamlet
indicate that he is ambitious for the throne? Support your answer.
6. What similarities are there in the positions of Laertes and Hamlet in their
families?
Plot
1. How are the incidents surrounding the Ghost’s appearance arranged to convey the
maximum amount of mystery?
2. Would Act I have been more or less effective had it opened with the enactment of
the actual murder of the King? Explain your answer.
3. How might your first impression of Claudius have been affected had the Ghost
told his tale to the men in Scene 1?
4. The events of Act I take place over a 24-hour period. What parts of the day are
more emphasized than others? How does this influence the main action as well as
the mood of this act?
5. Other than the fact that they are both living in Claudius’s court, what links the
similar but otherwise separate stories of Laertes and Hamlet?
Imagery
1. Relate the visual picture of the men on watch peering into the darkness to the
action of the first act.
2. How does Hamlet’s “nighted color” relate to his immediate situation? To his
character? To the problems of Denmark?
3. “With an auspicious and a dropping eye” is the way that Claudius describes the
mood of the time. Explain the changes of scene from castle wall to council room,
and so forth, in light of this image.
4. Locate the image by which Hamlet conveys his sense of the brief passage of time
between his father’s death and his mother’s second marriage. What is the effect of
this image?
Language
1. Explain how the shift in light—from dark night to the approach of dawn after the
cock’s crow has chased the Ghost—is reflected in the speech of the men in the
first scene.
2. Does the manner of Polonius’s speech—the long strings of wise sayings, his
extended puns so different from Hamlet’s—tell you something about his
character?
Note: These questions are from Daniel F. Howard’s Hamlet: Lessons in Critical Reading
and Writing, Harcourt Brace Jovanich, Inc., 1970