Write down your name.
Write down your mother’s name.
Write down your father’s name.
Write down the name of your paternal uncle
(if you have one. If you don’t, write down
the name of a godfather or a man who is
close to your family.)
Cross out your father’s name because he
just died.
Draw a line connecting your mother’s name
to your uncle’s name because two months
have passed, and your mother just married
your uncle.
Write a paragraph describing your feelings
toward their marriage.
This isn’t Jerry Springer.
This is Shakespeare.
The Tragedy of Hamlet:
Background
The Tragedy of Hamlet -- 1602
 Shakespeare’s longest play (1,530 lines)
 Often considered his greatest achievement
 Translated and performed more than any other
play in the world
 Requires from 4 ½ to 5 hours to perform
 Has inspired 26 ballets, 6 operas, 45 film
adaptations, and a “Simpsons” episode
 “To be or not to be” – the most quoted phrase in
the English language
Style
Shakespeare's Hamlet was a
revolutionary departure from
contemporary revenge tragedies,
which tended to graphically
dramatize violent acts on stage, in
that it emphasized the hero's
dilemma rather than the depiction
of bloody deeds.
Shakespeare’s Audience
 Belief in ghosts and in Purgatory (where
one would “work off” sins not confessed or
atoned for before death)
 Belief in the power of confession –
absolution through acknowledgement and
remorse
Family # 1 – The Royals
 Prince Hamlet – university student (Wittenberg
in Germany) and son of the newly deceased King
Hamlet of Denmark.
 Claudius – brother of Hamlet’s dead father;
Hamlet’s uncle; assumes the throne after marrying
his brother’s widow
 Gertrude – Hamlet’s mother, widow of former
king; marries Claudius just 2 months after the
death of King Hamlet
“Frailty, thy name is woman!”
 Ghost of King Hamlet
Family # 2 – The “Nobility”
 Polonius – Lord Chamberlain of the court
and Claudius’s chief advisor; Father of
Laertes and Ophelia
 Ophelia – daughter of Polonius, sister of
Laertes; courted by young Hamlet before
the action of the play begins
 Laertes – son of Polonius, brother of
Ophelia; Hamlet’s childhood friend
presently fighting for Denmark in France
Family # 3 – The Usurpers
King Fortinbras – King of
Norway, longtime enemy of old
King Hamlet
Prince Fortinbras – Prince of
Norway, on the move against
Denmark as the turmoil unfolds
The Friends
Horatio – Hamlet’s most loyal
friend; the first to reveal the news
of the Ghost to Hamlet
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern –
boyhood friends of Hamlet;
commissioned by Claudius to spy
on Hamlet; now synonymous with
betrayal
The Plot
 11th-century Denmark, castle at Elsinore
 Bloody, barbaric plot serves as a backdrop
for the unhappy young modernist who is
Shakespeare’s hero
 Revenge tragedy: Unless there is a reason
why the revenge is delayed, the play is over
in one act. Young Hamlet, an intellectual
and a dreamer, lives in the world of thought;
he is torn between action and contemplation.
Hamlet’s Private Tragedy -Indecision
Appearance vs. Reality
“Acting” vs. Honesty
Love vs. Hate
Self vs. State
Death vs. Life
Loyalty vs. Selfishness
Lust vs. Love
15 Suggested Discussion
Questions
 1 The ghost tells Hamlet to seek revenge but to “Taint
nor let thy soul contrive against thy mother aught.”
Does he succeed in this? Why or why not?
 2 Hamlet says, “Nothing is either right or wrong but
thinking makes it so.” Is he correct in regards to the
world of this play? Do you think he’s correct in regards
to the world in general?
 3 Explicate this quote by stating who said it, to whom,
regarding what, and how it is significant: “Frailty, thy
name is woman.”
15 Suggested Discussion
Questions Cont’d
 4 Explicate this quote by stating who said it, to whom,
regarding what, and how it is significant: “This above
all – to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the
night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”
 5 Explicate this quote by stating who said it, to whom,
regarding what, and how it is significant: “What a
piece of work is a man! How noble in reason! How
infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express
and admirable! In action how like an angel! In
apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world,
the paragon of animals”!
 6 Explicate this quote by stating who said it, to whom,
regarding what, and how it is significant: “Suit the
action to the word, the word to the action.”
15 Suggested Discussion
Questions Cont’d
 7 Explicate this quote by stating who said it, to whom,
regarding what, and how it is significant: “Let Hercules
himself do what he may, the cat will mew, and dog will
have his day.”
 8 Explicate this quote by stating who said it, to whom,
regarding what, and how it is significant: “There’s a
special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now,
‘tis not to come,’ if it be not to come, it will be now; if it
be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all.”
 9 Is Hamlet a static character? A full one or a flat one?
A stock one? Does he have a foil? Describe the
progression of his state of mind.
15 Suggested Discussion
Questions Cont’d
 10 Compare these three men : Hamlet, Laertes,

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Fortinbras – How successful is action versus
contemplation in this play?
11 Consider Hamlet’s friends – Horatio, Rosencrantz,
and Guildenstern – which are true friends, which are
not, and why.
12 Discuss the leitmotif of poison. How is this idea or
image used throughout the work and to what effect?
13 What, if anything, is actually “rotten in the state of
Denmark”?
14 How is the leitmotif of a “play” used in this work?
Who plays to whom and for what purpose?
15 What does Shakespeare accomplish with the
Frenchmen’s scene?
Interview Questions
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TO HAMLET : Did you love Ophelia?
TO HAMLET : Why did you hesitate in killing Claudius?
TO GHOST: What do you expect of Hamlet?
TO GERTRUDE : Are you guilty of anything and do you have any
regrets?
TO OPHELIA: Are you guilty of anything and do you have any
regrets?
TO CLAUDIUS : Why didn’t you try to kill young Hamlet much
earlier?
TO SHAKESPEARE: What is Ophelia’s role in the play?
TO POLONIUS : Why do you spy on people?
TO POLONIUS : Why do you think Hamlet is insane?
TO LAERTES: Why did you decide to kill Hamlet?
Connection to Hamlet? Discuss a thematic
connection that exists between Hamlet and
Sonnet 146 below.
Poor soul, the center of my sinful earth,
My sinful earth, these rebel powers that thee array;
Why dost thou pine within and suffer dearth,
Painting thy outward walls so costly gay?
Why so large cost, having so short a lease,
Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend?
Shall worms, inheritors of this excess,
Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end?
Then soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss,
And let that pine to aggravate thy store;
Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross;
Within be fed, without be rich no more:
So shalt thou feed on Death, that feeds on men,
And Death once dead, there's no more dying then.