William Shakespeare’s
Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
Lecturer: Audrey Tinkham
April 13, 2004
Themes in Hamlet

Revenge
 Religion & the Otherworldly
 Disease and Corruption
 Appearance vs. “Reality”

Fortune, Fate, Providence
 Impossibility of Certainty
 Mortality
 Complexity of Action
Hamlet, Act I

Scene 1: The Ghost,
the setting & context
 Scene 2: Claudius,
Gertrude, & Hamlet
 Scene 3: Laertes,
Ophelia, & Polonius
 Scenes 4 & 5:
Hamlet and the Ghost
Hamlet, Act II
Scene 1: Polonius and Reynaldo
 Scene 2:

 Rosencrantz
and Guildenstern
 Polonius, Gertrude, and Claudius
 Polonius and Hamlet
 Hamlet and Rosencrantz & Guildenstern
 Hamlet and the Players
Hamlet, Act III

Scene 1: The plot thickens;
Hamlet and Ophelia
 Scene 2:




Hamlet and the Players
Hamlet and Horatio
Hamlet and Ophelia
The Play within a Play
Scene 3: Claudius’s Prayer
 Scene 4: Hamlet & Gertrude;
Polonius slain

Hamlet, Act IV
Scene 1: Disposing of the corpse
 Scene 2: Hamlet and Rosencrantz &
Guildlenstern
 Scene 3:

 In
search of the corpse
 Hamlet and Cladius
 Hamlet departs for England
Hamlet, Act IV

Scene 4: Fortinbras marches; Hamlet reflects
 Scene 5:



Ophelia’s “madness”
Laertes “storms” the castle
Laertes and Ophelia

Scene 6: Letter from Hamlet re: pirate ship
 Scene 7:

Cladius and Laertes conspire
 Ophelia dies
Hamlet, Act V

Scene 1:




Clown and gravedigger
Hamlet and Yorick
Ophelia’s burial
Scene 2:

Hamlet explains his trick
 Osric invites Hamlet to fencing
match
 Madness and mayhem ensue
 Fortinbras claims Denmark
Critical Perspectives
We are now come to a scene which I have always much admired. I
cannot think it possible that such an Incident could have been
managed better, nor more conformably to Reason and Nature. The
Prince, conscious of his own good Intensions and the Justness of
the Cause he undertakes to plead, speaks with that Force and
Assurance which Virtue always gives, and yet manages his
Expressions so as not to treat his Mother in a disrespectful Manner
. . . . And his inforcing the Heinousness of his Mother’s Crime with
so much Vehemence, and her guilty Confessions of her Wickedness
. . . Are all Strokes from the Hand of a great Master in the Imitation
of Nature . . . . The Ghost’s not being seen by the Queen was very
proper; for we could hardly suppose that a Woman . . . Could be
able to bear so terrible a Sight. (George Stubbes, 1736)
Critical Perspectives
The queen was not a bad-hearted woman, not at all the woman to
think little of murder. But she had a soft animal nature, and was very
dull and very shallow. She loved to be happy, like a sheep in the
sun; and, to do her justice, it pleased her to see others happy, like
more sheep in the sun. She never saw that drunkenness is
disgusting till Hamlet told her so; and, though she knew that he
considered her marriage “o’er-hasty,” she was untroubled by any
shame at the feelings which had led to it. It was pleasant to sit upon
her throne and see smiling faces round her and foolish and unkind
of Hamlet to persist in grieving for his father instead of marrying
Ophelia. [She is] genuinely attached to her son (though willing to
see her lover exclude him from the throne); and, no doublt, she
considered equality of rank a mere trifle compared with the claims of
love. The belief at the bottom of her heart was that the world is a
place constructed simply that people may be happy in it in a good
humoured sensual fashion. (A. C. Bradley, 1904)
Something is Rotten in the
State of Denmark
Foreshadowings: I.i.69-83, 116-129
 “Unweeded garden”: I.ii.133-37
 “They clepe us drunkards”: I.iv.17-38
 “Smiling, damnèd villain”: I.v.106-10
 “I lack advancement”: III.ii.335-43
 “Those many many bodies”: III.iii.8-23
 “Through the guts of a beggar”: IV.iii.19-32
 “‘Th election and my hopes”: V.ii.57-70

Hamlet’s “Issues”
What troubles Hamlet? I.ii.129-59
 “Unmanly grief”: I.ii.87-97
 “What an Ass am I!” II.ii.549-88
 “A consummation devoutly to be wished”:
III.I.57-91
 “When honor’s at the stake”: IV.iv.33-67
 “Our indiscretion”: V.ii.4-10
 “Let be”: V.ii.207-22

Hamlet & Ophelia

What transpires in their
relationship?

I.iii.29-44, 100-35
 II.ii.182-86
 III.i.89-164
 III.ii.107-126

Ophelia’s “madness”:

IV.v.46-74
Hamlet in Performance

In preparation for the next
two classes, make a few
notes for yourself on how
you stage the following
scenes in your mind’s eye.
(How you stage them
depends, of course, on how
you interpret them):






Hamlet and the Ghost
Ophelia and Polonius
Hamlet’s soliloquy in III.i
Hamlet and Ophelia
Hamlet and Gertrude
Scenes concerning Fortinbras