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Hamlet

Introduction

Hamlet can be classified as a play based on revenge and tragedy. The revenge genre was popular in the Jacobean and Elizabethan periods. Some of the aspects of play which are common in all tragedy plays include: presence of a hero who takes revenge for an evil deed, scenarios depicting death and violence, high levels of insanity, play within a play and the tragic death of a hero.

Themes

The basic themes of the play revolve around tragic scenes and revengeful characters. What makes this play unique is the fact that Hamlet is the only protagonist in any Elizabethan play based on revenge, who is eligible for being labeled as a hero. The king was afraid of Hamlet's popularity and confessed that to Laertes (Shakespeare, IV. Vii).

The other character, Claudius's main role in the play is to add to Hamlet's confusion and anger, which in turn adds to the play's tragedy. He searches for the meaning of life and for finding the ultimate truth. Later on, he is murdered by Hamlet when Hamlet stabs him and then forces him to drink wine with poison (Shakespeare, 5.2). Hamlet also has to face death due to the wounds he suffered during his battle with Laertes.

The third character which is of significant importance is Ophelia. She is depicted as the tragic heroine in the play, and possesses the ability to fight the atrocities which have been imposed on her. However, she cannot gather the power to do so and instead goes insane, which proves that her character is also of a tragic nature (Sobran, pp. 76). Ophelia is even used by Polonius to find out the reason behind Hamlet's curiosity (Shakespeare, 2.2). He does that by making arrangements to use the attractive Ophelia as he knows that she is ...