Tuesday, October 29, 2013
hamlet is bugging me
I was just posting to the blog and noticed 6 people are on, so let me ask you a question: Do you think Hamlet's nuts? After our discussions today I reflected back on all the commentary and all the productions I could remember, and it seems like the overwhelming majority talk about Hamlet being mad. But I still wonder whether his ability to see the ghost is commentary on Gertrude's blindness to the truth and Hamlet's ability to see right and wrong. In fact, I wonder if it's the sanest thing in the world to be freaked out by feeling obliged to kill someone, and I also still wonder about Hamlet's ability to plan and say the right things (with double meanings!) under pressure. I guess he could be an endearingly fiendish sociopath, but he seems too self-critical for that. What do you think, and what is your evidence? Especially curious about your perspectives after you read DeBoer's paper.
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I don't particularly think Hamlet to be mad, or crazy, but perhaps just confused and misguided. He knows what is right and wrong, but cannot decide what to do with it. While on one hand his anger for what his uncle and mother have done drive his passion for revenge, we also see him think critically about his actions. It is the most logical answer to just say he is crazy, but what sane person wouldn't act enraged about a murderous uncle and oblivious/incestuous mother? In my opinion, I think Hamlet is trying to do too much at once, and trying to be many people at the same time. He plays multiple people, but in that moment when he is yelling at Gertrude in Act II, it is probably the most honest he has been with anyone besides the audience during his soliloquies. So I'm not sure if I am making any of my points clear, because it is all a bit confusing to me as well, but I see it as Hamlet recognizing what is right and wrong, but not knowing how to act upon it, so instead his actions come across a bit lost and all over the place. It's like the stages of having a melt down; he holds it all in, begins to show signs of major issues, and then it all comes crashing down.
ReplyDeleteFrom the way I see it, considering all of the comments made in class and the way Hamlet is portrayed by others online that Hamlet is slowly driving himself insane. At the beginning of the play we witness Hamlet giving a soliloquy about how he is almost suicidal over the death of his father and this is a very liable reason to turn anybody insane.
ReplyDeleteWe watch him sort of transition into insanity during his solioquy at the end of Act 2 where he has mental breakdown about the Actor's speech and to me a little switch just kind of flicks on and by the end of Act 3 he is able to kill a man with no hesitance.
Also concerning the ghost I think it's real because the men are able to see him in the first scene so I agree that the ghost might be evidence of Gertrude's refusal to see what is going on.
I just think he is basically in a different dimension where he can see everything and he is intelligent as F*#@ and when his father showed up as a "ghost" maybe it was effects that we haven't really inderstood! Like matrix! When the main character was able to dodge the bullets like crazy and when he took off his glasses and saw pure numbers and green computerized backround. It was as if he understood something nobody could see or do! Who knows!? I just pictured it because neo(main character of matrix) spent a lot of time with himself like hamlet. And he had clues from the Oracle and Hamlet probably got his clues from hia friends I am pretty sure please correct me if I am wrong. Anywhom they both were silent but in matrix neo had somebody to be by his side. Hamlet pushed everyone away so his plans weren't ruined. Hmm, I like where that went. Goodnight.
ReplyDeleteAgain, Hamlet is going insane with trying to revenge. He's letting the anger and spite get to him and control him. He is well aware of what he is doing and seems to be ruthless (as seen with the murder of Polonius). That is not to say he does not know what he is doing. He's a cold, calculating psychopath. Very Monte Cristo-esque.
ReplyDeleteI think Hamlet is nuts because from the beginning he was emotionally unstable, with evidence by Ophelia's encounter with him. Then in act ii, he stabbed Polonius spontaneously without any temptation at all. All of these events seem to slowly uncover the mask of his real personality to take revenge for his father's death. I do understand the peer pressure he has to kill Claudius from the ghost may have added to his lack of control. But in the end, Hamlet is scared not mad because of all these characters poisoning him with suggestions to feel better when they are actually destroy him from the inside.
ReplyDeleteI feel that Hamlet was sane until he went in to talk to his mother about Claudius in act 3. Before this, he was able to plot well, and scheme, and show different faces of himself to different people, but when he went to his mother, all of the passive aggressiveness and anger built up inside him erupted out, and he truly became insane, as evidenced by his swift murder of Polonious.
ReplyDeleteI feel Hamlet is sane, but then he gradually becomes insane. I think the fact that he is being bombarded/was bombarded by all the things that he learned has started to make him insane. Maybe he is having a hard time coping with everything because everything is so overwhelming for him. Maybe, his mind cannot take everything all at once or at different times when it is already occupied.
ReplyDeleteI honestly don't think Hamlet is insane or crazy. Sure his actions are dark, but I think he's playing the game well. He's the only one who seems to act upon the obvious truths (or at least acknowledge them). From a basic perspective, he's psychotic with multiple personalities, but I translate it to perceptiveness. His "madness" is most prominent around certain characters (Claudius, Ophelia, Polonius, Gerturude, and his two friends), but not around the guys who had also seen his father's ghost. Then again, maybe I'm automatically siding with Hamlet because the majority thinks he's psychotic.
ReplyDeleteNormally I would say that Hamlet is mad, because seeing ghosts...being so in control of a situation that almost forces someone to lose control seems beyond human abilities. But the guards at the beginning also saw the ghost. So Hamlet is not making that up or going nuts over that. There definitely is a ghost and it isn't just his imagination going nuts. I would argue that in all of the play, he is the most sane person. Sanity means to act in a calm and rational manner. Hamlet is very rational. Every act of his has been coldly calculated to produce the results he wants. He's acting rational in deciding to kill Claudius. Every action yields a reaction. It's practically Newtonian. Claudius kills his father, now he will kill Claudius. Polonious was just an unfortunate mistake, and Hamlet not bursting out in worries and lament over killing him simply has to do with the fact that he didn't like him or care about him, so why would he worry that hes dead, and eve then, it was an accident because Hamlet saw movement and acted on his instincts.
ReplyDeleteHamlet is too witty to be mad. His schemes are thought out to well. He outsmarts everyone and still manages to keep himself together in the presence of others for the most part. He is like an onion he has layers of personality. Would a crazy person be able to do that? He is not mad, but I believe that when you fake a personality you in some sort of way become it. When you spend so much time with a personality/character you start acting like them in real life. Hamlet is spending so much time with all of his layers of personality so it can easily be argued that Hamlet will soon turn mad.
ReplyDelete