Hamlet’s Delay Essay

In Shakespeares settlement, the main character continually checks acting out his duty of avenging his fathers murder. This essay will discuss how hamlets nature and morals (which are intensified by difficult events) prevent him from carrying out the task.In the commencement scenes of the play, the tad of junctures late father reveals to him the true means by which baron juncture died. The Ghost tells Hamlet that Claudius pouring poison into his ear caused his fathers death. He exhorts Hamlet to retaliate the murder. Hamlets initial response is to act on the Ghosts exhortation quickly. Hamlet says Haste me to knowt that I with wings as swiftMay sweep to my revenge, (Roberts, pg. 1370). just by the end of the same scene, his reluctance to murder King Claudius is evident. Hamlet says This time is out of joint, O cursed spite, that I was ever born to set it right, (Roberts, pg. 1374).Hamlet is like a soldier that is propel into a war where he has to do some things he quite a would avoid doing, simply under(a) the given circumstances he bites his teeth and carries himself well (Stratford, 128). In this war, the circumstances brought on by Claudiuss murdering of King Hamlet are Hamlets enemy. His dead father is the destroyed country, painful equity that leaves so much hatred and resentment in his heart. Being a loyal prince and son, and one whom good kingdom respected, he should seek revenge and bring justice back in the royal court. many a(prenominal) theories birth been put forward as to the reasons for Hamlets delay in avenging the King from hereon in. unrivaled theory suggests that Hamlet wished to determine the nature of the Ghost in the kickoff place acting, for he says in work on II Scene 2 that The spirit I nurse seen may be a devil. However, even by and by the play within a play through which Hamlet has obtained his proof as to the nature of the Ghost and confirmed that Claudius is guilty, Hamlet says Ill take the Ghosts word for a th ousand pound, but fails to act and can only contemplate the event.Similarly, when Hamlet stumbles upon Claudius praying, he does not take theopportunity to butcher the King, rather he makes excuses, saying he does not want Claudius to go to heaven. However, this is little more than a delay tactic, and Hamlet also does not make any further plans to kill the King, for we seem to be puzzled by it (if we were in the audience, the whole scene would have lasted only moments, but as readers, we have the freedom to ponder about it). At least so was Professor Dowden, to name one critic, who holds that Hamlet loses a sense of fact because he puts e really event through his mind, filtering it until every deed seems to have an alternative in not doing the deed, but evaluating it even more (Bloom, pg. 66).In addition, Hamlet was a philosopher rather than a man of action, unlike Claudius and Laertes. He himself sees that one of his problems is to think too precisely on the event. He is intellec tual and reflective, preferring to ponder rather than take action. Hamlet is very brave and impulsive Prince, but the spell seems to prevent him from finding an external model or a simple solution for conduct, so that he must depend more on thinking, and less on acting (Stratford, 105). He realizes that killing a King is a great crimeThe most plausible explanation is that Hamlets aver nature and values continually hindered him from performing the task. Hamlet is a sensitive, introverted young man, who is naturally given up to melancholia. Coleridge and Goethe would agree with this, holding that Hamlets soul is too philosophical and it lacks ability to instinctually act on impulse, and that he is too sensitive to avenge himself, (Grebanier, pg. 159). But if one only reads what goes on in the play, Hamlet could by no means be called too sensitive or passive. The Ghosts manifestation and also the fact that his mother has remarried to King Claudius, intensify his already melancholia c disposition. His mothers remarriage is an abuse in Hamlets eyes. This is because the marriage was soon after his fathers death King Hamlet was But three months dead.This shows little sensitivity to those who are grieving and also implies that their relationship was initiated before King Hamlet died. Secondly, the marriage was against canon law, which made it a sin. Hamlet says to his mother in Act III Scene 4, Have you not eyes? You cannot call it love. O shame Where is thy blush? These accompanying shocksdeepen Hamlets depression. In Act II Scene 2 Hamlet says to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, I have of latelost all my mirth. He falls deeper and deeper into the slough of fruitless brooding. In his first soliloquy he says O that this too solid flesh would melt. Thus, the task is too onerous for the fragile, melancholic Hamlet.Hamlet also delays killing the King because he is unsure of the morality of carrying out such a task. This factor is important, as Hamlet is a very idealist ic and moralistic person. Revenge was prohibited by ecclesiastical law, but the duty of personal honor prevalent in Elizabethan times oft won through. In the play, Hamlet debates the morality of revenge, saying that Isnt not perfect conscience and isnt not to be damned to let this canke of our nature come in further evil. At this stage it is piss that Hamlet is having serious doubts about killing the King.After all, to kill an anointed King, even in an act of revenge, was considered a serious offence. Furthermore, as Hamlet points out in the above quote, he would be carrying out the very act he was condemning. In addition, in regards to his mothers sin, the ghost had told Hamlet to leave her to heaven. This creates a moral dilemma for Hamlet because if it is Gods duty to deal with his Mothers sin, sure enough the same applies to Claudius.In conclusion, Hamlet delays in killing the King because of his own character he is a philosopher and is of a melancholic disposition. External events in the play do not contribute to Hamlets delay, but are rather used to Hamlets advantage as excuses to further delay avenging his fathers murder.Works CitedGrebanier, Bernard. The Heart of Hamlet, The Play Shakespeare Wrote. New YorkThomas Y. Crowell Company, 1960.Hamlet. Editor Harold Bloom. New York Chelsea mob Publishers, a division of MaineLine Book Co., 1990.Hamlet. Stratford-Upon-Avon Study. London Edward Arnold Ltd., 1963.Roberts, Edgar V. and Henry E. Jacobs. Literature An Introduction to Readingand Writing, (Upper Saddle River, New island of Jersey Prentice Hall Inc., 2001),pgs. 1349-1451.