Реферат: Hamlet Essay Research Paper Context
Summary
Polonius dispatches his servant Reynaldo to France with money and written notes for Laertes; he also orders him to inquire about and spy on Laertes’s personal life. He gives him explicit directions on how to pursue his investigations, then bids him on his way. As Reynaldo leaves, Ophelia enters, visibly upset. She tells Polonius that Hamlet has accosted her, unkempt and wild-eyed: he grabbed her, held her, and sighed powerfully, but did not speak to her. Polonius says that Hamlet must be mad with his love for Ophelia, for she has distanced herself from him ever since Polonius ordered her to do so. Polonius speculates that this love-sickness might be the cause of Hamlet’s general distemper, and hurries out to tell the king of his discovery.
Within the castle, Claudius and Gertrude are welcoming Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two of Hamlet’s friends from Wittenberg. The king and queen have summoned Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in the hope that they might be able to cheer Hamlet out of his melancholy, or at least to discover the cause of it. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern agree to investigate Hamlet’s feelings, and the queen orders some attendants to take them to her “too much changed” son.
Polonius enters, announcing the return of the ambassadors Claudius sent to Norway, Voltimand and Cornelius. He also says that he has discovered the cause of Hamlet’s “lunacy”; Polonius urges him to speak on that subject, but Polonius counsels the king to hear the ambassadors first. Voltimand and Cornelius enter, and describe what took place with the aged and ailing king of Norway: the king rebuked Fortinbras for attempting to make war on Denmark, and Fortinbras swore he would never again attack the Danes; the king, overjoyed, bequeathed upon Fortinbras a large annuity, and urged him to use the army he had assembled to attack the Poles instead of the Danes. He has therefore sent a request back to Claudius that Prince Fortinbras’s armies be allowed safe passage through Denmark on their way to attack the Poles. Relieved, Claudius declares that he will see to this business later. Voltimand and Cornelius take their leave.
Turning to the subject of Hamlet, Polonius declares after a wordy introduction that the prince is mad with love for Ophelia. He shows the king and queen letters and love poems Hamlet has given to Ophelia, and details his plan: Hamlet often walks alone through the lobby of the castle, and Polonius says that at such a time, he and the king and queen could hide behind an arras (curtain or wall-hanging) while Ophelia confronted Hamlet, allowing the hidden observers to judge whether Hamlet’s madness really emanates from his love for Ophelia. The king declares that they will try the plan; then Gertrude notices that Hamlet is approaching, reading as he walks, and Polonius says that he will speak to the prince. Gertrude and Claudius exit, leaving Polonius alone with Hamlet.
Polonius attempts to converse with Hamlet, who seems utterly mad; he calls the old man a “fishmonger” and answers his questions equivocally. (”What do you read, my lord?” Polonius asks, and Hamlet responds, “Words, words, words.”) But many of Hamlet’s seemingly lunatic statements hide barbed observations about Polonius’s pomposity and his old age (”Yourself, sir, should be as old as I am, if like a crab you could go backward”). As Polonius leaves, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern enter, and Hamlet seems pleased to see them; they briefly discuss Hamlet’s dissatisfaction with recent affairs in Denmark–he claims the country is made a “prison” by his “bad dreams,” and they speculate that his ambition has been thwarted by Claudius’s accession to the throne, a speculation Hamlet denies. Hamlet then asks why they have come. Sheepishly, the two men claim they have come merely to visit Hamlet, but he sternly declares that he knowsthey have been sent for by the king and queen. They confess that they were sent for, and Hamlet says that he knows why: because he has lost all his mirth and descended into a state of melancholy wherein all the earth and all of humanity appears sterile and worthless.
Rosencrantz smiles, and says that if Hamlet takes no delight in humanity, he wonders how he will receive the theatrical troupe currently traveling toward the castle. The trumpets then blow, announcing these players’ arrival, and Hamlet tells Rosencrantz and Guildenstern that they are welcome to stay at Elsinore, but that his “uncle-father and aunt-mother” are deceived. He says that he is mad only some of the time, and at other times is completely sane: “I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw.”
Polonius enters to announce the arrival of the players, who follow him into the room. Hamlet welcomes them, and entreats one of the players to give him a speech about the mythological fall of the city of Troy and the death of the Trojan king and queen, Priam and Hecuba. Impressed, Hamlet orders Polonius to see them escorted to guestrooms, and says that the next night, they will hear “The Murder of Gonzago” performed, with a short speech added, which he will write himself. Hamlet takes his leave of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and now stands alone on stage.
Hamlet immediately begins cursing himself, bitterly commenting that the player of the previous scene was able to summon a depth of feeling and expression for Hecuba, a mythological figure who means nothing to him, while Hamlet himself is unable to take action even with his far more powerful motives–for despite his encounter with the ghost, he has not taken revenge upon Claudius. He says that he will devise a trap for Claudius, forcing the king to watch a play that closely resembles the plot of his murder of Hamlet’s father; if the king is guilty, he thinks, he will surely show some visible sign of guilt when he sees his sin re-enacted on stage. By this method, Hamlet reasons, he will obtain definitive proof of Claudius’s guilt, and will have even stronger grounds on which to take his revenge. “The plays the thing,” he declares, “wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.”
Commentary
In this section, the characters become more complex (Polonius, the loving father, begins to spy on his son; Hamlet, the thoughtful prince, seems to lose his mind), the plots thicken (Polonius begins to suspect that Hamlet’s madness is due to his love of Ophelia; the king and queen hire Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to ferret out the cause of the prince’s strange behavior), and the minds and motives of the characters become much more difficult to discern. Polonius seems by turns a doddering, pompous fool and a sinister manipulator (and has been played onstage as both). Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are in many ways baffling characters: they seem completely undifferentiated from one another, completely ineffective for the king and queen’s purposes, and completely transparent to Hamlet; yet they are treated as significant characters–they appear throughout the play, and the news of their deaths is the final tragedy at the end of Act V. Finally, the plot is complicated by the question of Hamlet’s madness, which, of course, has been the source of enduring critical controversy.
If Hamlet is merely pretending to be mad, as he suggests, he does almost too good a job at it; his portrayal is so convincing that many critics have believed that his already-fragile sanity shatters at the sight of his dead father’s ghost. Given the acute and cutting observations he makes while supposedly mad (and which this “madness” allows him to get away with), it seems unlikely that Hamlet is actually mad. But he is certainly confused and mentally disordered, and his confusion translates into an extraordinarily intense, searching quality of mind that lends authenticity to his portrayal of a madman. In other words, Hamlet’s decision to play a madman is a sane one, designed to confuse his enemies and hide his intentions as he moves toward avenging his father. But his mental state takes him to the very edge of sanity, and makes his portrayal of madness entirely convincing. He may know a “hawk from a handsaw,” but the very fact that his mind would select those two elements as items to compare indicates a trauma-induced eccentricity.
Act III, Scenes iii-iv
Elsewhere in the castle, King Claudius speaks to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Still shaken by the play and now considering Hamlet’s madness to be dangerous, Claudius asks the pair to escort Hamlet on a voyage to England, and to depart immediately. They agree, and leave to ready themselves. Polonius enters, and reminds the king of his plan to hide in Gertrude’s room and observe Hamlet’s confrontation with her. He promises to tell Claudius all that he learns. When Polonius leaves, the king is alone, and he immediately bewails his guilt and grief over his sin. A brother’s murder, he says, is the oldest sin, and “hath the eldest curse upon’t.” He longs to ask for forgiveness, but says that he is unprepared to give up that which he gained by committing the murder–namely, the crown and the queen. He falls to his knees and begins to pray.
Hamlet slips quietly into the room, and steels himself to kill the unseeing Claudius. Suddenly he realizes that if he kills the king while he is praying, he will send the king’s soul to heaven–which is hardly an adequate revenge, especially since Claudius, by killing Hamlet’s father before he had time to make his last confession, ensured that his brother would not go to heaven. Hamlet decides to wait, resolving to kill Claudius when he is sinning–when he is drunk, angry, or lustful. He leaves; Claudius rises and declares that he has been unable to pray sincerely. (”My words fly up, my thoughts remain below…”)
In Gertrude’s chamber, Polonius urges the queen to be harsh with Hamlet when he arrives, taking him to task for his recent behavior. Gertrude agrees, and Polonius hides behind an arras, or tapestry, to watch. Hamlet storms into the room and asks his mother why she has sent for him. She says that he has offended his father, meaning his stepfather, Claudius; he interrupts her, and says that she has offended his father, meaning the dead King Hamlet. Hamlet accosts her with an almost violent intensity, and declares his intention to make her fully aware of the profundity of her sin. Fearing for her life, Gertrude calls for help; from behind the arras, Polonius cries out. Crying “How now! a rat?”, Hamlet draws his sword and stabs it through the tapestry, killing the unseen Polonius. Gertrude asks what Hamlet has done, and he replies, “Nay, I know not: / Is it the king?” The queen says his action was a “rash and bloody” deed, and Hamlet replies that it was almost as rash and bloody as murdering a king and marrying his brother. Disbelieving, the queen asks, “As kill a king?” and Hamlet replies that she heard him correctly.
Hamlet lifts the arras and discovers Polonius’s body. He bids the old man farewell, and turns to his mother, declaring that he will wring her heart. He shows her a picture of the dead king, and a picture of the current king, and bitterly comments on the superiority of his father to his uncle; he asks her furiously what has driven her to marry a rotten man such as Claudius, and she pleads with him to stop his speech, saying that he has turned her eyes onto her soul, and that she does not like what she sees there. Hamlet continues to excoriate her and rail against Claudius, until suddenly, the ghost appears before him.
Hamlet speaks to the apparition, but Gertrude is unable to see it, and believes him to be mad. The ghost intones that it has come to remind Hamlet of his purpose; noting that Gertrude is amazed and unable to see him, the ghost asks Hamlet to intercede with her. Hamlet describes the ghost, but Gertrude sees nothing, and in a moment the ghost disappears. Hamlet tries desperately to convince Gertrude that he is not mad, but has merely feigned madness all along, and urges her to forsake Claudius and regain her good conscience. He urges her as well not to reveal to Claudius that his madness has been an act. Gertrude agrees to keep his secret. He bids her goodnight, but before he leaves he points to Polonius’s corpse and declares that heaven has “punished me with this and this with me.” Hamlet reminds his mother that he must sail to England with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, whom he says he will trust as fully as though they were venomous snakes. Dragging Polonius’s body behind him, Hamlet leaves his mother’s room.
Commentary
Again, the limitations of theological law prevent Hamlet from taking action. Finally psychologically ready to kill Claudius, Hamlet is thwarted by his realization that doing so would send his uncle to heaven, while Claudius’s murder of Hamlet’s father sent him to hell. In the same way, Hamlet has curtailed his desire to commit suicide based on a fear of religious punishment in the afterlife. These invocations of apparently arbitrary theological rules would seem abstract and haphazard, were it not for the actual presence of the hell-tormented ghost to prove their validity. In light of the presence of the ghost, the rules of theology become legitimated commentaries on the theme of retribution and justice–just as Hamlet must kill Claudius to punish him for his father’s death, he cannot kill himself for fear of similar punishment.
Hamlet is determined that, just as Claudius hurt his father on both the natural and supernatural levels, he must not only murder Claudius but send him to hell as well, effectively achieving revenge for eternity. Strangely out of place in all this theology is the idea that the revenge Hamlet seeks is itself anti- Christian. This problem is never explored in the play, which exhibits a far more Old-Testament vision of theological law–except in the scene of Claudius’s prayer.
Hamlet’s confrontation with his mother gives Shakespeare the chance to explore and dispose of the moral problem of Gertrude in one fell swoop: in powerful, passionate language, Hamlet sums up Gertrude’s crimes and shows her the way to salvation (which she will refuse to take). Again, his pretense of madness verges on the real thing; and again, his family relationship is revealed to be terribly damaged and probably irreparable. When the ghost appears before Hamlet and his mother, their nuclear family is reunited–but what a bitter reunion! Gertrude is unable even to see her husband, and believes that her son is mad for speaking to him.
Act IV, Scenes i-iv
Summary
Gertrude goes to Claudius, who is in conference with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and asks to speak to him alone. She tells him that Hamlet is as mad as the sea during a violent storm, and tells Claudius that Hamlet has killed Polonius. Aghast, the king calls Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, tells them about the murder, and sends them to find Hamlet.
Elsewhere in the castle, Hamlet, alone, comments that Polonius’s body has been “safely stowed”; Rosencrantz and Guildenstern come upon him, and ask what he has done with the corpse. Hamlet refuses to give them a straight answer, instead saying “The body is with the king, but the king is not with the body.” He calls Rosencrantz a “sponge… that soaks up the king’s countenance, his rewards, his authorities.” Rosencrantz and Guildenstern escort him to Claudius.
The king is speaking to a group of attendants, telling them of Polonius’s death and his intention to send Hamlet to England. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern appear with Hamlet, who is under guard. Pressed by Claudius to reveal the location of Polonius’s body, Hamlet is by turns mad, coy, and clever, saying that Polonius is being eaten by worms, and that the king could send a messenger to find him in heaven–or to seek him in hell himself. Finally Hamlet reveals that Polonius’s body is under the stairs near the lobby, and the king dispatches his attendants to look there. The king tells Hamlet that he must leave at once for England, and Hamlet enthusiastically agrees; he exits, and Claudius sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to ensure that he boards the ship at once. Alone, Claudius expresses urgently his wish that England will obey the sealed orders he sends with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern–which, he reveals, call for Prince Hamlet to be put to death.
On a nearby plain in Denmark, young Prince Fortinbras marches at the head of his army, traveling through Denmark on the way to attack Poland. Fortinbras orders his captain to go and ask the King of Denmark for permision to travel through is lands. On his way, the captain encounters Hamlet, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern, and informs them that the Norwegian army rides to fight the Poles. Hamlet asks about the basis of the conflict, and the man tells him that the armies will fight over “a little patch of land / That hath in it no profit but the name.” Astonished by the news, Hamlet marvels over how human beings could act so violently and purposefully for so little gain. (In comparison, he still delays his violent action, while he has everything to gain.) Disgusted with himself for having failed to gain his revenge on Claudius, Hamlet declares that from this moment on, his thoughts will be bloody.
Commentary