Theme of Grieving in Hamlet Essay Sample

Mark Twain once said, “The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time”. In Hamlet by William Shakespeare, Senior Hamlet passes away at the beginning of the play and later returns in the form of a ghost. This sends Prince Hamlet into a spiral of disbelief when he finds the truth behind his father’s death. Senior Hamlet’s death affects Prince Hamlet for the rest of the play, especially his relationship with Claudius, who is now his stepdad and was once his uncle. To further explain, Hamlet went into a spiral when realizing the reality of his father’s death, which changed his life and the motivation of revenge and death. Along with this new path Hamlet comes across suicide morally, religiously, and visually. Hamlet has gone through multiple things all at once and has not been able to mentally take a break from everything going on in his life, and this can potentially cause him to act out. 

Grieving is an important step for an individual who has just gone through the experience of losing a loved one. That being said, Hamlet’s mental state had gotten pretty bad. His mother, Gertrude had noticed a difference in Hamlet. She later then stated, “ Do not for ever with thy vail lids, seek for thy noble father in the dust. Thou know’st ‘tis common; all that lives must die (Act Ⅰ, Scene 2, Line 72). Gertrude attempts to lighten up Senior Hamlet’s death to Prince Hamlet. In other words, she is telling him to move on from his father’s passing, because it is a natural thing that happens to everyone. While on one hand, this is true, death is inevitable for any human being, but the way Gertrude approaches Hamlet while he is in the midst of a depressive and toxic mindset is far from doing anything good. Hamlet’s toxic mindset soon turns into toxicity within himself and everyone around him. So much so that this turns into a poisonous trait that Hamlet has now gained through this new path of his.

 Referring back to this new path Hamlet is experiencing, comes with a deep hatred for Claudius. The reason for this would be because Claudius had poisoned his brother due to jealousy. After finding the truth out, Hamlet was out for revenge against Claudius. With revenge comes a malicious, and secretive plan, and let’s just say Hamlet was willing to do almost anything to end Claudius the way he ended Senior Hamlet’s life. Not only was poison literally used throughout this play but also metaphorically within the character of Hamlet. This can be shown by  Hamlet’s overall eagerness to use poison against Claudius, who also brought poison throughout his entire kingdom. An example of this can be shown through almost every person who dies in Hamlet. Though, to cut to the chase, Claudius eventually dies by hamlet who poisons him when Prince Hamlet finds out about Claudius’ plan after being struck by poison in a duel between himself and Laertes. The moment Hamlet realizes he has been struck with poison he states, “The poison quite o’er-crows my spirit” (Act Ⅴ, Scene Ⅱ). This poison had affected everyone throughout the entire kingdom including them to be morally poisoned, which can be due to Hamlet and Claudius who were both poisonous towards everyone around them. Nevertheless, Hamlet was going quite crazy for a quick minute while on his quest for revenge. For a short period of time this craziness that Hamlet had quickly turned into madness. Madness, in some ways, was used as a disguise that Hamlet had put on. For instance, Hamlet used madness to get information about Claudius and the plan he had to destroy Hamlet. Hamlet had put on this faked madness act because after all Hamlet may be going through a hard grieving process but he is certainly not blinded sided from the truth. “I am but mad north-north-west. When the wind is southerly, I know a hawk from a handsaw.” (Act Ⅱ, Scene 2) this quote indicates that Hamlet is aware of the difference between an enemy and a friend. Hamlet’s act worked in some ways because it gave him the advantage of knowing the inside scope of plans Claudius had against him so he will be prepared beforehand. 

All in all, the main character Hamlet shows us that grieving has many different stages. In this scenario, Hamlet goes through three different stages which can be looked at as suicide, madness, and lastly, poison. Sometimes we need a break from reality and put on this act that everything is OK. Hamlet is the perfect example of showing us that when keeping your true feelings in, you can “explode”. To conclude, grieving is a difficult process to go through, but never let the actions of others affect you, because if not then you’re the one that’s going to end up looking crazy.