The Revenge of Prince Hamlet
     
     Shakespeare’s, Hamlet, is a wonderfully written play that has many tangled webs
of lies, betrayal, and revenge. The play starts off with the death of Hamlets father, the
king. One night Hamlet sees the ghost of his dead father. The ghost speaks to Hamlet and
tells him that he was killed by Claudius. Claudius, who is Hamlets uncle, has recently
become the new king and as well married Hamlets fathers wife, Gertrude. Prince Hamlet
devotes himself to avenging his fathers death, but because he is contemplative and
thoughtful by nature, his heart is not fully in the deed, and he delays, entering himself into
a deep depression and strong apparent madness. Hamlets quest for revenge leads him on a
long journey of deception and eventually his own death.
     Hamlet himself feels that he is slacking on his vengeance. He explains that “...all
occasions do inform against [him] and spur [his] dull revenge.” (Act IV, Scene iii) There
are many points in the book were Hamlet gets upset at himself because he isn’t applying
himself to his quest for revenge. Hamlet must do what his father told him to do. His father
says that if Hamlet ever loved him, he will “Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.”
(Scene I, Act v) He considers himself weak and says “My fathers brother, but no more like
my father/ than I do Hercules.” (Act I. Scene ii)
     Eventually Hamlet gets his revenge in a sword battle between himself and Laertes.
Hamlet scores the first hit, but declines to drink from the kings goblet. Instead Gertrude
takes a drink from it and is swiftly killed by the poison. Laertes then succeeds in wounding
Hamlet, though he does not die of the poisoned sword tip immediately. Laretes is cut by
his own sword’s blade, and, after revealing to Hamlet that Claudius is responsible for the
queen’s death, he dies from the blades poison. Hamlet, in a angry rage, stabs Claudius
with the poisoned sword and forces him to drink down the rest of the poisoned wine. As
Hamlet dies he mutters the words "...the rest is silence." (Act V, Scene v) These four
words let the audience know he has succeeded at accomplishing his revenge.
     Shakespeare uses revenge as a major motif in this play. He uses these motifs to
successfully try and bring a moral outlook to the plot. He also brings in these factors to
try and connect the play to the audience. In doing this the audience can look at a broad
topic and relate that topic to his/her life. In making revenge such an important factor in
this story Shakespeare has made the reader think about vengeance and contemplate how
to use revenge in there life as well as bring the question of morality into it.
     Hamlets quest for revenge created many problems for him throughout the play.
One must contemplate the fact that if he just let it go he might still be alive. But, in his
eyes his life wasn’t a factor in his pursuit for vengeance. This is the question that
Shakespeare wanted the audience to ask themselves. Was Hamlets life worth it? Was his
madness caused my the fact the he could not carry out his vengeance? This is why
Hamlets plays were and are so popular. He creates these plays that ask questions about the
moral of life. He molds his plays into philosophical masterpieces that will and will always
change the way society looks at there own lives.