Hamlet as a Revenge Play

Topic : Hamlet as a Revenge Play.

Name : Makwana Ankita M.

Roll No : 2.

Paper No :1.(Renaissance Literature).

Semester : 1.

Year : 2013-14.

Submitted To : Dr.Dilip Barad and Heenaba Zala

His life

      

William Shakespeare was an English poet and plawright, extensively regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's most excellent dramatist.  William Shakespeare was the son of JohnShakespeare.His present works, including some collection consist of about 38 plays,154 sonnets, two long narrative poets and a few other verses, the authorship of some of which is uncertain. Shakespeare produced most of his known work between 1589 and 1613.

·      His work.

1)Hamlet2)King lear3)Othello4)Mackbeth                Published in 1609, the Sonnet were the last of Shakespeare's non-dramatic works to be printed. In his last time, he wrote tragicomedies, also known as romances, and collaborated with other playwrights. Many of his plays were published in editions of varying quality and accuracy during his lifetime.

·         Hamlet.

           Hamlet is the most famous play in English language .The play Shakespeare most popular play during his lifetime.The first comment on the play was written about the year 1600.

                 “ His Lucrece & his tragedy of Hamlet,

                    Prince of Denmark,haue it in them,

                    To please the wiser sort”.

-Chaucer Folio.

                 The tragedy of Hamlet include two part.1)Hamlet the play &2).Hamlet the prince. A.C.Bradley’s Says….

  ‘Hamlet is the Hamlet of the novelist’.

Hamlet the  play is an Elizabethan melodrama .The play falls into three movement.the first movement is an act of exposition .it leads the words ‘Murder ‘ & ‘Revenge’.Second movement is the pith & marrow of the play is unusally long.& Third movement is devoted to the counter plot .the play can be divided into 5 acts.Hamlet is protagonist & hero of the play.Hamlet is the son of Queen Gertrude.

·       Hamlet as a revenge play.

                 Hamlet is a play concern with son’s revenge for the murder of his father.Hamlet can be divided into three plot…

1)Revenge plot.

2)The Romance between Hamlet and Ophelia.

3)The looming war with Norway.

There are many character involved in the Revenge play of Hamlet like…..

Hamlet,Ghost,Claudius,Gertrude,Polonius,Laertes,Horatio.

                 Shakespeare conception of revenge is less simple.The revenge recedes behind the human creature,he has come to symbolize.Bradley  said…

               “Hamlet ,it is impossible to deny ,habitually assumes,

                without any questioning , that he ought to avenge  

                                                                               his father.”

The play open with the dark winter night and if the play imposes on its hero the duty of revenge. The Ghost appears to Hamlet and they leave to speak in private. Ghost reveals that he is, in fact, the ghost of Hamlet’s father. The revenge plot is established with the Ghost’s utterance…

"So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear"

 He tells Hamlet that he was poisoned by his brother Claudius as he slept in his orchard and, if Hamlet is not already feeling the desire, the Ghost makes plain the demand…..

 "Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder" .

Ordering  Hamlet to seek revenge on the man who unsurped his throne and married his wife, the ghost .Hamlet accepts the Ghost as spirit of his father.The spirit of his father it speaks to the deepest springs of feeling in him,to the primitive duty of the blood to filial responsibility and love.

           

 Claudius and Gertrude worried about the prince’s changeable behavior and attempt to discover its reason.They employ a pair of Hamlet friends , Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to watch him.When Polonius , the pompous Lord Chamberlain,suggests that Hamlet may be crazy with love for his daughter, Ophelia Claudius have the same opinion to spy on Hamlet in conversation with the girl.But though Hamlet surely seems crazy , he does not seem to love Ophelia.

                       

                Hamlet imagines his uncle to have murdered his father, so that if Claudius is responsible , he will surely react.After that the moment of the murder arrives in the theater, Claudius leaves the room.Hamlet and Horatio agree that this prove his fault . Hamlet has an opportunity to kill the unattended Claudius in his chamber, but, after soliloquizing on the matter, he decides not to take action because Claudius is praying. Killing Claudius in prayer would not really be revenge because he would go to heaven….

                     

                    

                    "fit and season’d for his passage" .

Hamlet kills Polonius, mistaking him for Claudius as he hides behind a curtain. Hearig noise from  behind the tapestry ,Hamlet believes the king is hiding there.He draws his sword and stabs through the fabric ,killing Polonius.For his crime , he is immediately dispatcheds to England with Rosencratz and Guildenstern.

               Though, Claudius’s plan for Hamlet includes more than punishment, as he has given Rosencrantz and Guildenstern sealed

Orders for the king of England demanding that Hamlet be put to death.

In the aftermath of her father’s death , Ophelia goes crazy with grief

And drowns in the river. Polonius’s son , Laertes , who has been staying in France , returns to Denmark in a range.

               Claudius convinces him that hamlet is to blame for his father’s and sister’s death. Claudius hears of Hamlet's return and he conspires with Laertes, Polonius's son, to murder Hamlet. The sword fighting begins.Laertes will use a poison-tipped sword during a fight with Hamlet, and Claudius will have a poisoned drink at the ready.First , Laertes 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 blade’s poison.Hamlet then stabs Claudius through with the poisoned sword and forces him to drink down the rest of the poisoned wine.Claudius dies, and Hamle dies immediately after achieving his revenge.

               At that time , a Norwegian prince named Fortinbras , who has ledAn army to Denmark and attacked Poland earlier in the play , enters with ambassadors from England , who report that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead .Fortinbrasis stunned by the dreadful sight of the entire royal family lying Sprawled on the floor dead.he moves to take power of the kingdom .Horatio ,Fulfilling last request , tells him Hamlet’s tragic story.

·        Conclusion.

     

              Hamlet is most famous play.Hamlet as revenge play.Hamlet is protagonist of the novel.Hamlet is a play concerned with son’s revenge for the murder of his father.Hamlet open with night scene.