Hamlet Themes

 

Hamlet Themes: Death

Death is a major theme in Hamlet. It appears all throughout the story. Even from the very beginning Hamlet’s father was murdered and it was the start of all the madness in this play. Hamlet knows that his uncle Claudius killed his father and he wants revenge by killing Claudius. Mistaking Polonius for Claudius, Hamlet stabs him and Polonius dies. So then Laerters, Polonius’s son, wants to kill Hamlet. The third death happens when Ophelia becomes depressed and drowns herself. Claudius finds out that Hamlet knows about his father’s death and tries to poison Hamlet’s drink but his wife accidently drinks it instead and dies. All while Hamlet and Laerters are fencing and end up stabbing each other. Quickly, before Hamlet’s death he forces Claudius to drink the left over poison and then he dies. Now all of the main characters are dead.

Hamlet Themes: Hesitation

            A major theme that occurs in Hamlet would be hesitation. Many of the characters hesitate when they plan to do something. Hamlet hesitates to kill Claudius a few times. At first, he wasn’t sure if Claudius was actually guilty of killing his father. He hesitated again after he found out that Claudius was guilty. When he was looking for him, he found Claudius praying and was afraid he would go to heaven if he had killed him then. Claudius also hesitated during the play. It took him awhile to figure out a way to kill Hamlet and he was changing his plans a lot. Claudius didn’t want his citizens to find out what he had done, so he was slow at coming up with ideas on how to get rid of Hamlet. Laerters hesitated on killing Hamlet too. After he had found out that Hamlet had killed his father, he wanted to get revenge and kill him right away but Claudius talked him into waiting. Therefore, there were many points in the play when characters hesitated.