It is sometimes said that, to be effective, any character in a play must be 'larger than life' - Argue for or against this opinion by referring to at least one major and one minor character in Hamlet.

Katarina Kollarova

English Literature

Class 12

Essay Topic 5 – It is sometimes said that, to be effective, any character in a play must be ‘larger than life’. Argue for or against this opinion by referring to at least one major and one minor character in Hamlet.

William Shakespeare’s Hamlet has been posing questions for centuries. He has fascinated audiences and readers all around the world mainly because there is always more to him than the other characters in the play can figure out. No matter how careful we are when reading the play, we get the feeling that there is still a lot about Hamlet that we don’t know about. Hamlet even tells the other characters in the play that there is more to him than meets the eye and we become more aware of this as the play progresses.

Does this mean that Hamlet is ‘larger than life’? First of all we need to define its meaning. When something is ‘larger than life’ it suggests that the person or the thing is somewhat abnormal, something that we don’t get to see in our reality. Is Hamlet ‘larger than life’ emotionally, physically or spiritually? Does any character in any play have to be larger than life for the play to be effective? To find the answer to this question, we must first examine some of the characters in the play. I will be examining the character of Hamlet, the Prince of Denmark, the title character who is the main protagonist. Hamlet is the son of Gertrude and his father, the late King Hamlet. He is the nephew of the present king, , who is married to his mother Gertrude. The other character I will be examining is Polonious who is a minor character. He is the father of Ophelia and Laertes and the counsellor to the King but most importantly he seems to be senile. He has many different faces. To his son Laertes he is a caring, helpful father “There, my blessing with thee, and these few precepts in thy memory look thou character.” When talking to Ophelia, he has a much harsher, stricter tone “Affection? Puh! You speak like a green girl, unsifted in such perilous circumstance.” This vision that we acquire of him later changes when we find out that Polonious was in fact tricking Laertes. The way he talks to the King and the Queen is mostly very formal and he talks with respect but in some scenes we can suspect that even they are beginning to sense his senility “Mad call I it, for to define true madness, what is’t but to be nothing else but mad? But let that go.” What Polonious was trying to say is that it would be madness to try to define madness but this joke miscarries as he finds himself defining madness as being nothing else but mad. This embarrasses him and he dismisses it with “But let that go.”
Hamlet is a university student whose studies are interrupted by his father's death and his mother’s marriage. Hamlet has a very philosophical side to him. He is drawn to difficult questions or issues that cannot be answered, such as his father’s death. Hamlet’s only evidence of his father’s murder cannot be rationally explained as it was given to him by his father’s Ghost and Hamlet doesn’t know whether to believe it or not and always seeks further evidence. Hamlet becomes obsessed with proving his uncle's guilt before trying to act. He is also repeatedly considering whether or not suicide is morally correct, in his situation. Hamlet's grief and misery is so unbearable that he begins to long for death to end his suffering.

In Hamlet’s “To be, or not to be, that is the question” soliloquy, he concludes that no one would cope and endure the pain of life if they were not afraid of what will come after death.
Hamlet prefers to talk about his grief than to act but when he does act, it’s swift and unpredictable like when he kills Polonious through the curtain in his mother’s chamber or when he hurts Ophelia while they are talking in the lobby. He overcomes his fear as the play progresses and his anger is also more evident “In the rank sweat of an ...

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To me Hamlet is not necessarily larger than life; he is extremely melancholy and discontented with the state of affairs in Denmark and in his own family. He is very disappointed with his mother for marrying his uncle, less than two months after his father’s death, and he rejects Ophelia, a woman he once claimed to love. His words often suggest that he hated and distrusted all women in general. In my opinion it is not Hamlet who is larger than life, the situation he is in is larger than life. It is understandable that he is behaving the way he does, because he must act mad in order to avenge his father and protect himself from the vicious King Claudius.

Polonious on the other hand could be considered larger than life, because of his eccentric character. There are many sides to him. On the one hand he is very unusual, pretentious and arrogant, on the other we feel sorry for him, because he is an old, confused man. Citing Hamlet “… old men have grey beards, their faces are wrinkled, their eyes purging thick amber and plumtree gum, and that they have a plentiful lack of wit, together with most weak hams.” The reason why Polonious is larger than life is because of the way he is behaving in his situation. Hamlet had a reason to act mad and foolishly but Polonious had no reason to betray his two children Ophelia and Laertes.

If we compare both characters to the character of Horatio, we can see all the differences there are between them. Horatio is Hamlet’s close friend and counsellor. Horatio is in the same position as Polonious – they are both advisers to the royalty but Horatio’s character is highly believable and simple. He is loyal and helpful to Hamlet throughout the play and his friendship is so strong he considers to kill himself at the end of the play in order to follow Hamlet. Horatio is clearly not larger than life but has the same effect as Polonious if not bigger, because he is a much nicer, more generous and appreciated person. He is the only character in the play to stay alive and is later used to explain the situation to Fortinbras. This is because he was so loyal to Hamlet and is very trustworthy. I don’t think that any character must be larger than life in order to be effective. Hamlet and Horatio are both extremely effective characters in the play but they are not larger then life and still they are unique and memorable.