Osric’s main function in the play is to invite hamlet to a fencing match against Laertes. He fulfils his function in a very dramatic manner; this is symbolic of the false façade that enveloped the English court around the years 1600 and 1601 A.D. He is a foppish character, and given to excessive courtesies. Osric’s character represents the corrupted State of Denmark as Hamlet says of him “he and many more of the same bevy that I know the drossy age dotes on”. Shakespeare inserting his character in this scene creates a fitting end to the play as the audience is given a last glimpse of corrupted Denmark before “the human canker” is destroyed. His manners also reflect the social and cultural manners to be observed in the presence of royalty. His knowledge of fencing shows him to be a man of his times.
The Elizabethans enjoyed wordplay in theatre. Osric’s language is full of puns. Fro example to describe the hangers the calls them “carriages”, his description of Laertes {103-109} is another such example. Osric who is seen as a variant of Polonius, too becomes a victim of Hamlet’s word play as we see in lines 93-94. Hamlet “No believe me, ‘tis very cold, the wind is northerly.” Osric (taking off his hat) “It is indifferent cold, my lord indeed.” When Hamlet parodies Osric’s style of speech he collapses and stands confused. Osric’s language brings comic relief to the play and he allows Hamlet to be witty after Ophelia’s death. He also reveals the theme of appearance and reality. He may or may not have realised that behind his comic character- he is deaths messenger. We the audience know that behind the wager of French rapiers and Arabian horses- lurks death. He is a foil to the depiction of Yorick through Hamlet’s fond memories in the first scene of Act 5. The court jester was a genuine fool and Osric is a false fool.
The Elizabethans believed that the perfect state for a body is a balance between the four humours. When the humours are unbalanced the result is vulnerability to disease. The themes of blood and judgement and reason and passion run throughout the play. The only character in ‘Hamlet’ to have a balance between blood (passion) and judgement is Horatio. As Hamlet says of him “and blest are those / Whose blood and judgement are so well commeddled” {3.2.66-67} Hamlet contrasts to Horatio’s well-balanced temperament with his own rapidly swinging moods. Hamlet respects Horatio’s balanced nature, and it is probably this balance that assures him that Horatio is someone who can be trusted and in whim he can confide. Hamlet tells him that he “wouldst not think how ill alls’ here about my heart;” and the uncertainties he feels about the duel.
Act 5-scene ii, brings this close friendship between Hamlet and Horatio to an end. Through out the play we have seen Horatio as one of Hamlets closest friends and allies, unlike Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, he keeps away from the Kings plotting and scheming against Hamlet. Hamlet puts all his trust in him; he was with Hamlet when the ghost of the Old King appeared, and when Osric invited him to the duel. He helps Hamlet in staging “The Mousetrap”; he is the first to be informed of Hamlets arrival into Denmark. We see the closeness and belief that Hamlet has in Horatio, when Horatio says he’ll drink the last of the poisoned wine so that he too may die with Hamlet. Hamlet stops him and says, “Give me the cup. Let go, by Heaven I’ll ha’t. /
O God, Horatio, what a wounded name, / Things standing thus unknown, shall I leave behind / me / if thou didst ever hold me in thy heart, / Absent thee from felicity awhile, / And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain / To tell my story.” This is also a fitting end to the play, as Hamlet’s story will be told. Hamlet’s handover of Denmark to Fortinbras in his dying wishes shows his maturity and concern for his country.
“O yet defend me, friends. I am but hurt.” {5.ii.317} The power that Claudius obtained when he took over the throne of Denmark has gone to his head by the end of the play. In the quoted line we see that he is trying his hardest to cling on the crown, he doesn’t want to let go of his authority and position. In the Elizabethan times order played a very important role in the running of a State. They believed that the King ruled by divine right and was appointed by God. Claudius usurping the throne put the chain of order in disorder. By doing so and marrying his sister-in-law, he caused his brother’s ghost to rise out of his grave to seek revenge. Claudius’s heinous act would have cause suspense in the audience’s minds; this suspense was like the state of mind of the Elizabethan people as they were curious to know the heir to the throne after Queen Elizabeth.
Claudius creates suspense in the play with his scheming and plotting against Hamlet. His tactics are similar to the Machiavellian form of scheming. First he plans to send Hamlet to England with Rosencrantz and Guildernstern to have them killed upon arrival. When this fails, he arranges a fencing match between Hamlet and Laertes and uses poison as a weapon. Claudius is the poison personified. He is like the poison that he poured into his brother’s ear, which corrupted his body. Claudius too corrupted the State with his plotting and scheming. The poison creates an appropriate ending to Claudius’s character as he dies after being slashed by Hamlet with the poisoned foil.
“No, no, the drink, the drink! O my dear Hamlet! / The drink, the drink! I am poison’d.” One can just hear the agony with which Queen Gertrude cries out her last words to her son. Her warning about the wine shows her true love and concern for Hamlet. She’s always wanted the best for him. For example in Act 5, scene i, when she is scattering flowers into Ophelia’s grave she says to the dead Ophelia, that she hoped that she would have been Hamlet’s bride. During the duel she asks him to wipe the sweat off his face, she drinks to his fortune, and then warns him not to drink the wine, so that he may not have the same fate as her. She is loyal toward her husband, as she knows that he has poisoned the wine, but even on her deathbed she won’t give away his secret.
The theme of appearance and reality is a very important theme in ‘Hamlet’. It appears throughout the play, and in the last scene Shakespeare has brought it to a climax before ending it. The theme causes suspense in the play and creates audience interest. The best example of this theme is Claudius. In Act 1 scene ii, the tone of his speech to the court is very ceremonious, but by the end of the play the audience can see the falseness in his flamboyant language. This is a trait of Claudius; he uses extravagant gestures to cover his scheming. In the fencing match the pearl that he will throw into the flagon of wine when “ Hamlet give the first or second, / Or quit in answer of the third exchange,” {5.vii.253-254} The pearl is used to cover the poison that he will be dropping in the wine from which Hamlet is supposed to drink and die. The audience and assembled court sees Claudius’s true nature, the “villain, villain, smiling, damned villain!” {1.v.106}. The Elizabethan culture consisted of a lot of noisy displays; hence Claudius orders that the cannons be fired for every hit made by Hamlet.
“I’ll be your foil, Laertes.” {5.vii.240} Hamlet is saying that he’ll ‘appear’ to be the weaker player, so that in his obliviousness, Laertes’ s skill will shine like a jewel, as the word ‘foil’ means background to show off a jewel. Before the duel begins, Hamlet asks for Laertes’ pardon for his behavior at Ophelia’s funeral. Laertes ‘appears’ to accept his love, but when presented with the foils he pick up the “Unbated and envenom’d” foil. By Hamlet’s “antic disposition” coming to an end, through his death the theme of appearance and reality comes to an end. The theme serves to bring about a fitting close as it creates suspense in the plot, and we see the completion of Claudius’s character- by seeing his true nature.
`Hamlet’ is a revenge tragedy. But its structure isn’t like the traditional play structures. In traditional plays revenge was accomplished by desire. Hamlet delays taking revenge on Claudius while he was praying, thinking his soul would go to heaven instead of being damned for eternity. The play ended with a corpse-strewn stage and a hero coming to restore order to the disrupted State, which is parallel to that happens at the end of ‘Hamlet’. Seneca published a lot of tragedies, and he had a very strong impact on Shakespeare. Some of the features of Senecan drama can be found in ‘Hamlet’; example the appearance of a ghost calling for revenge and displays of violence that resulted in a corpse-strewn stage.
A revenge tragedy has to have some element of victory in it. This element is present in ‘Hamlet’ and contributes to the audience’s interest in the play. Death, Hamlet and Fortinbras stand triumphant in the end of the play. There are a lot of images of death in the play. By the end of the play all the members of court are dead. Hence we see that death scores victory as Fortinbras says “O proud Death, / What feast is toward in thine eternal cell, / That thou so many princes at a shot / So bloodily has struck?” {5.ii.357-360}. Hamlet is victorious because he has avenged his father’s death by killing Claudius. He has his dying wishes fulfilled, that is for his story to be told and for Fortinbras to take over the Danish throne. But most of all it is Fortinbras who is most triumphant. In Act 1 scene i, we are told that he wanted to recapture whatever land his father had lost to King Hamlet. Now in Act 5 scene ii, we see him returning victorious from Poland, and upon arrival in Denmark, he is presented with Denmark’s Sovereignty.
Order played a very important role in the Elizabethan world. They that the stability of a country depended on the stability, and strength of the Government heading it. Hence if the Government was corrupted the rest of the State would get corrupted as well, as we see happen in Hamlet. Claudius was driven by the desire for power, and authority over Denmark’s Sovereignty that he would do anything to it. Even if it meant killing his own brother, and causing the break-up of families and the deaths of innocent people in the process. The Elizabethan audience would have been very disturbed with the appearance of the ghost in Act 1 scene I, as Marcellus says in Act 1 scene iv “Something is rotten in the State of Denmark”. And to restore their frame of mind, Fortinbras is reintroduced into the play, at this stage to restore order in the troubled State of Denmark. Act 5 scene ii, is a fitting close to the play Hamlet. The scene brings to an end all the corruption that Denmark was steeped in. All the characters who aided “the human canker” example Polonius, Ophelia, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and Laertes; and the victims of Claudius’s deviousness, Hamlet, the Queen Gertrude and Claudius himself are dead. These characters meet their end either through “carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts, accidental judgements, casual slaughters” or “Of deaths put on by cunning and forc’d cause”. When Hamlet puts Denmark in the hands of Fortinbras and dies on the throne, he is bringing an end to all the corruption that Denmark suffered during Claudius’s reign.
Hence we see that Act 5 scene ii, is a fitting close to the play Hamlet because, all the relationships, corruption and plotting that had begun in the beginning of the play has come to a halt, and has ended. We are given a last insight into the characters of Claudius and Gertrude, in their dying lines. The most important element that makes this scene a fitting close to the play is the restoration of order into the troubled state of Denmark.
