Even more revealing to Hamlet’s madness is the fact that was said in a soliloquy, where Hamlet was conversing with himself. This is the first of several soliloquies in the play. The purpose of this particular soliloquy is to reveal just how upset and saddened Hamlet actually is regarding the sudden marriage of his mother to his uncle, who is now the King. It is in this soliloquy that we find out this is potentially the root of Hamlet’s madness, and Shakespeare certainly doesn’t conceal this:
“But two months dead: nay, not so much, not two: So excellent a king; that was, to this, Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother”
The next event which cannot be fully described as Hamlet’s madness is the appearance of the ghost. A lot of people would argue that from the start of the play they were convinced that Hamlet was crazy as a result of the scene with the ghost, yet is also appeared to Horatio, Marcellus and Barnado. All three of these individuals say they also saw the ghost – if it was only Hamlet that saw it, then we could safely assume there is a very high chance he is crazy but he was not the only one. In fact the three men witness the ghost before even notifying Hamlet. Horatio states:
"Before my God, I might not this believe without the sensible and true avouch of mine own eyes."
Horatio recognises that Hamlet is not level minded at this point in the play, as he says to Hamlet how he is concerned that the ghost may take another spirit form and end up ‘luring’ hamlet to the ‘edge of a cliff’, as quoted.
You could argue that Shakespeare meant for all Hamlet, Marcellus and Barnado to be insane – as they were the only individuals who saw the ghost.
Regardless of this theory, when the ghost sees Hamlet, he tells him to kill Claudius. It is at this point where Hamlet becomes almost obsessed with revenge and the theme of it shadows the rest of the play from this point forward. Shakespeare uses a very tense moment to put across to the audience the point whereby Hamlet found out it was Claudius, the King, his uncle that killed his father. The ghost says to Hamlet:
“The Serpent that did sting thy father’s life,
Now wears his crown”
To this Hamlet replies:
“O prophetic soul! Mine Uncle!!!”
This is good use of short sentences by Shakespeare and makes a very edgy moment for the audience. Hamlet begins his status as a revenge seeking mad man after hearing this, he says to himself and the ghost:
“I'll wipe away all trivial fond records,
All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past,
That youth and observation copied there;
and thy commandment all alone shall live
Within the book and volume of my brain,
Unmix'd with baser matter”
It is in this quotation that Shakespeare makes it sound as though Hamlet will think of nothing but killing Claudius, and from this point on, he plots how to do so. I think Shakespeare makes it look as thought Hamlet was, if anything, mentally unbalanced before his father even got murdered by Claudius – as a sane minded individual would not have plotted to kill someone anyway even if that person had killed their father and a ‘ghost’ had confirmed it.
It is at around this point in the play, act 2 scene 1, that Gertrude and Claudius, Hamlet’s mother and uncle, begin to really realise that there are in fact significant changes occurring within Hamlet. It is at this bit of the play where Shakespeare brings Polonius into the play. Shakespeare makes Polonius a pompous interfering old fool to make the audience have an air of dislike for him, as he is almost disturbed in the way he interrupts with other peoples lives, especially his son Laertes, his daughter Ophelia and Hamlet, and especially of course Ophelia’s relationship with Hamlet. Polonius’ actual position is the Lord Chamberlain of Claudius’s Court.
Polonius tells Claudius and Gertrude that he thinks the reason for Hamlet’s eccentric behaviour and extended depression is due to his relationship with Ophelia. In an earlier conversation between Ophelia and her father, Polonius, he had asked her whether or not she believed Hamlet was:
“Mad for thy love?”
Her reply to this was:
“My Lord, I do not know;
But I truly do fear it”
From this, we can establish that perhaps Ophelia does not feel as strongly for Hamlet as he himself does for her. This could be an additional factor which helped to push Hamlet over the edge in his long winding journey to insanity. It is in fact Polonius who has forbid his daughter from seeing Hamlet – and at the time, which Shakespeare wrote this particular piece of writing, it was popular to believe that love which had become twisted and aggravated could lead to madness, personally I think that is ludicrous but that is what people believed many years ago – Polonius being no exception.
Shakespeare comes up with a clever idea when he stages a scene whereby Polonius gets Hamlet to go and see Ophelia in a room where they are allegedly alone to see his reaction to the situation:
“At such a time I’ll loose my daughter to him”
Hamlet may be insane – but he is far from obtuse – as proven when this scene occurs; he asks Ophelia where her father is, and then becomes outraged when she lies to him and tells him he is not present hiding or in view of the room. This was worse than ever for Hamlet, as it showed that his partner, Ophelia, could not be neither trusted nor relied upon by him, yet another reason for his gradual downward spiral of insanity.
Shortly after this part of the play, Gertrude describes Hamlet as her:
“Much changed son”
It is not knows at this point in the play whether or not she knows about whether it was Claudius that murdered her ex-husband, Hamlet’s father. Maybe she too would be ‘much changed’ is she were to be enlightened of that fact.
A key point in the play which displays Hamlet’s madness in its full swing is where Shakespeare stages a scene whereby Hamlet and Polonius are conversing in the vicinity of the library. The setting of this conversation is apparently in a drafty room, and Hamlet is asked by Polonius:
“Will you walk out of the air, my lord?
As in, will you come to a differing location to set this speech? To which Hamlet replies:
“Into my grave?”
This basically means then Hamlet would rather be dead than have to speak to Polonius. This could be seen by some as a threat of suicide – as he again speaks of death to himself. Hamlet again makes a rather bizarre comment when Polonius bids him farewell. Hamlet says to him:
“You cannot, sir, take from me anything that I will willingly part withal: except my life, except my life, except my life”
In this peculiar comment, Shakespeare is getting across from Hamlet to Polonius that Hamlet is willing to kill himself, and Polonius would be a reason for doing so.
After examining Hamlet’s madness – I can link it to one key word which I am sure Shakespeare would have had in mind while writing this play. The word being unfaithfulness. The examples of this which I believe pushed Hamlet over the edge are initially his mother’s unfaithfulness to his father, his uncle’s unfaithfulness to his brother, Hamlet’s father, his friends’ unfaithfulness to him and finally the unfaithfulness between Ophelia and himself.
Perhaps Hamlet was merely attention seeking? Perhaps he was genuinely insane? Or perhaps he fell into and out of insanity depending on his mental mood. One things for sure though, Hamlet certainly fooled his fellow friends and family in the play, and Shakespeare made sure that he did it in the most dramatic of ways!
A second individual in Hamlet, who was undoubtedly eventually crazy, is of course Ophelia. Ophelia started out as sane as anyone, but things soon changed rapidly for her. Ophelia and Hamlet are in a relationship and as far as we can gather, Shakespeare meant for them to be very much so in love. But her father, Polonius, as we discovered was a reason for Hamlet’s alleged insanity, said they could not be together. He told her:
"I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth have you so slander any moment leisure as to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet. Look to’t, I charge you. Come your ways."
To which she replies:
"I do not, my lord, what I should think."
From these two quotations – we can gather than Polonius is thinking for, making decisions for, and controlling Ophelia as well as her thoughts and feelings. I believe that Shakespeare put Polonius in this play to make life difficult for Ophelia and to contribute to a significant factor which in the end drove both Ophelia and Hamlet insane. This is the starting point for Ophelia’s madness, as she has been stripped of any independence she may have previously possessed.
Ophelia later on is troubled by Hamlet’s actions, you could even say that Shakespeare made events in such a way that meant Ophelia and Hamlet drove each other mad. The next time when Hamlet and Ophelia met – she was very surprised and even concerned by his actions. He was raving like a lunatic – and then stared deeply into her eyes, very closely followed by running away and leaving her! This was said to have left her in tears, and deeply troubled, this was on of many events which contributed to her downward spiral of depression ultimately leading to full on madness. Hamlet turns very odd indeed, with Ophelia, and when she attempts to approach him, she is greeted with the shouted phrase:
“Get thee to a nunnery!”
Hamlet also says to Ophelia:
"…I loved you not."
Leaving her saddened and feeling insignificant. Again, all of these helped her along her trail to madness and Shakespeare made sure the audience of the play were fully aware of this by making Hamlet’s outbursts so random yet also so hurtful.
I think it is blatant though that the factor which pushed Ophelia over the edge was undoubtedly the death of her father. Shakespeare timed this I think to come at the most inappropriate time for Ophelia to well and truly push her over the edge. The icing on the cake, as it seems, was when she was made aware of the fact that it was her lover, Hamlet, who murdered her father, Polonius.
It is at this point in time in the play that Ophelia goes into a state of insanity. She begins to engage in such activities as singing to herself and not making any sense whatsoever to anyone. We know that Hamlet’s bad treating of her was a key factor to her insanity as she sings in one of her songs:
“…to be your Valentine”
Here she is singing a song about Valentines Day which is obviously related to her feelings towards Hamlet. Also, she says:
“Quoth she, before you tumbled me, you promis’d me to wed”
This means she is upset she hasn’t married Hamlet, and Shakespeare made this stand out to show her true madness – as why would she be so bothered as to marrying Hamlet after he killed her father, although maybe this delves further into her madness. Shortly after all of this and a conversation with her brother, Ophelia is found dead, floating in a river. We do not know for certain whether or not it was suicide, murder or accidental, and in my eyes Shakespeare did this on purpose to make the audience make their own mind up with regards as to whether or not she was truly mad.
Ophelia was like no other character in the play. Unlike the themes of revenge and corruption, she stood out as being pure and innocent. It is in fact ironic that it is she whom should die so early on instead of one of the evil individuals – such as Claudius.
In my opinion, both Hamlet and Ophelia were crazy and were as mad as each other were, only Hamlet was stronger inside and resisted suicide as he has a reason to live, to seek revenge on Claudius. I think Hamlet and Ophelia loved each other throughout despite what they showed on the outside, and I believe that they both drove themselves to madness via their own love for one another.
