Was Hamlet sane or insane - Essay Example

This issue has always been controversial as different critics have different opinions. Many of them consider Hamlet to be sane and state that he got mad straight after the conversation with the ghost as he was initially predisposed to madness. This point of view is quite understandable as some actions of Hamlet are really difficult to explain and it seems that only a mad person could act this way. Hamlet made many mistakes, but it was the cruelty of life that led him to this. This work will prove that Hamlet was not really mad and his psychological state underwent transformation in order to make it possible for him to commit an inevitable revenge.

Hamlet is so emotional and sensitive that it seems that he is predisposed to madness. His emotionality can be easily explained by this age: he is very young, and young people are usually captured by their feelings simply because they lack experience that would help them evaluate the situation properly. The death of the father and the marriage of his mother hurt Hamlet’s psyche and this was natural as young people always take such events too hard. However, it does not mean that Hamlet got mad.

Hamlet is really curious about death, thus he seems to be mad. However, this curiosity was a result of psychological stress that hurt his psychological state severely. This state can be also explained by the inevitability of revenge that Hamlet was not ready to commit “If it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all” (Shakespeare 5.2). Hamlet is a young person who wants to live and has to die, because he can’t trust this world any more. The world appeared to be too cruel after his conversation with the ghost (Shakespeare 41).

While discussing the psychological state of Hamlet it is essential to mention the ghost. Certainly, the fact that Hamlet sees the ghost makes his psychological health doubtful as people do not usually see phantoms. Moreover, nobody sees the ghost in the castle except Hamlet that may make readers think that it was a hallucination. However, Hamlet is not sure about what he saw: “the spirit that I have seen May be the devil: and the devil hath power To assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps Out of my weakness and my melancholy (Shakespeare 2.2). Furthermore, Hamlet is not going to follow the directions of the ghost at once, because he wants to get the proofs first (Holl 15).

This testifies, that Hamlet is totally sane, that can be also seen in his monologues. The soliloquy “To Be or Not to Be” shows the transformation of Hamlet’s soul. It is the most important speech in the play as it really explains the state of Hamlet (Levin 34). Hamlet is considering the way of life, he had before and the way, he should behave in the future. Every sentence of the monologue reflects the understanding of the situation and shows the way of Hamlet’s thinking “Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing, end them.

To die, to sleep” (Shakespeare 3.1). It is possible to learn all the feelings of Hamlet, his sense of both doom and innocence. He wants to forget about the ghost and its words to live further without any trouble, but he cannot act this way as has to commit revenge. Hamlet wants to give up, but he cannot: “To sleep, perchance to dream. Ay, there's the rub, For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause. There's the respect That makes calamity of so long life” (Shakespeare 3.1). Many young people, if they appear in such a situation, would give up or would grow really mad.

However, Hamlet appeared to be a sensitive but