Poetry and Pathos in Hamlet - Essay Example

Poetry and Pathos in Hamlet Hamlet, like all other plays of Shakespeare, is In the paper “Modern Slavery and Fraud Schemes” the author provides a study of human weaknesses which manifest themselves in so many different forms and so many different ways within the span of a lifetime, with a hero whose guilt-ridden mind is relentlessly torn between duty and conscience, love and justice, madness and reason. Hamlet can be critically examined for a reflection on human frailty, fallibility, treachery and insanity - that has come to be regarded as one the greatest tragedies penned in the Elizabethan era. The unmatched poetic grace and tragic nuances of the play find their most striking expressions in the famous soliloquies of the titular character, expressing with unmitigated agony the rambling musings of a grieving son, an indecisive heir to the throne and a soul tortured by its own inactions. Hamlet with its resonant poetry and tragic philosophy of love, loss and duty highlight, with supreme grace, the intricacies of characterization. A close study of the formal artifices employed through poetry, play of contrasts and the structural integrity of the action in context of the famous soliloquy under discussion, offers as a glimpse into the complex textual dynamics of Shakespeare’s generic as well as particular plot devices that constantly interact with each other within the expertly woven, intricate matrix of Hamlet. Hamlet’s famous soliloquy in Act 3, scene 1 (56-89), begins with - “To be, or not to be, that is the question” (Shakespeare 277). Hamlet’s breathtaking “To be, or not to be” soliloquy, delivered at a crucial junction of the plot in Act 3 scene 1, stands at the center of the play’s action. Indeed, it has carved a focal position for itself in the history of the western theater and poetic oeuvre. The iambic rhyme scheme, a trademark of the Shakespearean tragic genre, exudes a reflective self-portrait of the troubled prince, caught in an inextricable web of conflicting centripetal forces and actions that draw him in different directions at once. The tragedy of Hamlet is ‘foregrounded’ in the mutinous attitude, chronic melancholia and acute monomania with which he surrounds himself from the very beginning. This act of foregrounding plays a critical role in a formalist reading of the soliloquy and, by extension, the play. The graceful harmony of the rhythm does not detract from the torturous musings and self-inflicted verbal abuse of a man driven to the brink of madness by the guilt and indecisiveness of his own flawed nature. Instead, it seems to reinforce the tragic emphasis of the action. In the first soliloquy of Act 1 scene 2, lines 84-85, Hamlet had delivered a scornful repartee to his newly wedded mother’s woeful beseeching that he may cast off his mourning, saying that he had “that within that passes show,/ These but the trappings and the suits of woe” (Shakespeare 172). This bold self-assertion of heartfelt melancholia continues to haunt him throughout the remainder of the play. His self is divided between ‘being’ (“to be”) and ‘non-being’ (“or not to be”). He is forever in between, a willing prey to the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” (Shakespeare 278). Should he remain a passive victim to the multitude of evils that surround him? Or should he rise up in arms against the tide of misfortune, exact revenge on his father’s killer and go boldly to the end? Again, the split nature of this immensely complex character does not offer an easy answer. He must, therefore, “die” in the end. In a structural reading of the play, that entails an overview of the contemporary vocabulary and a study of the word selection, the implications of this particular usage of the word assumes special significance. In the Elizabethan lexicon, to ‘die’ carried overt seductive nuances - it often had an implication of impending sexual climax. This sexualized use of the word ‘die’, therefore, complicates the motivations behind Hamlet’s obsessive soul-searching. Hamlet’s death-wish is best manifested through his words: “To die, to sleep” (citation); his desire to end his suffering, when examined through the critical lens of ‘ostranenie” or “de-familiarization”, may be interpreted as a distinct, albeit subconscious, attempt on his part to psychologically and physiologically distance himself from the unfaithful and treacherous world (Shakespeare 285). The lines “Devoutly to be wishes – to die: to sleep….the dread of something after death…puzzles the will” (Shakespeare 286) become almost an ode to the fantasy of death that Hamlet nurtures and dwells upon with the intensity of a lover. The death-wish paradigm of this discussion gains relevance in context of the ebb and flow of emotions in these tragically charged lines. The twist and turn of metaphors of sleep mingles with a soulful tirade against the calamities born out of time and the inherent frailty of all lives. Hamlet’s preoccupation with escape and his elusive rhetoric of self-deception pervades the entire soliloquy. These, in turn, foreshadow the subsequent escapism and thwarted opportunities in the somewhat misogynistic outburst of Hamlet’s equally famous “nunnery soliloquy” – “get thee to a nunnery” (Shakespeare 290), occurring in the same scene. Yet, even in death, as he is painfully aware, there is no respite, for the thought of afterlife haunts him. His inability to bring Claudius to justice to father, furthermore, gives rise to an unnamable “dread of something after death” (Shakespeare 286). The character of Hamlet is an embodiment of negativity and although his feelings never overtly depict malevolence or iniquity, it is susceptible to both. In the course of the play, Hamlet begins to doubt the existence of good fortune and salvation, though he is equally frantic about evading what he comes to perceive as the inherent proclivity to evil and struggles with his inner self and conscience. The play depicts a significant role of Hamlet’s conscience which restricts him from his action of revenge which he had contemplated at the play’s beginning. The ending of this soliloquy points at the crux of the play’s dilemma –“conscience does make cowards of us all” (Shakespeare, 287). Hamlet switches between the idea of right and wrong before acting in vengeance. He delves into the pros and cons of death and life and weighs the existence of life after death. His philosophical mindset constantly holds him back from action. He looks for justice and morality before acting. Here the focus lies more closely on the related dynamics of conflict inherent within Hamlet himself. His justification for inaction is not merely the philosophical debate between right and wrong, but also his ability to perform. This aspect of functionality and performance, therefore, becomes the bane of Hamlet’s existence – his “sins” to be “remember’d” (Shakespeare 287). Ophelia, in her subsequent state of madness and inane rambling, picks out rosemary for “remembrance”. She is doomed, by tragic association, for it is the memories of Hamlet’s “sins” that haunts her, plagues her and finally drives her into insanity. Hamlet has bidden Ophelia to remember his “sins” in “thy orisons”. Ophelia, through her suicide, literally chooses to turn a blind eye to Hamlet’s sins and in so doing seals his tragic fate. Hamlet’s incapability to ‘perform’, therefore, extends to a further dimension where he fails to act upon his love and ultimately chooses to condemn himself and his beloved to a perpetual state of psychological dissonance, disparity and, finally, death. Thus, the “to be or not be soliloquy” is integral, not only in its wider connotations within the fabric of the plot and action, but also as a marker of the absolute finality of doom and tragedy that pervades the play. References: Shakespeare, William. Hamlet: third series. Cengage Learning, 2006. Print. Read More