1. Plot
1.1. Hamlet's effort to avenge the murder of his father.
1.1.1. Quotes
1.1.1.1. Haste me to know 't, that I, with wings as swift As meditation or the thoughts of love, May sweep to my revenge. (1.5.31-37)
1.1.1.1.1. Hamlet is eager for revenge, but before he knows he has to kill the king for his revenge.
1.2. Constant Death
1.3. Sexuality
1.4. Characters uncertainty
2. Themes
2.1. Madness
2.1.1. "How strange or odd some'er I bear myself (As I perchance hereafter shall think meet To put an antic disposition on)" (1.5.190-192)
2.1.1.1. Hamlet is going to pretend to be mad. However, he does not realize he is already depressed.
2.1.2. "antic disposition" = pretend to be a madman.
2.2. Tragic Hero
2.2.1. Hamlet is a tragic hero
2.2.2. Tragic flaw is indecisiveness and inability to act
2.2.3. Tragic flaw leads him to his own death
2.3. Women
2.3.1. Dual nature for women
2.3.1.1. Ophelia and Gertrude
2.3.1.1.1. Shakespeare created a raw image of Gertrude and Ophelia as their tragic deaths can be blamed on the issue of gender inequality as both characters are illustrated as weak, vulnerable, fragile and tools of manipulation by the men.
2.3.2. Hamlet is sexist
2.3.2.1. That it should come to 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 That he might not beteem the winds of heaven Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and Earth. Must I remember? why, she would hang on him As if increase of appetite had grown By what it fed on. And yet, within a month (Let me not think on 't; frailty, thy name is woman!) (1.2.141-150)
2.3.2.1.1. Hamlet is disgusted by his mother's sexual desires and blames her for her horrible remarriage with the murderer. At the end of the quotation he says that all women are frail.
2.4. Family
2.4.1. Hamlet is depressed after his fathers death. He is sad because he was murdered, but he's more upset about his mother's remarriage to his uncle, Claudius.
3. Characters
3.1. Hamlet
3.1.1. Gertrude's son
3.1.2. Romantic relationship with Ophelia
3.1.3. Loyal and love for Family
3.1.3.1. Hamlet learns that his father was murdered by Claudius. Hamlet is shocked and furious. He makes a promise to the ghost of his father that he will avenge his death. Hamlet is very loyal and caring towards his family.
3.1.3.1.1. “So, uncle, there you are; now to my word; It is “Adieu, adieu! Remember me.” I have sworn’t” (1.5.111)
3.1.4. Revenge
3.1.5. Tragic hero
3.1.5.1. Hamlets begins with his noblest motivations but by the end, his final act was his death.
3.1.6. Indecisive
3.1.6.1. Hamlet has promised to avenge his father’s death. However, He does not take any immediate action to it even though he has reason to.
3.1.6.1.1. Hamlet becomes inspired by Fortinbras, The Prince of Norway.
3.1.6.1.2. "Rightly to be great Is not to stir without great argument, But greatly to find quarrel in a straw. When honor’s at the stake." (4.454)
3.2. Ophelia
3.2.1. Polonius's daughter
3.2.2. Innocent, fragile and vulnerable
3.2.2.1. She crumbles into insanity, becoming merely a tragic death.
3.2.3. Dual nature for women
3.2.4. Romantic love for Hamlet
3.2.4.1. Hamlet: (...) I did love you once. Ophelia: Indeed, my, lord, you made me believe so. Hamlet: You should not have believed me (...) I loved you not. Ophelia: I was the more deceived. (1.5.105)
3.2.4.1.1. She still loves Hamlet through his brutality
3.3. Claudius
3.3.1. King of Denmark
3.3.2. Murdered Prince Hamlet's Father
3.3.3. He is bent upon maintaining his own power.
3.3.4. Married Gertrude
3.4. Gertrude
3.4.1. Hamlet's Mother
3.4.1.1. Loves Hamlet underneath her shallowness.
3.4.1.1.1. She tells the king that Hamlet has killed Polonius. However, she does what she can to help Hamlet, so he would not get in trouble.
3.4.1.1.2. "He weeps for what is done." (4.1.28)
3.4.2. Gertrude is also very sexual, and it is her sexuality that turns Hamlet so violently against her.
3.4.3. Queen of Demark
3.4.4. Dual Nature for women
3.5. Horatio
3.5.1. Hamlet's friend
3.5.2. Witnessed the ghost of King Hamlet
3.6. Polonius
3.6.1. Ophelia's father
3.6.2. Spies on Hamlet
3.6.3. Murdered by Hamlet
3.6.3.1. "How now, a rat? Dead for a ducat, dead!" (3.4.23)
3.6.3.1.1. Hamlet accidentally killed Polonius thinking it was King Claudius spying on him.
4. Setting
4.1. Denmark
4.2. The story of Hamlet is set in the middle ages 14th and 15th centuries around the royal palace in Elsinore.
4.2.1. Quotes
4.2.1.1. "As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood, Disasters in the sun, and the moist star Upon whose influence Neptune’s empire stands Was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse." (1.1.115)
4.2.1.1.1. In this quotation the atmosphere is being described by Horatio before the ghost enters