Hamlet: Thinking and Ideas as Inaction in the Tragedy

“Understanding kills action.” With these 3 straightforward words, Nietzsche explains the thought behind Shakespeare’s development of the acting of believed as inaction, and also the reason that Hamlet hesitates for more than 3000 lines of blank verse and prose to avenge the murder of his father. The motif of delay and inaction as believed can be observed in numerous situations throughout the play, the primary getting that of Hamlet, although secondary performances are offered by Laertes, Pyrrhus, and Lucianus (in The Mousetrap). These scenes serve as support and emphasis for the central element of the play.

Hamlet expresses his thoughts mainly by way of his soliloquies, Shakespeare’s vehicle to present inaction and delay in essence, to act Hamlet’s thoughts. The theory is that if the character is portrayed “thinking aloud early on [in the play] and then again and once again and again…[the audience will] understand that pondering with him is an ongoing process” (De Grazia 1). Nietzsche gives an explanation for Hamlet’s tendency toward internal contemplation: “That which we can discover words for is something already dead in our hearts there is always a kind of contempt in the act of speaking.” This statement offers a cause both for Hamlet’s constant inaction (in believed) and his biting wit. Hepeppers his speech with contempt, simply because that which he speaks is dead to him, but filled with meaning, resulting in many fascinating conversations, specially with the adults, Claudius, Gertrude, and Polonius. Nineteenth­century critic Coleridge singles out Hamlet as “representative of contemporary tragedy simply because as opposed to Greek tragedies, Hamlet is driven not by an external agent or principle, but by his own inner prompting, his prophetic soul” (De Grazia 5). This “internalization of the self” represents a single of Shakespeare’s greatest contributions, and provides the basis for an understanding of the basic concept of the play (Bloom 408-9). Several critics identify the central action of Hamlet as certainly Hamlet’s inaction. This is shown via the opinion that if a single only discovers the explanation for Hamlet’s delay, he would “have the answer to Hamlet’s character which is also the important to the whole play (for the play is his character)” (De Grazia 4). The most hugely favored explanation for Hamlet’s hesitation is that Hamlet is a persona as well huge for the revenge-tragedy that is Hamlet. Certainly, without having the prince (as Shakespeare presents him), it becomes “the revenge of Hamlet,” not The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (Bloom 415). With no Hamlet’s hesitation, his continuous and deliberate believed, and “antic disposition” (De Grazia 11), the plot would go straight from the Ghost’s briefing of Hamlet to the murder of Claudius, no queries asked. Hamlet’s questioning of the ghost’s validity, and consequently his questioning of everything else writes the play (Bloom 187). Critic Harry Levin describes Hamlet as “a play obsessed with the word ?question'”, and Bloom makes it clear that “the question of Hamlet usually should be Hamlet himself” (Bloom 386-7), simply because every little thing in the play depends on Hamlet’s response to every little thing in the play, starting with the ghost of his father.

Nietzsche, in his explanation for Hamlet’s hesitation, differentiates in between Hamlet’s inaction due to understanding, and inaction due to reflection. Due to the fact of the Ghost’s revelation, Hamlet gains expertise, which, in impact, destroys the need and the potential to act on that information. From his work The Birth of Tragedy (1873):

“Knowledge kills action action needs the veils of illusion: that is the doctrine of Hamlet, not that inexpensive wisdom [which]…reflects too considerably and, as it had been, from an excess of possibilities does not get around to action. Not reflection, no – true expertise, an insight into the horrible truth, outweighs any motive for action…”.

This concept of expertise and reflection and their impact on action supplies insight to Hamlet’s dilemma: with no “the veils of illusion”, or the absence of understanding, he can not carry out his revenge. Hamlet’s understanding of the blindness and injustice of action outweighs all motives for action. The ugliness of the truth in Denmark’s monarchy so disgusts him, he cannot act.

“Denmark’s a prison” (Hamlet II, ii, 262) – or so claims Hamlet. But of all Shakespeare’s characters, Hamlet starts as the freest (Bloom 417-eight). Hamlet’s own inwardness and continual questioning denies himself that freedom. And this self-denial types from itself an ambiguity in Hamlet’s reasoning, because, as stated by Harold Bloom, “Hamlet implicitly defines character as a mode of freedom” (Bloom 427), but far more as one thing originating within freedom, rather than a item of freedom. Thus Hamlet, probably the greatest-recognized personality in Western culture, denies himself a means of making that character. This paradox also serves to create delay. Hamlet deprives himself of options, and so denies himself the capability to act.

As a result of Hamlet’s intellect and Hamlet’s reliance on Hamlet, significantly of Hamlet is in Hamlet’s wit. In a simple and grotesque revenge-tragedy, Hamlet’s inner monologue and quips drive considerably of the plot among the induction and the conclusion. Hamlet knows the corruption of Denmark is also in him, lending a connection amongst his “disposition to think” and his “indisposition to act” (De Grazia 2). Hamlet is aware that this burden rests on him, which effects his personal actions as nicely as his reactions to events (those handful of out of his manage). So his hesitation in his actions may possibly be attributed to this overwhelming load. As stated by T.S. Eliot, “we uncover Shakespeare’s Hamlet not in the action…so considerably as in an unmistakable tone.” Hamlet’s essence does not rest in the minimal action of the revenge play, but on Hamlet’s theories, witticisms, and, overwhelmingly, internal deliberation (Eliot three).

Understanding of the play’s core does not rest solely on Hamlet, even though he does carry the bulk of it. Hamlet’s own hesitation and inaction carries Hamlet, but the identical traits in minor characters serve to underscore the essence of the play. The most deliberate of these assistant scenes is Pyrrhus’s hesitation in the assassination of Priam, in the Player’s recitation of Priam’s slaughter. There are thirteen full lines fall in between the raising of his sword and its strike of its mark:

“…For lo, his sword,Which was declining on the milky headOf reverend Priam, seemed i’ th’ air to stick.So as a painted tyrant Pyrrhus stoodAnd, like a neutral to his will and matter,Did nothing.But as we typically see against some stormA silence in the heavens, the rack stand still,The bold winds speechless, and the orb belowAs hush as death, anon the dreadful thunderDoth rend the region so, following Pyrrhus’ pause,Arousèd vengeance sets him new a-work,And in no way did the Cyclops’ hammers fallOn Mars’s armor, forged for proof eterne,With significantly less remorse than Pyrrhus’ bleeding swordNow falls on Priam” (II, ii, 502-17).

The gods inflict “Priam’s pause,” whose wills are against Priam’s death. But it mirrors Hamlet’s hesitations in its permitting a pause for believed, a moment of inaction. Also, at the end of this break, Pyrrhus shows no regret for his murder of Priam, just as Hamlet shows no remorse or passion, in neither his murders nor his attack on Ophelia. Strangely, Hamlet will not commit his actual commission, the avenging of his father’s death, till Hamlet himself is dying. It is as if his delay all through the play, and the digressive deaths of other characters, makes it possible for him to avoid the looming guilt in his murder of Claudius. Bloom provides an interesting possibility as explanation for this peculiarity, as effectively as a justification for his hesitations. According to Bloom, Hamletmay not know whose son he is. The query on his mind is, “How far back in time did Gertrude’s ?incest’ go?” Bloom’s suggestion:

“What is really exclusive about Hamlet is not his unconscious wish to be patricidal…but rather his conscious refusal to really grow to be patricidal. Gertrude dies with Hamlet…but it is exceptional that Hamlet will not kill Claudius until he knows that he himself is dying, and that his mother is currently dead” (Bloom 419).

Only with the death of Claudius would Hamlet really feel guilt, and can only commit the act after his mother is dead, so as not to face her disappointment, and he himself has been mortally wounded. As a result, Pyrrhus’s actions (or inactions) reflect Hamlet’s at Claudius’s death, but even though Pyrrhus feels no remorse, Hamlet, in this final act, for the first time fears guilt.

The other two scenarios are minor imitations of Hamlet’s behaviors. In Act III, scene ii, Hamlet curses Lucianus for his “damnable faces” (277), a reflection of Hamlet’s contempt for his own dallying, or his appears “as if he had been loosed from hell” (De Grazia 15). Like Hamlet, Lucianus bides his time, till the proper moment approaches for the committing of his deed. As Laertes plots his duel with Hamlet, his indecision as to whether or not or not to go by way of with the act mirrors Hamlet’s inability to stay the course of his father’s spirit’s demand. As Shakespeare’s plot needed, each Laertes and Hamlet commit their crimes, in spite of their hesitations. Thus these two scenes imitate Hamlet’s actions or thoughts, serving to emphasize Hamlet’s influence over the play.

Unlike many tragedies, Hamlet is driven not by any outdoors aspect or principle, but by the inner consciousness and understanding of its protagonist. The characteristic themes and motifs of Shakespeare’s masterpiece inspired the use of a new method – soliloquy – to convey an ingenious device: the representation of thought as inaction. This forced not only a adjust for future Shakespearean creations, but also prompted the revision of most of his preceding works (Bloom 400). Therefore, the notion of thought’s representation in inaction influences not only Hamlet, but also the creation of drama considering that its conception.

Performs Cited

Bloom, Harold. “Hamlet.” Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human. New York: Riverhead Books, 1998.

Eliot, T.S. “Hamlet and His Troubles.” The Sacred Wood. London: Methune, 1920.

De Grazia, Margreta. “Hamlet’s Thoughts and Antics.” Republic of Letters 2000 Conference at Oxford University. Cambridge, Sept. 2000.

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Ed. Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine. New York:Washington Square, 1992.