Esame Letteratura inglese magistrale, analisi sonetti e opere di Shakespeare, prof. Lucking, Shakespeare

ANALYSIS

Literary Devices in Hamlet

Symbolism, imagery, allegory

Yorick’s Skull

In Hamlet, physical objects are rarely used to represent thematic ideas. One important exception is Yorick’s skull, which

Hamlet discovers in the graveyard in the first scene of Act V. As Hamlet speaks to the skull and about the skull of the king’s

former jester (giullare), he fixates on death’s inevitability and the disintegration of the body. He urges the skull to “get

you to my lady’s chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favor she must come”—no one can avoid death

(V.i.178–179). He traces the skull’s mouth and says, “Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft,” indicating

his fascination with the physical consequences of death (V.i.174–175). This latter idea is an important motif throughout

the play, as Hamlet frequently makes comments referring to every human body’s eventual decay, noting that Polonius

will be eaten by worms, that even kings are eaten by worms, and that dust from the decayed body of Alexander the Great

might be used to stop a hole in a beer barrel.

Act Your Age

There's also a weird part in this scene where Hamlet all of sudden appears to be a lot older than we thought. When the

play begins, Hamlet is a university student, which means he's pretty young. By the time Hamlet makes it to the graveyard

in Act V, he's apparently thirty years old (much older than the average university student). The First Clown says he's been

a gravedigger in Elsinore since "the very day that young Hamlet was born" (5.1.152-153) and a few lines later he reveals

that he's been a "sexton" in Denmark for "thirty years" (i.e. working at the church and graveyard) (5.1.167). Hamlet literally

aged between Act I and Act V and perhaps it's a reflection of his new, more mature outlook on life and death.

Necropolis

In this scene, the graveyard is specifically opposed to the royal court, and not just because of the dirt and bones and all.

In Act I the court is a place where Hamlet's told to "not for ever with they vailèd lids/ Seek for thy noble father in the dust"

(1.2.72-73) and reminded that "your father lost a father,/ That father lost, lost his" (1.2.93-94): in other words, there's no

time to remember the dead. People die; get over it; move on.

But not in the graveyard. In the graveyard, Hamlet's allowed to remember the dead. "Alas, poor Yorick," says Hamlet, as

he recalls that Yorick was "a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy," one who "hath borne [Hamlet] on his back a

thousand times" (5.1.190-191; 191-192; 192-193). So, Hamlet encounters the skull of a man who worked for his father

and who Hamlet knew as a child. He remembers his childhood as a happy time in which Old Hamlet was alive and all was

well in the world. All this happiness, of course, is disrupted when Hamlet realizes Ophelia (now dead) is being buried a

few gravestones over.

Ghost

Ghosts are a common element in revenge tragedy. What is surprising is that this ghost isn't as straightforward as it seems.

Ghost Hunters

The spirit claims:

• The ghost says he's Hamlet's father (it sure looks like the guy);

• The ghost also says that he was murdered by his brother, who happens to be Hamlet's uncle Claudius, the guy

who's now married to Gertrude and sitting on the throne of Denmark;

• The ghost also claims he's "doomed" to suffer in "sulph'rous and tormenting flames" until the "foul crimes done

in [his] days of nature / Are burnt and purged away" (1.5.6; 17-18). It sounds a lot like Purgatory, where sins had

to be "purged" before a soul could make it to heaven.

But there are a couple of hitches (problemi).

1. First, purgatorial spirits weren't supposed to ask people to commit murder, since that basically defeats the point

of being purged of your sins. Still, that's exactly what the ghost wants. In fact, he says he's doomed to suffer until

he gets his revenge.

2. Second, Protestants don't officially believe in the doctrine of Purgatory and Hamlet is a Protestant (He lives in

Denmark, a Protestant nation, and goes to school in Wittenberg, where the Protestant Reformation began).

Hamlet seems to agree, and he's not about to go on a murdering spree (strage) until he knows the truth. The

ghost's appearance sets the revenge plot into motion, but it also delays the play's action.

The Ghost and Hamlet

A lot of literary critics notice that the ghost has a whole lot in common with young Hamlet. When Ophelia describes the

way Hamlet appeared when he showed up in her room looking all ghostly "pale," almost "as if he had been loosèd out of

hell" (2.1.93)? Yeah, sounds a lot like the ghost to us. So maybe the ghost-as-dad is just a figment of Hamlet's imagination.

Other characters may see the ghost (the castle guards and Horatio, for example), but Hamlet's the only one who has a

dialogue with it. He's also the only one who sees or hears the ghost when it shows up in Gertrude's chamber to remind

Hamlet to be nice to his mom (3.4.126-131).

Has Hamlet been imagining his conversations with the ghost the whole time? Does this have anything to do with the fact

that Hamlet says to Horatio "My father—methinks I see my father [...] in my mind's eye" (1.2.191; 193) before he even

finds out that the ghost has been appearing on the castle walls? Regardless of whether or not we believe the ghost is

"real," we feel safe saying that the spirit represents the way young Hamlet is haunted by his dad's memory. We get it; the

prince has just lost one of the most important figures in his life, a man he idolizes and loves, and everyone is just telling

him to move on and forget about his father. Claudius insists Hamlet's excessive grief is "unmanly" and Gertrude tells

Hamlet to ditch (disfarsi) his mourning clothes and quit moping (piagnucolare) (1.2.98). Maybe he's real and maybe he's

not—either way, he sure seems real to Hamlet.

Rank (di valore) “gardens”

The gardens in Hamlet aren't necessarily the kind of places where you'd like to hang out and watch butterflies while you

picnic. In fact, they're more like overgrown vacant lots than plots that have been tended and nurtured (coltivati).

According to Hamlet, the entire world "tis an unweeded garden, / That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature /

Possess it merely" (1.2.139-141). The word "rank" refers to the fertile overgrowth of vegetation and also implies the kind

of festering and rot (marcire) that often accompanies lush foliage. The term "rank" turns up over and over again

throughout the play.

Garden of Eatin'

Lit crit pro-tip: whenever you see gardens in Western literature, it's a pretty safe bet that there's at least some deep-down

allusion to the Garden of Eden. In this case, Hamlet's rank gardens recall Eve's temptation in the Biblical Garden of Eden,

particularly when the Ghost reveals that Old King Hamlet was murdered by his brother, Claudius, while he slept in his

orchard.

Hamlet’s costumes changes

Early on in the play, we learn that Hamlet's all black get-up seems to be getting on his mom's nerves. Hamlet wears an

"inky cloak" because he's in mourning for his dead father—but he's the only one in court still wearing black. Now that

Claudius is king, the happy couple wants everyone to forget about Old Hamlet. So, Hamlet's black attire sets him apart

from everyone else —just like his grief makes him an outsider in the cheerful court. But don't tell Hamlet that his clothes

reflect his grief —he might jump down your throat, as he does here when his mom asks him why he "seems" so sad.

In other words, Hamlet objects to the idea that any outward signs (dress, behaviour, etc.) can truly "denote" what he's

feeling on the inside (which is rotten). Hamlet's "suits of solemn black," he says, can't even begin to express his grief and

anguish. Later on, however, Hamlet changes his tune about what it is that clothing or costume can "denote." After he

decides to play the role of an "antic" or madman, he does a costume change. If we assume that Hamlet makes himself

appear dishevelled in order to convince Ophelia that he's lost his mind, then we can also assume that Hamlet is banking

on the convention that one's physical attire is a reflection of one's state of mind. And it works. Ophelia and Polonius are

convinced that Hamlet is mad.

At the same time, we know that Hamlet isn't really mad. So is he right after all, that clothes don't indicate anything about

the state of mind? If he is—and we suspect that he is—then this is a pretty mind-blowing statement for Shakespeare to

make: there can be a difference between the outside and the inside. And that difference is called interiority.

Flowers

When Ophelia loses her mind in Act IV, Scene v, she starts handing out flowers to everyone around her. Sure, she talks

directly about the symbolic meaning of those flowers, but what's also important is who might be getting these flowers.

Fennel (finocchietto) symbolized strength and praiseworthiness, columbine (aquilegia) symbolized folly (follia), daisies

(margherite) symbolized innocence, and violets symbolized faithfulness and modesty. So which flowers belong to which

characters? Does Ophelia give the rosemary (for remembrance) to an invisible Hamlet, praying he hasn't forgotten about

her? Does she give the rue (another word for regret) to Gertrude, who may be regretting her hasty marriage to Claudius?

Setting

Elsinore, Denmark: in and around the royal palace

The story of Hamlet is set in the late middle ages (14th and 15th centuries, or 1300 to 1499) in and around (mostly) the

royal palace in Elsinore, a city in Denmark.

Sixteenth-Century Vibe

The story may have a specific location and time, but it's not exactly historical drama: the play has a distinct turn-of-the-

17th century vibe. (Hamlet was written between 1599 and 1601). There are several allusions to the Protestant

Reformation, which wasn't initiated until around 1517, when Martin Luther laid out his beef with the Catholic Church in

his Ninety-five Theses. Denmark (like England) was a Protestant nation at the time Shakespeare wrote the play and Hamlet

seems to be the quintessential Protestant kid —he goes to school in Wittenberg, Germany (where Martin Luther hung

out) and he's also sceptical of the Ghost, who claims to be his father's Purgatorial spirit (Protestants rejected the notion

of Purgatory as mere "superstition”).

There's also a whole lot of play-acting in Hamlet, including a performance of The Murder of Gonzago, which is put on by

a troop of travelling players (actors) who drop by the castle to put on a little show