The Insanity Of Hamlet :: essays research papers

In William Shakespeare?s hamlet, crossroads leads an antic disposition that causes his downfall and leads him to insanity. His antic disposition affects his judgment, destroys relationships and creates a belief that he is truly mad. Throughout the play, critical point is consumed with anger which causes him to act through emotion and without reason. Hamlet?s main goal is to avenge the death of his father but, his actions to do so are hindered because of the unreasonable decisions he has made through the antic disposition he has put on. Hamlet?s antic disposition began with the death of his father. Hamlet returns to his home, Denmark, to find queen mole rat Hamlet, his father, dead. As any normal human being would be allowed to grieve, Hamlet was not. Hamlet was expected to accept the death of his father and move on. (Do not eer with thy vaild lids/Seek for thy noble father in the dust./Thou knowst tis common. All that lives must die,/Passing through nature to eternity.)(1.2.68- 73). Without the time to grieve, Hamlet was left with the call up of his mother?s and Claudius?s hurtful and unsympathetic words of advice. While Hamlet was forbidden to ?useless mourning? (We pray you, throw to earth/This unprevailing woe, and rally of us/As of a father.)(1.2.106-108), his mother quickly marries to his uncle Claudius and undoubtedly moves on with her life. In T.S. Eliot?s The Sacred Wood, Hamlet?s ?disgust envelops and exceeds her. It is thus a feeling which he cannot understand, he cannot objectify it, and it therefore remains to poison life and obstruct action.? With little time to grieve and a mother that seems to tuition less about her deceased husband, Hamlet?s mind was given the perfect recipe for insanity. In mid night, a mysterious nuance appears to Prince Hamlet in the shape of his 2father, King Hamlet. The strange and mystifying ghost guides Hamlet away from Horatio and Marcellus, as if wanting privacy. Hamlet becomes defensive and mad and believes his fate is to discover the ghost, ?My fate cries out/And makes each petty artery in this body/As hardy as the Nemean lions nerve./Still am I called.?Unhand me, gentlemen.?(1.4.86-89). Hamlet is determined to hear the words of the ghost and threatens Horatio and Marcellus to death if they do not let him go. Horatio and Marcellus follow him for his safety but believe ?He waxes desperate with imagination.?(1.4.92). The ghost is the first obvious sign that Hamlet?