Hamlet, the Bi-Polar
... insane rage, the people who so loved him in his kingdom would look on him with pity instead of alarm at the grisly murder of a king. While his reasoning would have been good at first, Hamlet played the part of the fool for too long. He should have killed his uncle directly after the news of his poor mental health had spread through the town, but he continued to bide his time because he still was not sure that his actions were justified in the eyes of God. His greatest mistake lay in this indecision. After much pretending that he was crazy, he began to be a bit crazy in reality. In the movie, this was more reflected by the scene in his mother’s chamber when Hamlet confronted her about her sins and seemed about to rape her. In the book, it showed more through his accidental killing of Polonius in his enraged fit. A rational man would think that it could be anyone from the king to a visitor or servant behind the arras, but Hamlet, having no true reason to believe that his uncle would hide from him despite the open accusations of Hamlet’s play, thrust his sword blindly into the wall without fear of the consequences. The scene also hints at his cowardice, how he could not convince himself to take his revenge in any way but an abrupt, reflexive action. Hamlet’s cowardice became apparent in other acts, as well. Most consider it the mark of a coward to contemplate suicide. Suicide is an act that suggests one does not have the will or the inclination to pull oneself out of a rut. The ‘easy way out,’ people call it, and Hamlet finds himself wondering if he should not take it three times in the play yet dismissing it every time, too coward to take the coward’s way out. More chicken still did Hamlet prove himself to be by postponing the death of his uncle. Hamlet was obviously a lover, not a fighter, as the saying goes, thus had many reservations about the murder of another human being. No matter how much he idolized his father and understood the cruel deception of his uncle, Hamlet had conflicting emotions about committing the murder. His father wanted it done, Hamlet himself wanted it done, but carrying out a mortal sin was so repulsive to him that he pushed it back and pushed it back until he ended up killing someone innocent and, indirectly, killing himself and his mother. Hamlet had an intense desire to exact revenge, but did not have the resolve to carry it out. Resolve was by far not his only weakness of strength. Hamlet walked the line between strength and weakness. He was intellectually strong – cunning, self-analyzing, clever – but tended to over think, as evinced by his belated killing of his traitorous uncle. Physically, his strength was superb; Hamlet was an excellent swordsman. Mental weakness was where he could be faulted, which is a tad ironic for such an otherwise brilliant mind. Part of the trouble was that he did not think his actions through thoroughly enough when he needed to (like in the chamber when he killed Polonius), and thought them through too thoroughly when it would ...