Hamlet Commentary
...tes himself), Hamlet assumes this moment as the opportune time to seek his revenge. Laertes remark to Hamlet, “In thee there is not half an hour’s life” (5.2.319) undoubtedly expresses a sense of urgency, creating a time constraint for Hamlet to execute his plan of vengeance. In contrast to Hamlet’s other attempts at murdering Claudius, Hamlet ignores any contemplation and/or hesitancy of action by proceeding directly to action which may also be indicative of urgency for revenge. Hamlet’s deep infatuation with Claudius’s and Gertrudes’s relationship could have also swayed his decision to act directly. As witnessed in the confrontation between Hamlet and Gertrude (3.4), Hamlet has a genuine disdain for Gertrude’s relationship to Claudius, believing that Claudius has corrupted her. When Gertrude is “poison’d” inadvertently by Claudius, Hamlet may have triggered the realization that Claudius must be killed in order to acquire retribution for the manipulation of his mother. Hamlet’s comprehension of death induces him to act. Before Act Five, Hamlet possesses a weary outlook on life. He speculates that death will bring an end to, “The heartache and the thousand natural shock/That flesh is heir to” (3.1.62-63), and contemplates suicide accordingly. However, the option of suicide poses a psychological dilemma for Hamlet: The ambiguity of the afterlife. Hamlet is aware that suicide is a religiously condemned practice, consequently affecting one’s placement in the afterlife. Conversely, Hamlet maintains that suicide, as aforementioned above, will end his emotional sorrow. It is the conflict between Hamlet’s religious and emotional convictions that prevents him from taking action. In Act Five, Hamlet’s perspective of death is drastically altered when he encounters Yorick’s skull. As Hamlet studies the skull, he ponders upon the inevitability of death. Hamlet claims that even the greatest of individuals, Alexander the Great in this case, will eventually die and, “return to dust” (5.1.203-204) for it is a physical consequence of all life. Abiding by this ideology, it is conceivable that Hamlet would believe that because death is inevitable for everyone, one should seize the opportunity to accomplish goals and to live a fruitful life. This notion could have potentially given Hamlet an incentive to achieve vengeance and liberate Denmark from the evil grasps of Claudius. Lastly, the fate of the play influences Hamlet to act. As witnessed thro...