This study will provide a comparative analysis of the relationship between fiction and reality in Shakespeare's Hamlet and Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. The study will also consider what each work tells us about the respective societies out of which each work emerges. The argument of the study will be that while both works certainly display significant conflicts between fiction and reality, Shakespeare's work is more effective because it is more fearless in its pursuit of the core of the character as he evolves and defines reality with no external aid. Defoe's novel, on the other hand, finally has the character rely on God and Christ for the ground of his reality. In addition, Crusoe's need for hard work to survive further grounds him in reality, whereas Hamlet's abundance of free time allows him to drift in and out of self-deception, illusion, and the fictions of imagination.
Defoe's novel is essentially the story of one man trying to discover what is fiction and what is reality, what is false and what is real. On the one hand, the author leads the hero toward the complete surrender of Christian conversion, but on the other hand he has him remaining as self-sufficient as any atheist. The problem in Defoe's novel is that he has not himself decided what to do with Crusoe in terms of reality and fiction, and so he has left it up to the reader: "It was the sixth of November, in the sixth Year of my Reign, or my Captivity, which you please" (Defoe 100).
There is no doubt about what is real and what is fiction in Shakespeare's play. Or, rather, there is no doubt that Shakespeare is in control of what is false and what is real in Hamlet. Certainly Hamlet himself knows what is real---his uncle killed his father, married his mother, and now must be killed by Hamlet. However, Hamlet is a thinking man rather than a man of action, and in any case he is not a man quick to murder, even in justifiable vengeance. The entire play, once Hamle...