Hamlet and the Ghost
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This study will examine William Shakespeare's Hamlet to determine the reason Hamlet first believes in the honesty of the Ghost and then manifests profound doubts about that honesty. Of course, the fact that the Ghost is indeed telling the truth does not change; what changes is the fact that believing in the Ghost's honesty (with respect to Claudius' having killed Hamlet's father) requires Hamlet to kill Claudius for justice and revenge. This is an act for which the philosophical Hamlet is not prepared. Hamlet immediately believes the Ghost's claims about the truth of his father's death because he is already in a state of rage at Claudius and his mother for their hasty marriage in the wake of the murder. His subsequent "doubting" of the honesty of the Ghost is more a means of delaying the inevitable than it is a legitimate reason to test the Ghost's honesty by trying to draw Claudius out of his pose of innocence. With respect to Hamlet's believing and doubting the Ghost, the study will focus on Hamlet's psychological composition and on the external reality in which that psychology exercises itself in the play. Hamlet is in a state of great distress when he is first able to express himself freely. Before the arrival of the Ghost, Hamlet hardly suspects Claudius of the murder of his father, but he does feel that all is not as it should be in the royal family. In the monologue beginning with "O that this too too sallied flesh would melt" (Shakespeare 38), Hamlet makes clear t
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The serpent that did sting thy father's life/ Now wears his crown" (Shakespeare 51), and when the Ghost goes on at length to spell out the details of his own murder by poison at the hands of Claudius, Hamlet instantly and completely believes the Ghost with no sign of doubt whatsoever. In the heat of the passion of rage he feels at the moment, Hamlet vows revenge. However, before long, with that heat cooling and the terrible reality of his vow of vengeance sinking in, Hamlet begins to "doubt" the honesty of the Ghost. This doubt is specious, however, for it first appears at the end of a monologue which up to that point is dominated by Hamlet's verbal self-abuse for his having failed to already take the revenge he swore to his father he would take. He calls himself a "coward," "pigeon-liver'd," "an ass," and "a whore" who can only talk when he should act. His alleged "doubting" of the Ghost comes only after he has devised the use of the traveling players in a scheme to expose Claudius' guilt. He "doubts" the Ghost only in order to justify his continuing delay, whether that delay is the result of cowardice or a philosophical nature. Hamlet vows again to act, but first he must test Claudius because the Ghost might be lying:
"The spir
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1717
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)
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