Alannie Cervantes
Some have argued that Hamlet lacks a desire for revenge in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet (c. 1599). However, his contemplative manner, stemming from his scholarly background, fosters a more vengeful disposition and enables a more meticulously calculated strategy for avenging his father than it initially appears. James Hirsch, for example, characterizes Hamlet as hesitant and uncertain, whereas Phoebe Spinrad attributes these behaviors to his complex self-consciousness. However, building on this scholarly conversation, Hamlet’s intellectual background provides him with the tools to analyze the ethical and moral implications of his situation and, ultimately, his actions.
Hamlet’s scholarly background has refined an introspective, self-aware and reflective nature that allows him to use psychological manipulation effectively. Instead of acting solely on impulse, he devises strategic plans to manipulate others, utilizing his feigned madness to validate his suspicions and maintain control over the situation. These aspects of Hamlet’s character arise as consequences of his social class, including the privilege to be a student, as well as a vengeful nature that allows him to adopt a thoughtful plan for revenge.
Hamlet’s aristocratic background provides him with the opportunity to obtain an education at Wittenberg, allowing him to practice analysis and critical thinking (1.2.113). Elizabeth Hanson suggests that Hamlet’s position as a student was highly significant in Denmark during the late Middle Ages, as education, increasingly prioritized by the noble class, became a sign of wealth. Hanson is aware of the importance of this educational revolution and its effect on Hamlet, stating, “In this respect, the play and its title character are synecdoches for the gentrification of learning that transformed the European aristocracy from a martial class to a highly literate, governing one in the early modern period” (207). Hamlet utilizes this education in every step of his journey to avenge his father. Academic settings allow students to learn skills such as careful examination, analytical thinking, and the ability to develop well-constructed plans. Hamlet’s education aids in his understanding of the political dilemmas occurring in the wake of his father’s death, and Hamlet keeps these issues in mind while enacting his revenge.
In contrast to many of the other characters, Hamlet’s education allows him to think and act like a student rather than a soldier or leader. Hamlet, responding like an educated person, utilizes the skills of restraint and reflection even in stressful situations, allowing him to remain calm and not act on his impulses. In contrast, the roles of a soldier or a leader involve acting with courage and decisiveness to achieve a goal no matter what. These characteristics are displayed in Laertes and Fortinbras, who serve as foils to Hamlet due to their desire to achieve a more immediate and intentional revenge.
While Laertes and Fortinbras are more active and forward with their desires for justice, Hamlet embodies the common values of a student: introspection, calculation, and self-awareness. Laertes reacts to the death of his father by stating, “Let come what comes, only I’ll be revenged / Most throughly for my father” (4.5.134-35). These lines reveal Laertes’s willingness to face any obstacles that may occur in his pursuit of revenge. Laertes’s need to uphold the characteristics of leader and soldier, a commitment that pushes him to seek vengeance, provides contrast to Hamlet’s lack of immediate impulse for revenge. In contrast, Fortinbras exemplifies a more strategic plan based on impulsivity and a desire for revenge. He is willing to risk his own life and the lives of others to avenge his father, as the Captain explains to Hamlet, “We go to gain a little patch of ground / That hath in it no profit but the name” (4.4.17-18). Although Fortinbras uses his military knowledge to avenge his father, he does so in a way that is, given the impulsivity of his actions, dangerous and places others in harm. While Fortinbras, Laertes, and Hamlet ultimately create plans for revenge, Hamlet’s intellectual skills support him to be more thoughtful than impetuous.
Hamlet’s education leads to an increased self-control that allows him to not act on instinct and explore alternate methods towards vengeance. Neil Rhodes explains that Hamlet’s hesitance to avenge his father is due to him being “a character who regards the whole process of revenge as a primitive and barbaric ritual that is offensive to his more refined sensibilities” (124). As a result of his education, Hamlet’s initial reaction to avenging his father may be derived from his knowledge and perception of those who commit themselves to revenge. Initially, Hamlet does not want to succumb to this process, but through contemplating his circumstances, he views that adopting a vengeful nature is the optimal course of action to achieve his desires. Instead of following the order of his father’s ghost (1.5.25), Hamlet contemplates the different paths that he can take. While revenge often arises from extreme emotions such as sadness and anger, Hamlet’s approach involves rational thinking, setting him apart from those around him. Hamlet expresses that “The play’s the thing / Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king” (2.2.539-40). By staging The Murder of Gonzago, Hamlet creates an environment where he can confirm Claudius’s guilt without asking him directly or harming himself. In addition to his skills of selfcontrol, Hamlet also utilizes his knowledge of theater as a tool in his calculated plan of revenge to ensure he is working from a place of certainty rather than pure emotion (2.2.353 ff.).
Furthermore, throughout the play, Hamlet reflects on the role his religion plays in altering his response to his situation. Hamlet’s Christian views affect his responses, especially to the death of his father and the betrayal of his mother and her new husband. In Hamlet’s first soliloquy, he states, “Or that the Everlasting had not fixed / His canon ’gainst self-slaughter! O God, God” (1.2.131-32). According to Spinrad, Hamlet’s Christian beliefs lead him to follow many laws of this religion, such as suicide and seeking vengeance being violations of religious law (454). Like many Christians, Hamlet relies on his religion to guide him while grieving for his father.
Rather than blindly accepting these Christian beliefs, however, Hamlet views these concepts through a scholarly lens, evaluating their implications before making a decision. Hamlet’s exclamation, “I do not set my life at a pin’s fee, / And for my soul —what can it do to that, / Being a thing immortal as itself?,” uses rhetorical questions to reflect his uncertainty concerning revenge at this point in the play (1.4.65-67). While Hamlet’s desires and opinions regarding avenging his father shift throughout the play, there is an agreed-upon opinion that Hamlet ultimately seeks revenge (Spinrad 453). He continually reverts to Christianity for his moral compass, and while Hamlet does seek revenge in his own way, it is strongly influenced by a critical evaluation coupled with his religious values.
To maintain clarity in the observational senses shaped by his education, Hamlet regulates his emotions through self-expression to control himself rather than falter to recklessness. Expressing his thoughts of himself and others is crucial in Hamlet’s journey of making sense of his emotions, actions, and goals. In his soliloquy, Hamlet expresses, “O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!” (2.2.485), critically evaluating his frustration towards his inaction as compared to the emotions portrayed by an actor. Joe Keener discusses the element of drama that Hamlet emphasizes in his speech and actions when speaking to himself and others. Keener argues, “The title character uses this art form to escape his world; at the same time, he employs drama to understand how to live in his world—how to determine if family members are villainous, the nature of revenge, relationships both familial and nonfamilial” (154). The dramatic and thoughtful nature central to Hamlet’s character serves as an outlet to channel his emotions of grief and betrayal. Ultimately, Hamlet’s introspection concerning his own and others’ behavior, as well as the theatrical performance, is guided by the skills of analytical thinking that are cultivated from his scholarly background, including observations that support a better plan for revenge.
Hamlet’s reflective nature, which is a product of his education, enhances his ability to manipulate those around him. As Hamlet contemplates “To be, or not to be —that is the question” (3.1.55), he analyzes the consequences of living, dying, and action, demonstrating the stream of consciousness that occurs prior to making a decision. He then carefully analyzes the intentions and motivations of other characters, particularly expressing his anger toward his mother and revealing his thoughts about her betrayal. Later, Hamlet observes his mother’s and Claudius’s reactions following The Murder of Gonzago in order to analyze their guilt (3.2.26387). Hamlet intentionally uses this play to serve two purposes: to confirm Claudius’s guilt and also to provoke a possible response from his mother suggesting her or Claudius’ culpability. Additionally, he reveals to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern that he is aware of their true intentions, as well as his mother’s role in their spying on him. This awareness allows Hamlet to continue strategizing his actions by using his insights into others’ behavior to create elaborate plans towards revenge.
These other forms of manipulation, acting and scheming, are essential tools used by Hamlet to ensure his feigned madness is as convincing as possible. While it may at times be difficult for both Hamlet and the audience to distinguish between his feigned and genuine madness, Hamlet initially adopts a performance of insanity to help him complete his quest. Bennet Simon states that “Hamlet’s feigned madness is a symptom of the ‘feigning’ and deceit around him” (715). Hamlet discovers that his only option for uncovering the truth among those who are lying and scheming is discreetly to use their own tactics against them. Due to his educated background, Hamlet draws on his knowledge of language, rhetoric, and theater, as well as his observational skills to imitate various behaviors convincingly. This scheming is part of a deliberate strategy to expose the truth of those who view Hamlet as mentally unstable and therefore incapable of seeking revenge. This deception invites the people around him to lower their guard, and they unintentionally reveal themselves, unaware that Hamlet plans to use this information in his favor. The other characters consistently underestimate Hamlet’s capabilities, allowing him to gain intelligence regarding their conspiracies and to further his own goals.
Hamlet possesses a heightened awareness of the effects of revenge, including the lack of mental clarity and excess of emotional turmoil that results from seeking revenge. George Lunt, a nineteenth-century memoirist who, in Behind the Bars (1871), focused on mental health, the treatment of mentally ill individuals, and the “reform of asylum practices,” states that “Hamlet was neither witless nor mad; for it is apparent in his case, that the opinions with regard to his insanity have been drawn rather from the attempted perversions of his mood by other characters in the drama, than from his own conduct, however erratic” (Qtd. in Reiss 790). Lunt emphasizes Hamlet’s unpredictable actions while noting that his behavior is a reaction to the conspiring attitudes of those around him. Hamlet’s mental state must be viewed with the reminder that education is an aid in his journey but does not exempt him from basic human processes of grief and the desire for vengeance. James Hirsh strengthens these claims by stating, “following the “To be or not to be” scene Hamlet exuberantly pursues his plan to catch the conscience of the King without expressing relief that he has overcome ‘our’ incapacity for action” (39). By focusing on “our” incapacity for action, Hamlet means that humans have an innate reaction to overthink our decisions from an emotional point of view. He is aware that this incapacity affects him, as well, and perhaps on a deeper level due to his experience in academia. This heightened emotional situation creates a mixture in Hamlet of both feigned and actual madness, even as he is aware of what is happening around him. While stress and grief affect all humans, Hamlet’s skills of enhanced awareness and reasoning allow him to remain mindful of his morality and goals.
As the play progresses, Hamlet increasingly questions his understanding of justice and morality, observing his environment and reflecting on his methods for seeking revenge. Aware of the corruption within the court and within family members and closest friends, Hamlet cannot help but wonder if his actions align with his moral compass. In the “To be or not to be” soliloquy, he questions, “Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer / The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, / Or to take arms against a sea of troubles” (3.1.56-58). The concept of virtue is a recurring theme in the play, and, in several soliloquies, Hamlet contemplates the moral value of action or inaction. Hamlet is acutely concerned with the feelings behind his decisions, revealing that he filters his grief over his father’s death and his desire for revenge through an intellectual and contemplative lens. Hamlet’s desire to take the most noble path is indicative of the influence of his scholarly background on his everyday life.
In this way, after deliberate observation and manipulation, Hamlet concludes that the only suitable response to his father’s death is to kill his murderer, his uncle Claudius. While Hamlet chooses this typical route of revenge, this decision does not come easily, as his educated consciousness makes it very difficult to decide. Ultimately, Hamlet uses his observations and critical thinking, while being aware of the heightened emotions that he and those around him experience, to create a plan to manipulate his father’s murderer and kill him. Hamlet’s education plays a vital role in his tragic journey, aiding in his strategic decision-making while burdening him with a perceptive understanding of the weight of his choices.
Although many view Hamlet as lacking an impulse for revenge, his reflective nature, rooted in his scholarly background, deepens his intent to avenge his father by providing him with a wide range of strategic techniques from which he can draw, both in his contemplation regarding his action and in the deed itself. Hamlet consistently considers the morality of his actions and of those around him. Rather than giving in to impulsivity, Hamlet relies on his reflective nature to maintain emotional clarity while feigning madness to manipulate those around him. Hamlet’s actions display that an educated background does not erase the desire for revenge but rather makes the plan to achieve it more complex, reflective, and meticulous.