Kelly Mahon
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, the themes of illusion versus reality and communication breakdown serve to demonstrate similarities between Shakespeare’s character, Hamlet, and Stoppard’s characters, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. These themes refer to the characters’ struggles to distinguish between a concrete reality and a fictional world. Furthermore, the theme of communication breakdown refers to characters’ inabilities to express thoughts and feelings via language as the respective dramas progress. The similarities between Hamlet and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in terms of the above-mentioned themes represent a universal problem.
The nature of reality plagues Rosencrantz and Guildenstern throughout Stoppard’s drama. As Hynes asserts, these characters “spend their lives constructing their own meanings.” However, the difficulty in finding meaning arises as they begin to realize their fate as characters. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern have difficulty understanding that they are living their roles. Numerous instances demonstrate this lack of understanding. At the end of Act 2, Rosencrantz states, “We’ve come this far. And besides, anything could happen yet.” At this point, he has begun to realize he is a character, but does not understand that his demise is inevitable. Therefore, only his scripted fate will occur, regardless of any future choices he makes. Guildenstern’s final words demonstrate that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern never reach this understanding: “Our names shouted in a certain dawn . . . a message . . . a summons . . . There must have been a moment, at the beginning, where we could have said no. But somehow we missed it” (125). They realize they are characters, but believe they made a choice to become them. In other words, they believe they made a choice to live the illusion as reality, never realizing their entire reality is an illusion.
The theme of illusion versus reality is especially prevalent in the discussions regarding death. Delaney notes, “Of all the concerns expressed in Rosencrantz, nothing calls attention to the gulf between reality and the realm of imaginative reality so sharply as the fact of death.” Rosencrantz and Guildenstern die in Act 3 still believing that their deaths are final; however, their deaths are only the final illusion of that performance. Their existence is perpetuated with each showing of Hamlet, in which the illusion of their reality is relived. Therefore, the nature of characters that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern fail to grasp is that each time their drama is preformed, studied, or remembered, they are reborn.
Also, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s lives are an illusion because they are predetermined. They encounter the arrangement of their lives in instances such as the coin-tossing scene in Act 1. In this scene, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern toss ninety-one coins, all landing ‘heads up,’ in favor of Rosencrantz. Brassell points out, “This is because Rosencrantz and Guildenstern exist in a world in which the normal rules of probability simply are not operating.” In other words, since the author wrote that Rosencrantz wins the coin-tosses, he will forever win all coin-tossing matches with Guildenstern. More obvious examples of predetermination occur throughout the drama during the scenes taken directly from Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
In Hamlet’s case, the theme of illusion versus reality is manifested in the form of madness. Early in the drama, Hamlet directly states that he will “put an antic disposition on” (1.5.172).9 Therefore, Hamlet’s initial madness is clearly an illusion; however, as the drama progresses, the distinction between the mad illusion and sane reality blurs. Bloom notes that Hamlet’s mental state is difficult to ascertain because “he does nothing which he might not have done with the reputation of sanity.” The question of Hamlet’s sanity is complicated by his moral code. Hamlet states, “There is nothing either good / or bad but thinking makes it so,” implying his moral code is dictated by whether or not he can justify his actions to himself (2.2.239–240). According to this statement, actions such as murder are only good or bad according to how each individual views the situation. As a result, when Hamlet kills Polonius in Act 3, scene 4 and expresses no sorrow or regret for his actions, he can be viewed as either sane or insane, living his illusion or reality. Hamlet may have allowed the illusion of madness he created to become his sane reality, or he may simply have morals that allow him to commit violent crimes without remorse. In the latter instance, Hamlet is able to internally justify his actions, and, therefore, they become his reality.
Both Hamlet and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern come to question what is real and what is an illusion. At the end of their respective dramas, all three characters feel as though they have separated illusion from reality; on the contrary, these questions are not concretely answered. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern never come to understand that their entire reality is an illusion. In the end, Hamlet believes he is living his sane reality, though it is unclear as to whether the illusion is gone or takes over his reality. In both dramas, the theme persists beyond the performances because the audience is left to distinguish the reality from illusion. The irony is that the performances further the illusion, and the reality then becomes the most believable of the illusions. Guildenstern, in Act 1, makes this observation when he defines reality as “the name we give to the common experience.” All three characters live according to Guildenstern’s notion, believing their common experiences are valid and therefore reality, and in so doing, they completely eliminate illusion from their lives.
Communication breakdown also applies to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Spoken language becomes an inadequate means of expression for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern because their words are scripted and contain no meaning for the characters. Londre observes, “They are weakly motivated, express few opinions, have no memories or hopes, experience no strong emotion, and fail to interrelate meaningfully with other characters.”
It is because of this that they are able to count how many questions are asked of and answered by Hamlet in Act 2. Rosencrantz observes, “It was question and answer, all right. Twenty-seven questions he got out in ten minutes, and answered three . . . Six rhetorical and two repetition, leaving nineteen, of which we answered fifteen.” They are able to tally questions and answers because they are not truly paying attention to their conversation with Hamlet. The words are not their own, not original thoughts, thus they are meaningless.
Communication also breaks down between Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. As the drama advances, the two characters eventually become completely incapable of understanding the other’s comments. For instance, in Act 3, Guildenstern states, “Death is the ultimate negative. Not-being. You can’t not-be on a boat.” Rosencrantz replies, “I’ve frequently not been on boats.” Guildenstern responds, “No, no, no—what you’ve been is not on boats.” Rosencrantz’s misinterpretation of Guildenstern in this scene demonstrates that by the third act, the two characters are completely incapable of comprehending one another. Gruber also points out that in the above dialogue, “Both twisted syntax and twisted logic are appallingly true: wherever they are—on boats, on the road, within a court—it is the fate of Ros and Guil never to be.”16 Thus, while Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s lines are incomprehensible to each other, for the audience, they contain a recognizable truth.
Hamlet, similarly, finds communication difficult due to misinterpretations by other characters. Polonius often misconstrues Hamlet’s witty remarks. One such instance occurs when Polonius asks, “Do you know me, my lord?” and Hamlet replies, “Excellent well, y’are a fishmonger” (2.2.171–172). While Polonius disregards Hamlet’s response as mad babble, he fails to see the truth in the pun. Hamlet implies that Polonius, like a fishmonger, takes advantage of those who are beneath his status (such as Ophelia) for his own gain. In a statement regarding the significance of Hamlet’s puns and riddles, Welsh asserts they “create a special kind of dramatic irony, since the reader or listener to the story is able to glimpse both meanings while the antagonist is only able to sense that he is being put on.”17 Therefore, the communication breakdown onstage has a dual purpose: to further the inaction on the stage while increasing the audience’s understanding of the characters and their situations.
The obscure, incomprehensible, nature of some of Hamlet’s remarks leads the audience to question his sanity. If he is sane, then the question becomes whether or not his ‘remarks in madness’ are symbolic, or indeed, if he is even aware of the dual nature of some of his comments. One such comment is made in Act 3, scene 2 during Hamlet’s conversations with Ophelia; he asks to lie in her lap and she refuses. Hamlet’s question has a literal meaning of laying his head in her lap, and a sexual meaning of having intercourse with Ophelia. Hopkins believes Hamlet is aware of the dual meanings: “It is notable that Hamlet himself seems ultimately to become aware of the duplication of meanings that proliferates around his every attempt to establish distinction.”18 Conversely, if Hamlet is insane, then the question becomes are his remarks meaningless words to him. This is unlikely given the aptness of the comments. Either way, Hamlet becomes increasingly difficult to directly communicate with throughout the rest of the play.
Hamlet and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are unable to express themselves or comprehend others in their respective dramas. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s remarks are generally void of meaning, and if the comments are significant, the ideas are poorly expressed. Eventually, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are incapable of understanding one another and only the audience is able to glance the meanings of their remarks. Hamlet becomes equally incapable of communicating. However, his credibility is questionable; his replies depend on each audience member’s judgment regarding his sanity. Thus, the audience is allowed to determine the meaning of the character’s lines, but the other individuals onstage remain ignorant. The misinterpretation of lines by other characters is symbolic of the audience’s quest to determine the meaning. Hamlet, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern’s difficulty communicating stems from their uncertain environments; they do not understand that they are experiencing both illusion and reality.
While the portrayal of illusion versus reality and communication breakdown vary greatly from Shakespeare to Stoppard, the presence of these themes as exemplified by Hamlet and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern serve to demonstrate the similarities between these seemingly different characters. The distinction between true reality and created illusion becomes a question both Hamlet and the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern duo ultimately never concretely answer. All three characters find language an inadequate means of communication due to its limitations in expression and inherent misinterpretations. The themes of illusion versus reality and communication breakdown stem from each other and circuitously speak to the universal problem of understanding.
Works Cited
Elliott, George Roy. Scourge and Minister: A Study of Hamlet as Tragedy of Revengefulness and Justice. New York: AMS Press, 1965.
Gruber, William. “Wheels Within Wheels, Etcetera in Comparative Drama.” Drama Criticism. Edited by Lawrence J. Trudeau. Vol. 6. Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 1996.
Hopkins, Lisa. “Parison and the Impossible Comparison.” In New Essays on Hamlet. Edited by Mark Thornton Burnett and John Manning. New York: AMS Press, 1994.
Hynes, Joseph. “Tom Stoppard’s Lighted March.” In Drama for Students. Edited by David Galens and Lynn Spampinato. Vol. 2. Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 1998. Londre, Felicia. Tom Stoppard. New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing, 1981. Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Stoppard, Tom. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. New York: Grove Press, 1991.
Welsh, Alexander. Hamlet in His Modern Guises. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001.