Hamlet: An Existential Crisis in the Making
Through the dawn of mankind, one thing has remained constant for humanity, and that is our crippling mortality. The tragedy of Hamlet by William Shakespeare is about the self-doubt of the tragic hero Hamlet and his journey towards revenge in order to honor his father. Shakespeare uses the popular ideology of the time, The Great Chain of Being, to demonstrate the flaws and irregularities of the ideology which attempted to deter evil and solve the rationale for the world to make sense. The Chain contained the status and role of every being in creation as well as the role emotions had on the Chain. However, in Hamlet’s favor, the Chain goes against him as emotion and passion were at their lowest level and the reason is at its highest. Shakespeare uses the Great Chain of Being to demonstrate the necessity of emotion which allows for a greater existence through existential suffering.
The belief system of the chain creates an obstacle throughout the story and Shakespeare uses the dead king’s ghost as a reference to the great chain of being causing hamlet to take in the opinion of the ghost hastily. When he is confronted by the ghost, he takes no time stating that he will take revenge on the murderer oddly enough.
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Ghost: Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.
Hamlet: Murder!
Ghost: Murder most foul, as in the best it is;
But this foulest, strange and unnatural.
Hamlet: Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swift
As meditation or the thoughts of love,
May sweep to my revenge (Shakespeare 1.5.31-37)
It is a natural instinct to get upset and mad, as it was Hamlet’s first instinct to kill whoever was the perpetrator of this vile act. However, instead of the conventional revenge drama trope which is to take immediate action, Hamlet's apprehensiveness deters him from immediate action to kill Claudius. Hamlet spends more than half the play devising ways to kill Claudius because regicide is against the Great Chain as killing a king constitutes death. The possibility of taking over the throne is a life that Hamlet is not destined for as he is a grad student basking in the world of academia and living life as he pleases. Prince Hamlet’s doubt concerning his ability to kill Claudius is natural because he is out of his element as well as due to his Christian background. Hamlet’s apprehension culminates when he is unsure whether or not the ghost is his father. Ghosts were seen as loved ones in purgatory or as figments of one’s imagination in the form of demons which causes Hamlet to be afraid of life after death. If the ghost is truly Hamlet’s father, then he is honoring his father. On the contrary, if the ghost is a demon, then he would be participating in the devil’s grand design. In the Christian faith, revenge no matter how necessary is not just as well as seen as a mortal sin. Christians were supposed to love their enemies, just as much as their friends and families. As Hamlet ponders his newfound information, he then decides to set a trap for Claudius via a play.
In Act 2 Shakespeare shows the necessity of feeling grief when Hamlet is unable to grieve for his father while watching his play, and when emotions are suppressed it leads to existential suffering.
But in fiction in a dream of passion
Could force his soul so to his own conceit
That from her working all his visage wann’d
Tears in his eyes, distraction in’s aspect
A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
With forms to his conceit? And all for nothing! (2.2. 511-516)
In regards to the great chain of being, critical thinking and logic overshadow intuition, and Hamlet’s self-doubt and questioning show how suffering is necessary for him to grow and find strength. His attempt to be logical and skeptical due to his academic background makes him question the validity of the Ghost’s message and disregard his intuition. The effect of the great chain of being suppressed his true desire to having revenge on Claudius because of his fear of death as said in his soliloquy:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles (Shakespeare 3.1.65-67)
and the possibility of gaining the throne, which heightens the plot for the tragic hero to overcome the obstacle of facing his suffering or ending it all out of cowardice. To live is to suffer at the hands of society, and by that experience, one life and grows from it, hence, Shakespeare illustrates this as a silver lining to tragedy leaving the audience to feel regret and remorse for tragedies in their own lives. Hamlet’s inaction reflects a state of chaos that represents a time of disbelief in ourselves, heightening the action of the plot.
The more Hamlet ruminates, the more he suffers, and throughout the play, his actions reveal the faultiness in the Great Chain of Being. For example, during the climax of the play in Act 3, Hamlet misses his chance to kill Claudius while he is alone praying because he talks himself out of it and ends up killing Polonius out of brashness causing a calamity.
Now might I do it pat, now he is praying,
And now I'll do 't. [He draws his sword.]
And so he goes to heaven,
And so am I revenged. That would be scanned:
A villain kills my father, and for that,
I, his sole son, do this same villain send
To heaven. (Shakespeare 3.3.77-83)
When Hamlet says “ A villain kills my father… I, his sole son, do this same villain“, he is balancing the chain by killing Claudius out of honor as Claudius killed Old Hamlet. However, his actions fall short when he realizes the ethical dilemma that accompanies killing Claudius whilst praying, at a time when a confession from Claudius has not yet been given. The chain coerces him into taking action no matter what the consequences because of the superiority of the human race to use their knowledge and power as best they can.
In Hamlet’s self-realization in Act 4, the Great Chain acts to boost Hamlet’s confidence towards revenge on Claudius and understand the potential of being human. He compares the ranking of an animal to be a highly ranked human which triggers him to take action since animals are lower on the chain. He questions:
What is a man
If the chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? A beast no more
Sure He that made us with such large discourse
That capability and godlike reason
To fust in us unused. (Shakespeare 4.4.36-41)
The essence of the great chain of being is to take action because of the numerous abilities and forms of expression that humans have in comparison to animals “a beast no more” who do not have reason and therefore, exert the same power as humans. Unlike animals, humans are capable of power, imagination, and self-autonomy; without using them we neglect our true potential. He continues to compare himself to a gluttonous lazy being which is seen lower on the chain as Hamlet is a scholarly man who is not using his wits. Hamlet has the ability to be or not to be and in choosing to be, he chooses to take control of his life rather than let logic and reasoning dictate life. Shakespeare shows that the human experience is taking advantage of life as it comes rather than being self-deprecating and wallowing in self-doubt as Hamlet did in earlier acts. Hamlet’s mental state changes from suffering into self-realization in himself as a tragic hero.
Though Hamlet has tied himself to the Chain, Claudius has done so as well through his passion for power and the crown. Personal ambition and gain are not to be dealt with within higher levels of the chain, instead one must accept what they have and not go against the higher order. Hamlet sees Claudius as a dirty cheat who represents the worst in human nature despite the allusion to being a king, as he says:
With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!
It is not nor it cannot come to good:
But break , my heart; for I must hold my tongue (Shakespeare 1.2.161-163)
His passion has no logic and only continues to consume him leading him to make unconscious decisions out of the lust for power rather than reason due to its deceiving nature. Greed is part of the human experience because you’ll always want more than what you can have. This is tragic because what once might have been an innocent thought of excelling oneself was taken to the extreme when he decided to kill Old Hamlet and marry Gertrude for ambition; “Of those effects for which I did the murder, my/ crown, my own ambition, and my queen” (3.3.54-55). His desire for a favorable result consumed him, giving birth to an insatiable nature, and costing him his life. Shakespeare uses this as a warning sign of the human condition, and how passion can turn against people. This is no indication to say that passion should be abhorred but allows humans to feel more than thought possible, but selling one’s humanity and soul for a few titles does not bring lasting happiness.
Finally, at the end of the play, Hamlet’s fatal flaw is resolved with a realization about death and honor. His self-realization transcends his hamartia which causes Hamlet to come to terms with his desire to kill Claudius. The tragedy of this is that he died as soon as he was confident in his decision and left behind his constant self-doubt. Hamlet did everything he could in the face of external conflict with passive, cowardly behavior as well as obeying the chain. However, the feelings of the heart led him to stronger heights (Golden). This comes about when Hamlet sees a foil of his, Prince Fortinbras, fight over a piece of land that is barely worth a penny which brings him to the realization that Fortinbras is a man of action as well as honor. Great men do not need a reason to fight for familial honor as it is the responsibility of those men.
To be great
is not to stir without great argument
but greatly to find quarrel in a straw
when honor's at the stake (4.4.56-59).
Though this thinking goes against the logical thinking of the chain, this allows Hamlet to go beyond his knowledge and take action for his family. Hamlet realizes that he is given great potential by the chain because of his knowledge, status, and ability to fight for his family's honor. This is an example of transformation out of tragedy because he moves on from the social construct of the chain. Hamlet learns how to be his own person by finding a quarrel in everything that can potentially harm his family, and honor, as Hamlet learns to take life by the tail and not solely make logic out of it.
As Hamlet began to draw his final breaths, he rattled out; “There’s a divinity that shapes our ends, Rough- hew them how we will” (5.2. 10-11) which reinforces the benefits of feeling emotions, in the sense that to live is to suffer. By acting with emotion as well as acting according to his desires after the climax of the plot, Hamlet allows himself to let the chips fall where they may and to act confidently. Though his story ends in death, he stalwartly forges ahead and fights with everything he has left. Notably, the stark difference between Hamlet’s behavior in Act 1 to his resolve in Act 5 is when he lets his head get the best of him instead of listening to his emotions. Shakespeare conveys the tragedy of not taking advantage of emotions because feeling everything in existence is the silver lining in Hamlet. To feel is better than not feeling at all despite the existential suffering because out of the suffering comes transcendence from pain and a richer life.
Hamlet is a tragedy of thought and the Great Chain of Being allows for the capability of scholarly thought, yet matters of the heart are not worthy of anything. Hamlet’s emotions are concealed, but he is able to transform when he realizes that the hierarchy of personal status on the great chain means nothing. For he is dust, and to dust, he shall return, as death equalizes all at the end of time. This is a mature acceptance of one’s mortality since it is the destiny that all of the humankind shares. Shakespeare demonstrates the nature of man; continuous suffering until we are nothing. Tragedy allows us to reflect and refine how we see our lives. There is a deeper understanding of the human condition when Hamlet realizes that in death people are one. The tragedy in life is not taking action and floating passively through it. Hamlet harbors powerful emotions after seeing how destructive and painful the great chain of being is as it suppresses emotions that are meant to be cultivated and explored.
Works Cited
- Golden, Leon. 'Othello, Hamlet, and Aristotelian Tragedy.' Shakespearean Criticism, edited by Michelle Lee, vol. 125, Gale, 2009. Literature Resource Center, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/H1420093201/LitRC?u=jesuiths&sid=LitRC&xid=8f63df18. Accessed 28 Oct. 2019. Originally published in Shakespeare Quarterly, vol. 35, no. 2, Summer 1984, pp. 142-156.
- Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Edited by Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine, Simon and Schuster, July 2012.
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