Madness and Insanity in Shakespeares Hamlet Essay example -- The Melan

The Melancholy Hamlet  Ã‚        Ã‚  Ã‚   William Shakespeare’s tragic play Hamlet is an exercise in the study of melancholy. Let’s explore the in’s and out’s of this aspect of the drama in this essay.    Gunnar Boklund gives a reason for the highlighting of the melancholy aspect of the protagonist in Shakespeare’s Hamlet in his essay â€Å"Judgment in Hamlet†:    In the tragedy of Hamlet Shakespeare does not concern himself with the question whether blood-revenge is justified or not; it is raised only once and very late by the protagonist (v,ii,63-70)and never seriously considered. The dramatic and psychological situation rather than the moral issue is what seems to have attracted Shakespeare, and he chose to develop it, in spite of the hard-to-digest and at times a little absurd elements it might involve. . .(118-19).    Imagery is a factor in the melancholy. The imagery in Othello â€Å"enhances the strain of melancholy in Hamlet by dwelling on sickness and decay [. . .]† (Levin 14). The initial imagery is very bleak and depressing: â€Å"The story opens in the cold and dark of a winter night in Denmark, while the guard is being changed on the battlements of the royal castle of Elsinore. For two nights in succession, just as the bell strikes the hour of one, a ghost has appeared on the battlements, a figure dressed in complete armor and with a face like that of the dead king of Denmark, Hamlet’s father† (Chute 35).    Horatio and Marcellus exit the ghost-ridden ramparts of Elsinore intending to enlist the aid of Hamlet. The prince is dejected by the â€Å"o’erhasty marriage† of his mother to his uncle less than two months after the funeral of Hamlet’s father. There is a social gathering of the court, where Hamlet is present,... ...ess, 1999. Rpt. from Introduction to Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. Ed. Philip Edwards. N. P.: Cambridge University P., 1985.    Levin, Harry. General Introduction. The Riverside Shakespeare. Ed. G. Blakemore Evans. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1974.    Mack, Maynard. â€Å"The World of Hamlet.† Yale Review. vol. 41 (1952) p. 502-23. Rpt. in Shakespeare: Modern Essays in Criticism. Rev. ed. Ed. Leonard F. Dean. New York: Oxford University P., 1967.    Rosenberg, Marvin. â€Å"Laertes: An Impulsive but Earnest Young Aristocrat.† Readings on Hamlet. Ed. Don Nardo. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1999. Rpt. from The Masks of Hamlet. Newark, NJ: Univ. of Delaware P., 1992.    Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 1995. http://www.chemicool.com/Shakespeare/hamlet/full.html No line nos.