Hamlet Insanity In Hamlet

In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, many see Hamlet as mad, or even at times distraught. However, insanity is in the eye of the beholder and although those around him claim he’s insane, Hamlet is actually sane throughout the play. Over time, Hamlet crosses over between the realms of insanity and his true sanity. Although throughout the play the others are convinced Hamlet is mad, through brilliant planning and scheming, Hamlet proves his own sanity. Hamlet perfectly portrays the actions of a deranged young man, which he had to appear to be in order to get revenge on Claudius.

Hamlet is a very confusing character in the story Hamlet. In this story Hamlet is acting as an insane person towards typical people. This is very debatable because, Hamlet is a person who switches on and off being an insane or sane person. There is many evidence that proves that Hamlet is not actually an insane person. Hamlet is a sane person because of the actions he takes.

Whether it is Hamlet’s antic disposition, or Macbeth’s mask of friendship, it is clearly evident that not everything is as it seems. Yet Shakespeare does more than just show that people put up a false exterior, he also places events into doubt. All the way from Macbeth’s encounter to the witches, to his hallucinations, his version of reality is constantly in doubt. From Hamlet’s conversations with Ophelia, to his acknowledging of the ghost which his mother cannot see, his sanity is placed into doubt. On top of this, Shakespeare also relates the theater to life.

An overwhelming amount of evidence shows that Hamlet faked his insanity to confuse the king and his accomplices. Often revered for their emotional complexities, William Shakespeare’s tragic characters display various signs of mental illness. Sylvia Morris notes “Hamlet contains Shakespeare’s most fully-developed study of mental illness, and has always intrigued commentators on the play.” (“Shakespeare’s Minds Diseased: Mental Illness and its Treatment”). When looking at the play, one can infer that Shakespeare makes the relationship between sanity and insanity undistinguishable from one another. At the beginning of the play, Hamlet is melancholic and in a state of grief, which is not out of the ordinary because he is still mourning the loss of his father.

Who weeps for these weeps for corruption” (Miller 1333). Although some believe that Proctor is doing the right thing, he ultimately dies because of Judge Danforth’s ignorance. He feels that he must kill Proctor and all of those accused of witchcraft to prevent an overthrow of the courts due to a lack of consistency. He shows no remorse, which verifies Proctor’s heroic life and portrays Danforth as a villain. Overall, Proctor’s death wraps up a truly heroic life for a man that had several

Reverend Hale's last attempt to save Proctor is to try to have Elizabeth convince Proctor to confess. Proctor strongly considers it but tears the confession paper up as he does not want to ruin his family name. Hale, defeated, weeps in prayer as Proctor is sent to hung. Reverend Hale's downfall in the novel was his quick assumption that there was witchcraft in Salem. Everyone's fear of the unknown and the chance of witches being present in Salem caused many deaths due to jumping to conclusions.

I also used 2.1 as an example of Hamlet’s method acting. Even though the audience doesn’t get to participate in the scene firsthand, we hear Ophelia explain to her father Polonius that Hamlet might be “mad for thy love (85). This is a perfect example of Hamlet rehearsing his insanity when he comes into her room “as if he had been loosèd out of hell/ to speak of horrors—he comes before me (83-84). You brought up an interesting question about 3.4 which was why Queen Gertrude can’t see the ghost of her dead husband, Hamlet Sr. My theory to this question is that Hamlet has not yet come to terms with his fathers’ death but Gertrude has. By Hamlet being able to see his dead father, it’s a sign that he is still mourning for him and that he can’t let go

Hamlet's overthinking and inaction led to several unnecessary murders. Hamlet knew that Claudius is guilty, yet he still wants to make sure, therefore Hamlet made a play that played out the exact way that Claudius had killed King Hamlet. Hamlet had done this in order to watch how Claudius reacts to make sure that Claudius is the one who murdered his father, “I’ll observe his looks, if he do blench, I know my course” (Ham.2.2.583-585) “Now might I do it pat, now’a is a-praying. And now I’ll do’t” ( Ham. 3.3.72-73), Hamlet says, as he is debating whether or not to kill the king as he prays and thinks to himself if he kills him now then the king will just go to heaven because he is praying.

In Shakespeare’s tragedy, Hamlet, many times the sanity of Hamlet, the protagonist, comes into question. This question has been debated by both lay-readers and scholars alike for hundreds of years. Although this topic could be strongly debated either way, the evidence leans more towards the idea that Hamlet was simply feigning insanity, and portrayed the role of a madman only in front of those whom he thought to be his enemies. This faking of craziness can be seen most in his conversations with friends, his conversations with those he distrusts, and through the stark difference of his craziness and the truly demented mind of Ophelia. From the beginning of the story, it can be seen that Hamlet is under a lot of stress.

From the perspective of neuroscientist Nancy J. C. Andreasen, besides his harrowing confession, Macbeth’s hallucinations are another sign of him “still suffering enough from pangs of conscience.” Some may wonder if Macbeth is only talking to himself rather than the ghost since the ghost never answers Macbeth’s questions. This proves that his hallucinations drive him further into insanity and deviance. In fact, they also push him to do the unthinkable in order to maintain his