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Hamlet Rhetorical Devices Essay

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Throughout the play Hamlet, William Shakespeare uses rhetorical devices and hidden meanings to convey his work. While at the same time, he stays in iambic pentameter throughout the script. This is tremendously a tedious task he encountered, which would stump most writers. In Act IV, scene III, Shakespeare incorporates sarcasm and hyperboles when Hamlet is being questioned by King Claudius, and an epanalepsis when Hamlet is expressing where Polonius’ body lies Act IV, Scene III, involves King Claudius and Hamlet discussing where Hamlet placed Polonius’ dead body at. It ends with Hamlet being told he will be shipped to England to live for a time. Throughout the scene, Hamlet is sarcastic by constantly responding to Claudius with irony and mockery. For example: “Not where he eats, but where he is eaten. A certain convocation of politic worms are e'en at him. Your worm is your only …show more content…

Shakespeare also uses an epanalepsis in the following quote by stating fat multiple times in the same sentence. This is to make fun of King Claudius’s weight, and how much he eats. Shakespeare also incorporates sarcasm and a hyperbole in the following quote, “In heaven. Send hither to see. If your messenger find him not there, seek him i' th' other place yourself. But if indeed you find him not within this month, you shall nose him as you go up the stairs into the lobby.”. Hamlet states that Polonius is in heaven and that Claudius should send a messenger to him. Obviously, Claudius can not send an actual messenger to heaven and Hamlet does not even know if he is there which can be seen as an hyperbole. Next, Hamlet says if the messenger can not find Polonius then he should go search in hell. This shows the sarcastic tone Hamlet portrays by edging towards the fact that Polonius is actually in

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