A Literary Analysis of Hamlet and His Proximity of Death

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Many times in life, people go through near death experiences in which they do something extremely dangerous, and almost end their lives on accident. I have such a personal experience in which I had almost died myself. This last summer I was driving a four wheeler with my friend on the back of it. We had been doing so all day, but we drove through a creek and for some reason everything went terribly wrong. I must have been going too fast, but I hit a rock that was hidden by mud, thus causing a chain reaction of turning my wheels and hitting the water at just the right time to cause the four wheeler to roll. This was probably one of the scariest times of my life because I thought I was going to die! In relation, Hamlet in Shakespeare’s famous plays “Hamlet,” was also in near death experiences in reaction from choices he made including, not killing Claudius when he had the chance, killing Polonius, and fighting in the duel.
In Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” Hamlet himself is faced with a challenge of having to avenge his passed father by killing Claudius, but he makes the mistake of not killing him when he has the chance. Hamlet was about to kill his uncle, King Claudius while he was praying but then at the last second he decided not to. Hamlet decided that because Claudius killed his father while he was sleeping, sending his soul to purgatory, this wouldn’t be good enough revenge to kill his uncle while praying, sending his soul to heaven. “Now might I do it pat, now he is a-praying. And now ill do’t. And so he does to heaven; And so am I revenged” (Hamlet Act 3 Scene, Pg. 186 Lines 76-79). In this quote Hamlet talks about how he is going to kill him, and he even draws his sword, but then decides not to. This a great mistake that he would soon regret.
After the mistake of not killing Claudius, Hamlet went and talked with his mother, where unknowingly, Polonius hid, and he would make the mistake of killing him. In Act 3, Scene 4 of Hamlet, Hamlet kills Polonius, who was hiding in the curtains. “Oh, I am slain” (Hamlet Act 3 Scene 4, Pg. 190 Line 27). Polonius cries out as Hamlet ran a sword through him. Hamlet doesn’t think much of killing Polonius although.

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