Hamlet Essay

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Hamlet has been hailed as Shakespeare’s best and most popular play for centuries. Even a person who has not yet read the play can easily quote the famous six words: “To be, or not to be” (Shakespeare, Hamlet, 3.1.55). Hamlet is irrefutably one of the best political thrillers and revenge tales of its time. As a drama, it draws people in with its intrigue, mystery, and emotional strife. However, as one examines Hamlet with Shakespeare’s original intent, one would see a classical tragedy that is rife with inconsistencies and unfaithful to the definition of a classical Aristotelian tragedy. As Aristotle stated in his work Poetics, tragedy is a literary word, in which the tragic hero brings ruin or suffers extreme sorrow. Moreover, it is an imitation of an action that is serious and complete, in language embellished with artistic …show more content…

The plot must have unity of action, meaning that it must be structurally contained within incidents that occur with some internal necessity and not external influence (Aristotle, X). It is evident that this unity is not fully present in Hamlet. For example, Hamlet only actualizes his resoluteness and determination to bring honor to his father’s name in Act 4 Scene 4: “O, from this time forth / My thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth” (64-65). As soon as he makes this realization, he is immediately sent to England with seemingly no way to return to exact his revenge. In order to continue to the plot, Shakespeare has to use deus ex machina, a plot device that Aristotle specifically disapproves of: “It is therefore evident that the unraveling of the plot, no less than the complication, must arise out of the plot itself, it must not be brought about by the Deus ex Machina” (Aristotle, XV). The grand reveal of Hamlet’s return to England to exact his revenge is frankly absurd, which is very ironic, given that it is a

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