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In William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the focus of many of the characters in the play is to be (or not to be) avenged. Both Hamlet and the minor characters surrounding him revisited the theme of revenge frequently. Shakespeare’s use of secondary characters highlight the important theme of revenge and specifically how a mind set strictly on revenge can corrupt the actions and thoughts of an individual and bring about their destruction. The minor characters of Laertes, the Ghost and Fortinbras display this maxim perfectly. Through their experiences with revenge, two meet their end and the other meets success.
The first character to meet his doom was Laertes. His father’s death and sudden burial alarmed Laertes and he realized that his family’s honor needed to be avenged. Laertes immediately became engulfed in his revenge and this leads to his own untimely demise. In act one, Laertes returns to Denmark to celebrate the new king’s coronation, but once that was over, he asked for the king’s and his father’s permission to return to Paris:
‘Yet now I must confess, that duty done,
My thoughts and wishes bend again toward France
And bow then to your gracious leave and pardon’ (Shakespeare 1.2.54-56)
Laertes did not want to stay away from Paris more than he had to; showing the importance of what he was doing there, but when Laertes heard the news of his father’s sudden death he stops everything he was doing in Paris and headed for Denmark. This journey was not made to mourn, but it was made to revenge. When Laertes returns to Denmark, he collects the citizens from around the palace and forms a mob to help him storm the castle. “‘Than young Laertes, in a riotous head/ O’erbears your officers…’” (4.5.100-101) As can be seen in the firs...
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...ras only wanted revenge, he would be elated that he did not need to use force to carry out his plans, but this was not the case. Fortinbras was the only character to totally succeed in their revenge and this is because he was able to think and act without the influence of a burning need to get revenge.
Revenge, like any other intense feeling, can be over powering if left to be the sole focus. Laertes, the Ghost and Fortinbras all have this in common, they all sought revenge and they all succeeded, but the most successful was Fortinbras. While the Ghost and Laertes held the unhealthy obsession that abetted more destruction to them than who they were trying to kill, Fortinbras exercised self-restraint and controlled his revenge and this resulted in his success.
Works Cited
Shakespeare. William. Hamlet. Ed. Roma Gill. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 2009. Print.
shadow and ends the circle of murder by announcing the true nature of Claudius. Laertes’s repressed anger guides the play into the duel where many deaths occur including
Moreover, Fortinbras is about to conquer a small piece of land without hesitation in order to honor his father. Consequently, his purpose is to characterize the bloody deeds that Hamlet cannot descend to. Hamlet praises Fortinbras, “Exposing what is mortal and unsure / To all that fortune, death, and danger dare, / Even for an eggshell” (4.4.53-5). Therefore, Shakespeare allows the audience to see how Hamlet admires a man who can act on an action that is much smaller than Hamlet’s cause of action. That is, hamlet is conflicted, and he proclaims, “My thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth!”
”(153) It becomes clear that the parallels presented throughout the play are there to further illuminate the flaws of Hamlet’s character. Laertes is a hot-headed man looking for revenge. His father was killed by Hamlet and his sister was driven insane due to the series of events that took place because of Hamlet. Like Hamlet, Laertes wants to avenge his father by killing the man who killed Polonius.
Laertes’ idea of revenge that was instinctive, it almost was it built into his identity. Clearly any boy with his father and his sister dead all of a sudden would seek a culprit, but Laertes was different. Laertes clearly states his intentions,
It is the idea of revenge that sends a cool shiver down the spines of justly men when they begin to question as to why someone would stoop to such a level. But yet it is still more than an idea for revenge has been carried out in various forms along all the eras of history side-by-side of that of novels and tragedies. Even so, revenge is still a dark scheme; an evil plague of the mind per se. It is such a plague that will turn even the greatest persons of the brightest, optimistically capable of minds into lowly, as well as lonely, individuals. Thus, revenge will, and can, only end in despair and agony of the mind. Therefore, provided that all that has been said is true, revenge would appear quite unseemly to the observant onlooker. However, taking an in-depth insight into revenge you can uncover quite a compelling feature, which is best summed up into one word. Pride. Pride is the one clear motivational proprietor needed to push a protagonist into the downward spiral of personal vendetta. Without pride, revenge is no more than a mindless massacre of flesh and bone ending in the obliteration of any hope for reconciliation.
...he sons: Fortinbras aims to gain honour for his country, Laertes seeks impulsive, cold-blooded killing, and Hamlet mostly ponders the morals of vengeance. Shakespeare’s impeccable characterization illuminates the human desire for revenge, and shows the various ways in which that impulse can be acted upon.
Laertes is greatly influenced by revenge for his actions especially when he is seeking revenge for his sister. He shows his brotherly love for Ophelia when he says “For Hamlet, and the trifling of his favor,/Hold it a fashion and a toy in blood,/A violet in the youth of primy nature,/Forward, not permanent, sweet, not
Although each character plots to avenge his father in the play, the motives of Laertes and Fortinbras differ greatly than that of Hamlet. Fortinbras, who schemes to rebuild his father's kingdom, leads thousands of men into battle, attempting to capture a small and worthless piece of Poland. After his uncle warned him against attacking Denmark. The added land will do little to benefit Norway's prosperity, but this campaign may cost "two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats" (4.4.26) . This shows that pride is a driving factor behind Fortinbras' plan because he is willing to put the lives of his countrymen at risk for a minimal gain. Laertes, on the other hand, is compelled to seek revenge because he loses his father and eventually his sister. The root of Laertes' revenge appears to be the love for his family because he proclaims that he will "be revenged / most throughly for [his] father" (4.5...
By proper revenge we refer to the Elizabethan view that revenge must be sought in certain cases, for the world to continue properly. This is the main plot of Hamlet. In Poetics, Aristotle defines for us, the element of plot and shows us how he believes it must be put together. He also believes in various unities which he states are necessary for a proper tragedy. Aristotle believes in what he calls "Unity of plot" (Aristotle 42 - 3). This "Unity" leaves no room for subplots, which are crucial to the theme of Hamlet. Without the subplot of Laertes' revenge and the subplot of Fortinbras' revenge, we are left with a lugubrious play where the ending, although necessary, is pointless. The three sub-plots together as a unit, allow us to understand what Shakespeare thought of revenge.
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, many themes are explored that allow the audience to analyze into their deeper meanings. One example of such is the theme of revenge and its connection with one’s loyalty towards their father. This is seen clearly in the characters of Hamlet, Laertes and Fortinbras. Laertes is the son of Polonius, a nobleman of Denmark, while Fortinbras is the son of Fortinbras Sr., the deceased king of Norway. In regards to the structure of the play, both Laertes and Fortinbras serve as foils to oppose Hamlet. It remains true that the expectations one has for Hamlet can be found in the traits of the other two. The fundamental truth found in the characters on Hamlet, Laertes, and Fortinbras is their passion on revenge for the crimes
Revenge has caused the downfall of many a person. Its consuming nature causes one to act recklessly through anger rather than reason. Revenge is an emotion easily rationalized; one turn deserves another. However, this is a very dangerous theory to live by. Throughout Hamlet, revenge is a dominant theme. Fortinbras, Laertes, and Hamlet all seek to avenge the deaths of their fathers. But in so doing, all three rely more on emotion than thought, and take a very big gamble, a gamble which eventually leads to the downfall and death of all but one of them. King Fortinbras was slain by King Hamlet in a sword battle. This entitled King Hamlet to the land that was possessed by Fortinbras because it was written in a seal'd compact. "…our valiant Hamlet-for so this side of our known world esteem'd him-did slay this Fortinbras." Young Fortinbras was enraged by his father’s murder and sought revenge against Denmark. He wanted to reclaim the land that had been lost to Denmark when his father was killed. "…Now sir, young Fortinbras…as it doth well appear unto our state-but to recover of us, by strong hand and terms compulsative, those foresaid lands so by his father lost…" Claudius becomes aware of Fortinbras’ plans, and in an evasive move, sends a message to the new King of Norway, Fortinbras’ uncle.
Hamlet is intelligent, thoughtful but calculating and is out for revenge for the murder of his father. However, he is not able to carry out his revenge immediately which is crucial for fairness and his rightful ascendancy to the Danish throne. However, he rationalizes to hide behind excuses instead of seeking revenge by killing Claudius. Hamlet’s inability to act and make a final decision is his single tragic flaw. In direct contrast, Laertes suffers from not able to control his emotions. He comes back from France angry at Claudius with a suggestion of a coup. However, when Claudius redirects anger from Laertes away from himself, he is so fired about killing Hamlet, he would not mind killing him in a church.
Revenge is a motif we see repeatedly throughout the play. Different characters use revenge differently according to their situation. Revenge leads Hamlet and Laertes to their deaths while it makes Fortinbras gain back the land of Denmark. As you can see, the quote by Phaedrus encompasses the entire concept of revenge in Hamlet. The swordfight at the end of the play allowed the characters to complete their revenge, and probably without this, the different reprisals probably wouldn’t have been carried out. All in all, throughout the play, Hamlet, Laertes, and Fortinbras all had a tragic death of a family member which caused their decision for revenge.
Throughout Hamlet, each character’s course of revenge surrounds them with corruption, obsession, and fatality. Shakespeare shows that revenge proves to be extremely problematic. Revenge causes corruption by changing an individual’s persona and nature. Obsession to revenge brings forth difficulties such as destroyed relationships. Finally, revenge can be the foundation to the ultimate sacrifice of fatality. Hamlet goes to show that revenge is never the correct route to follow, and it is always the route with a dead
Hamlet, Laertes and Fortinbras seek retribution for the violent deaths of their fathers in different ways and for different reasons, but the three acts of revenge do not end the same way. Hamlet's brooding over the morality of the act of revenge leads him into a downward spiral of misfortunes. Cold-blooded murder of the type that Laertes seeks ultimately ends with his own life being taken away as well. Fortinbras’s revenge, planned and executed, is the only one that results in minimal consequences to himself and awards him with success. In the end, only Fortinbras survives the play with his heart still beating. Shakespeare’s lesson is to remind that that not every path for revenge ends in the same way and that there is a correct way for dealing with things.