Hamlet

William Shakespeare did not write novels. Hamlet is not a novel. It's a play. They are very very different. Novels are to be read. Plays are to be watched.

Hamlet is considered one of the greatest works of literature because it touches on a great many themes. A few of the major ones are "What is the point of life?", "Is revenge justified?", "What is sanity?", "How should we deal with death?", "How should children deal with parents who go wrong?" etc. etc.

I recommend you immediately watch a movie of the play or, better yet, buy a ticket to see it played live at a theatre.

Hamlet is still mourning his father's death while his mother has quickly ended her mourning and has remarried. The "nighted colour" is the colour of night, which is to say, black. Gertrude wants Hamlet to cast off his black clothes, to stop mourning.

Assuming you are talking about Act II, Ophelia describes how Hamlet came to her chamber, looking disheveled and unkempt, looking depressed, unable to speak, but looked at her, sighed, and wandered away, distracted.

Yes, rather quickly. Claudius does not use the time-honoured device of liars by insisting "You've got to believe me." Instead he says;

"Go but apart,

Make choice of whom your wisest friends you will

That they may judgment make twixt you and me.

If by direct or by collateral hand

They find us touched we will our kingdom give,

Our crown, our life and all that we call ours,

To you in satisfaction; but if not

Be you content to lend your patience to us"

Claudius offers to submit to a trial, before judges picked by Laertes himself, to determine whether he directly or indirectly killed Polonius. If he is found guilty, he will voluntarily give up his kingdom and his life, but if not, Laertes must accept that as the final word on the matter. Laertes accepts this offer. Either the trial proved Claudius's innocence or Laertes was so satisfied that he did not require it.

Of course Claudius is as wily as ever. Laertes is on the point of taking his life and kingdom by force anyway. If Claudius loses, he's no worse off, and if he wins he gains a useful and powerful ally and saves himself and his kingdom.

Many people die after being poisoned since the poison destroys the organs in the body. Sometimes, the doctors can stop the poisoning if caught early enough.

Ophelia is definitely very hurt by what Hamlet has said. Hamlet saying such a phrase only further pushes Ophelia's feeling that she was cheated by Hamlet, that the love they had together earlier was not real.

King Hamlet won, and therefore won certain territories in Norway, which young Fortinbras resents.

He interprets Claudius's action during the play as confirming the ghost's story. This is not something he sees so much as something he comes to believe. What he sees is Rosencrantz and Guildenstern telling him to go see his mother.

No. He is of the view that Hamlet will have a bride chosen for him, probably some woman of royal blood. He wouldn't be able to marry Ophelia even if he wanted to. (Ironically, Gertrude later reveals that she had intended that Hamlet should marry Ophelia, so Laertes was wrong.)

By sheer luck and nosiness. The nosiness comes in because he decides to have a look at Rosencrantz and Guildenstern's sealed orders, and finds that they are instructions to the English to execute him. Fortunately he has the equipment and skill to forge a new set of orders in which Rosencrantz and Guildenstern go to the chop in his place. He is also extremely lucky in that pirates attack and he ends up on the pirate ship, and the pirates agree to return him to Denmark.

Hamlet finds Claudius praying for forgiveness after the play. He decides that if he were to kill Claudius at that moment, Claudius would go to heaven rather than to hell. Hamlet decides to wait until he finds Claudius sinning, in order to kill him.

An example of a homonyms by Shakespeare is when Romeo and Mercutio are at the Capulet ball. Romeo says that Mercutio has a nimble sole, but that his own soul is heavy.

Somewhere around half of Shakespeare's plays were written after Julius Caesar. We cannot say which one was immediately afterwards, because we have no hard evidence of which plays were written when. Henry V is a possibility, although many scholars would reverse the plays and have Caesar follow Henry.

In Shakespeare's "Hamlet", The Ghost demands Hamlet kill Claudius, the brother who betrayed, murdered and stole his throne and wife. However, this murderous vengeance does not extend to his offending wife. He tells Hamlet not to seek vengeance on her and to just focus on dealing with the usurper.

If you ask me, it's just because Hamlet is a natural born jack-@$$. Some people will try to defend him by pointing out that he has a reason to be angry about Ophelia's spying and is venting his frustrations; but honestly, what he says is extremely harsh. When I was reading it, I was surprised to see in the annotations that nunnery was a euphemism for brothel. I mean, ouch! Your father's just died, the prince who's been pursuing you has apparently gone crazy, and then he basically just snaps at you that you are trash and belong in a brothel. That's just cruel.

Fortinbras is the son of the former king of Norway. His father died at the hand of Hamlet Sr (Hamlet's father). His uncle took the throne, however it is said that he is on his death bed. Fortinbras is said to be mounting an army throughout the play in order to take back the land his father lost to Denmark.

At the end of the play, just before Hamlet dies he announces Fortinbras to be the new king of Denmark.

The main reason is that he kills Polonius and generally acts crazy. It is also likely that the king is also trying to get rid of him for his own purposes. When Hamlet stages his play "The Mousetrap" he reveals that he knows about the king killing Hamlet's father.

Claudius banishes him to England (with a letter asking the English to execute him) so that he doesn't have to kill Hamlet in Denmark, where he is very popular.

I think the psychological climax is in the last scene of the play. Throughout the play, Hamlet has struggled with himself about his reaction to the Ghost's revelations and command to take revenge on King Claudius; he has called himself a coward, passed up a chance to kill the King, and blamed himself for not being decisive. But in the last scene, after having a premonition that the fencing match with Laertes might mean his death, Hamlet seems suddenly to achieve a kind of serenity. He says to Horatio: we defy augury: there's a special

providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now,

'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be

now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the

readiness is all: since no man has aught of what he

leaves, what is't to leave betimes? Let be. (5.2.219-224)

They sympathise with him; they understand his torment, his dilemma and they feel extremely sorry when he dies. Some people can also judge him more severely for his hesitations and for the pain he causes to the people he loves and who love him.

His brother, Claudius, came out into the garden while King Hamlet was sleeping and poured poison into his ear.

I guess you could say that Hamlet's first attempt to kill Claudius was when he stabbed Polonius, since he says "I took thee for thy better." At that time Claudius was probably still downstairs somewhere.

"Osric did not "get" Hamlet and Laertes to fight. He stood by as a referee in the duel between the two adversaries. He called out the "hits". They duelled because Laertes believed that Hamlet was responsible for the death of his sister Ophelia and wished to avenge it. This belief had been fostered by Claudius who saw a way of having Hamlet killed as he knew that Claudius had murdered his - Hamlet's - father."

This is almost correct. Indeed Osric was not the cause of Hamlet and Laertes duel, the King was the one who came up with this idea because he found it the easiest way to have Hamlet killed without the suspect of foul play. But Laertes agreed to the duel not only because he believed Hamlet's madness caused Ophelia to also go mad ultimately killing her, he also dueled because of Hamlet's cold blooded murder of his father Polonius...just wanted to add that Polonius had two reasons for wanting to duel Hamlet.