Essay: Unlock The Mystery: Is Hamlet Mad or Just Feigning It?

Hamlet by William Shakespeare is a tragedy in which a young prince, Hamlet, is seek revenge for his father’s murder. At the beginning of the play, Hamlet is introduced to the audience as a normal person grieving his father’s death, but throughout the play Hamlet’s state of mind changes for the habitual to depressed/mad. In the play, Hamlet’s state of mind is to question since it is not truly clear if he is indeed mad/insane or just faking it to avenge his father’s assassination. There are some indication that Hamlet was feigning his madness to get his revenge on Claudius, his father’s brother and killer, but, there are some sign Hamlet is, indeed, insane. In the first act of the play, Hamlet sees a ghost that tells him who killed his father and to get revenge on the matter, it is unclear to the audience of the ghost is real or a hallucination. Most people define madness as “the state of being mentally ill” but in the play is mostly define as “acting in a different way than before, being melancholy”
In act I, scene I, the ghost makes it’s first appearance, in the play, to the guards, Marcellus, Bernardo and Francisco, in front of the castle. “In the same figure like the king that’s dead.” (Shakespeare. 1.1.3) not one but three people saw the ghost, which according to Bernardo, looks exactly like the dead king. They later tell Hamlet about the ghost and how it looks like his dead father and how it appears at night. When the ghost reappears, he tells Hamlet that the causes of his death was poisoning by his brother, and now king of Denmark, Claudius. “A serpent stung me… The serpent that did sting thy father’s life now wears his crown.” (Shakespeare, 1.5.24). The ghost then continues by asking Hamlet to avenge his death. Making Hamlet’s disposition change, now being angry at the fact that Claudius killed his father and married his mother.
In act II, scene II, Gertrude, Hamlet’s mother, manipulates Hamlet’s childhood’s friend, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, into gathering information on Hamlet’s abruptly “transformation”, as Claudius calls Hamlet’s madness. Claudius and Gertrude plan to use Rosencrantz and Guildenstern as a bridge between Hamlet’s thoughts and the king. “That you vouchsafe your rest herein our court…” (Shakespeare, 2.2.33). Claudius is offering them to stay in the castle so they can spend as much time as possible with Hamlet to decode his thoughts and his actions. “Some little time: so by your companies… to gather so much as from occasion you may glean…” (Shakespeare, 2.2.33). Claudius is basically saying stay as long as necessary to gather as much information as possible to Hamlet’s old friends. In act II, Scene II Polonius and Hamlet are talking while Polonius is trying to decipher Hamlet’s state of mind about what Polonius says, “Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t.” (Shakespeare, 2.2.39). Polonius is convinced that reason behind Hamlet’s madness is due to the love he feels for Ophelia while in reality, Hamlet is actually acting mad purposely to hide his true intentions, to avenge his father’ death.
At the end of act II, scene II, Hamlet is conflicted, he is grieving, he is frustrated, and he is part madness, more as in angry than insanity, since he cannot start putting he plan ongoing since he delays his plan to kill Claudius once and for all because he is over thinking the situation. Making it clear to audience that he is no completely insane since he, first, wants to figure out of the ghost really exist, if is really he’s father or if the ghost is the devil. Insane people do not have this mindset. “The sprit that I have seen may be the devil, and the devil hath power to assume a pleasing shape…” (Shakespeare, 2.2.50). Hamlet starts questioning the true identity of the ghost since he is not utterly sure of the ghost is telling him the truth and if Claudius actually killed ja father. “… perhaps out of my weakness and my melancholy as he is very potent with such spirits, abuses me to damn me.” (Shakespeare, 2.2.50). Hamlet thinks he saw the ghost in a moment of vulnerability while grieving his father’s death which makes him shows his sanity since no one who is insane is able to think in such way.
In act I, scene V, after Hamlet and the ghost have a conversation, Hamlet tells his friends “How strange or odd soe’er I bear myself- as I perchance hereafter shall think meet to put an antic disposition on”. (Shakespeare, 1.5.28). This implies that he, Hamlet, will start acting insane and is letting his friends know of such thing, he also makes them swear that they will no tell a soul of what they have seen that night, referring to the ghost. Once again, this indicates how Hamlet is feigning his madness since he told his friends about his plan of acting it’s madness, from that night on, but, Hamlet, for some reason, does, or plan to do, what the ghost asked him to do without thinking the consequences and risks of following a ghost since it can be dangerous, making the audience question his sanity since people wouldn’t have done what he did.