Essay: Hamlet – a symbol of honour

Hamlet is, indisputably, a play full of devastating events and situations that make it a Shakespearean tragedy. Although Hamlet is manipulated by his surroundings, he is ultimately heroic because he overcomes his tragic flaw of the inability to act: he succeeds in getting revenge while eliciting catharsis from the audience. Hamlet is a tragic hero because, despite his corrupted surroundings, he maintains a noble core and represents honor. The idea of Hamlet being a symbol of honor, despite the corruption around him, can be seen through his relationship with the secondary characters.
Although many of the people in Hamlet’s life are corrupted, he is most affected by Claudius, because Hamlet’s main goal is seeking vengeance for his father’s death. Hamlet has intentions to kill Claudius when he finds out the truth about his villainous act of killing his father. Additionally, Hamlet recognizes that Claudius is the epitome of an overarching theme in the play, seeming versus being. Claudius is seen as the noble king of Denmark who rightly took the throne when Old Hamlet died; however, Hamlet knows that his nobility is unjust, and that he has corrupted both honor and the state of Denmark. Despite Hamlet’s desire to uphold his values of honor and nobility and to kill Claudius, his tragic flaw of the inability to act gets in the way. Hamlet struggles with his indecisiveness throughout the play: “Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave, that I, the son of a dear father murdered…must unpack my words, and fall a-cursing, like a very drab, a scullion! Fie upon-t! Foh! About, my brains!…” (II, ii). Hamlet knows that he has reason to kill Claudius, but there are many psychological reasons for his delay. Hamlet’s depression at the start of the play leads him to isolate himself from the diseased and corrupted kingdom that Claudius created. Regardless of Hamlet’s flaws, he ultimately upholds honor when he defeats Claudius, ridding the state of Denmark of his evil hypocrisy.
In the midst of Hamlet’s complex relationship with Claudius, he experiences lost love from Ophelia. Ophelia follows her father’s advice and betrays Hamlet, which later leads her to believe that she caused Hamlet’s madness. When Ophelia’s father, Polonius, is killed, she begins to go mad herself. In act four, Ophelia expresses that nothing turned out the way she thought it would: “They say the owl is the baker’s daughter. Lord we know what we are, but know not what we may be,”- and this leads her to commit suicide (IV, v). Additionally, the name Ophelia means “help”, and the corruption of her innocence represents the duplicitous state of Denmark. Hamlet is corrupted by both Ophelia’s betrayal and her manic state of mind, but he stays honorable to her because he illustrates to Laertes that he truly loved her: “Forty thousand brothers could not, with all their quantity of love, make up my sum” (V, i). Additionally, Hamlet feels a sense of guilt for Ophelia’s death, and the audience pities him for his loss. Hamlet’s suffering as a result of Ophelia’s death also makes him more relatable to the reader. This makes him all the more heroic when he defeats the force that fostered the corruption that is spreading through the kingdom like a disease.
Horatio, Hamlet’s life-long friend, is symbolic of morality despite the corruption and evil encompassing Hamlet. He is Hamlet’s confidant, who is ultimately the only character who stays loyal to Hamlet in spite of his madness and his isolation. Hamlet also admires that Horatio is not easily influenced by his emotions: “Give me that man that is not passion’s slave…” (III, ii). Throughout the play, as Hamlet is dealing with his indecisiveness, he reflects on life and death and has many doubts and uncertainties about killing Claudius. One reason Hamlet is unable to act stems from his fear of the afterlife. Hamlet’s corrupted surroundings cause him to contemplate suicide: “To be, or not to be: that is the question: Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take up arms against a sea of troubles” (III, i). However, Hamlet has an underlying fear of the unknowns of death: “..The dread of something after death…the undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns” (III, i). Throughout the play, Hamlet shifts from being an overthinker to being desperate and impulsive. Nonetheless, in act five, Hamlet transitions back to being thoughtful and sensible. When Hamlet agrees to participate in a duel with Laertes, Horatio warns him to trust his instincts. However, Hamlet does not listen to his trustworthy friend; he instead confides to Horatio that he has learned to accept his fate. Hamlet no longer fears what will happen to him; he puts everything in God’s hands and says, “Let be” (V, ii).
Additionally, Horatio is the only main character who survives the pestilence of the kingdom, embodying the idea that Hamlet was heroic in abolishing Denmark of corruption. When he loses Hamlet, Horatio contemplates suicide, but knows that he is the only one that knows the truth behind the noble deaths. He chooses to live to tell Hamlet’s story, crying out, “Now cracks a noble heart.- Good night, sweet prince. And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!” (IV, ii). Horatio assures the reader that Hamlet was a good person who had noble intentions and an honorable core.
Overall, Hamlet is greatly influenced by his deceitful surroundings and corrupt relations with others. However, he proves himself to be heroic by overcoming his indecisiveness and defeating Claudius, honoring Ophelia’s death, and accepting his inevitable fate, leaving his friend Horatio to tell his story. In spite of the fact that Hamlet himself can be seen as a tragedy because of the grave series of events that occur in his life, he is a tragic hero because he evokes catharsis from the audience and upholds the value of honor.
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