ENG 1C- Short Essay Hamlet Motif Essay PDF

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A SHORT ESSAY ON HAMLET: INCLUDES: MOTIFS, SYMBOLISM, IMAGERY IN THE PLAY...

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Motif Essay: Hamlet In Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet , there is immorality and corruption in all aspects of sinful human behavior. Shakespeare uses immorality as a motif in order to convey that human values are inevitably corrupt and human intentions are flawed. Hamlet embodies the persona of someone who begins with good intentions but ends up transforming into the person he resents the most. In short, Hamlet's Uncle murdered his father, he married and had sex with his mother, and he stole Hamlet’s throne. Hamlet has all the right motives to get revenge on his uncle, Claudius, as retribution. Hamlet has clear intentions, and they seem most valiant in his thoughts, but as his plan follows through, he slowly transforms into an unknowingly murderer. As he fakes his madness, he actually becomes mad. He becomes so wrapped up in his revenge plot that he loses sight of his just intentions. He does not kill his Uncle when he has the chance to make things “right”. Instead, Hamlet essentially begins to strategize his scheme to ensure his Uncle’s fall and descendance into hell for his cursed sins. He prefers “to take him in the purging of his soul, when he is fit and seasoned for his passage” (Ham.3.5). Hamlet wants justice for his father, but he is quickly turning to a dark and cruel path of retaliation. His anger provoked a new side of Hamlet that we haven’t seen before, a most unruly and unrestrained Hamlet. Hamlet despises his mother, Gertrude, for being untrue to her husband. It enrages Hamlet so much that his incentive to kill his Uncle heightened to another extent. Hamlet accuses her of being an incestual monster who “from the fair forehead of an innocent love, [sets] a blister there; makes marriage vows/ As false as dicers oath- O, such a deed…Is thought- sick at the act” (Ham.3.4). Hamlet is implying that his mother is immoral and has become corrupt because she has betrayed his father. As the audience, we don’t know the true feelings of grief Gertrude may be experiencing or her inner thoughts about Claudius, but we do know that Gertrude is guilty and resents her actions when Hamlet speaks the harsh truth. Incest is a sin and Gertrude knows the sins of religion just as well as Hamlet does. Gertrude loses sight of the values of marriage that

she was entitled to. Marriage binds specific values that test moral strength between two people. Gertrude failed to stay true to her husband and she chose to continue living her life in incest. Claudius reveals his corrupt nature throughout the entire play. Hamlet discovers why King Claudius killed his father: to acquire riches, wealth, a queen, and ultimately power. Claudius is blatantly malevolent and his values diminish the moment he murdered his brother. We could even speculate that he lost his morality in the making scheme of his brother’s death. To us, Claudius does not have a sane conscience, but a glimmer of morality is revealed when he tries to make amends with God, praying “O, my offense is rank, it smells to heaven; It hath the primal eldest curse upon’t, / A brother’s murder! I pray can I not / Though inclination be as sharp as well; my stronger guilt defeats my strong intent” (Ham.3.3). Claudius ends up never making amends with God and he loses all morality because he could not confess his sins, therefore he continues to follow his dark path in vain. Morality is something that is hard to maintain when humans by nature sinful. Shakespeare writes tragedies because they are sad and corrupt and everyone dies someway, somehow, and for some reason. He is trying to communicate the idea that society is tainted and that no intention, whether good or bad, is truly for the benefit of the cause. Humans can conceal their moral values to believe that what they are doing is just or right in their perspective. Immorality is a tempting choice that we can choose to follow or ignore. The characters in Hamlet choose immorality to bury their guilt and abandon their moral values....