Hamlet delayed because he was suffering from melancholia by Sara Gilliard
Once Hamlet has became aware of his father's life ending in a murder by his uncle, he is vastly aggravated by the question of whether his mother Gertrude, was an accomplice with Claudius in the murder of his father (Dover, Wilson 251). There is the suggestion present in the play that Claudius had seduced Gertrude, "O wicked wit and gifts, that have the power / So to seduce!" is spoken by the ghost in the play (Sahkespear.I.iv.42-45. All further quotations will be from this same edition, and referred to by act, scene, line only), but the ghost of King Hamlet also calls Claudius an "adulterate beast", hereby suggesting that Gertrude was involved in an affair before her husband's death. The fact that his father had been murdered by none other than his own brother truly irritates Hamlet, however his father's murder is a small fraction of his troubles, as compared to the horror of Gertrude's remarriage (Lerner 79). The marriage is what drives most of Hamlet's delirious actions (Nardo 55). Since the play had begun, Hamlet was upset because of the shady marriage of his mother Gertrude, to the new King, Claudius. Hamlet begins by not communicating his true feelings by showing respect for his mother's choices. When Hamlet is alone, however, he expresses his true feelings, "It is not nor it cannot come to good. / But break my heart for I must hold my tongue" (I.ii.157-158). Later in the plot, Hamlet announces to Gertrude how much he dislikes Claudius, "but sure that sense / Is apoplexed, for madness would not err, / Nor sense to ecstasy was ne'er so thralled / But it reserved some quantity of choice / To serve in such a difference..." (III.vi.73-77). Hamlet believes that even if his mother were absolutely psychotic, she would have made the decision never to marry Claudius. The marriage absolutely shocked him, it was too sudden and unexpected as he, and his mother, had little time to grieve fully,...