Skillfully Insane
Shakespeare’s main character in Hamlet is, the young Hamlet, he has a large task at hand to complete by the end of the play. He has a responsibility to kill his uncle, now King Claudius for vengeance for his father’s murder. He decides to employ madness as part of his plan to gain the opportunity to kill Claudius. As the play progresses, his depiction of a madman becomes increasingly believable, almost too madman like some people suggest. Characters around him begin acting differently. Onel Brooks in his article Psychodynamic Practice states “...Hamlet's sanity presents an example of mourning and trauma…” I think this shows that other than motivations there are reasons for him to act crazy. Hamlet is still morning from his father’s death. However, through his inner thoughts and the apparent reasons for his actions, it is clear that he is not really mad and is simply an actor, acting with insanity in order to fulfill his father’s wishes to kill his father’s brother Claudius. Hamlet needs to for various reasons act crazy to justify and hopefully get away with killing his uncle Claudius.
Hamlet acts totally sane when acting insane would be totally unnecessary. Hamlet is very sane when he talks to Horatio about keeping an eye on Claudius for signs of lapse in covering his guilt during the play, he says “Give him heedful note, for I mine eyes will rivet his face, and, after, we will both our judgments join in censure of his seeming (3.2.87).” His words to Horatio are those of a sane man. Horatio is one of the few people to whom he does not need to prove he is “insane,” and as such, he does not try. Also, when he is explaining to the players how to act, he is very organized and free flowing in his speech. For example, he asks “You could, for a need, study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, which I would set down and insert in ‘t, could you not (2.2.565)?” His question is understandable and he the actor understands what the...