The Fear and Uncertainty of Death in Hamlet by William Shakespeare

The fear and uncertainty of death despite being a major part of the human experience are constantly ignored. Shakespeare’s Hamlet, through the use of imagery, symbolism, and soliloquy explores this very idea, compelling the audience to acknowledge the fear and uncertainty of death. Shakespeare’s imagery of the ghost of Old Hamlet “doomed” to suffer in “sulfurous and tormenting flames” creates an image of hell that inflicts fear in the audience of the afterlife. The ghosts’ untimely death, inhibiting him to confess to his “foul crimes”, results in him being trapped in purgatory. This instills the audience to acknowledge death as a significant part of the human experience and to recognize its powerful nature in molding life after death.

This creates fear of death in the audience and makes them question the nature of the afterlife that this untimely death may bring. Shakespeare further highlights that the ghost is “forbid[den] to tell the secrets of” the purgatory, which distresses and creates fear in the audience as they are forced to reminisce about the mysterious nature of the afterlife. Fear and uncertainty of death are also observed through Hamlet’s soliloquy when he contemplates “to be or not to be”, whether to live or die. Shakespeare’s use of this powerful soliloquy encourages the audience to contemplate life and death, to think of the uncertainty of the “sleep of death” and “what dreams” it may hold. The audience further qualms about death as Hamlet compares it to an “undiscovered country”, that may fail to hold his “sea of trouble.” The setting of the graveyard where the gravediggers nonchalantly “throws…skull(s) and sing sonnets” further emphasizes the fear and ambiguity that death creates.

The juxtaposition between the gravedigger’s light-hearted actions and the sombre graveyard surrounded by the bones of the dead creates an uncertainty in the audience of their own treatment in this very graveyard after death. “Yorick’s skull”, also thrown indifferently, is used by Shakespeare as a physical symbol of death. Hamlet, when looking at the skull, literally stares into the eyes of the dead and reflects on the “infinite jest” and life that this skull once possessed. The audience is exposed to a blunt portrayal of the value of human life after death, which makes them fearful of their own treatment in a graveyard full of indifferent gravediggers. This is further emphasized by Shakespeare’s comparison between the deaths of “Alexander” the great and “Yorick, the jester” that “return[ed] to dust.” The audience is distressed and made aware of the insignificance of social status in the afterlife, something they have sacrificed their whole life trying to achieve. They further contemplate their own actions and the things they give significance to, that they are uncertain may not hold any true value in the afterlife. Through the use of imagery, symbolism, and soliloquy, Shakespeare successfully explores the ever-present fear and uncertainty of death in our conscience; which we constantly ignore as it reminds us of the insignificance of human life and the horrors that await us in our life after death.

The Freedom of Action Madness Provides

Shakespeare’s Hamlet explores the freedom that madness provides through setting and the characterization of Hamlet and Ophelia, presenting the freedom their changing speech and behavior provide. Shakespeare emphasizes the liberty of Hamlet and Ophelia’s seemingly irrational actions against their confined status and actions in a rigid social structure where women still “obey” a male figure and Princes feel trapped in a “prison.” Hamlet uses the façade of madness to “put on an antic disposition”, to find his father’s murderer. Shakespeare portrays the liberty a responsible Prince is provided through his madness to justify his irrational and indecent investigation of his father’s death, concerning the “King” himself. Similarly, Hamlet uses his madness to deny responsibility for the murder of Polonius as he was “from himself taken away” when Polonius was killed.

Shakespeare portrays Hamlet’s apparent absence, due to his madness, from the scene through the use of third-person narrative that angers the audience as Hamlet easily gets away with murder. Shakespeare displays Ophelia’s madness as a sign of the loss of her father, which is the first indication of her freedom from the confinement of a “male figure” in her life. Her speech is changed from iambic pentameter to prose in her sonnets, indicating her madness and freedom of speech. Her once submissive character that “obey[ed]” her father’s every wish is portrayed as outspoken as she insults Gertrude by offering her “fennel” and “columbines”, that symbolize adultery. She can break from her confinement as a polite “noblewoman” who now has the freedom of speech as that of a man. The audience further acknowledges Ophelia’s will to take control of her own life through her suicide in which she “chant[ed] snatches of old lauds” and drowned “like a creature native” to water. Her madness which allowed her to peacefully “drown” is indicated by Shakespeare as the gateway to free Ophelia from this rigidly patriarchal society, resonating with the audience who themselves may feel oppressed and would want to take control of their own life. Through the characterization of Ophelia and Hamlet, and their changing speech and behavior, Shakespeare successfully displays that despite the alienation and isolation of madness, madness also allows truth and freedom to act.