Hamlet’s Delay

crossroads is matchless the most discussed dramas in English Literature. It has enkindle the connoisseurs for four centuries to unravel the mystery behind villages insure in victorious revenge of his poses death. His chink has attracted many literary critics to analyze and interpret the reasons for his inaction. The depth of causaization and the complexity of the speckle clear made the task of the critics much complex and complicated. A regular analysis of the criticism helps the reader for a better go outing of the character of hamlet, his inaction and apathy for purport.Hamlet, one of the four groovy tragedies by William Shakespeargon, is the seven-day and most popular. Hamlets delay in avenging his aims murder, has led many to interpret Hamlet in different slipway taking different approaches to demystify the dilemma in Hamlets mind. If to be or non to be is the question that haunted Hamlet, it is Hamlets undue delay that has troubled many readers for hundreds of years. Hamlet is an enlightened gentleman with refined views in an era of turbulent times when his family, land are threatened by forces that are all in all beyond his control.His raising has made him into a refined man making him distinctly philosophical. He addresses the questions of universal importance that have troubled many a philosopher. His soaking up with these questions has sole(prenominal) made him more wavering in his attitude and detain his action. His quest for answers non only deferred his actions but also brought his doom finisher to him. At first he is non convinced with the tinges words and motivations to have indicate. When he has got evidence, he doesnt find righteous justification for taking revenge. When an opportunity presents itself, he leaves it planning for a more serious punishment.Thus, the story gets prolonged until it comes to his tragic end. In fact, Hamlet could non reconcile with the idea of cold blooded murder as a justification for r evenge. The very introduction of Hamlet is indicative of the nature of his character. He is introduced in the do still wearing black mourning clothes (I. ii. 66). He was asked to cast off his nightly color by his buzz off. plain he is gloomy and at that place is some affaire in his mind that escapes a finish off statement. It reflects his agonized and troubled mind unable to bear the grief of his fathers death and reconcile with the hasty marriage of her mother with force Claudius.He was totally devastated by his fathers death and totally betrayed by his mothers marriage. Finding himself that something is destructive in the rotten state of Denmark, he contemplates suicide. His soliloquy on suicide raising questions of its good validity sets the tone of the things that come later. (I. ii. 129130) What we see in Hamlet is a perpetual conflict in his mind that made him literally bats though he pretends that purposefully. To thine ownself be true is the guiding principle of hi s moral sense in deciding to be or non to be in the beginning, contemplating the merits and demerits of committing suicide.He feels himself helpless in finding himself in such a ruthless world and thus he laments O that this alike too solid skeletal frame would melt, Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew Or that the Everlasting had non fixed His canon gainst self-slaughter O God O God How weary, stale, flat, and shadowy Seem to me all the uses of this world. (Act. I. Scene. I) Throughout the scarper we see how his world gets crumbled piecemeal making him more and more cynical and withdrawn. The most shocking thing for Hamlet is he could not bear the news of his mother marrying his uncle male monarch Claudius in undue haste.It has totally unsettled his equilibrium. She married O, most sickening speed, to post With such dexterity to incestuous sheets (Act. I. Scene. I) When he is down with first and shock he is advised by might Hamlets phantom to take aim revenge. In the d arkness, the ghost speaks to Hamlet claiming to be his fathers spirit. It arouses the sensations of vengeance in Hamlet and to revenge his death, a foul and most unnatural murder (Act. I. v. 25). Hamlet was horrified at the stool of the Ghost and by knowing how his father was murdered by his uncle Claudius.At first he could not believe whether the Ghost was real. The message of the Ghost puts him in a dilemma, as it advises him to take revenge on Claudius and not to offend Gertrude and leave her to destiny and her sense of right and wrong. Hamlet gets shocked and bewildered. He does not like to jump to the conclusion of taking immediate action. He wants to realise it by his own method of getting enough evidence against powerfulness Claudius. To confirm what the world power Hamlets Ghost has told Hamlet plans to represent King Claudius a shoo-in which has close resemblance to the murder of King Hamlet.The play called The Murder of Gonzago was played causing King Claudius to r eact which logically concludes Hamlets suspicion. Once his suspicion is confirmed, he wants to proceed with his plans of put an end to Claudius. Hamlet realizes his weak mind when he feels the intensity in the expression of the dialogues of the players when they were practicing. He resolves to take decisive action and plans a snare drum for Claudius. Hamlet is quite successful in trapping Claudius and getting evidence from the way Claudius reacts when he watches the drama and cries out at the crucial moment.It is kind of Hamlets personal requirement to answer his conscience that he needs clear evidence to prove what King Hamlets Ghost has told him. It is the hallmark of Hamlets character that he does not jump to conclusion without enough proof. Hamlets education and sensibility and general philosophical disposition must have made him taste for valid proof against the King Claudius. But what surprises everyone is he doesnt take the chance to kill Claudius when an opportunity pre sents itself. Hamlet finds his own reasons in not taking the chance.He doesnt like to allow his murderous uncle to go to Heaven by killing him when he is in prayer. So he leaves the opportunity which is considered by many the best chance. He reasons out that the liquidator of his father does not deserve Heaven. This only delays his action further. According to capital of Delaware Wilson in that respect is no delay in avenging the death of Hamlets father. He feels Hamlet has acted in time. According to E E Stoll, there is no delay it is just a convention of the play. He is of the opinion that if there is no delay, there is no play at all. any these indicate that there is delay in taking revenge.Hamlet himself feels it and it is singular that he has to be reminded by the Ghost again when he was uncivilised with his mother Gertrude. These are proof enough to prove that revenge has been delayed. When the play itself is addressing the issue of delay, it is unreasonable to say that there is no delay. T. S. Eliot, the noted poet and critic considers Hamlet an artistic failure. He says So far from being Shakespeares masterpiece, the play is most certainly an artistic failure. In several ways the play is puzzling, and disquieting as is none of the others.Of all the plays it is the longest and is possibly the one on which Shakespeare spent most pains and yet he has left in it superfluous and inconsistent scenes which even hasty revision should have noticed. (Eliot) He also feels that Hamlet is dominated by an emotion which is unutterable and is in excess. Hamlet is unable to manage his own emotions as he could not find objective correlative (Eliot). In other words, it is a set of objects, a situation, a chain of events which shall be the formula of that circumstance emotion. Explaining his theory, Eliot saysHamlet is up against the difficulty that his disgust is occasioned by his mother, but that his mother is not an adequate equivalent for it his disgust envel ops and exceeds her. It is thus a feeling which he cannot understand he cannot objectify it, and it therefore remains to poisonous substance life and obstruct action. (Eliot) In the article Hamlets thoughts and Antics, Margreta de Grazia observes that Shakespeare wanted to create a character that thinks and showed it through Hamlet. Shakespeare produced a tragedy of inaction- a tragedy of thought. It is performance of thought-as inaction- as DELAY. Margreta de Grazia) A. C. Bradley considered an authority on Shakespearean Tragedy, analyses the reasons for Hamlets delay in his famous lectures on Hamlet. His discussion on Hamlet attracted many with his convincing reasons. He does not find any foreign things as obstacles for his delay in taking revenge. Hamlet has access to the King and Hamlet never mentions nigh any immaterial barriers. Hence citing the external factors as the primary reason for the delay in action is totally nullified. Bradley does not accept Hamlets reason to ju stify his conscience as the main reason for the delay.Hamlet is unconsciously ambivalent or so this duty Bradley says in the depths of his nature, and unknown to himself, there was a moral draw to the deed. (Bradley) Goethes popular view of Hamlet as a polished youth, sweet and sensitive, full of delicate sympathies is nothing but sentimental consort to Bradley. In the same way, Bradley disagrees to Coleridges view that Hamlet has lost himself in the labyrinths of thought. Bradley proposes that Hamlet delays because of his melancholy. Melancholy is not the usual state of Hamlets mind. It is a temporary depression at the sudden outlet of his father.And the subsequent incidents will only paralyze him in contempt for everything- the world, the flesh and himself. He justifies it and proceeds further to show how this disgust at life and everything results in longing for death and inexpressible apathy. Hamlet does not understand his own inaction and apathy and curses himself in utte r disappointment everyplace his disinclination to take revenge. There is another strong argument claiming that there is no delay in taking revenge. During the presentation of the drama on the stage the spectators never realize Hamlet has delayed his action.The depiction of the sexual struggle of the protagonist rather enhances the effect of the drama on the stage. It provides configuration and takes the audience along with the hero to different emotional states and keeps them curious until the end. This is Shakespeares most amusing play says, Dr. Johnson. The play shows two more characters who want to take revenge of the death of their fathers. They offer a good line of credit to Hamlets delay. Fortinbras and Laertes are unlike Hamlet. They are effective in their decision to take revenge and are very quick in their action.Shakespeare presents these two characters offering the spectators an opportunity to understand Hamlet in a different way. When the very purpose of the drama is to present the hero in that mode there is no argument regarding his delay in taking revenge. The argument that Hamlet is basically a coward can not be taken valid at all as there are many instances to show against it. He does not run away from the Ghost as cowards do. He does not escape from the challenges especially the duel among him and Laertes. The claim that Hamlet has a physical problem will only undermine his character.If there is a serious physical problem, then he becomes a good example for medical case study, and certainly does not deserve a place in literary criticism. The interpretation that he has a serious mental health problem will not stand given the depth and meaning of Hamlets soliloquies. In fact, the crucial point in the play is Hamlet himself feels guilty about his inability in taking timely action. He laments at the delay and attributes that to his lack of tenacity for action. He is on the search to know why he is not able to take revenge immediately. He is at a loss to express what represses him from taking revenge.Freudian school of psychology has interpreted Hamlets story from Oedipus complex point of view. Though the argument is persuasive, one can not subscribe to that point. Hamlet continues to be a puzzle and his delay can be interpreted in every possible way. The endless criticism on Hamlet reminds the lines of great Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore, who says from the words of the poet, men take what meanings please them. (Tagore) Every interpretation focuses a new aspect of Hamlet. It is worth exploring as it helps readers to have a better understanding of Hamlets dilemma.