Christie Kieu

Kimberly Hohl

Lit Mod Med

27 January 2023

Madness for the Truth

Shakespeare’s ideology on madness was shown through his character, Hamlet. Though

Hamlet may have spawned his madness through the start of a revenge plot, his real madness

appeared because he could not find the line between reality and pretend. He may have said there

had been a method to his madness, but had lost sight of his method and became a person his

closest friends had no longer recognized. Be that as it may, Hamlet's journey through madness

leads to maturity and finding his true self.

Hamlet’s journey of madness started as a screen so no one would question his odd actions

whilst he was trying to find the truth about his father. He started by pretending to be mad and

telling his associates “however strange or odd I might sometimes behave - because I may

perhaps think it best to feign insanity”(Shakespeare I.v.190-195). He had thought of this to be his

greatest approach to snooping around at the time. Nonetheless, this good idea would become one

of his greatest downfalls because he would then start to project those mad actions onto the ones

he loved. Hamlet had started acting indecently around Ophelia, a woman he had claimed to love.

She had frantically gone to her father saying “Lord Hamlet confronted me with his clothing all

unbuttoned … and with a haunted look as if he'd been let out of hell to describe its

horrors”(II.i.85-92). People had started to think he had gone mad, but of course, that was his plan

all along. He wanted to be perceived this way. He wanted to be left unquestioned when

conducting his investigation.

 There had always been something to prevent Hamlet from finding the truth. Therefore,

Hamlet had pretended to be mad for so long that he had adapted to that persona. Shakespeare

creates an environment where everyone starts to believe Hamlet has gone mad. Hamlet says “My

brain is addled”(III.ii.316-319) when asked about the stunt he had pulled with the actors and his

rewrite of the play. Hamlet finally admitting that he had an “addled brain” was the first sign of

true insanity. When someone is mad they think they’re normal when they’re not, as for Hamlet,

the more he started to act like he was mad, the more it settled in to become a part of him. When

Hamlet kills Polonius after he mistakenly mistakes him for Claudius is the death of the little

sanity he has left. After killing Polonius, Hamlet says “You sad, silly, interfering fool, goodbye. I

mistook you for your superior. You’ve gotten what you deserve, and found that meddling can be

dangerous”(III.iv.36-38). Hamlet in the previous scenes was never able to hurt even a fly,

however, this time he had killed a human being and had no remorse. He showed his madness and

the shift it had led to in his personality as he is not the same boy we had known in the previous

scenes.

Through everyone's revealed transgressions, Hamlet grows to find his maturity and who

he is without having to conceal his truths. When Hamlet learns the truth of why Claudius had

sent him to England, Hamlet reacts in a way we would have never expected to do. Hamlet finds

Claudius’s letter to the King of England that was in the possession of Rosencrantz and

Guildenstern and then takes the letter and rewrites it to say “I instructed the King of England

that, after reading and reviewing the letter, without any further debate, he should immediately

kill the men who delivered the letter”(V.ii.47-51) this is something that we would have never

expected Hamlet to do, thus showing us a new Hamlet. Although an immature move, it showed

that Hamlet had grown out of his comfort zone and was able to finally act on his intrusive
thoughts. In the last scene, Hamlet publicly apologizes to Laertes by saying “I ask your

forgiveness, sir. I’ve done you wrong. Forgive me, as a gentleman … you must have heard it too

that I’m suffering from insanity”(V.ii.230-232). This scene shows that through learning the truth,

Hamlet grows as a person and becomes mature. This is a side of Hamlet we had never seen, the

side that made Hamlet feel the need to apologize for his previous transgressions.

All in all, Shakespeare’s Hamlet persona was a great way in showing his views on

madness. The beginning of his revenge plot may have been the start of Hamlet’s madness, but his

true madness manifested as a result of the inability to differentiate between reality and pretend.

He might have said there was a method to his craziness, but he had lost sight of it and changed to

become a person no one, even his closest friends, could recognize. Whatever the case, Hamlet’s

path through madness resulted in maturity and a discovery of his true self.