Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Neveah Dunbar - Short Essay Is Hamlet Crazy
Neveah Dunbar - Short Essay Is Hamlet Crazy
Mrs. Farina
Senior Seminar
01 March 2024
Is Hamlet Crazy?
After thoroughly reading, watching and examining acts 1-3 of Hamlet, I have determined
that, in my opinion, Hamlet is not crazy. Hamlet is simply misunderstood during times of great
grief and loss. When Hamlet is introduced to us, his uncle, Claudius who has just married his
mother is telling Hamlet that it is not manly to hold onto his grief for such a long time. We are
then informed that Hamlet's father had just passed abruptly in his sleep only two months prior.
Later in the play when a grieving Hamlet makes contact with a ghost that is told to hold the spirit
of Hamlet's late father, the ghost then explains to Hamlet that he was murdered by his brother
Claudius. This new found information causes Hamlet to create a plan to draw the truth from
Claudius. To execute his plan though Hamlet needs to be seen as incompetent, not a threat to
Claudius' throne, so that he is no longer under a magnifying glass. Only then is when Hamlet
begins to act as though he is crazy. Hamlet’s plan does seem to work because his strange
behavior does not go unnoticed, it is quickly dismissed as being lovesick, when in all actuality I
believe Hamlet was trying to grieve. With little to no actual control over his life, constantly being
told to finish up grieving his father, and feeling abandonded by his mother due to her marrying
his uncle, Hamlet was looking for any outlet to make everything make sense. That is not Hamlet
being crazy, that is him experiencing what we call the 5 stages of grief.