Hamlet and looking into the Abyss of Yorick's Skull

by Christopher Barr

“To conquer oneself is a greater task than conquering others.”

  - Buddha

“The ghost which cried so miserably at the theatre, like an oyster-wife, Hamlet, revenge!” 

- Thomas Lodge

William Shakespeare’s Tragedy of Hamlet has been played by hundreds of Actors, both on stage and in film, Hamlet (1948) (1990) (1996) were among my favorites.  I think the first point of relating to the character comes when one accepts the role and that is through binary opposition.  The actor desperately wants to do the role but is equally scared to death of it.  The reason for that is the character is a tragic figure that bares the whole of his heart and soul from beginning to catastrophic end.

Hamlet is a play about monarchy, madness, murder and suicide.  It starts with the young Prince of Denmark returning home to Elsinore from college, where his father King Hamlet has passed away.  Prince Hamlet is not only troubled by the death of his father but also that his mother, Gertrude has married his uncle less than two months after his father’s death, and his uncle Claudius has ascended to the throne of Denmark.  This puts Hamlet into a melancholic, dejected mood to say the least.  Hamlet then is told by his friend Horatio along with Bernardo and Marcellus that they have seen an apparition, a dreadful sight; they believe that the Ghost of Hamlet’s father is up and about.  Without little to any denial, Hamlet meets with this ghostly figure, who tells him that he was murdered and his killer wears the crown.  The ghost tells Hamlet that he wants him to avenge his murder by killing Claudius.

As Claudius and Gertrude display their love and sexual attraction in view of the people in Denmark, Hamlet laments, feeling anger and isolation while still in mourning over his father’s death.  He watches as everyone around him appears to have quickly recovered from the passing of their King.

Clearly a horrible thing to have happen in anyone’s life is losing a parent.  Grief can easily be over-whelming and quite engulfing to most people while they try to live with such a tragedy.  Before this play was written, Shakespeare lost his own son at the age of 11 in 1596.  This obviously would have been devastating to the playwright.  No parent should ever outlive their own child.  This boy’s name was Hamnet Shakespeare, a name quite popular at the time and in the loose orthography of the time, the names Hamnet and Hamlet were virtually interchangeable.  Shakespeare’s grief for the loss of his son may lie at the heart of the Tragedy of Hamlet.

The play appeared in and around 1601 with an Elizabethan audience, that believed in ghosts and the supernatural, so they didn’t think anything of Hamlet’s father standing before his son as a ghost.  They were part of the metaphysical world at that time as they are today, certainly not as pervasive.  Most people today have the benefit of science and evidence to help them understand, that the afterlife is a myth and disembodied premonitions of dead people wandering around this plain of existence, are simply not possible.  So whether Shakespeare thought ghosts were real or not, he was using one as a catalyst for revenge to ignite his story.  How one interprets this supernatural phenomena may determine the outcome very differently than one who simply sees it as an expositional narrative device.

Remember me………

Hamlet strives to know what is questionable and terrifying when he sees the Ghost for the first time.  At this point in the play we see Hamlet begin his ongoing ambivalence and discombobulated state that he carries throughout in the form of binary opposition.  When he sees the Ghost, naturally he’s taken back in fear, exclaiming, “Angels and ministers of grace defend us!”.  He is also perplexed by its questionable shape, wondering if it is a “spirit of health or goblin damned” whether it “bring airs from heaven or blasts from hell” and whether its “intents be wicked or charitable”.

Prince Hamlet is stuck with a prodigious dilemma.  If the ghost was real and the news of his murder was correct, now what?  Hamlet is pitted with a problem, will he or will he not avenge his father’s murder by killing the sitting King?  Will this be justified as an act of retribution, or another murder?  What does this mean for Hamlet and his future?  Does he accept this vengeful path, knowing this could lead to his own death?  Fatalism plays an important role in understanding the tension between action and inaction in Hamlet.  

The play has a lot of surveillance happening throughout it.  Whether it's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern spying for the King on Hamlet or Polonius, one of the king’s minsters, spying on Hamlet fearing that his recent loss could have negative effects on his daughter, Ophelia, Hamlet’s love.  Polonius also uses Ophelia as bait to spy on Hamlet for King Claudius.  There are many whispers in hallways and rooms while others listen from behind curtains or around corners.  This keeps the audience on edge for pretty much the entirety of the play.  Because of Hamlet’s behavior, many fear that he might be slipping into madness.

Hamlet has many conflicting thoughts rolling around in his head and can’t speak to anyone about how he’s really feeling, the audience becomes his confidant as he speaks to them in a soliloquy.  Which are thoughts in the locked room of his mind spoken out loud only for the audience to hear, rather than a monologue which is for other characters in the play to hear as well.

To be or not to be, that is the question.

This transcending ego-driven soliloquy spoken from Hamlet is a call to action.  He can do all the talking he chooses but within this play, revenge must be something that happens in the world, outside of his complex thoughts about it.  He can no longer second guess himself but he does; to act or not to act, that is the question.

Hamlet wonders whether he should accept things as they are, or simply suffer in silence, it certainly would be easier to not do anything but remember that Hamlet should rightfully be king.  He’s angry but he isn’t doing anything about it, and by the end of the soliloquy he still doesn’t do anything about it.  He’s stuck in his thinking about whether to act or not to act.  Essentially, if he does act his fantasy becomes contaminated with reality, much in the same way as one does when they awake from a dream.  He remains confused, unsure of himself and his thoughts as he hovers between two different extremes; life and death.  Does he avenge his father?  Does he do nothing and remain in silence?  Does he kill himself because suicide is the ultimate gutless act, but must still be seen as an option for Hamlet as he incessantly peruses his memories, his ideas, his thoughts and his depression?  We are cowards on the subject of dying, on our own death, so we avoid all paths that could lead to it.  Life does require one to contemplate death but ideally one should do that while they are not at such a loss.  Shakespeare put words in Hamlet’s mouth for those that are willing to listen so this doesn’t happen to us, because his tales of tragedy are tragic cautionary tales.
 
Religion encourages our capacity for illusion, it guides us toward the light in a hypnotic state where most follow blindly.  It heartens a desperate sense of entitlement, convincing ignorant people that if they do right, everything will be all for them.  Religion erases the possibility for critical thought; it vexes the mind to maintain its control.  Hamlet lived among religious people that truly believed in the 'undiscovered country', Heaven and in the devils that possess the underworld.  They believed there was a war between these two realms for their very souls.  Suicide was illegal and traumatic for this mutual illusory society, and the fact that Hamlet considered it, would have been disturbing to many, especially because if he was possessed by a demon of sorts.  But in reality, he was just a man considering his many options giving his particular situation.

Hamlet was vulnerable; he’s exposed himself and all his idiosyncrasies.  He’s confused and says so and for an audience member to witness that bare-all moment in the play while he stares at them, symbolically naked, will still go down as the most moving moment in literary history.  Not only did this play change the forecast in human history but that moment when Hamlet stands their facing the audience and pours himself onto the stage and spills into the theatre, was an evolution in psychology and human behavior that could never get undone.  This changed what human beings thought and understood about the plight of existing alone in one’s head, alone in the world, among strangers.  Whether they knew it or not, the Church lost a lot of its dogmatic sway as Hamlet stood alone on that stage, as he essentially told the audience that the complexities of human consciousness far outweigh the control that the fantasy of religion holds over the minds.  

As the play moves forward Hamlet’s dilemma up to this point is, should he trust the ghost of his murdered father and can he be sure that Claudius dripped the poison in his ear shuffling him off this mortal coil.  Hamlet decides to enlist the help of some travelers to reenact the murder of his father in a play called The Mouse Trap.  The king is to sit, watch the play and if it stifles him when the poison is poured into the ear of the actor playing a king on stage, then he will confirm his guilt to Hamlet.

The king reacts with dismay and storms off, leaving Hamlet with a sense of righteousness for at this point of the confirmation, he must act.  Claudius is later seen in a room alone praying, feeling the guilt of what he has done swell his heart, suffocating it.  Hamlet watches Claudius, seeing his opportunity to kill him where he kneels but he hesitates, considers that the king is praying so he can’t take the chance, that if he slays him there on that spot, that might insure the king passage to the kingdom of heaven and not the incarcerating pits of hell.   Hamlet painfully walks away but not without regret, because he finally had the chance to repay his father’s symbolic debt by killing his murderer, thus releasing his father into the realm of the Real.

Hamlet later argues with his mother Gertrude as Ophelia’s father Polonius hides behind a room curtain to confirm what many are thinking about Hamlet, that he’s going insane.  Hamlet confronts Gertrude about her marriage with Claudius and while in a fit of rage over her betrayal of her dead husband, Polonius is heard moving behind the curtain and Hamlet, thinking that it’s the king, lunges his sword through the curtain and to his surprise, a dead Polonius falls to the floor.  Revenge is deterioration in thought and language, where at the point of decay, violence becomes its mediator.

Hamlet knows after killing Polonius that he can’t go back now, thinking is no longer enough, he’s acted now, it’s real – in the world.  Hamlet confronts his mother again about sharing her bed with Claudius.  Queen Gertrude becomes dreadfully upset as her son constantly berates her, resulting in her storming out, ordering him to never speak of it again or never to speak to her again.

One consideration by Sigmund Freud is; Hamlet’s rage toward his mother isn’t about her betraying her dead husband, but rather her betraying Hamlet himself.  Hamlet is the phallus and now that his only competition for his mother affection is dead, he should finally have her full attention but doesn’t.  Hamlet screams about her sexual promiscuity in such a way, that Freud hypothesized as jealousy, oedipal jealousy.  Sir Lawrence Olivier as Hamlet in the 1948 film adopted this interpretation as did Mel Gibson later in 1990, by kissing Gertrude on the lips with hints of passion in this critical, mother and son moment in the play.

At this point things are spiraling out of control and the king fearing his life, sends Hamlet away.  He doesn’t dare kill him because Hamlet is loved by the people of Denmark.  Hamlet sails to England and is intercepted by pirates and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are killed, thus leaving Hamlet the opportunity to escape and shorten this unwanted trip and return to Denmark.

Laertes travels back from France to Denmark and upon arriving is enraged that his father is dead and his sister has fallen into madness.  Claudius convinces him that Hamlet is the one responsible.  Then when news that Hamlet is returning, Claudius swiftly concocts a plot in the form of a fencing match between Laertes and Hamlet with poison tipped sword-pummels, but also plans to offer Hamlet poisoned wine if that fails.

In Hamlet’s absence, his love Ophelia has lost her mind culminating over the death of her father, Polonius, she is found dead in a watery bed of floating flowers – mermaid-like.  It’s all too likely the melancholic Ophelia took her own life as a result, just like some people who spend their lives obeying other people without any sense of personal agency.

Ophelia was a witness because she wasn’t really allowed access to what was really happening around her by the controlling men in her life, Hamlet and Polonius.  Ophelia was used by everyone around her, and maybe the most tragic is by Shakespeare himself.  Her presents in the play at points seem to have more to do with the relationship between Hamlet and Gertrude then she and Hamlet.  Hamlet clearly has issues with women in general, calling them “breeders of sinners”.

Ophelia had no control over her body, her relationships, or her choices.  Her marriage plans were totally in the control of her father, Polonius.  Because she was a good girl, she was often left opinion-less in the face of Hamlet, who believed that after they married she would turn him into a monster and inevitably cheat on him.  Maybe most of Hamlet’s hostility toward Ophelia was displaced anger toward his own mother and her own infidelity.  Ophelia’s brother Laertes told her that she should fear intimacy with Hamlet and that pre-marital sex is unacceptable and that ‘deflowered’ woman are damaged goods that no man would want to marry.  It’s likely that she and Hamlet have not been intimate, even though she sings a bawdy song about a maiden who is tricked into losing her virginity with the promise of marriage, but never the less, doesn’t convince her father and brother of this.  They think men and woman are for sex in their feeble minds, so they simply assumed that this would be inevitable, even though in reality it wasn’t true.  The true tragedy of Ophelia is she didn’t do anything wrong, she just falls victim and is destroyed by the patriarchal court culture anyway. 

"On the calm black water where the stars sleep

White Ophelia floats like a great lily; 

Floats very slowly, lying in her long veils…. 

You hear in the distant woods sounds of the kill."

-Arthur Rimbaud

 When Hamlet arrives back in Elsinore he happens upon a freshly dug grave.  He is unaware of who the grave is dug for.  It is here in a pivotal part of the play that Hamlet comes face to face with mortality.  Hamlet holds up the unearthed skull of Yorick, a man that he once knew as a child, and is reminded of the permanency of death.  This is a meaningful existential moment in the play that we are forced to see a bigger picture without us in it.  We are not a celebration in the universe let alone in the story of man, we are going to die and we are going to be forgotten and if not forgotten we are going to likely be misunderstood.  All of Hamlet’s brooding over life, death, mortality and the philosophical contemplation of man; all comes to a grotesque head.  This ages him as he awakens to the wise reflective outlook on life as it spans across the ages of many men.


This turning point for Hamlet is a result of him thinking of the commonness of death and the vanity of life.  He thinks of Yorick, a fellow of infinite jest and of the most excellent fancy, as well as he considers the body of Alexander the Great, seeing both men as meeting the same end.  Death has no opinion on men and what they have done with their lives or what they have not done with them.  Death doesn’t care about who you were.  Hamlet is contemplative but he’s not melodramatically contemplating suicide anymore as he becomes more mature to his acceptance of a common human fate.  Hamlet is ready for the inevitability of death and his unavoidable fate, if not now it will come one day.  This is a very Buddhist acceptance for him in the end by accepting death as something finite and not immortal.  This frees Hamlet of all his religious obligations in structured society, he sees that he is a secular man in a fantasy world of phony ideologies.

       “ To philosophize is to learn to die.”                                                                                         – Michel de Montaigne

It is time now for Hamlet to confront the unknown inevitability as this thriller of a play unfolds.  Hamlet has been invited by Laertes to a fencing match where he is fatally wounded with a poisoned tipped blade.  The sword is dropped and Hamlet uses it to stick Laertes thus poisoning him with the very same fate.  Queen Gertrude drinks the poisoned wine meant for Hamlet and dies.  Did Gertrude drink from the poison to save her son from doing it or was she just simply unaware that it was poisonous?  Was she aware about the poison and knew it was for her son and had second thoughts, so drank it herself?

Before dying, Laertes reconciles with Hamlet by informing him that this was the unfolding of Claudius’s evil plot to kill him.  In turn, Hamlet stabs Claudius with the poisonous sword and forces him to drink of the ill-fated wine.  Claudius dies.  Hamlet names Fortinbras, prince of Norway, heir to the throne of Denmark then dies.

Hamlet, before the events of the play unfolded, was a man with a promising future.  He was set to marry his love Ophelia and become King; he was off getting an education, then his father died in his sleep. 

I see Hamlet as a young man that was truly naïve to the trappings of the world at large but I also see him as a bad guy, he is not entirely innocent to the circumstances of the events as they unfold, he certainly overthinks them but he has a malicious side to him.  He’s Nietzsche’s Human all too human but lacks the laughter about his meaningless power in the long run.

Reflection and action are what highlights Shakespeare’s meditative characterization of Hamlet.  The loss of the word is often the tragedy in the play in the Lacanian sense.  Hamlet enters the Order of the Real and never quite recovers from it.  His diction becomes littered with binary oppositions placing him in a precarious state of flux, rendering ideas without opposition unpalatable.  This directly relates to his inaction in the play, thus assuming the role of the phallus, which increasingly distances Hamlet from reality.  The human psyche is determined by the structures of language and the linguistic delivery of our human desires. 

The loss of the word is indicated at the end of the play as all the main characters that are dying are all speaking, respectively, lending itself to the fact it wasn’t the loss of death but rather the loss of speech that was the most crucial part of mankind and that speech will be lost in death.

T.S Eliot in his essay, The Sacred Wood: Hamlet and his Problems, concludes that Hamlet was truly unable to convey the true essence of his emotions, also his lack of external emotions in an objective correlative.  His inexpression, Eliot believed was the result of the playwright’s inability to understand it himself, emotionally.  What I think Eliot was saying about this ‘artistic failure’ was Shakespeare might have bitten off more he can chew.  The inner workings of the brain that he so desperately attempted to mine cannot be put into words on a page or even articulated by actors on a stage.  Eliot confirmed his prognoses by not offering a way to correct or to better the play.   Maybe that’s because we don’t know what was going on in Shakespeare’s mind, when he was writing what was going on in Hamlet’s head, for the playwright wrote Hamlet and never wrote about why or how he wrote Hamlet.  This lends itself to the theory that Shakespeare drew from an early play called Ur-Hamlet.

For me personally, I think that’s the genius of the play.  Shakespeare attempted something that has never been done before.  He wanted to know what, Nietzsche and Freud would later explore, was happening inside our minds when the external world interacted with it.  What was the convoluted path an idea took when it entered our ability to perceive it, as it made its way through the Id, the ego and the superego, the unconscious, subconscious and conscious mind?  These questions finally resulted in early 20^th century structuralism, picking the brain apart by way of language, that tool we all use to communicate our thoughts in the first place.

What Hamlet didn’t realize was what Nietzsche’s Dionysian man did, no matter what knowledge you have about the world; the prospect of changing it with that knowledge is often an act of futility.  Deductive reasoning as Hamlet displayed, didn’t have the most optimal results as in the case of Socrates, who wanted to enlighten the minds of his fellow Athenians and as a result was put to death.

Knowledge can be quite paralyzing while in the company of unmitigated ignorance.   Hamlet will always be open to interpretation because he’s not easily definable and he will always be a part of the past, present and future.  Our failure to learn from this magnificent piece of work is up to us. 

The rest is silence….