Hamlet's Weakness

Carlos A. Romero
Mrs. Cocciolone
College Preparatory English 12
December 5, 2010
Hamlet’s Weakness
Once upon a time, there was a tale named Hamlet, were ninety percent of the characters, were in some way, victims of their own weakness. “Thus conscience makes cowards of us all”. This phase very smart from Shakespeare’s mind makes Hamlet’s soliloquy show what he was trying to write in thewhole play. The beginning of the story shows that most of Hamlet’s characters are absolutely cowards. Hamlet, Claudius, Polonius, Gertrude, Ophelia, Guildenstern and Rosencrantz, are names that for Hamlet’s readers are symbols of cowardly and weakness, but who is the weakest of them all? Who actually take wrong decisions and even die as a result of a long way of coward and weak actions? In some way,they are all cowards; they all show what Shakespeare wants us to get from his play.
The definition of the words weak and coward are very similar, however Cambridge Dictionaries Online, wrote:
Coward is a person who is too eager to avoid danger, difficulty or pain. A weak person is a not strong human; not strong enough to work, last, succeed, persuade, be effective or in taking decisions.The next analysis of this controversial scheme will be placed to understand the answer of that matter. Even when is very complex to understand some of the lines that Shakespeare is showing on his book, one of the characteristics that is always latent is that, Hamlet characters are cowards and weak, that even when Hamlet did all what he did to find out the truth of his father’s murderer, and torevenge his own pain, he is shown in the whole play as a very weak character, however, his actions were so amusing that he probably is not the weakest one of all.
About this matter, Sigmund Freud, a recognized psychologist, wrote:
Hamlet represents the type of man whose power of direct action is paralyzed by an excessive development of his intellect. (He is ‘sicklied o’er with the pale cast ofthought’.) According to another view, the dramatist has tried to portray a pathologically irresolute character which might be classed as neurasthenic. The plot of the drama shows us, however, that Hamlet is far from being represented as a person incapable of taking any action.
Remember that we have the coward Polonius, that by following all Claudius’ lines die in a very bad way; also we haveClaudius, that by cowardly killed his brother and married his wife, and by this actions he knew that was condemned to a everlasting hell, and he wanted to repair this matter, he never did it because he wasn’t strong enough to let go the kingdom, the queen and in general, the power. However, even when this two characters where completely cowards, each in their own way, the female characters of the playmanage a giant weakness of their souls.
Gertrude and Ophelia, the two characters that never shown a little of force of their souls. Gertrude was very coward to reveal against Claudius, even when she was in love of Hamlet’s father. She is so weak, that even when his own husband was recently murderer, she was so coward to affront the new world that came upon her, that she prefers to married hishusband’s brother, isn’t this a big sign of weakness? Isn’t this one of the most coward actions in the play? Hamlet’s view shows that this is true. Shakespeare wrote in his book a very important matter to describe this series or events (Hamlet Act 1, Scene 2, 142-146):
Hamlet:
Heaven and earth,
Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him
As if increase of appetite had grown
By what it fed on,and yet, within a month—
Let me not think on't—Frailty, thy name is woman!—
Hamlet, in his first soliloquy, recalls tender scenes between his mother, Queen Gertrude, and her deceased husband. What irks Hamlet is that, after his mother had seemed so sexually dependent on the old king, she could turn around within a month of his death and marry her brother-in-law Claudius, who, Hamlet claims, is...