Poll: Was Hamlet Crazy?

[Korten12]

I just finished Hamlet in English and my teacher told us that some believe that Hamlet was really crazy the whole time (he doesn't think so) and I am inclined to agree with him.

Reasons why I think he wasn't crazy.

1.Horatio and the guards also saw the ghost. Their would have been no way if Hamlet would have learned about the ghost if they didn't tell him.

2.The play ending where they renacted the murder scene. Since the ghost told him how he was murder and he got the actors to have the scene (even though it was interrupted by Hamlet), Clanius(sp) reacted the that scene.

If the ghost was all an hulluncination, not only would their be no way to know of the murder scene, but if it wasn't real, the king wouldn't have been stariled by the scene.

What do you guys and gals think?

 

[Prince Regent]

My guess is that he was just drunk the whole time. Just like Macbeth.

 

[Scorched_Cascade]

Wow a Hamlet thread I never thought I'd see the day.

I don't think he is totally crazy but he is somewhat deranged. An example would be when he mocks the dead Jester in the famous Alas poor Yorick, I knew him Horatio scene. Of course Shakespeare is prone to macabre humour in some of his plays, presumably for shock value to his theatre goers, so that might be the Author coming through rather than the character.

 

[Canid117]

Pretty sure he was supposed to have multiple personality disorder.

 

[Scorched_Cascade]

Also I think there is a point in the play where he does become actually crazy. Prior to this point he has been pretending that he is insane so that people take him less seriously and don't consider him a threat so he can work out what is going on.

[sub]He also has a massive Oedipal complex going on.[/sub]

 

[StellarViking]

There's a line by Polonius-

"Though this be madness, yet there is method in it."

Hamlet knew what he was doing. He might have gotten a bit koo-koo bananas at some point in enacting his plan, but I think he was sane.

 

[Tossth Esalad]

Just like every other person from Helsingør, he's bat-s**t crazy...

Furthermore, Hamlet is based on a viking age epic poem; that's a whole other level of insane.

 

[Latinidiot]

No he's not insane. He's just, well, troubled. Who wouldn't be at that point.

 

[Korten12]

Wow a Hamlet thread I never thought I'd see the day.

I don't think he is totally crazy but he is somewhat deranged. An example would be when he mocks the dead Jester in the famous Alas poor Yorick, I knew him Horatio scene. Of course Shakespeare is prone to macabre humour in some of his plays, presumably for shock value to his theatre goers, so that might be the Author coming through rather than the character.

You've seen the day.