HAMLET: Themes
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Each theme below gives a short overview, how it develops across the play, key scenes and speeches, images to track, quick revision quotes, and study prompts.
APPEARANCE VS REALITY
Overview
Elsinore is a court of performances – mourning, marriage, prayer, diplomacy – where public show often hides private motive. Hamlet distrusts surfaces, testing words and faces for proof.
How it develops
Ceremony clashes with grief in A1S2 – “Seems… I know not ‘seems’.”
The Ghost rewrites the official story in A1S5.
Spying multiplies in A2S2; the play-within-a-play tests the king in A3S2.
Graveyard truths strip rank in A5S1.
Key scenes & speeches
A1S2 (analysis), A1S5 (analysis), A2S2 (analysis), A3S1 (analysis), A3S2 (analysis), A3S3 (analysis), A3S4 (analysis), A5S1 (analysis).
Language & imagery
Masks, acting, eavesdropping, letters, poison through the ear, disease, mirrors.
Quick quotes
“Seems, madam? Nay, it is; I know not ‘seems’.” – A1S2
“That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain.” – A1S5
“The play’s the thing…” – A2S2
Study prompts
Where does Hamlet perform sincerity – and where does he perform madness? Is Claudius’ prayer in A3S3 genuine or theatrical? How do stage directions for spying shape the audience’s knowledge?
Action vs Inaction
Overview
Hamlet’s delay is not simple cowardice. He wants certainty, proportion and moral cleanliness — which the world will not give him. Thinking slows action; action risks injustice.
How it develops
Vow of revenge collides with doubt in A1S5 and disgust in A1S2.
Plans replace acts in A2S2; “To be” weighs the cost in A3S1.
Claudius at prayer — the wrong moment for clean justice — in A3S3.
Fortinbras’ march shames Hamlet toward readiness in A4S4.
Acceptance replaces calculation in A5S2.
Key scenes & speeches
A1S5 (analysis), A2S2 (analysis), A3S1 (analysis), A3S3 (analysis), A4S4 (analysis), A5S2 (analysis).
Language & imagery
Balance, scales, conscience, sleep vs motion, appetite vs purpose.
Quick quotes
“To be, or not to be — that is the question.” — A3S1
“Thus conscience does make cowards of us all.” — A3S1
“How all occasions do inform against me.” — A4S4
Study prompts
Does Hamlet achieve a moral form of revenge by the end? Compare Hamlet’s, Laertes’ and Fortinbras’ styles of action. Where does thought serve justice, and where does it sabotage it?
Madness & Performance
Overview
Madness is worn, shown and diagnosed at court. Hamlet adopts an “antic disposition”; Ophelia’s breakdown exposes truths polite speech can’t say; Polonius hears method in seeming nonsense.
How it develops
Hamlet declares he will perform in A1S5.
Behaviour veers between strategy and volatility in A2S2 and A3S2.
The nunnery scene mixes role-play and genuine bitterness in A3S1.
Ophelia’s songs speak grief and politics in A4S5.
Key scenes & speeches
A1S5 (analysis), A2S2 (analysis), A3S1 (analysis), A3S2 (analysis), A4S5 (analysis).
Language & imagery
Masks, rehearsal, cueing, music and ballads, disorder vs method.
Quick quotes
“I am but mad north-north-west.” — A2S2
“Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t.” — A2S2
“There’s rosemary — that’s for remembrance.” — A4S5
Study prompts
Where does Hamlet’s performance tip into genuine dislocation? What does Ophelia’s “madness” let the play say about court politics? How should an actor signal performed vs real distraction?
Death & Mortality
Overview
Hamlet stares at the fact of death — as sleep, as corruption, as the leveller of rank — and tries to think and live in its shadow. The question is how to act when the end is certain.
How it develops
Grief, haste and disgust set the frame in A1S2.
“To be” imagines death as sleep, then fears what dreams may come in A3S1.
Bones and skulls collapse status in A5S1; acceptance frees action in A5S2.
Key scenes & speeches
A3S1 (analysis), A5S1 (analysis), A5S2 (analysis).
Language & imagery
Sleep, rot, skulls, dust, funeral ritual, silence.
Quick quotes
Study prompts
How does the graveyard scene re-frame revenge? Is Hamlet’s final composure resignation or courage? What does the play suggest about rites and memory?
Corruption & Disease
Overview
The new regime smells wrong. Political wrongdoing maps onto bodily rot and infection. Private sin bleeds into public decay.
How it develops
“Unweeded garden” and “rotten state” metaphors set tone in A1S2 and A1S4.
Claudius names his offence rank in A3S3; justice is gilded and delayed.
Plots, poison and counterfeit letters carry the “disease” through the court in A5S2.
Key scenes & speeches
A1S2 (analysis), A1S4 (analysis), A3S3 (analysis), A5S2 (analysis).
Language & imagery
Weeds, rank smells, sores, poison through the ear, infection.
Quick quotes
“Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” — A1S4
“’Tis an unweeded garden…” — A1S2
“O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven.” — A3S3
Study prompts
Track poison as image and plot device. How does the garden image shift meaning from A1 to A5? Where do public rituals try — and fail — to disinfect private sin?
Theatre & Truth
Overview
The play is obsessed with plays. Hamlet believes performance can expose reality — and instructs actors how to show truth without rant. Drama becomes a trap and a mirror.
How it develops
The Players arrive and Hamlet sets the Mousetrap in A2S2 and A3S2.
The show flushes Claudius; Gertrude’s “protest too much” reads falseness in A3S2.
Stories and testimony become the final court in A5S2.
Key scenes & speeches
A2S2 (analysis), A3S2 (analysis).
Language & imagery
Mirror, measure, temperance, cue and action, audience and conscience.
Quick quotes
“The play’s the thing / Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.” — A2S2
“Suit the action to the word, the word to the action.” — A3S2
“…to hold, as ’twere, the mirror up to nature.” — A3S2
Study prompts
Is Hamlet a good director — and why does that matter? How should the Mousetrap be staged to read as truth-telling? Where else does the court function as a theatre?
Conscience & Guilt
Overview
Conscience bites across the court. Hamlet fears damnation for rash revenge. Claudius wants pardon without restitution. Words and thoughts split from deeds.
How it develops
Hamlet’s self-reproach and planning in A2S2; moral calculus in A3S1.
Claudius’ kneeling prayer — words fly up, thoughts remain below — in A3S3.
Cruelty to Gertrude framed as kindness in A3S4; Polonius’ death complicates guilt.
Confession, testimony and judgment close the action in A5S2.
Key scenes & speeches
A2S2 (analysis), A3S1 (analysis), A3S3 (analysis), A3S4 (analysis), A5S2 (analysis).
Language & imagery
Prayer, mercy, scales, stain, confession, theatre of penitence.
Quick quotes
“May one be pardon’d and retain the offence?” — A3S3
“My words fly up, my thoughts remain below.” — A3S3
“I must be cruel, only to be kind.” — A3S4
Study prompts
Does the play offer any true absolution? How should an actor balance anger and care in the closet scene? Compare Claudius’ guilt with Hamlet’s scruple.
Providence & Readiness
Overview
Late Hamlet trusts a pattern larger than choice. Readiness becomes a moral stance — act cleanly when called, not anxiously before time.
How it develops
After the sea voyage Hamlet accepts contingency and risk; by A5S2 “the readiness is all”.
Key scenes & speeches
Language & imagery
Divinity, shaping ends, sparrows, the fitted time.
Quick quotes
“There’s a divinity that shapes our ends…” — A5S2
“There’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow.” — A5S2
“If it be now… the readiness is all.” — A5S2
Study prompts
Is this faith, philosophy or coping strategy? How does “readiness” alter Hamlet’s ethics of revenge? What staging choices signal this change to the audience?
Memory & Remembrance
Overview
Memory is duty and burden — from the Ghost’s “Remember me” to Ophelia’s herbs. The court manages remembrance through ceremony; Hamlet keeps a private ledger.
How it develops
Hamlet vows to wipe away trivial records in A1S5.
Tokens and keepsakes become moral evidence in A3S1 and A3S4.
Yorick’s skull collapses nostalgia into mortality in A5S1; Horatio becomes living memory in A5S2.
Key scenes & speeches
A1S5 (analysis), A3S1 (analysis), A4S5 (analysis), A5S1 (analysis), A5S2 (analysis).
Language & imagery
Books, tablets, herbs of remembrance, relics, testimony.
Quick quotes
“Remember me.” — A1S5
“There’s rosemary — that’s for remembrance.” — A4S5
“Report me and my cause aright.” — A5S2
Study prompts
What does Hamlet choose to remember — and to forget? How do props serve memory on stage? Is Horatio’s role ethical witness or loyal friend — or both?
Jump to themes on: Appearance vs Reality • Action vs Inaction • Madness & Performance • Death & Mortality • Corruption & Disease • Theatre & Truth • Conscience & Guilt • Providence & Readiness • Memory & Remembrance