Hamlet has seven major themes, and each has its own in-depth guide. Revenge and Justice follows the Ghost's command and the three sons – Hamlet, Laertes and Fortinbras – who must avenge a murdered father. Madness and Folly separates the madness Hamlet performs from the real madness that destroys Ophelia. Appearance vs Reality is about a court where smiles hide murder and nobody can be taken at face value. Death and Mortality traces the question the whole play circles, from suicide to the graveyard. Action vs Inaction asks why Hamlet, who knows what he must do, cannot bring himself to do it. Disease and Corruption shows Denmark as a sick, rotting body. Gender and Power looks at how little room the play's two women are given to act. Each guide explains what the theme means, where it appears in the play, and what it tells us about the tragedy.

The Ghost orders Hamlet to avenge his murder, but Hamlet's Christian beliefs tell him that killing is a sin. He is trapped between the two. The play sets three young men against each other, each avenging a dead father in a different way: Hamlet thinks and delays, Laertes acts on impulse, and Fortinbras works through politics and an army. The key moments are the Ghost's command in A1S5, the prayer scene in A3S3, and the poisoned duel in A5S2. All three sons get their revenge, but none of them achieves real justice, and the Danish royal family is destroyed. See Revenge and Justice in Hamlet for the full analysis.

There are two kinds of madness in the play. Hamlet's madness is mostly an act. He warns his friends in A1S5 that he will "put an antic disposition on" – a pretend madness he uses as a weapon and a disguise – and even Polonius senses there is "method" in it (A2S2). Ophelia's madness is the opposite: it is real. Grief for her dead father, and the cruel way the men around her have treated her, break her mind, and she drowns (A4S5). The play also shows ordinary folly, from Polonius's foolish spying to the joking gravediggers. See Madness and Folly in Hamlet for the full analysis.

From his very first scene, Hamlet insists he is not pretending – "I know not 'seems'" (A1S2) – in a court where almost everyone else is. Claudius can "smile, and smile, and be a villain" (A1S5): he looks like a caring king but is a murderer. Polonius spies and sends others to spy. Women's faces are painted over. Because nobody can be trusted at face value, Hamlet stages a play to trap the truth, deciding that "the play's the thing / Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king" (A2S2). See Appearance vs Reality in Hamlet for the full analysis.

The whole play circles around death. In his most famous speech, "To be, or not to be" (A3S1), Hamlet weighs living against dying and admits that the fear of what comes after death is what stops people ending their lives. In the graveyard (A5S1) he handles the skull of Yorick and realises that death levels everyone, from a court jester to Alexander the Great. By Act 5 his fear has turned into a calm acceptance, captured in his line "the readiness is all". See Death and Mortality in Hamlet for the full analysis.

Hamlet knows what he has been told to do, but he cannot make himself do it. Again and again he decides to act and then stops to think instead. He even blames thinking itself, saying that "conscience does make cowards of us all" (A3S1). The play measures him against men who act without hesitating – Fortinbras, who marches an army across Denmark for a worthless scrap of land, and Laertes, who storms the palace the moment his father is killed (A4S4). Their decisiveness shows up Hamlet's delay. See Action vs Inaction in Hamlet for the full analysis.

Shakespeare describes Denmark again and again as a sick, rotting body. The warning "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark" (A1S4) sets the tone, and the play fills with images of ulcers, poison, infection and weeds. The rottenness is moral and political as much as physical: Claudius has poisoned his brother and seized the throne, and his guilt "smells to heaven" (A3S3). The poison that kills old Hamlet in his ear becomes the symbol for a corruption that spreads unseen through the kingdom. See Disease and Corruption in Hamlet for the full analysis.

Power in Elsinore belongs to men, and the two women in the play are given very little room to act for themselves. Ophelia is controlled by her father, her brother and Hamlet, and is told to obey all three. Gertrude is judged above all for her remarriage and her sexuality. Hamlet's bitter line "Frailty, thy name is woman!" (A1S2) shows how harshly the play, and its hero, judge women, and both women end the play dead. See Gender and Power in Hamlet for the full analysis.