Literary Analysis of Shakespeare’s Hamlet Essay

In the English reincarnation, identity was an important engross, occurrencely the verbalism of identity. As Stephen Greenblatt argues, there is in the early modern period a change in the intellectual, social, psychological, and aesthetic structures that govern the generation of identities that is non save complex except resolutely dialectical (1). The identity of the independent was of particular importance how monarchs shaped their own identities, and how these identities affected their subjects.Ta baron Greenblatts argument, this physical composition examines the construction and manipulation of identity in Shakespeares hamlet in particular, the ways in which Elizabeth Is self-representations inform the add. In supplement, the penning will show how the characterization of critical point is shaped by the radiation pattern of Elizabeth I, who controlled her reality moving picture through elaborately constructed self-representations. Reflecting her use of these represe ntations, crossroads, who possesses stereotypically maidenly attri neverthelesses, fights to reanimate himself as a masculine character to recover his familys and demesnes honor.The late Elizabethan period was filled with anxiety and get down over the aging of Queen Elizabeth I. Concern about her impending termination was solo made worse by her refusal to name a surrogate. When Shakespeare quiet settlement in 1600, the playwright was subject to an aging, infirm pansy, who at cardinal had left no heirs to the English thr hotshot. In settlement, Shakespeare thus addresses two semi policy-making problems that England typefaced at the beginning of the s heretoforeteenth-century royal season and womanly sovereignty. As Tennenhouse argues, History plays could non be written afterward hamlet, because the whole payoff of dislodgering power from single monarch to another had to be rethought in enamour of the aging clay of the queen (85). The preoccupation of the Engli sh public with who would mystify their new ruler, along with eager laughipation of male kingship, is expressed passim settlement. Although the play is not written as a political allegory, un signalion qualified resemblingities do exist between aspects of Queen Elizabeth Is public persona and the character of critical point. Before further explaining this comparison, however, it is necessary to describe how Elizabeth I shaped her public persona.Elizabeth Is Image As head of the Angli stomach Church, Elizabeth I was wary to align herself in marriage with a Catholic. Accordingly, carole Levin argues that Elizabeth I promoted the image of herself as a pristine maiden head into the middle and advanced years of her life Elizabeth presented herself to her state as a symbol of virginity, a Virgin Queen (64). Whether political or personal, her refusal to hook up with was in many ways advantageous, for she avoided the disaster of Mary Is match with Phillip II. Yet it likewise cau sed a great deal of concern among the populace.As Levin observes, by not binding, Elizabeth also refused the most obvious plump of being a queen, that of bearing a child. Nor would she name a successor as Parliament begged her to do, since Elizabeth was convinced this would increase, sooner than ease, both the political tautness and her personal danger (66). Elizabeth Is strategy to retain political power may create pr make upted the usurpation of her authority by a husband, plainly it did cause disfavor among the English citizens, peculiarly as she grew fourth-year without announcing an heir.Anxiety over the ecological succession led to disrespect for Elizabeth I, with many people gossiping that she did not marry because she was an un born(p) muliebrity. Levin writes, there were rumors that Elizabeth had an impediment that would eradicate regular sexual relations (86). Levin provides an example for these rumors in an excerpt of a letter from her cousin Mary Stuart indubi tably you are not like other women, and it is folly to advance the notion of your marriage with the Duke of Alencon, seeing that much(prenominal) a conjugal union would never be consummated (86).Others claimed that Elizabeth I had illegitimate children who were kept secret (Levin 85). These accusations indicate that English citizens, as spunky as family relations, perceived Elizabeth Fs prolonged maidenhood as unnatural and even monstrous. Although Elizabeth I was willing to admit to Parliament that she had spent much of her strength, she was awake to cultivate the image of herself as a schoolboyish woman to the public. unitary important example of this method is the famous Rainbow Portrait, which Elizabeth I commissioned in approximately 1600, the same period critical point was written.Even though Elizabeth I was sixty-seven years old when the painting was commissioned, she appears in the painting to be a young woman (Levin). Elizabeth I created an intricate and diverse im age of herself. As an unmarried monarch, she became Englands Virgin Queen. Possessing two bodies, Elizabeth I schematic masculine authority as Prince and as mother to her subjects. As Elizabeth I grew previous(a), she relied on iconography to deceive the English populace into faceing her as young and vital. These diverse representations of Elizabeth I are complexly reflected in Hamlet.The similarities between Elizabeth I and Gertrude are obvious both women are perceived as indulgent, aesthetic monarchs and are criticized for attempting to act like women younger than their aline ages. To Gertrude, Hamlet even states, O shame, where is thy blush? (3. 4. 91). Despite these correspondences, a to a greater extent(prenominal) interesting analogy exists between Elizabeth I and the character of Hamlet. The paper will compare Elizabeth I, who claimed to fuddle the heart and stomach of a king (Levin 1) with Hamlet, a prince often castigated for playacting in a stereotypically femini ne manner. Reflections of Elizabeth Is Constructed Identities in HamletOne attempt by Elizabeth I to maintain her image as the Virgin Queen was a use of heavy cosmetics in an drift to make herself look younger and therefore stronger. Mullaney quotes Jesuit priest Anthony Rivers as describing Elizabeth Is makeup at some celebrations in 1600, when Hamlet was written, to be in some places near half an inch slurred (147). Unfortunately for Elizabeth I, this attempt to hide the helplessness of her age seems only to suck in exacerbated her subjects contempt for the assumed impuissance of her sex. M. P. Tilley observes that during the late Elizabethan period, there was a strong feeling a get tost a woman using cosmetics (312).Women who used cosmetics, accord to popular feeling, altered their bodies, the understructures of God, and were therefore not only immodest but blasphemous. According to Mullaney, women who used cosmetics considered to be false women because they created a decep tive face to replace the one given to them by God altering their natural female appearance made them not genuinely women. Not only were cosmetics blasphemous and dishonest, they were physically destructive. A woman who piebald her face in the Renaissance thus arguably destroyed her person in both way possible spiritually and bodily.Hamlet displays notable disgust toward pied women, yet critics have overlooked that many of the contemporary Renaissance objections to womens use of cosmetics apply to Hamlets actions. Similar to the way that painted women used cosmetics to disguise the faces that God had given them, Hamlet puts on his wondrous disposition to disguise the faculties of reason which God has given him (1. 5. 192), faculties which in the Renaissance were an essential aspect of the virtuous man. Whether or not Hamlet is truly mad, he constructs a persona to dissimulate his purpose of revenge.Painted women were disparaged for insobriety their corpse with dangerous chemic als Hamlet engages in a dangerous quest to avenge his father, and because of his quest for revenge, he is fatally poisoned. By assuming an antic disposition, a false face, Hamlet is physically poisoned by the bated mark of Laertes. Laertes poison destroys Hamlets frame natural and symbolically disrupts the body politic, since Hamlet will be unable to rule Denmark. In addition to putting on an antic disposition, a type of face painting, Hamlet possesses other womanly attributes that would arguably have caused some anxiety.Mullaney asserts that popular idea in the Renaissance, specially in the final years of Elizabeth Is reign, was against the rule of a female monarch. The English people had always been hesitating to accept a female queen as Elizabeth I grew older and more infirm, their tolerance for being ruled by a woman diminished. Mullaney further argues that this intolerance was a part of the English subjects realization that Elizabeth I was feeble and politically weakening f or the Renaissance misogyny may in fact be an integral part of the mourning process when the lost object or ideal being processed is a woman, especially but not exclusively when that woman is a queen of England, likewise (140). As the English publics sorrow for the decline of their queens strength increased, so too did their contempt for her bodily weakness and inability to govern effectively. Reflecting anxiety about Elizabeths I old age and infirmity, Hamlet displays a stereotypically feminine quality that makes him problematic as heir to the danish throne.Early in the play, Claudius chides Hamlet for his unmanly grief concerning the passing of his father (1. 2. 98). Elaine Showalter claims that Hamlets emotional vulnerability can readily be conceptualized as feminine (223). Discussing Hamlets creation of a mad persona, Carol Thomas Neely also lists passivity and harm of control among Hamlets feminine attributes during his period of madness (326). Hamlets emotional vulnerabi lity and passivity, when considered in the politically-charged atmosphere of the late Elizabethan period, can even be seen as his downfall.Mullaney, quoting Tennenhouse, argues that Hamlet is a play keenly aware of its late Elizabethan status, in which the impending transfer of power from one monarch to another had to be rethought in view of the aging body of the queen (149). He goes on to view Hamlet as inhabiting a male-constructed world. Mullaney asserts that like other Shakespearean males, Hamlet achieves a incomplete if suicidal resolution of the contradictions of patriarchy by constructing a world that is not so much gendered as free from gender differentiationa world that is all male (158).It is believable that Hamlets true problem is actually the oppositehis world is too female, or rather feminine. Despite the small number of females in the play, Hamlet presents a feminine character in a male body, a twisted disapproval of Elizabeth I, who claimed to have the body of a wea k and feeble woman, but the heart and stomach of a king (Levin 1). Hamlet possesses the body of a prince, but the heart and stomach of a woman a fusion which was oddly problematic in the misogynistic environment that prevailed during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.As a feminine character in the body of a male, particularly one who, as Claudius observes, is most immediate to the throne (1. 2. 113), Hamlet cannot be allowed to conk out and assume the throne. His death, as well as the passage of the danish pastry monarchy to the quintessential warrior figure, Fortinbras, reflects the transition of the throne from Elizabeth I to James I. James Is ascension to the English throne alleviated some anxiety of female sovereignty, although his reign showed his peevish, cowardly, and self-indulgent disposition.When Hamlet puts on an antic disposition, crafting himself as mad, he evinces natural traits that are usually associated with feminine weakness. Hamlet is beset with passivity and indecision, two qualities often ascribed to women in the Renaissance (Woodbridge 275-99). Passivity and indecision deflect and nearly thwart his quest to obey his fathers make for revenge. Davis D. McElroy claims that Hamlet, in addition to considering the ghosts exhortation to avenge him, contemplates taking no action at all. McElroy examines the opening five lines of the to be or not to be soliloquy To be, or not to be, that is the questionWhether is nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing, end them. (3. 1. 64-8) McElroy alleges that these lines, which are generally believed to be Hamlets argument regarding suicide, constitute a different deliberation on revenge hideing Claudius, as the alleged ghost of his father demands, or taking no action at alla more cowardly decision, certainly, but definitely safer. McElroy compares the two options by examining the rhetoric of chiasmusclaim ing that to be refers to taking arms against Claudius and not to be refers to suffering outrageous fortune. He argues that the speech pertains more reasonably to revenge than suicide because killing oneself is more like avoiding ones troubles than opposing them (544). It can be posited that Hamlets indecision concerning his vow to avenge his father parallels Elizabeth Fs refusal to name an heir. As Tennenhouse observes, Where Claudius would be second to Hamlet and Hamlets line in a patrilineal system, the queens husband and uncle of the kings son occupies the privileged male position in a matrilinear system... It is to be expected that Claudius could not legally possess the crown, the matrilinear succession having the weaker claim on British political thinking. (89) Hamlets province is not merely to uphold his promise of vengeance. He also has an stipulation to his terra firma to see Claudius removed from the throne and Hamlet, the rightful ruler in patrilineal succession, put i n his place. When Hamlet contemplates neglecting this obligation, he endangers the succession to the Danish throne in much the same way that Elizabeth Is secrecy concerning her own succession endangers England.Arguably, Hamlet fails in his responsibility to cheer the Danish succession after Hamlets death, Fortinbras, a Norwegian, assumes the throne. Although Fortinbras is a better candidate than the corrupt Claudius, he is a member of Norways royal line, not Denmarks. Elizabeth Is refusal to marry consigns England to a similar fate regarding kingship and royal lines. James I is a member of the British royal family, but he is a Stuart, not a Tudor. As the Virgin Queen, Elizabeth I secures her own power by refusing to name a successor during her life beat, but she allows her familial line to die with her.Elizabeth I also protected her political authority by crafting several personas. As seen in the Rainbow Portrait, she took liberally from mythological figures, such as Astraea, Flora , and Diana. Just as Elizabeth I appropriated the appearance and femininity of goddesses, Hamlet appropriates the masculine authority he observes in Fortinbras. Hamlet attempts to construct a persona that goes beyond an antic disposition, abstracted to fashion himself as a strong son and leader of Denmark. later hearing of Fortinbrass plan to attack a desolate prolong of Poland, Hamlet resolves to emulate the militant Fortinbras by fashioning himself as a bloody avenger How stand I, then, That have a father killed, a mother stained, Excitements of my reason and my blood, And let all sleep O, from this time by My thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth (4. 4. 59-62, 68-9) Although Hamlet desires to construct himself as an aggressive and violent fighter, he is never able to attain Fortinbrass forcefulness. Hamlets passivity here shows weakness and debility, not qualities appropriate in a military leader or a monarch.Although Hamlet attempts to assume the masculinity of Fortinbras, shaping himself as a potent agent of revenge, Hamlets attempted emulation of Fortinbrass masculinity is merely another false front. Hamlet recognizes his own passivity, but however much he tries to counter and suppress it, his femininity is too firmly a part of his personality for him to overcome it completely. Even though Hamlet seeks to avenge his fathers murder, he is unable to kill Claudius in Act three, scene three. Hamlet decides not to kill Claudius at his attempted prayer, and he thus does not do what he has intractable to do.At this point in the play, the audience sees a fluid character, one who first fashions himself as mad, then earnestly attempts to mold himself like the soldier Fortinbras. However much Hamlet views himself as mutable, he cannot override his inactive nature. Hamlet attempts to put on Fortinbrass masculine disposition after killing Polonius and assuring the deaths of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, yet even after returning from his pilot to England, Haml et is caught in his feminine passivity. Despite his earlier resolve that his thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth (4. 4. 69), Hamlet makes no move against Claudius.He walks with Horatio in the graveyard, where he learns of Ophelias death (5. 1. 253), and he attacks Laertes at her gravesite (5. 1. 273), but he still clings to his false antic disposition. Gertrude calls his appearance mere madness and compares Hamlet to a female dove (5. 1. 302, 304). Hamlets shock and grief at learning about Ophelias death could excuse his distraction from attacking Claudius, but Hamlet delays his childbed too long. By waiting for Laertes challenge instead of choosing his own time to confront Claudius, Hamlet is forced to fight on the treacherous kings terms and dies at the tip of Laertes poisoned sword.Hamlets debate mirrors the rule of Elizabeth I, who controlled her public image through elaborately constructed personas. Similar to Hamlet, Elizabeth I attempted to disguise or suppress her femi nine weakness. She proclaimed that she have a masculine body politic despite her female body natural. Elizabeth I maintained supremacy throughout her reignno diffused task for a woman in the Renaissanceyet her refusal to marry and produce heirs ended the Tudor line of succession.Hamlets enlist reflects the anxiety experienced by many English subjects as Elizabeth I grew older with no children to succeed her as Elizabeth I aged, the question of the sovereigns role or representation to provide for the common eudaimonia became increasingly critical. The Queen was still a mere woman, even though she had the heart and stomach of a king (Levin 1). Equally, Hamlet strives to create a public persona that corresponds with the masculine strength of Fortinbras, but he in conclusion succumbs to feminine passivity, even though he is a prince. ConclusionHamlet reflects the anxiety of many of Elizabeth Is subjects concerning the strength of their Queen and the succession of the monarchy. With no husband and no heir to the throne, the political security of the country was at stake. Furthermore, many citizens were concerned with Elizabeth Is aging body and her undignified attempts to appear younger. This concern developed in many cases into contempt for Elizabeth Is deceptive manipulations of her image. Hamlet has many feminine characteristics that, especially in the climate of Elizabeth Is decline, make him unsuitable as a ruler or potential king.Although he is not naturally suited to the masculine requirements of kingship, Hamlet strives to overcome his feminine nature in order to reinstate the honor and dignity of his family and kingdom. Although he accomplishes this end, his femininity delays him until he is betrayed by Claudius treachery. Hamlet removes Claudius from the throne, but at the cost of many lives, and the Danish monarchy passes to a Norwegian ruler. Like Elizabeth I, Hamlet tries to recreate his identity to gain needed respect and authority, but ultimate ly fails to protect his fathers line of succession.In Hamlet, readers can surmise some of the feelings Shakespeare may have experienced in the growing misogyny that permeated the final years of Elizabeth Is reign. Like Hamlet, Elizabeth I was not without flaws, and her subjects came to resent her for these weaknesses, anticipating the advent of a more powerfuland masculinemonarch. As Shakespeare demonstrates with Hamlets poignant death and with Fortinbrass triumph, a stronger, more manful monarch is not necessarily a more admirable or worthy one. full treatment Cited Greenblatt, Stephen. Renaissance Self-Fashioning From More to Shakespeare. Chicago U of Chicago P, 1980.Levin, Carole. The Heart and acquit of a King Elizabeth I and the Politics of Sex and business leader. Philadelphia U of dada P, 1994. McElroy, Davis D. To Be, or Not to BeIs That the Question? College English 25. 7 (1964) 543-545. Mullaney, Steven. mourn and Misogyny Hamlet, The Revengers Tragedy, and the Final Progress of Elizabeth I, 1600-1607. Shakespeare Quarterly 45. 2 (1994) 139-62. Neely, Carol Thomas. Documents in Madness Reading Madness and Gender in Shakespeares Tragedies and Early Modern Culture. Shakespeare Quarterly 42. 3 (1991) 315-38. Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Eds. Barbara A.Mowat and Paul Werstine. New York majuscule Square P, 1992. Showaiter, Elaine. Representing Ophelia Women, Madness, and the Responsibilities of Feminist Criticism. Hamlet Complete, Authoritative Text with Biographical and historical Contexts, Critical History, and Essays from Five Contemporary Critical Perspectives. Ed. Susanne L. Wofford. Boston Bedford Books of St. Martins Press, 1994. Tennenhouse, Leonard. Power on Display The Politics of Shakespeares Genres. New York Methuen, 1986. Tilley, M. P, I develop Heard of Your Paintings Too. (Hamlet III, i, 148). The Review of English Studies 5. 19 (1929) 312-17