III. Hamlet’s  Character  Defects哈姆雷特的性格缺陷

3.1 Contradictions in Hamlet’s Character

On the journey through the path of life, people encounters with many different incidents and situations where they must act accordingly.  Depending on what type of personality is possessed, people can deal with them in numerous ways.  In the play Hamlet, the main character is faced with a cluster of dilemmas and is in emotional distress. Hamlet’s character always has the contradictory sides.

3.1.1 Brave as Well as Timid

Hamlet is the Prince of Denmark. He enjoys a high social position and is respected by his people. Yet ever since he is called back from the university to the Danish court by the news of his father’s sudden death, he is involved in the depth of misery and the arduous task of avenging . His misery is deepened by his mother’s hasty marriage to his uncle, the present king and the suspected killer of his father. Life has suddenly become so complicated and challenging for Hamlet .

Young and inexperienced as he is , Hamlet’s strong character enables him to stand firm under such a difficulty . Feeling isolated and lonely, he remains calm, using his intelligence to contend with his uncle’s crimes and finally carrying out the revenge, though at the cost of his own life. Throughout the play, we can see that Hamlet is “neither a frail and weak-minded youth nor a thought-sick dreamer”; on the contrary , he is “fearless and impetuous in action”. His rushes after the ghost , kills Polonius , deals with the King’s commission on the ship, board the pirate ship , jumps into the grave of Ophelia out of honest love and executes his final revenge during the duel with Laertes. He appears insensible to the fear of any ordinary kind.

Yet in the play , Hamlet’s delay and hesitations in carrying out his task of revenge is also obvious . He even appears to be shrinking and slow sometimes. He has several good chances to kill Claudius but he just lets them slip by. Sometimes, when he fails to make good use of a chance, he has to find some excuses for his inaction to comfort his guilty conscience. For instance , on his way to his mother’s when the play-show ends , he meets the king praying, he could have drawn out his sword and killed him on the spot. If his delay so far is due to the lack of evidence of the present King’s crime , now he has got what he needs and he should have taken immediate action. But he fails again on the pretext that hemight send the King to heaven if he kills him then because the King is praying at that moment. Often he reproaches himself bitterly for the neglect of his duty. He even asks himself in genuine bewilderment,“ what should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven?” “Do I linger? Can the cause be cowardice ?” what is it that makes me sit idle when I feel if is shameful to do so , and when I have cause ,and will, and strength , and means to act?” why in the world did not Hamlet obey the ghost at once, and save seven of those eight lives ? If he had been Laertes of fortinbras, he would have accomplished his task in a day .

3.1.2 Careful as Well as Careless

In the depth of such misery , Hamlet remains calm and acts cautiously for the most of the time. Instead of taking rash actions, he thinks things over again .He is perplexed by several questions: Is what his father’s ghost says true ? How can be ascertain it ? If it is true, his uncle , the murderer of his father , must be suspicious of him and be on guard against him. So how can he take the revenge ?

To find out the truth , he arranges the plat-show tries to detect the King’s reactions during the play; to protect himself from the King’s persecution, he feigns madness and he does so well that even his mother, the queen , his girl friend Ophelia and Ophelia’s father Polonius are all made to believe that he has really gone out of his mind . when the King tells him to go to England , he immediately realizes the scheme under it .

Nevertheless, despite all his efforts to be careful, Hamlet sometimes turns out to be careless or even rash. At the beginning of the play, Hamlet wears mourning dress and appears depressed at her mother’s marriage. When his mother asks him to exchange his clothes and “look like a friend on Denmark”. Knowing clearly that he is under the close watch by the King and his followers, he speaks out the King’s crime in his mother’s chamber. Fortunately , the eavesdropper Plonius is killed by mistake .But Hamlet has made a big mistake. Though his mother promised to keep what he says a secret, his rash movement leads to the death of Ophelia and the King’s another plot against him, that is , the duel with Laertes at the end of the play .

When the king suggests that Hamlet play fencing with Laertes , Hamlet becomes careless again . He should have known what conspiracy is in it , especially after so many incidents, but he fails to give any consideration to it and agrees at once. As a result , three more persons ,excluding the King , die in the end .

3.1.3 Kind as Well as Cruel

Before the catastrophe falls upon him, Hamlet is the favorite of the people . Everyone shows him respect. He has been charmingly frank ,courteous and kindly to everyone, of whatever rank, whom he liked or disliked. But his melancholy caused by the death of his father and the arduous task of revenge makes him sometimes hard and cynical as well .Hamlet

is also too hard in his words to his mother and Ophelia.

From the above discussion , we can see the contradictions in Hamlet’s character. It might be difficult for us to understand it at first. But if we look deep into Hamlet’s life before the catastrophe, the task his dead father asks him to fulfill, his perilous situation in carrying out the task and his speculative mind, we can surely get the answer to it .