now we know hamlet is a political play, with it being set in elsinore, hamlet being the heir, awaiting an invasion, the time it was written in ie the elizabethean period, yada yada yada but what the hell does hamlet say to actually prove this! i saw this particular definition and it really interested me, but then thought about the above. "hamlet hides the spirit of political resistance, representing a challenge to a corrupt regime" Now the honest truth is i was gonna use that in an evidence, but then realised i had no evidence to back it up! help please, really startin to irritate me.

-- Cheri (spankingorgeous@hotmail.com), March 25, 2004

Answers

Hamlet's general view is, I think, that since Claudius is corrupt and wicked, and is the top of the political, governmental power tree, his corruption will eat away at the whole state and thus cause its ruin. It's hard to pinpoint where he says as much, because it is fairly diffuse throughout all his speeches, some of them cryptic, which build up this general impression through the whole play. In addition, rather than what Hamlet actually says himself, it is put forward through remarks and speeches that others make, such as Marcellus, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and through Hamlet's treatment of people whom Claudius's corruption corrupts, including Polonius, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and Laertes.

-- catherine england (catherine england@arts.usyd.edu.au), March 25, 2004.