Austin Younger Period 3

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Term Paper Title	Austin Younger Period 3
# of Words	631
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	2.52

Austin Younger Period 3
“Hamlet’s Flaw”
Hamlet's father, the king of Denmark, has died suddenly. The dead king's brother, Claudius, marries Hamlet's mother and swiftly assumes the throne; a throne that Hamlet fully expected would be his upon the death of his father. Hamlet's father's ghost confronts Hamlet and tells him that his death was not natural, as reported, but instead was murder. Hamlet swears revenge. But rather than swoop instantly to that revenge, Hamlet pretends to be insane in order to mask an investigation of the accusation brought by his father's ghost. Why Hamlet puts on this masquerade and delays in killing Claudius is the central question of the play. But Hamlet did not swear to his dead father that he, detective-like, would investigate. Hamlet swore revenge. And he has more than enough motivation for revenge.
His motivations for revenge are made clear when Hamlet says,
”Does it not, think thee, stand me now upon-
He that hath killed my king, and whored my mother;
Popped in between th' election and my hopes,
Thrown out his angle for my proper life,
And with such cozenage-is't not perfect conscience
To quit him with this arm? And is't not to be damned
To let this canker of our nature come
In further evil?” (5.2.71-80).

It is this delay in performing the act he has sworn to accomplish which leads to Hamlet's death. The poison on the tip of Laertes' rapier, in a way symbolizes the procrastination that has been coursing through Hamlet's system throughout the play. Hamlet's thoughts focus upon death rather than upon action. Hamlet states this theme when he says, “To be, or not to be, that is the question/” (3.1.64). The answer escapes Hamlet throughout the play, because it is the wrong question. Hamlet is alive and to be alive means, “to do” not merely “to...

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