Hamlet is very much a play about seeming and not doing. Discuss the Essay

Hamlet is very much a play about seeming and not doing. Discuss the difference between seeming and doing, and how those caught up in seeming are paralyzed and u - Essay Example Hamlet, even at the onset, is disappointed as much as mournful about the turn of events (Act I, scene ii (129-158). He is not there when his father dies and when he gets home his mother has married his uncle. He gets suspicious that the marriage is rather done in haste Instead of confronting his mother and demanding an explanation, he just keeps his miserable feelings and doubts to himself. He seeks for justification but does not let it out so he becomes all the more burdened with so many questions and no answers. It is in this scene that he shares his opinion that humankind is more impressive in "apprehension" or understanding than in "action;" he himself being an epitome of this idea for he is more prone to apprehension than to action too. He keeps delaying for so long before putting to action his revenge on Claudius. The most famous soliloquy of Hamlet in Act III, scene i (58-90) displays his hesitations that leads more to his delayed action. It is also in this passage that his reasons for delaying his actions are enumerated. The very familiar line, "To be, or not to be: that is the question," speaks of Hamlet's reflection on whether he would choose to live (to be) or to commit suicide (not to be). To die means to end one's sufferings and pains on earth: He does not know what lies ahead. ... Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportion'd thought his act. This is another form of seeming but not doing. He advises his son not to let others see his true feelings and to act with caution Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice: Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment. His advice seems contradicting though because he tells his son to appear in certain manners and then he ends by saying This above all,-to thine own self be true; And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man. Back to Hamlet, when he comes face to face with his university friends, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in Act II, scene ii (287-298), he expresses his melancholy I have of late,- but wherefore I know not,- lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory." It is in this scene that he shares his opinion that humankind is more impressive in "apprehension" or understanding than in "action;" he himself being an epitome of this idea for he is more prone to apprehension than to action too. He keeps delaying for so long before putting to action his revenge on Claudius. The most famous soliloquy of Hamlet in Act III, scene i (58-90) displays his hesitations that leads more to his delayed action. It is also in this passage that his reasons for delaying his actions are enumerated. The very familiar line, "To be, or not to be: that is the question," speaks of Hamlet's reflection on whether he would choose to live (to be) or to commit suicide (not to be). To die means to end one's sufferings and pains on earth: Whether 'tis nobler in