Since the first time I read William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, I loved it. I was worried that after reading so many great Shakespearean plays, it would lose its position as my favorite, but the second time around just cemented its spot.

The first thing I love about Hamlet is the ambiguity. Is Hamlet insane or is he just acting the part? Does the ghost appear? Is the ghost really Hamlet Sr.? (Even Hamlet initially doubted that.) Is there really a ghost every time Hamlet sees it? Why doesn’t Gertrude see the ghost Hamlet sees? In a fictional story, the fictional characters and the real audience are both puzzled as to what is real and what is not. Reality and fiction mingle in Hamlet: the protagonist plans to find out what really happened with Claudius and his father by having Claudius watch fiction. Furthermore, death is both reality and fiction for Hamlet, as corpses have substance and can be eaten by worms, but death might allow for the chance to dream… The ambiguity then becomes both a literary technique and the makings of a theme. Very cool.

The second thing I love about Hamlet is Hamlet. Hamlet is one of my favorite characters of all time. A melancholy intellectual who over-thinks every aspect of his life to the point of near inaction. It just appeals to me. I think his story, the real tragedy of Hamlet, is one of self-destruction. He alienates himself from those who care for him and whom he cares for (I am obstinate about his deep, deep, love for Ophelia), those he could turn to for comfort, because he chooses instead to turn to his thoughts. He is intelligent and wise, but he fails to see what he truly has, pessimistically (and understandably) dwelling on his father’s death. He’s such a round character, so strong and so weak. He’s just great, okay?

Okay, the long-awaited Hamlet quotes:

“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy” (Hamlet, Act 1).

"Brevity is the soul of wit" (Polonius, Act 2).

“For there is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so” (Hamlet, Act 2).

"O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams" (Hamlet, Act 2).

“What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable; in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god: the beauty of the world, the paragon of animals—and yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust?” (Hamlet, Act 2).

"Thus conscience does make cowards of us all" (Hamlet, Act 3).

“Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind” (Ophelia, Act 3).

"Ay, truly, for the power of beauty will sooner transform honesty from what it is to a bawd than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness" (Hamlet, Act 3).

“You do surely bar the door upon your own liberty if you deny your griefs to your friend” (Rosencrantz, Act 3).

“My words fly up, my thoughts remain below; / Words without thoughts never to heaven go” (Claudius, Act 3).

“So full of artless jealousy is guilt, / It spills itself in fearing to be spilt” (Gertrude, Act 4).

“We know what we are but know not what we may be” (Ophelia, Act 4).

"When sorrows come, they come not in single spies, / But in battalions" (Claudius, Act 4).

"That we would do / We should do when we would; for this 'would changes / And hath abatements and delays as many / As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents; / And then this 'should' is like a spendthrift sigh, / That hurts by easing" (Claudius, Act 4).

“Why may not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander till he find it stopping a bunghole?” (Hamlet, Act 5).

And with that happy note, I end.

(This review is old--from my second read in 2003. I just added some quotes.)