Hamlet Revenge Tragedy

Introduction

“Tis now the very witching time of night,

When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out

Contagion to this world. Now could I drink hot blood,

And do such bitter business as the day

Would quake to look on.” (Shakespeare and Procter, pp. 564)

To discuss Hamlet solely in terms of revenge is somewhat like attending to the trellis rather than the rosebush it supports. Shakespeare's Hamlet transcends the revenge theme, and any criticism of it from this point of view alone can hardly be exhaustive. Yet the revenge theme in Hamlet cannot be ignored, for it is the basis of the play's structure: an interpretation that neglected it would be inadequate in the opposite direction. Nor could any study of the revenge tragedy motifs themselves be complete without considering Hamlet, the keystone of the genre (Mercer, pp. 1-57).

Discussion

In Hamlet, we find everything transmuted. A finer imagination is at work, and its effects upon the material are evident at every level of the play, from dramaturgical invention to intellectual scope (Bushnell, pp. 67-99). The revenge experience is now linked to another, a wider experience, the experience of knowing. Shakespeare's protagonist, thrust into the dilemma of the revenger, focuses on his own mind's reactions to the experience as much as on the experience itself.

One possibility, which I think, has not been canvassed adequately, and the oversight may have something to do with the enthusiasm with which source-hunters have searched outside Shakespeare--is Shakespeare's own work. Though, it has no comprehensive sources, "The Tempest" has precursors in the revenge tragedies of the time, and is especially influenced by Hamlet (Woodbridge, pp. 17-33).

As Ashley H. Throndike defined it, revenge tragedy is "a tragedy whose leading motive is revenge and whose main action deals with the progress of this revenge, leading to the death of the murderer and often the death of the avenger himself” (Bowers, pp. 66-99). Thorndike notes that the revenge motive appears in the anonymous Alphonsus of Germany (c. 1590) and Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus(also c. 1590), but after examining precursors of Shakespeare's Hamlet, (including the earlier or Q. 1 version) he suggests that Kyd's Spanish Tragedy and the Q. 1 Hamlet are the main sources of later developments in the genre (Mercer, pp. 1-57).

As the epitome, of revenge tragedies, Hamlet has all the apparatus of the type:

Revenge is the fundamental motive for the action.

The revenge is supervised by a ghost--usually the ghost of someone who has endured a blood wrong.

There is justifiable hesitation on the part of the revenger, who is weaker than his adversary and who, on the failure of legal justice, supposedly lacks a decent opportunity for direct action.

Madness is an important dramatic device.

Intrigue used against and by the revenger is an essential element.

The action is bloody and deaths are scattered through the play.

The contrast and enforcement of the critical situation are achieved by parallels.

The villain is an almost complete Machiavellian.

The revenge is accomplished terribly, fittingly, with irony and deceit (Woodbridge, pp. 17-33).

As will be ...