What Is Horatio In Hamlet

Why Horatio is the Only Character to Appear in Both the Opening and Closing
Scenes of hamlet. In William Shakespeare's Hamlet, the only character to appear in both the opening and closing scenes is Horatio. In Shakespeare’s play, the audience might interpret why he did this through looking at what purposes Horatio serves in the play. Some of Horatio’s biggest roles are that he acts as a chorus like figure at times, he is Hamlet’s closest companion, and at the end of the play the reader discovers that Horatio is the one who gave words to the events that transpired in the play. These three roles suggest that Shakespeare may have considered himself to be Horatio. Especially towards the beginning of the play, Shakespeare uses Horatio to get the audience caught up to speed about what is going on. For instance, in the opening scene the audience learns through Horatio that the king is dead and the reason that the guards are on watch is for fear of a Norwegian invasion. In fact, the beginning of the play is really the only time Horatio uses overly colorful language. For the rest of the play, he tends to get straight …show more content…
Horatio comes out and says it is his responsibility to tell the world about what happened to Hamlet. Therefore, Shakespeare might have put Horatio in Hamlet to give himself a little more credit because it puts the audience members in Horatio’s shoes, by trying to express the story of Hamlet themselves. This may then show the audience members how difficult it is to do what Shakespeare does.
Thus, the reason that Horatio is the only character in Hamlet to appear in both the opening scene and closing scene is because Shakespeare considered himself to be Horatio. Therefore, just like a storybook it begins and ends with the one who is telling the