Comparison Of Revenge In Shakespeare's Hamlet And Laertes

In the tragedy hamlet by William Shakespeare, the recurring contrast between the two main characters hamlet and Laertes has been well established in this play in different scenes. In a certain scene hamlet is seen confused and slow to act while on the other hand Laertes is assertive and acts with haste. I therefore argue that both hamlet and Laertes act dishonorably in different scenes while in their venture to seek revenge for the murder of their respective fathers. Because of their respective positions in the society, they take advantage of that to do unforgivable actions all in the name of vengeance. Before we continue, we are going to first establish the definition of honor from which we can contrast the actions of hamlet and Laertes. Generally, honor is a fine sense of strict allegiance to what is believed to be right. For these two characters to be able to seek revenge for the murder of their respective fathers …show more content…
Like for example, in the second scene of the first act, where hamlet is trying to explain that he has been reprimanded for his prolonged grief period over his father’s death. However, the story of the supposed travel of hamlet and Laertes can be termed as the discretion of their respective fathers. At some point Claudius asks Polonius his stake on the desire of his son to return to France and Polonius answers with much grief. Polonius response clearly shows that he initially objected the idea of Laertes journey abroad although Laertes was able to convince him to allow him go abroad until he received consent from his father to return to France. On the same scene, Claudius feels that it is necessary to talk to hamlet and he makes it clear to him that he is not his legitimate father and he also expresses his desire for hamlet to stay in Denmark rather than Wittenberg (Shakespeare,