Hamlet’s status of a prince brings him a lot of stress to hold the strong masculine figure of the city to have a good-looking future bringing inner conflict in him of what his identity is. Hamlet thinks it is better to die than to be someone that he is not or even be someone he is because he feels no value in himself. Hamlet describes “To be, or not to be: that is the question: Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer. The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune Or to take arms against a sea of troubles” (Hamlet 3.1). On one side, he feels the pressures of society and notices he is not fitting in them. On the other side, he is not enjoying faking his identity. The clashing of thoughts makes him believe that death is the best option for escape. In, “Madness and Difference:
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Hamlet is aware of what that word will do to him if he were to mention it, therefore he finds it best that he acts sane. Here it shows that Hamlet is trying to show his power through his words to by being very sarcastic with Polonius and cynical with Ophelia. He feels comfortable enough with the word madness that he is fine with suppressing their value, only showing his madness to them. Shafer, however, fails to recognize the time period that the play was written in. During that time, madness had a bad stigma around and with Hamlet’s high status from being a prince, therefore Hamlet was hiding his madness so that people would not question him. In “The Sanity of Hamlet” by Tenney L. Davis, he explains that “To his friends, when he wishes to be agreeable, his hair-splitting is pleasant banter: to the others, when he chooses to be reserved, it appears to as a barrier behind which he hides his thoughts and motives” (Davis 631). Davis is explaining that Hamlet is acting different depending on who he is with depending on the social structure. With other people, since they are not at his level he feels a barrier of pressure with them as he needs to please them and be someone
Hamlet is aware of what that word will do to him if he were to mention it, therefore he finds it best that he acts sane. Here it shows that Hamlet is trying to show his power through his words to by being very sarcastic with Polonius and cynical with Ophelia. He feels comfortable enough with the word madness that he is fine with suppressing their value, only showing his madness to them. Shafer, however, fails to recognize the time period that the play was written in. During that time, madness had a bad stigma around and with Hamlet’s high status from being a prince, therefore Hamlet was hiding his madness so that people would not question him. In “The Sanity of Hamlet” by Tenney L. Davis, he explains that “To his friends, when he wishes to be agreeable, his hair-splitting is pleasant banter: to the others, when he chooses to be reserved, it appears to as a barrier behind which he hides his thoughts and motives” (Davis 631). Davis is explaining that Hamlet is acting different depending on who he is with depending on the social structure. With other people, since they are not at his level he feels a barrier of pressure with them as he needs to please them and be someone