Theme Of Honesty In Hamlet

There are many themes in any story written by any author no matter what time period they write in. Shakespeare is a very intelligent man and has many themes in every play he writes. Hamlet was written sometime before 1602 by William Shakespeare when he lived in England. Hamlet is a very interesting play because we watch the main character slowly fall and not be himself anymore. He is at ahigh point in life and he slowly just gets worse and lower in life every day. The play Hamlet is a very interesting one and many would claim that nothing happens in the play except for “Words, words, words” as Hamlet himself would say. John Berryman says so as well by stating that, “ Traces are visible indeed of a related dissatisfaction in Henry …show more content…
At one point during the play, Hamlet asks Ophelia if she is honest, and then says that she is beautiful, therefore she is not honest. I do not think that is how things should go but Ophelia does not take any real offense to the comment because according to everyone else, Hamlet is mad and doesn’t know what he is saying when he says it. He knows that his uncle is not an honest man either. He killed his brother and now is hiding the fact that he did and living the life of his dead brother as if nothing happened. This really makes Hamlet mad and he tries to get the honest truth out of his uncle dad before he actually kills him. Another way of saying honesty is saying if you are believable or not. William O’Neill says, “One of the many accidents that form this story occurs just as Hamlet is wondering how and whether to proceed with the revenge. One problem, in addition to his distrust of the apparition, is that if he kills Claudius with no other motive than a story he got from a ghost, he will not be believed” (Berryman, John. “The Crisis.” ProQuest Sirs. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Oct. 2015). Being believed is something that a lot of people worry about and if you are not believed while you are telling someone a story, for example, they might think you are lying or being …show more content…
There is a lot of death that takes place during the play, but not many in the first three acts. The only significant death in the first three acts is the death of King Hamlet. This is the one death that sets the play in motion. It hurts Hamlet and it is the reason he pretends to go mad so he can prove that the death wasn’t accidental. It was in fact murder and it was his uncle that committed the terrible crime. Even Hamlet himself wants to die and we see that in the first three acts of the play as well. Ernest Jones addresses this issue very well, “In the Hamlet play, on the other hand, Claudius disclaims all responsibility for his brother’s death and spreads a somewhat improbable story of his having been stung to death by a serpent while sleeping in the orchard. How he knew this we are not told, nor why the adder possessed this quite unwonted deadliness.” (Jones, Ernest. “The Death of Hamlet’s Father.” ProQuest. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Oct.