HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Hamlet is the prince of Denmark.
His father has recently died.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
His uncle, Claudius, has married his mother, Gertrud,
and is the king now.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Hamlet's father appears as a ghost and tells him that he has to kill Claudius
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Gertrud ClaudiusThe Ghost
Hamlet
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Hamlet is a person who always THINKS to decide what to DO.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
He wants to kill Claudius.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
He pretends to be mad because this could help him...
... but the question remains throughout the play: Does he
actually go mad?
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Polonius is the chamberlain.
Ophelia and Laertes are his daughter and son.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Claudius and Polonius want
to know if Hamlet is
mad with love for Ophelia.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
(TO BE OR NOT TO BE solilloquy )
They hide and watch Hamlet when he thinks aloud about life
and death
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Hamlet designs a trick to prove that
Claudius killed his father: some
actors will perform a play where a king is murdered by his
brother.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Hamlet watches Claudius's reaction.
Claudius is frightened, leaves the theatre and
starts to pray.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Hamlet tries to kill Claudius now but he stops: Claudius would go
to heaven while his father is suffering in hell.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Hamlet confronts his mother.
He says that it is a shame that she
is married to Claudius,
someone so inferior to her
former husband (Hamlet's father).
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Polonius is hearing from behind a curtain. Hamlet discovers him and kills him thinking that it is Claudius who
is hiding there.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Ophelia goes mad and drowns in a river.
Her brother, Laertes, is very sad.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Hamlet doesn't know Ophelia is dead and takes a walk in the
fields.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
He discovers someone who is digging a grave and finds Yorik's skull.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Yorik was a clown with whom Hamlet used to play as a child.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
The skull makes him reflect on the consequences of death.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
The play ends with a long scene where Hamlet and Laertes fight with swords, apparently only for sport.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
But Claudius and Laertes have put some poison in Hamlet's drink
and on Laertes's sword.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
After some confusions, Gertrud drinks the poison and dies and Laertes and Hamlet are killed by the sword.
Before dying, Hamlet kills Claudius.
HAMLETHAMLETSummarySummary
Denmark dies as a country, too:
Fontinbras, king of Norway, who has conquered Poland, finds the royal family dead and takes
power of the kingdom.