How Revenge Lead To Tragedy In Hamlet English Literature Essay

In the play Hamlet, the main theme is revenge turn the whole story into tragedy. Whoever involves to the revenge plan has end up death. Hamlet, the prince of Denmark, wants revenge on his uncle, who killed Hamlet’s father and took over the crown and married the Queen, Hamlet’s mother. Hamlet has a revenge plan. In order to do that, he accidentally kills Laertes’s father. In turn, Laertes wants revenge his father’s death by killing Hamlet. Moreover, the King of Norway was killed by Hamlet’s father in battle. The prince of Norway also wants revenge on Denmark. The story has a complicated relationship. Therefore, it has full of revenge powder in every corner. Since someone light it up, everyone die.

The funeral of Hamlet’s father and the wedding of Hamlet’s mother and uncle were so close together. The leftover food from the funeral was used for the marriage. Hamlet was unappreciated the marriage between his mother and uncle. He thought that was not respecting his father at all. Until the visiting of the ghost, Hamlet’s father, the ghost tells Hamlet that his uncle is a murderer. His uncle killed Hamlet’s father. Hamlet wants revenge his father’s death. However, he does not know the ghost is saying the truth or not. He does not want to kill innocent people.

The murderer is the one who now wears the crown. Since Hamlet does not like his uncle, he cannot do a thing about it. But now, he notices that his uncle should be the murder. He decides he must kill his uncle to revenge his father death. Unfortunately, Hamlet stabs through a curtain and kills an innocent person, Polonius, because he thinks that is his uncle hiding behind the curtain. This is the first innocent person die because of the revenge. Ophelia, Polonius’s daughter and Hamlet’s ex-girlfriend, becomes crazy because she has so many bad things happened to her in a short period of time. She kills herself afterward. She is the second victim between the revenge. Laertes wants revenge for his father and sister now.

Because of Hamlet’s madness and murder, the king has an excuse for him to send Hamlet away from him. He sends Hamlet to England and escorted by Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, with a note to England to kill Hamlet. However, Hamlet finds out about it. He changes the notes so that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are killed in England. Two of them are the third and forth innocent deaths between the revenge.

Upon Hamlet is returning to Denmark, the King notices Hamlet is still alive. He decides to use Laertes’s want for revenge in order to kill Hamlet. He sets up a duel for Laertes and Hamlet. If Laertes does not kill him with the poisoned sword, he will have a glass of wine with poison for Hamlet to drink it. Nevertheless, the queen drank the poisoned wine without knowing it. She is the fifth victim. Laertes killed Hamlet with the poisoned sword. Hamlet killed Laertes with the same poisoned sword, and he finally kills the King with the same sword too. Three of them die because of the revenge. Horatio is the only one who is not involving the revenge. He is the only character survive in the story to the end and follow the order of Hamlet to tell his story.

The revenge of the death of Hamlet’s father ended up in tragedy. Hamlet’s uncle should be the only one revenge but it brings seven deaths with him. The mistake that Hamlet made cannot be acceptable. If he did not kill the first innocent person, Polonius, he may not end up die and bring these all into the tragedy. Since Hamlet killed Polonius, he brought everyone into his revenge. However, the death of Ophelia, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and the Queen were died for nothing.

In the end of the story, Fortinbras, the princes of Norway, does not pursue revenge. He is the only one who has lost someone but does not die himself.

The play Hamlet tells us that extremes pursuit of revenge causes tragedy. As far as Hamlet gets to kill his uncle to revenge his father, he brings eight deaths including himself. However, when Laertes reaches to revenge his father’s death, he ends up death too. It shows that revenge lead to tragedy. If the tragedy did not happen, the revenge would be continuing as long as someone wants revenge. More victims would be involved until the end of everyone dies.