Hamlet's Madness

Question 1

“Much evidence . . . ”

Answer 1

“Much evidence in the play that Hamlet deliberately feigned fits of madness.”

• Alexander Crawford

Question 2

“In the play . . . ”

Answer 2

“In the play the only persons who regard Hamlet as really mad are the king and his henchmen.”

• Alexander Crawford

Question 3

“The comic . . . ”

Answer 3

“The comic element of the play is madness.”

• Sir Herbert Tree

Question 4

“Gives him . . . ”

Answer 4

“Gives him the licence of a fool to speak cruel truths, transgressing the language of social decorum.”

• Kate Flint

Question 5

“He identified . . . ”

Answer 5

“He identified Hamlet’s illness as Melancholy.”

• Thomas Bright

Question 6

Hamlet’s disorder not only . . .

Answer 6

Hamlet’s disorder not only transgresses acceptable aristocratic behaviour but can be spoken of as something threatening the well being of the state as well as the individual.

• Kate Flint: Madness and Melancholy in Hamlet 1988

Question 7

His feigned madness . . .

Answer 7

His feigned madness ‘seems to have been the most likely way of getting himself confin’d and consequently, debarr’d from an opportunity of avenging his father’s death.

• Thomas Hamner

Question 8

When Hamlet puts on an ‘antic disposition’ it is . . .

Answer 8

When Hamlet puts on an ‘antic disposition’ it is ‘feigned, forced’ rather than the ‘natural . . . role of inflamed madness’ according to revenge tragedy custom.

• Glyn Austen