King Hamlet's Ghost

                Many of the early scenes revolve around the ghost. The guards are frantic and become hysterical when they discover that it is the ghost of King Hamlet. However the ghost’s relevance surpasses just what it does and mainly resides in what it represents.  Firstly the ghost represents the disorder that has befallen Denmark. King Hamlet is murdered by his own brother Claudius who forms an “incestuous marriage” with King Hamlet’s wife.  As a result the current aristocracy has been built upon a throne of disorder.  Now there is a ghost to fully bring home that “something is rotten in the state of Denmark”. Denmark has become like a rotten apple that appears fresh from the outside. Denmark tries to “seem” like they have everything in control to other nations while in actually they are falling apart from the inside.  King Hamlet was murdered and thus unready for death so he ghost continues to walk the Earth. The dead are supposed to stay dead. The fact that the spirit of a dead person can roam and interact with the living exemplifies this chaos which is so bad that it not only affects the world of the living, but the realm of the dead.  

                

More importantly the ghost represents what Hamlet might have been looking for since the marriage of his uncle and his mom, a reason to further justify his detest for them and to take action.  He was already unhappy that Gertrude and Claudius were able to so easily get over the death of his father. He knew something was array but in his current position he was unable and didn’t have just cause to do anything about. Now the ghost of his father has come to him and tells him that he was murdered by Claudius and that he wants Hamlet himself to avenge him.  Like the God that Hamlet idolizes him to be, King Hamlet comes and gives Hamlet divine like instructions to bring order to Denmark. And like a orthodox follower of a religion, Hamlet swears to not be distracted by any other “baser matter”.  King Hamlet and Hamlet are shown to have more of God to religious follower relationship than a father- son relationship. This connects back to Act I scene ii when Hamlet refers to his father as the Sun God. I think this is why it becomes a burden for him to carry out his father’s wishes because he feels like it something a god has chosen him to do and thus it is something that he must do as he says “O cursed spite that ever I was born to set it right”. It becomes his “duty” which is a recurring theme. This task becomes so important to him that it appears to drive him mad. Though we know he is likely acting/seeming mad initially as he says “As I perchance hereafter shall think meet to put an antic disposition on”, I wonder if eventually might be driven mad by his burden as the tragic hero.