Hamlet is one of my perennial favorite literary works. I suppose that probably makes me something of a stereotype myself. Imagine that, an English teacher who likes Hamlet....big shock! I won't pretend to sneer at it, though, just because it's often-taught or often-loved. It is too wonderful for that. I know some of my former students probably wish I loved it less, but, well, some of those same people have gotten through college classes on the notes they saved from their time with me, so....
Hamlet himself is my second-favorite literary man (number one being John Faustus in Marlowe's The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus....bet you thought it was Darcy, didn't you? Ha. No. He's number three, actually. The Elizabethans top Austen, believe it or not.) for a variety of reasons. I feel such compassion for him throughout the play. His whole system of beliefs is attacked repeatedly. His father, his own personal god, has been attacked and is suffering in the afterlife. Hamlet himself is betrayed by almost everyone that matters to him. He does things that seem right to him at the time but have consequences that profoundly change him and everyone around him. Little seeds of evil blossom and grow, send out roots that pull down everything, and all his efforts to the contrary cannot stop it. He feels like most of us feel, I think, when we realize we are, despite all our skill and strength and intelligence, caught in a situation we really can't do a damn thing about: scared.
Ultimately, he comes to the realization that all he can do is live each day the best he can, do what he believes to be the right thing, that "the readiness is all." Hamlet reaches a point where he becomes content with his own behavior and stops questioning every single action and thought so that when death inevitably comes for him he has no regrets. He has had to go through an almost literal hell on earth to reach that revelation, and when he's talking to Horatio about it, it's heartbreaking but one of the most beautiful scenes in literature to me.
He has moved from "To be or not to be," and a place where he'd take his own life if he weren't so afraid of what comes next to trust in his own actions and no fear of whatever will come because he is satisfied with himself and the choices he makes. He doesn't have to be afraid of death anymore because he is living his life in such a way now that he is ready for it whenever it comes, the good and the bad. He will have no unfinished business. He has conquered the indecision that has kept him from being the great man he was always on the verge of being the whole play. He is no longer afraid of his own mortality. The brevity of life has been driven home to him brutally as he has taken life and as those he loves have been stripped away one by precious one. He knows that in the time he has, however long that may be, he must act instead of just being trapped in his thoughts.
Of course, we know what comes next.....
I love Hamlet, then, for the journey on which he goes and on which he carries us. I can't think of this play ever as cliched or worn out. Every time I come to it, I find something new to take away with me. If a work does that after this many years of dealing with it, then I think it deserves all the press it gets. He's going to stay my Valentine this year. Well, one of them, anyway. (And what that says about me and my psychology, I don't even want to contemplate, thankyouverymuch.)
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