Examples Of Sane In Hamlet

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The Trial of Hamlet’s Sanity In Hamlet by William Shakespeare one of the major sources of intrigue is discerning if the main character, Hamlet, is rational or insane. Throughout the play Hamlet is put into situations in which the reader could easily presume that he is senseless; however, Shakespeare left behind clues that will obviously lead to the conclusion that Hamlet is not only sane, but quite clever. While there are undoubtedly some flaws with this logic, all of them can be swept under the rug due to Hamlet proclaiming at the beginning he is going to act mad throughout the duration of the play. And while this is a big part of the argument, there are much more intrinsic points that will lead to the correct conclusion that Hamlet is not …show more content…
Here he is telling Horatio and Marcellus that from this point forward he is going to act crazy and not like anything they would ever expect him to be like. This is something that a truly irrational person would not do, due to the fact that they would not understand that their actions were unhinged. Since hamlet tells them that he is not actually crazy and since this is something a crazy person would not do, the reader can safely deduce that he is not actually crazy at the time at which he is saying this, and because he is not crazy when he is saying this the reader can trust him at face value, proving that throughout the entire book he will be sensible. There are some circumstances that a crazy person would lie, but no one at this point believed Hamlet was crazy so there would be no point for him to even bring it up, again proving his …show more content…
Polonius, believing that Hamlet was acting so instable because of his infatuation with Ophelia devised a scheme in which he and King Claudius would spy on an encounter between Ophelia and Hamlet. Hamlet rather quickly figured out the ploy and before leaving said, “Go to, I'll no more on't; it hath made me mad. I say, we will have no more marriages: those that are married already, all but one, shall live; the rest shall keep as they are” (III, I, 55). Hamlet, realizing he was being spied on not only acted even crazier than usual, but also threatened the king’s life. While inherently this appears crazy it is actually brilliant. Hamlet phrased this threat in a way that only Claudius would understand. So if Claudius had wanted to punish him for this crime he would have to admit to spying on Hamlet which would cause him to lose a lot of respect from his people. Hamlet knows all of this so he openly makes his threat, knowing there will be no repercussions for him. So if he indeed is crazy, he just outwitted three well educated