Your Hamlet essay ideas

Dear Class,
Other than Michelle Dingsun's and Sam Engle's (I looked at theirs and talked with both students way back when we had school), all thesis statements from those who submitted them are listed below with my responses, many of which are far more substantial than I had at first intended. I was going to e-mail these separately -- then I got the inspiration to post everything so that the thinking of these students and my thinking would be available to everyone.

My hope is that there is some sort of answer or guidance to be found below for all of you. Many of the issues that we've considered or that lend themselves to essay analysis are raised and so I've found that I have written a sort of patchwork essay of my own on Hamlet. I've also been careful to cite the text wherever necessary as an example of what you can and should do.

As I write now, the snow has risen above a foot in my neighborhood. It makes last week's weather, which was enough to suspend school, look pitiful. Well, I hope you enjoyed the added vacation and I hope you are rollicking in the snow while it lasts.

To quote that noted thinker and philosopher, Santa Claus,

"Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!"

best wishes,
JD

THE THESIS PROPOSALS:

Aditya Arun wrote:
Hamlet's view on women is based upon his sole judgment on his mother Gertrude and the woman he once loved, Ophelia. His dismal view on women is founded upon his ill experiences with these two women and helps to solidify the hatred shown by Hamlet towards women illuminating the sort of society women lived in during that time period.

Aditya,
I don’t like your thesis proposal very much. It’ll get you into trouble. For one, Ophelia is the primary victim of Hamlet’s poisoned view of women, and so hardly responsible for his skewed opinion of womankind. Her situation is complicated, moreover, because she has a father who is fond of espionage, as Hamlet undoubtedly knows. Polonius does in fact set Ophelia out as bait for the prince, and any suspicion Hamlet has that she is acting on someone else’s behalf makes things worse for her.
I don’t think it’s a good idea to attempt to draw conclusions about the women of “that time period.” You don’t know enough about Shakespeare’s time and society, and anyway that’s exactly the sort of phrase you should quit using in your essays.
If you want to examine this aspect of Hamlet, I think you must concentrate upon Gertrude as the source of his misogyny, and perhaps as the catalyst for his disillusionment with people in general. He finds wherever he turns that people are not as they seem, starting with his own mother. When first we meet him, he is depressed to the point of suicide and disgusted with the world in general: “…‘tis an unweeded garden, / That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature / Possess it merely…” His disillusionment is an important factor in his subsequent behavior—from behind his “antic” mask he pokes fun at the pretenses of people like Polonius and Claudius, whom he sees as cynical manipulators, and Ophelia, whom he decides is too easily manipulated and thus false to her true feelings.
See what you can develop in that direction.
JD

Scott McIntire wrote:
Thesis: Hamlet's madness is a cleverly disguised persona that he puts on to carry out his rage and ultimately avenge his father's death.
My essay will be all about Hamlet's madness, and how he isn't as mad as he seems, but actually just more full of rage. I'll also maybe compare it to ophelias madness, which I think is true madness, and show how the two differ.

Scott,
I think you must think more specifically. Hamlet himself tells Horatio that Hamlet’s friends should not be surprised no matter “How strange or odd soe’er I bear myself, / As I perchance hereafter shall think meet / To put an antic disposition on…,” nor should they breathe a word to anyone that his madness is anything but genuine.
Comparing Ophelia’s genuine madness with Hamlet’s “antic disposition” could be more fruitful, provided you have a clear purpose. If you can argue for Hamlet’s strategy in finding the truth under an assumed madness, and perhaps show that, once he adopts that mask and is drawn into the quest for revenge he really does snap the night of the play, when he unmasks Claudius but kills Polonius. His wild action provokes Ophelia’s madness (Hamlet, the one she loves, not only treats her harshly and cynically, but is responsible for her father’s death), you might have something. After all, he uses madness as an excuse in his final apology to Ophelia’s brother Laertes—and we can almost believe that Hamlet is momentarily overcome by passion when he leaps into Ophelia’s grave to fight with her brother over who loved her the most. His credentials for being the most aggrieved, at that point, are suspect to say the least.
Consider these things, then, as you build a stronger thesis.
JD

Brianna Tilleman wrote:
Ophelia is only a pawn in the struggle between the men of the court, manipulated by them all to achieve their own ends.

Brianna,
I think you can write a good essay that focuses upon Ophelia, but you’ll need a more definitive thesis than you presently have. Re-read her first scene, in which first Laertes, then Polonius, lectures her on Hamlet and his true intentions. Then look at the first scene of Act II, in which Polonius sets Reynaldo to spy on Laertes in Paris. He makes it clear that he expects some misbehavior, of much the same sort that Laertes promises his sister he won’t do. In his advice to his sister, Laertes is nearly as pompous, and certainly as judgmental, as his father Polonius—just more loving and less harsh. The double standard is impossible to miss, though.
We see later that Polonius is willing to use Ophelia as bait with which to probe Hamlet, and that Hamlet uses her quite roughly (but that is a separate issue that you must clearly deal with as such).
A young woman of marriageable age was not to be anywhere public without an escort, and so Polonius provides his daughter with a book—not much of a substitute for her father, for example. We can see that Ophelia, once she severs her ties with Hamlet, has no confidante
You might find a point of connection with Marlow’s recommendation that women be kept in blissful oblivion when it comes to the ugly matters of men and their arena of action. He lies to “the Intended” to keep her in that state.
See what you can do,
JD

Shea Meisner wrote:
Mr. Duncan,
Here are some (rough) thesis idea’s for my Hamlet paper:
• It is in Hamlet’s soliloquies that his true character is most easily seen.
• If not for his mother’s hasty marriage to his uncle, Hamlet would likely not view all women with such distaste.
• Gertrude plays a much more important role than she is given credit for.
• It is quite possible that Shakespeare based Hamlet off of the Garden of Eden and what took place there.
Thank you,
Shea Meisner (ap lit, per 1)

Dear Shea,
Your ideas are interesting. I’m not sure they belong all in one thesis, but they are not incompatible. You can sort the soliloquies by their theme:
#1 “O that this too too sullied flesh…”Hamlet, clearly depressed, expresses his disgust with the world and particularly his mother’s weakness, as well as his consideration of suicide, which continues in #3. Yes, here he says, “Frailty, thy name is woman” and much of his subsequent treatment of Ophelia is clearly warped by the trauma of what he perceives as his mother’s betrayal.
#2 “O what a rogue and peasant slave am I…” After witnessing the passionate impromptu performance of the player, who brings himself to tears, mingled disappointment and anger directed toward Hamlet himself for his own weaknesses as a “swift avenger.” Then inspiration: his resolve to use his doctored play “to catch the conscience of the king.” Thus this is a more positive reflection that results in the sort of action at which Hamlet excels.
#3 “To be or not to be…” I see this Hamlet turning away from action to reflect on the world in which he dwells (and all of us dwell), and I think it is in some way related to his imprecation at the end of Act I: “The time is out of joint: o cursed spite, / That ever I was born to set it right!” He is an introvert, and perhaps not ideally suited to revenge, as say Fortinbras might be. He ranges over nearly all the frustrations of human existence and considers the afterlife. This is sort of the calm eye of the storm, in which Hamlet questions the point of existence.
#4 “How all occasions do inform against me…” This one is related to #2, as Hamlet sees Fortinbras coming across Denmark on his way to make war in Poland “to gain a little patch of ground / That hath in it no profit but the name.” Now he considers what honor is worth—everything, he decides. Hamlet now seems to believe that he should be more like Fortinbras: make his thoughts “bloody or else nothing worth.”
I think you should also look at his final statement to Horatio, in which his mood, though fatalistic, is serene. He no longer chastises himself or seeks a way out, and he even paraphrases the Bible: “there’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow.” Maybe his tussle with Laertes in Ophelia’s grave and his cathartic confrontation with Gertrude have together purged him of his inner rage and conflict? That idea, if you develop it, might tie your analysis of Hamlet’s development seen through his soliloquies to your Gertrude/womankind idea.
As far as the “Garden of Eden” theme goes, that’s probably material for a separate essay, and a rather technical one that seeks to find parallels and allusions. Very tricky—I’d avoid it (and by the way: the expression is not “based off of” but “based on” or “based upon”).
I hope this is helpful.
JD

Meiying Piao wrote:
I have a pretty uh interesting thesis statement that many people might disagree with.
Should I scape it all together and start a new thesis with a brand new essay?
My thesis statement: Hamlet cannot handle the truth regarding his father's murder. His grief and sense of betrayal possess him and he becomes a man with a blurred sense of justice. Hamlet's wretched state is more caused by Gertrude's betrayal, than his father's murder.

Dear Meiying,
I think your idea could work, provided you structure your thesis properly. Right now you have the idea only. Think about some of these things: Hamlet’s sense of his mother’s betrayal he clearly expresses in his “O that this too too sullied flesh…” soliloquy. We learn that he is disenchanted not only with his mother, but with the world in general: “How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, / Seem to me all the uses of this world! / Fie on’t! ah fie! ‘tis an unweeded garden, / That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature / Possess it merely…”
Remember his standards are very high—he is an idealist who sees cynical behavior (Claudius, Polonius, etc.) all around him and can’t abide it. Hamlet sees Claudius and all who resemble him as the enemy, and now Hamlet’s mother has joined them! I don’t really think his sense of justice becomes blurred (if anything it is so highly developed that any injustice offends him to the core) —but his view of womankind is certainly distorted, and this clearly arises from his feelings about Gertrude.
The way his mood and resolve lift when Horatio tells him of the ghost that resembles Hamlet, Sr. (no more thoughts of suicide for a while at least) supports your idea. The Ghost gives him concrete action—revenge—to take, and tells Hamlet that Claudius is a murderer who committed the sin of Cain. It’s just that, as soon as he has time to pause and reflect, he realizes what a terrible responsibility he now carries: see my note to Shea about Soliloquy #3. The world appears an even worse place than before, with treachery everywhere and no solution but to kill, to be killed, or to kill onself—and then there may still be no escape from the agony of existence (“…what dreams may come, / when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, / must give us pause…). There is thus no end to calamity, he decides, and the responsibility is all ours. He’s quite an existential prince.
On the whole, his mother’s defection appears to be the catalyst that turns a young man I assume (from his banter with Horatio and later with Rosencrantz & Guildenstern, and his love for Ophelia) to have been an utterly witty, charming and brilliant Renaissance prince into a man whose humor is expressed through bitter irony and who must hide his inmost feelings from everyone.
Well, I hope there’s something in all this you can make use of.
JD

Hari Raghavan wrote:
Sorry for the delay but I was foolishly under the assumption for most of this weekend that I could put away my thesis statement since you'd looked at it once already. I didn't realize until only just now that I needed to revise it, so I've printed my revised version here now, for posterity:
Women occupy an important role in William Shakespeare's play Hamlet, as their presence in the story reveals aspects of the title character that could not otherwise be glimpsed. After all, it is only in the company of his mother Gertrude that Hamlet makes evident his absolute, god-like reverence for his father and reveals his distorted notions of spousal loyalty; it is also only in the company of his adored Ophelia that he exposes his warped perception of women, of their position in society and the duties he feels they ought to serve. It is among the play's female characters that Hamlet is most emotional, that he is most vulnerable, and it is through his interaction with them that Hamlet offers a window through which can be observed his slow, tragic undoing.
Please reply back with thoughts/further edits if possible! And please let me know if I got credit for showing you my original thesis statement! Thanks! Enjoy the snow!
Hari.

Dear Hari,
You might also note that Hamlet admits faults of his own to Ophelia in that bitter confrontation. Yes, those two scenes are, next to the soliloquies, perhaps the most revealing of Hamlet’s complex nature and outlook than any others. I don’t like your expression “distorted notions of spousal loyalty,” though. That sounds like an unsubstantiated value judgment. In that first court scene, when Claudius introduces Gertrude formally to the court as “our sometime sister, now our queen,” Hamlet, Sr. has been dead less than two months, as Hamlet, Jr. tells us:

A little month, or ere those shoes were old
With which she follow’d my poor father’s body,
Like Niobe, all tears:—why she, even she—
O, God! a beast, that wants discourse of reason,
Would have mourn’d longer—married with my uncle,
My father’s brother, but no more like my father
Than I to Hercules…

And to Hamlet, Claudius stands for everything he despises, so Gertrude has, as I observe to Meiying, betrayed more than her love for her son and her former husband. I don’t think many of us, in similar circumstances, would feel less than does Hamlet, though we would express our feelings less elegantly.
Your basic idea is promising, as long as you are specific about what you believe constitutes Hamlet’s “slow, tragic undoing.” Maybe keep in mind the Aristotelian notion that tragedy encompasses the fall of a great man and the grief and destruction that is a part of it.” Hamlet seems to know, in his last speech to Horatio, that he is heading that way, has always been heading that way since the news of his father’s death, and “If it be now, ‘tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all.”
JD

Krista Young wrote:
I’ve been trying to form my thesis for my Hamlet essay but so far I have been unable to get a good concise idea to work off of. I was contemplating writing about gertrude; i don’t think she was truly in love with Hamlet senior and I think that she married Claudious out of duty, i was going to defend this position by discrediting Hamlets observations of her by the fact that a mother especially a queen must keep a certain attitude of everything being alright to their children and if she was having marital issues she wouldnt have told him, especially since Hamlet idolizes his father. I was also going to use gertrude’s optimism toward ophelia and Hamlet to show that she wanted them to have true love because as a mother she would want for her son what she was never able to have or what she was robbed of because of her position. I was also looking at writing about the nature of revenge and why it doesnt work and the consquences of Hamlet seaking revenge. I was thinking about discussing why Hamlet felt the need to seek revenge despite the fact that he is obviously not a murderer and didnt want to be one. He was trying to fill the role society hat set before him and act how he believed princes were supposed to act— similiarly to how pip acted how he thought a gentleman should act. Im not sure of either of these ideas could bear to fruit in an essay and I was wondering if you thought there was potential or if I should look for something else. Also I feel most of my ideas are coming from the essays we’ve read on Hamlet, and since you said you had some others we could read I was wondering if you get send me the titles and authors so I can look them up online. Thanks so much, I would have just asked you this at school but I didnt want to delay my essay since it looks like more bad weather for the next few days

Dear Krista,
I think there is a lot of evidence tucked away between the lines of Hamlet that Gertrude was an unhappy queen and that Claudius is, ironically, a better husband to her than the elder Hamlet was. If they lived near Tanasbourne circa 2008, a quick divorce and remarriage might have been in the cards, with young Hamlet disgruntled and maybe even depressed but hardly required to revenge papa, and full permission to return to his studies in Palo Alto. Claudius strikes me as a king who likes to stay around the castle and enjoy life, while employing his political savvy through delegates to keep everything in tip-top order around Denmark. The problem is: Claudius murdered Hamlet, Sr., and gained the throne and his queen in criminal fashion. Regicide and fraticide all in one! Shakespeare was highly concerned with the natural order of humankind, under which the king served on earth as God’s designated representative. It is because of Claudius’s heinous act that “there is something rotten in the state of Denmark.”
Gertrude doesn’t know that, of course. Even Hamlet accepts her stunned reaction as clear evidence of her innocence on that score.
Still, we have Hamlet’s view of his father as the incarnation of Hyperion, and his hateful attitude toward mom’s new husband that was poisonous even before Claudius poisoned Hamlet the elder. Note his fearful, even guilty response to the Ghost when it appears only to him in Gertrude’s chamber, Act III:

“Do you not come your tardy son to chide,
That, lapsed in time and passion, lets go by
The important acting of your dread command? O, say!”

He sounds a bit like a son who has failed to please his father, or to measure up to his father’s expectations (there’s even a hint that this apparition of the Ghost could be a figment of Hamlet’s imagination).
Hamlet the elder appears to have been a fairly grim sort, who was comfortable in a suit of armor waging war on his neighbors, as when he “smote the sledded Polacks on the ice.” There is much description of him and his legacy among the men on the parapet in the first scene of Act I. Take a look. Hamlet’s own words regarding his father also are important. Hamlet seems not to value his own attainments when he considers his father’s greatness. For example, he almost classes himself with the despised Claudius when he says his uncle is no more comparable to Hamlet’s father “than I to Hercules.” I say that because I believe Hamlet would compare his father favorably to Hercules (definitely smarter, but so is most everyone). If you take Carolyn Heilbrun's favorable assessment of Gertrude’s way with words as valid (I do), I think you could by extension argue that Hamlet, the brilliant and incisive wit of Elsinore, is more an intellectual and spiritual product of his mother than of his father. Thus, when Hamlet compares himself unfavorably to Fortinbras (IV, iv), he implies that Fortinbras is more the sort of princely offspring one would imagine as the heir to Hamlet the elder—and, of course, that is how our drama turns out!
Don’t be afraid to use the ideas of others (Heilbrun, for example) in support of yours. As far as essays on Hamlet go, you’ll have a tough time getting any relatively recent ones online. I could suggest a few of the essays in the Norton Critical edition of Hamlet if you like. But think of Hamlet as perhaps the Renaissance philosopher and artist prince (note his easy relations with the players) and his father as more of a Medieval warrior king. And trust your instincts, too.
JD

Camden Hardy wrote:
i'm really struggling with my thesis ( as always) , you're thoughts would be very much appreciated. I apologize for my tardiness, my diligence in checking the blog has been lacking. Shame on me. But if you could give me some help, that'd be great.
I was considering focusing on death as a theme throughout he story, specifically suicide. I was hoping to discuss it with you in class on Monday, but that's clearly impossible. U, would it be possible, do you think, to focus on suicide with regard to the different approaches to it? Namely Hamlet's and Ophelia's opposite opinions and how that accentuates their characters individually? I'm not sure there's enough material in this...
Perhaps something like this.
Suicide, as a central theme of HAMLET, is used by Shakespeare to accentuate the individual attitudes and personal struggles of his main characters as well as draw attention to the intensity of their suffering.
Your assistance would be much appreciated!
Thanks, Camden

Dear Camden,
If you wish to write about Hamlet and suicide, I don’t think you’re going to find any of Ophelia’s opinions on the matter. Her genuine madness is understandable: Hamlet, the one she loves, not only rejects her harshly and cynically, but is carelessly murders her father. She goes mad and drowns, without getting her thoughts down on paper.
Hamlet, on the other hand, has much to say on the matter. His assumed madness is at least in part a response to the “seeming world” around him; through the madness he can meet the “seemers” on his own terms. But he also takes up the idea of suicide at least twice in his soliloquies, when he examines the deepest recesses of his conscience. His mother’s lack of fidelity has triggered a disgust for the world in general. He tries to express some of this disgust to his old school chums Rosencrantz & Guildenstern in his Act II speech—“ I have of late—but wherefore I know not—lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory…” That speech could be examined in conjunction with the two soliloquies ‘O that this too too sullied flesh…” and “To be or not to be…” To him suicide could be a release from all the burdens, disappointments and humiliations of living (To be or not to be is his major statement) but he rejects suicide at least in part because he fears the dreams that may come to his still living conscience: “the dread of something after death,” and because “the Everlasting” has “fix’d His canon ‘gainst self-slaughter!”
The irony, then, is that Ophelia does (in a maddened state, however) take the route that Hamlet has considered and rejected. And he perceives that she is receiving the diminished rites of a suicide when he witnesses the funeral party, and must feel his part in her death. The more I look at that funeral scene, the more I think Hamlet’s irrational outburst towards Laertes is a key moment. After all, Laertes has not only a father’s death to avenge, but a sister’s, and Hamlet is responsible for both! He must look across the grave at Laertes as his mind clears and see himself to some extent.
Well, that’s all I intend to say. Hope it gives you something to go on.
JD

Lisa Chau wrote:
1. Concerning #10: As Hamlet considers suicide – a method that would surely ease life – he understands, somewhere within himself, that he can not kill himself; to kill himself would be too easy, too cowardly; life should be lived under God and human nature obstinately.
2. Concerning #6: Feigned madness and real madness are exhibited by Hamlet; he fakes his antic disposition to mask his intentions from the King’s spies, yet is also severely grieved by his father’s death to the point where he considers suicide and killing others.
3. Concerning #1: To be rational, or not to be, that is the internal conflict Hamlet faces; his long speeches provide a way for Hamlet to present multiple opinions about a subject and a way to rationalize his actions.
I think I might have to read the play again, or watch it, or download an audio book version before my thesis and subject is made definite.

Dear Lisa,
With regard to suicide, see my note to Camden above. With regard to madness, see my note to Scott. With regard to Hamlet’s speeches as vehicles whereby he comes to terms with his world and it events, see my very long note to Shea. From reading the three thoughts you include, I get the impression that your first contains the idea that most intrigues you. You could read Hamlet, for all its catastrophe, as a rejection of suicide. The act is in Hamlet’s mind when we first see him, and then he speaks of it as something he must regretfully put aside because God forbids it. Later, in the “To be or not to be” soliloquy, Hamlet does not invoke God, but examines suicide almost as a philosopher would. He is just about completely alone, with no one but Horatio to rely upon, and no one including Horatio to confide in completely. He classes himself with the rest of humankind as desirous of escape from the hateful aspects of life, but fearful of what lies beyond. His glimpse of his father’s spirit (if that’s truly what it is) could hardly be reassuring on that score.
Still, he moves away from suicide and takes the most positive route he can follow to find the truth, until he loses his composure and runs his sword through the fateful arras—the 137th that Polonius has hidden behind in his career as chief minister to the kind, I’ll bet (and doesn’t count the spying within his family).
As I said to Shea, look also at Hamlet’s acceptance of whatever fate may await him, in that short Act V speech to Horatio.

Grace Chang wrote:
Gertrude’s personal mistakes are not solely driven by lust or a simple desire to see those around her happy and whole but by a compulsion to find intimate understanding and relationship with the characters around her.

Dear Grace,
I think an essay centering on Gertrude could be good, but you must make your thesis more compelling. How about examining Hamlet's dilemma based upon an analysis of his relations with both his parents. There are many hints about the character of the elder Hamlet, and most of them indicate a personality very different from the prince's. Hamlet clearly idealized his parents's relationship and held his father in near awe. Why did his mother fall? How much of his plight derives from her failure as a wife and mother and how much from the role of revenger that Hamlet must play?
I'm not asking you to psychoanalyze Hamlet, but to view the tragedy that comes of his mission of revenge from a unique angle--that of a son whose nature is more like his mother's than his father's.
What do you think?
JD

I’m going to take Alexander and David Kim together, as they have something similar in mind:”

Abert Johnberry, Phd. (aka Alexander Fine) wrote:
In William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the readers are given a prolonged glimpse of Hamlet’s most personal sentiments. His sharp expression of his disillusionment engages, and speaks for, mankind in ways we couldn’t articulate but still feel. Many have, from Hamlet’s behavior, attempted infer his presumed age. Yet, to define his age is to limit his message. Part of his effectiveness as a character lies in the ageless state in which he exists. Hamlet, in his most speculative moments, speaks for all man, and achieves a state of equilibrium, of both old and new. His existence, like the electron’s wave particle duality, is best interpreted if it is treated at once as two entities—in this case, old and young.

David Kim wrote:
Four Hamlet theses
1. The difficulty in understanding Hamlet as a character comes from the fact that all the actors playing him are far too old—when interpreted as much younger, he makes far more sense.
a. In this respect, the Folio is wrong (since it more or less explicitly states that he is 30 in the Yorick scene) and the Quarto is right (it is much looser in its woriiding, placing Hamlet at at about 20).
2. The difficulty in understanding Hamlet as a character comes from the fact that he incorporates elements of both young and old—he is ageless, or rather a union of ages, one character representing the lament of all.
3. The themes in Hamlet are timeless—the play means just as much to audiences today as it did to audiences in the 1600s at the Globe.
4. Descent into madness (along with its extent) is a key element of interpreting Hamlet’s and Ophelia’s character—some sort of qualitative analysis and assertion follows.

Dear Doctor A. & David,
I’m going to respond to the ageless, timeless idea that you both present. Everything else you bring up, David, I think I’ve already addressed in one or the other of my previous comments. I will say, though, that you have an acute case of “the-fact-that”-itis, which I hope is not incurable. Neither of your facts is in fact a fact! But it’s a fact that writers who employ that phrase are almost never dealing with facts.
Gosh, that was fun. And my mind is so tired from all this thinking about Hamlet. I’m leaving the play to you guys after this.
Youth is very much a part of Hamlet. He sees corruption all around him, particularly in the machinations of the older ones who hold the reins of power. He is bitterly disappointed in his mother and his friends. He gives up his love for Ophelia and everything else to dedicate himself to revenge, as he swears (I, v):

Yea, from the table of my memory
I’ll wipe away all trivial fond records,
All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past,
That youth and observation copied there;
And thy commandment all alone shall live
Within the book and volume of my brain,
Unmix’d with baser matter…

I think Ophelia’s tale of Hamlet’s wordless visit, and the high emotion of his later speech to her, are testimony to the degree of sacrifice. After all, Shakespeare often dedicated plays (including at least one tragedy) to love. And this is young love.
The difficulty with understanding Hamlet is not so much that he is somehow spiritually “old” as well as young—it’s that he is brilliant and complex, as brilliant and complex, perhaps, as his creator, and Shakespeare does not bother to explain everything about Hamlet. He leaves it to us, his audience, to interpret, to probe and to infer.
Hamlet is seen as a character who embodies universal qualities. Each generation finds something to respond to, and each one tends to interpret Hamlet according to its prevailing values. The important thing is that Hamlet remains modern, because he perceives and expresses the human condition as well as any character in literature has. We share his problems with him, and listen as he thinks himself through them and beyond them to matters far more weighty than a sordid tale of murder, betrayal and revenge should be able to convey.
The problem with all this is that it is rather abstract. The universal Hamlet is a subject for a book-length essay. It’s also tempting to carry on as I just have for several paragraphs without quoting the text referring to any concrete event. You must root your essay in specifics and keep your scope at a setting for four to six, not 40 to 60, pages. If he speaks for all humankind, make a list of his most important statements. Document the falseness he perceives and combats and explain their relevance to a contemporary audience. Look for those moments of epiphany, of recognition and the resulting wisdom.
I’m just played out at this point. I’m going to sign off.
JD