Madness Flashcards
(14 cards)
Traditional Interpretation
Critics such as Samuel Taylor Coleridge suggest that Hamlet’s madness is feigned to carry out his revenge and that his self-awareness of his performance is key.
Modern Criticism
psychoanalytic critics like Sigmund Freud argue that Hamlet’s madness reflects repressed desires (e.g., his Oedipal complex) and inner conflict over his mother’s marriage to Claudius.
Feminist Criticism
Some critics explore how Ophelia’s madness is tied to gender oppression, suggesting that her breakdown is a result of patriarchal constraints and family pressures.
Daemonologie in forme of a dialogue - King James vi of Scotland - 1597
The devil is the source of all ghostly apparitions to delude the living’
William blake painting
1806 - Hamlet and his father, Hamlet on his knees, father towering over him - completely dominating him.
Eugene delacroix painting
1835- painting of hamlet and corpse of Polonius - Hamlet lifting the curtain revealing Polonius, Hamlet is smiling
‘ Hamlet conduct is cruel… so unworthy of a hero’
Thomas Hanmer - 1736
Voltaire - 1748
A vulgar and barbarous drama’
‘ The play is built up on Hamlet’s hesitations’
Sigmund Freud - 1900
John Dover Wilson - 1935
‘Hamlet may even seem a monster of inconsistency’
The ghost dominates even in his absence’
Terence Hawkes - 1986
Allan Ingram - 2005
‘ The Ophelia figure was a kind of feminine ideal: totally passive, sexualised, and utterly defined by her romantic relationships’
Gould 2025 - Act 1 scene 5
when ghost is on stage audience cant see hamlets face
Kate winslet adaptation
Ophelia wearing a big white baggy dress - suggesting pregnacy. her hair messy
