Brief Summary of Hamlet
Hamlet Brief Summary
Old Hamlet = dead King,
Prince Hamlet, son of Old Hamlet and Getrude
Queen Getrude, Hamlet’s mother
Claudius = Old Hamlet’s brother, Hamlet’s stepfather
Horatio = Hamlet’s best friend
Orphelia = daughter of Polonius, the Lord Chamberlain
Polonius = Lord Chamberlain
Laertes = son of Polonius, brother of Orphelia
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern = Hamlet’s friends
O N A DARK WINTER NIGHT,a ghost walks the top of Elsinore Castle in Denmark. Discovered first by a pair of guards, then by the scholar Horatio, the ghost looks like the Old King Hamlet, who died recently. His brother Claudius is now King and has married the K ing’s widow, Queen Gertrude. When Prince Hamlet, the son of Gertrude and the dead King, sees the ghost, it tells him that he is indeed the ghost of his dead father who was murdered by Claudius, his own brother. It tells him to get revenge on his uncle who killed his father and married his mother. Then, the ghost disappears with the beginning of daylight.
Prince Hamlet plan s to avenge his father’s murder but he delays, and becomes very depressed and pretends to be mad. Claudius and Gertrude want to know what is wrong with him. They pay a pair of Hamlet’s friends, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to watch him. When Polonius, th e pompous Lord Chamberlain, suggests that Hamlet may be mad with love for his daughter, Ophelia, Claudius agrees to spy on Hamlet in conversation with the girl. But though Hamlet appears mad, he does not seem to love Ophelia: he orders her to become a nun. She is heartbroken and later, when her father Polonius is killed, she kills drowns herself in a river.
A group of traveling actors comes to Elsinore, and Hamlet has an idea to test his uncle’s guilt. He tells the players to perform a play of events similar to what he thinks has happened. If Claudius really did kill his father, he will not be able to hide his guilt. When the actors perform the murder scene, Claudius jumps up and leaves the room. Hamlet and Horatio agree that this proves his guilt. Hamlet goes to kill Claudius but finds him praying. Since he believes that killing Claudius while in prayer would send Claudius’s soul to heaven, Hamlet waits.
Instead, Hamlet goes to confront his mother in her bedroom, where Polonius is hiding behind a curtain. Hearing a noise coming from behind the curtain, Hamlet believes the king is hiding there. He draws his sword and stabs through the fabric, killing Polonius. For his crime, Claudius immediately sends Hamlet o England with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern with a letter telling the King of England to execute Hamlet.
After Orphelia’s suicide and Polonius murder, Polonius’s son, Laertes, returns to Denmark in a rage. Claudius blames Hamlet for his Laertes’ father’s and sister’s deaths. After Hamlet returns from England, Claudius decides to use Laertes (who believes him) to kill Hamlet. Laertes will fence (sword-fight) with Hamlet, but Claudius will poison Laertes’ blade so that if cuts Hamlet, he will die. As a backup plan, the king decides to poison a goblet, which he will give Hamlet to drink.
The sword-fighting begins. Hamlet scores the first hit, but doesn’t drink from the poisoned cup. Instead, Gertrude drinks from it and dies quickly. . Laertes succeeds in wounding Hamlet, though Hamlet does not die of t he poison immediately. First, Laertes is cut by his own sword’s blade, and, after revealing to Hamlet that Claudius is responsible for the queen’s death, he dies from the blade’s poison. Hamlet then stabs Claudius with the poisoned sword and forces him to drink down the rest of the poisoned wine. Claudius dies, and Hamlet dies immediately after getting revenge for his father.
The whole Royal Family lie dead on the floor and it is a great tragedy.