by Trey Russell

Created on: October 20, 2007

Hamlet, by the forever-famous William Shakespeare, is a tale of sorrow and woe. However, its purpose was more complex than simple sorrow, madness, death and misunderstandings. Rather, it is a story of humanity, touching upon some small flickering shadow of universal truth. The play shows the natural order of things shattered and the chaos that loss of order brings. Truly, Shakespeare examines the very idea of "order".

In Hamlet, Shakespeare allows the natural order of things to fall apart in order to examine the emotions engendered from such disruption. Before the play had even begun the king of Denmark died of "cursed hebona", and from his death, the slide into disorder began. Cracks, spreading outwards from the initial sin, grow into each of the characters. For, while established order often brings security, such a thing never lasts forever. In the void that forms when order is lost, something is always waiting to jump in. Claudius, foul brother that he was, attempts to fill the void. Calling Hamlet his son, and wedding the widowed queen, he tried quite hard. However, as Order is a stiff and uncompromising god, one piece of a puzzle can not be changed without changing all the rest. And, as a loose thread serves to unravel a sweater, so does the initial change in the structure of the kingdom bring it down.

Following that first change, Shakespeare shows the chaos that springs from order overturned as one after another, the court falls. For Hamlet, it was a trio of tornados that brought him to his knees. Every time he tried to restructure himself and accept what fate had dealt him he was bent by his environment again, even unto madness. In a tormented string Claudius' ambition created Hamlet's madness that served as a spur to Ophelia's, and hers summoned forth Laertes' latent anger. Curving back to the source, this line of chaos incarnate would be Claudius' and all the others' downfall. The epitome of dis-equilibrium, the unholy mess of Hamlet suggests both lesson and warning in its yellowed pages: When the normal of structure of life is bent, it may lead to tumultuous action ere it is reestablished. As such, sacrificing time, energy, and soul to create said structure while it may yield many good results is an act that carries grave risks. Often, as in Ophelia's case, it is difficult to remain standing when the crutches you've carried through life (a father, for instance) break.

Order, the antithesis to chaos, has been with us since before our ancestors walked on land. Ever the friend to the confused mind, it is in our very genes to choose certainty over uncertainty. The young can tolerate the uncertainty and random fate to some degree, but as our brains calcify into their mature form, the lure of structure becomes nigh undeniable. However, as this play shows with such a poisonous and bloody vigor, the comforting and securing qualities of our contrived order abandon us when they are needed the most. When something occurs that kills the keystone of order such as a king, a father, or something as ordinary as a missing pen, we feel lost. That sense of being lost and the search to re-find ourselves can lead to disastrous results, as Hamlet clearly shows. Perhaps the real lesson is to hold back, and to never love or count on anything overmuch when all that lives must die?

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