Hamlet Whos Whom Horatio Hamlet Old Hamlet Rosencrantz

Hamlet Who’s Whom?

Horatio Hamlet Old Hamlet Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Gertrude Claudius Ophelia Polonius Laeretes

Plot • Looming war between Denmark and Norway – Old Hamlet verses Old Fortinbras • Revenge – Major and minor characters • Love between Hamlet and Ophelia

Revenge Plot • Requirements – a play within a play – mad scenes – a vengeful ghost – one or several gory scenes – a central character who has a serious grievance against a formidable opponent. – Takes justice into his own hands after the public has failed him

Soliloquy • character talks to himself or herself or reveals his or her thoughts without addressing a listener.

Aside • A piece of dialogue intended for the audience and supposedly not heard by the other actors on stage.

Oedipal Complex • Sigmund Freud • a desire for sexual involvement with the parent of the opposite sex and a sense of rivalry with the parent of the same sex. • boys and girls resolved the conflicts differently as a result of castration anxiety (for males) and penis envy (for females). • unsuccessful resolution of the Oedipus complex could result in neurosis, pedophilia, and homosexuality.

Electra Complex • Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung • A daughter's amorous obsession with her father • Freud attributes the character of this developmental stage in girls to the idea of "penis envy" • Leads to resentment towards the mother figure • Hostility towards the mother is then later revoked for fear of losing the mother's love