You could begin with Hamlet's concluding point of view on
life and death, the point of view at which he finally arrives at the end of the play.
His lines from Act V, scene ii:
readability="9">
There is special providence in the fall of a
sparrow. 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.
There are traceable
references to the New Testament in the above lines, and they are the words of a man who
has found his peace with the potential moment of his death. This Hamlet no longer
either wishes to or wonders about taking his own life. He accepts that this decision
lies in other hands; his only job is to be ready for that moment whenever it should
come. Quite a different point of view from the guy who was torn between "[t]o be or not
to be."
So you could begin with the end and have your paper
jump from this point back to the beginning of the play for an investigation of how
Hamlet got from "O that this too, too sullied flesh would melt/Thaw and resolve itself
into a dew," in Act One to this all-accepting Act Five point of
view.
Please follow the links below for more on the three
moments in the play that I have made reference to above. Good luck with your
paper!
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