Friday, January 3, 2014

In Act 1 Scene 4 of Hamlet, what relationship does Hamlet see between national defects and personal ones?

This conversations is one of the most interesting ones in the
play because Hamlet is talking specifically about personal flaws -- ie. tragic flaws and where
they orginate from.  It is, in a sense, Shakespeare talking about his tragic hero.  Hamlet starts
the speech talking about the excessive drinking in Denmark and how it affects everyone's
perception of the country, but he then uses that idea to launch into an analysis of human flaws
and notes that they can come from "a mole of nature" meaning something someone is born with; they
can come from an "overgrowth of some complexion" meaning there is an unbalance of the humors in
the body that affect the personality; or they can be "a habit overlevened" meaning something that
starts as a habit and becomes an addiction.  In the end, it doesn't matter where the flaw comes
from, the fact is the flaw exists and it can ruin the whole of the person.  He starts out saying
that about Denmark, but concludes it as a truth about human nature. 

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