Hamlet: Reflection

Phew. Hamlet is over. In a way, I am relieved. The constant battering of old English has left my brain a little sore. The hither and thither of Shakespeare made learning the themes of Hamlet just that much more difficult to understand. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the story. This was always one of the Shakespeare stories (if any) that I wanted to learn more about. Well, I learned a whole lot about it. I learned more about the concepts of tragedy and irony than I ever had before. I was able to better understand the inner workings of the driving forces behing Shakespeare's intellectual expertise. This, in turn, allowed me to analyze Hamlet in a way that made me think about what is actually being said. The conversations between characters, soliloquys and narration suddenly had new meaning. I was beginning to translate the text as I read. As a result, the themes of the story began to make sense to me as I tried to tie them in to my understanding of each individual situation. This reading has ultimately proved to be one of the most helpful explorations of Shakespeare yet. I will walk away from this unit with a greater knowledge of Shakespeare and any literature of this kind.