Gertrude and Claudius Group at eNotes

Thank you very much, this information really truly helps. Honestly,...

Wed, 8 Apr 2009 04:36:25 PST

Thank you very much, this information really truly helps. Honestly, Hamlet is the very first Shakespeare play I have read through and I find it so intruiging compared to Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet, and Midsummer Night's Dream. (The plays I have read as of yet.) But what inspired me to write about Gertrude was that during my class nobody really gave Gertrude the credit for her fire starting actions! I was really dissapointed when I saw that...

Hamlet's transition from a philosophical and idealistic youth to a...

Fri, 3 Apr 2009 10:33:00 PST

Hamlet's transition from a philosophical and idealistic youth to a jaded, hopeless adult is the result of a series of psychic blows which open his eyes to human frailty and imperfection. What was once a wonderful world full of perfect abstracts like love, beauty, honor, loyalty, truth etc becomes a grim place full of selfish inconsistency, base urges and brief mortality. And the heaviest blow to Hamlet's perfect world is his mother's...

With regard to secondary sources, perhaps you could research the...

Fri, 3 Apr 2009 10:33:00 PST

With regard to secondary sources, perhaps you could research the influence of mothers upon main characters/people. Wasn't it Freud who attributed so much of what one becomes to the mother? (e.g. Psychological studies of disturbed people such as serial killers usually do involve disturbed mothers.) Often criticisms of the play will provide some insight to a reader's questions. See the site listed below as well as other criticisms here...

In what ways is Gertrude a very crucial character in the play "Hamlet"?

Fri, 3 Apr 2009 06:03:16 PST

I'm doing a reasearch paper about how Gertrude is the catalyst of all the events in Hamlet. She started the desire for Claudius to kill Hamlet's Father, for he loved her, she caused Hamlet to be suspicious of Claudius for her hasty decision to marry Claudius, etc. I'd like to gather as much information about this topic as possible. At the moment I can't seem to find any secondary sources to back-up my information appropriately and am hoping...

In Act IV, Laertes comes home in a fluster because his father has been...

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 18:43:38 PST

In Act IV, Laertes comes home in a fluster because his father has been murdered. We learn that he is willing to cut a deal with Claudius to get at the murderer...Hamlet. He is resolved to act against Hamlet in a contrived plan to make it seem an accident. From this we know that Laertes is more of a person who acts than who thinks--the opposite of Hamlet. We also know he believes what he is told--not at all like Hamlet. Laertes seems a...

The content to be derived from other literary works depends greatly on...

Mon, 30 Apr 2007 18:27:27 PST

The content to be derived from other literary works depends greatly on what you choose as your thesis. You could do a comparison/contrast of the leadership roles in Danish history vs. Scottish history, as portrayed in Shakespeare's Hamlet and Updike's novel VS. Shakespeare's Macbeth. You could examine the change in the time period of the author's the subsequent focus of their works. The cornerstone of Updike's novel is Shakespeare's Hamlet,...

What should I write for my research paper concerning the topic "Gertrude...

Sat, 28 Apr 2007 13:49:56 PST

What should I write for my research paper concerning the topic "Gertrude and Claudius?"

Two other titles come to mind: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by...

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 14:03:08 PST

Two other titles come to mind: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard and Grendel by John Gardner. Both of these titles rework classic tales into something new and more modern. It might be interesting to compare and contrast the way various authors have adapted classic works to a new era.

What can I research about concerning the novel Gertrude and Claudius for...

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 13:42:28 PST

What can I research about concerning the novel Gertrude and Claudius for my senior thesis?

What new information did you learn about Laertes in act IV that would...

Wed, 21 Mar 2007 07:51:34 PST

What new information did you learn about Laertes in act IV that would help an actor or actress?