1. Act 5

2.  Nemesis  Foils  Disease and Corruption  Women  Hamlet as Tragic Hero  Appearance vs Reality

3.  Why does Shakespeare include the gravedigger scene? What purpose does it serve?  Existential Hamlet: Hamlet, in reflecting on what happens to us after we die, seems to be even less certain of an afterlife.

4.  Hamlet is 30 Gravedigger: …I came to it that day our last King Hamlet overcame Fortinbras. Hamlet: How long is that since? Gravedigger: …It was the very day that young Hamlet was born—…I have been sexton here, man and boy, thirty years. (5.1.147-165)  Does Hamlet seem like a 30 year old man?

5.  “Alas, poor Yorick. I knew him, Horatio.” (5.1. 187-188) Hamlet confronts his own mortality and seems resigned to it.  Ophelia’s funeral: Laertes’ show of grief vs Hamlet’s (5.1.253-295) Did Hamlet really love Ophelia?

6.  Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead. Did they deserve their fate?  Osric and comic relief  Hamlet is ready to accept his fate—whatever that may be. “There’s a special providence in the fall of a sparrow.” (5.2.215-216) But Horatio is worried.

7.  The duel: dramatic irony: we know the cup and sword are both poisoned but Hamlet doesn’t.  Does Gertrude know the cup is poisoned? If so her decision to drink anyway could be read as protecting her son.  Is the chain restored by the end?

8.  Does Hamlet suffer from an Oedipal complex?  Did Hamlet really ever love Ophelia?  Is Hamlet a tragic hero? (Does he face his destiny with courage and nobility?)  Is Hamlet mad?  Why can Hamlet be ruthless with Polonius and R&G but not Claudius?