With the death of my beloved brother, I understand that am
the closest person Hamlet will find to a father figure at the moment. While he
has yet to acknowledge me as his “substitute” father, I have already declared
Hamlet to be my “courtier, cousin, and… son” (1.2.117). Depressing as these
times might be for Hamlet, I actually think this situation that we have been
hurled into will eventually be a mutual stepping stone in our relationship.
Hamlet’s feelings of “impious stubbornness” and “unmanly
grief” are getting him nowhere (1.2.94). Perhaps he subconsciously feels the
pressure from being the “immediate to our throne” (1.2.109). After his father’s
death, reality must have hit him like a cannonball, giving him thoughts about
the kingdom he could have and eventually will inherit. Perhaps he feels he isn’t
ready, and those thoughts are distressing him. Emotions are silly things, and
to be subject to them for too long is certainly unhealthy.
Putting all the speculation aside though, Hamlet MUST stop
fretting and stressing over his father’s death. There are deeper problems in
the nation that must be addressed, now that that a formal mourning and new
appointment of a king has been settled. I have no doubt that Fortinbras will be
at our front step at any given moment, trying to recover “those forsaid lands/
So by his father lost” (1.1.103-104). We’re talking about the security of a
nation and its people! Hamlet better gear up for this inevitable rollercoaster
of war that will be our lives in the foreseeable future.
I think my new wife Gertrude sums it up best: “all that
lives must die” (1.2.72). If Hamlet doesn’t see eye to eye with that soon…
Well, let’s not even consider that possibility.
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