Hamlet as a character is impossible to interpret in a nutshell. His character is multidimensional and complex. Having said that, I believe that Freudian analysis, although perhaps radical for its time and insightful even today, limits the possibilities of analyses of the play, that seem otherwise almost endless. Indeed, Freud himself acknowledges this limitation: …so, all genuinely creative writings are the product of more than a single motive and more than a single impulse in the poet's mind and are open to more than a single interpretation. In what I have written, I have only attempted to interpret the deepest layer of impulse…
That being said, I still believe that a psychoanalytic approach to Hamlet will enrich our understanding of the play.
Freud believed that Hamlet was a prime example of the effects of Oedipus complex on one’s psyche. According to Freud, Hamlet, unlike Oedipus, fails to fulfill his childhood fantasy, killing his father and marrying his own mother, which leads him to a neurotic state.
“The play is built up on Hamlet's hesitations over fulfilling the task of revenge that is assigned to him; but the text offers no reasons or motives for these hesitations”.
This is the starting point of Freud’s argument. Despite previous efforts to interpret Hamlet’s inability to make decisions, not enough insight has been provided. According to Goethe, “Hamlet represents the type of man whose power of direct action is paralysed by an excessive development of his intellect”. This could be true. However, Hamlet is capable of taking action (eg he kills Polonius when he catches him eavesdropping); he only seems hesitant and indecisive when it comes to fulfilling his oath to the ghost of his father. Murder as a task is far from noble as well. It could be that Hamlet doesn’t want to commit murder and irreparably damage his soul. This is again reversed by Hamlet’s murders: Polonius and his friends.
It is worth mentioning that Hamlet, when he encounters the ghost (Act 1, scene 5), says: “I will wipe away all trivial fond records”: he wants to erase everything else in his mind and only focus on his father’s revenge. Freud would in fact interpret this statement as an example of fixation. But even if we don’t follow this interpretation, how is it possible for Hamlet to be willing to go to such extremes to avenge his father, but in the end to be so hesitant to do that very act? Why can’t he kill the man who murdered his father only to take his place on the throne and on the queen’s side?
To answer the above questions, Freud proposes that Claudius in fact represents to Hamlet his repressed childhood dreams. Hamlet’s childhood wish is fulfilled by another man, one that Hamlet must hate. In doing so though, he has to hate himself too, because essentially his uncle and himself share the same incestuous motives (“he himself is literally no better than the sinner whom he is to punish”). Hamlet is filled with self-loathing, indecisiveness and madness, because these childhood dreams, which were supposed to remain into his unconscious, begin to surface and paralyze Hamlet’s will.
Source: “The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism”: Sigmund Freud: The Interpretation of Dreams: Chapter V. The Material and Sources of Dreams
Elle Papadopoulou
That being said, I still believe that a psychoanalytic approach to Hamlet will enrich our understanding of the play.
Freud believed that Hamlet was a prime example of the effects of Oedipus complex on one’s psyche. According to Freud, Hamlet, unlike Oedipus, fails to fulfill his childhood fantasy, killing his father and marrying his own mother, which leads him to a neurotic state.
“The play is built up on Hamlet's hesitations over fulfilling the task of revenge that is assigned to him; but the text offers no reasons or motives for these hesitations”.
This is the starting point of Freud’s argument. Despite previous efforts to interpret Hamlet’s inability to make decisions, not enough insight has been provided. According to Goethe, “Hamlet represents the type of man whose power of direct action is paralysed by an excessive development of his intellect”. This could be true. However, Hamlet is capable of taking action (eg he kills Polonius when he catches him eavesdropping); he only seems hesitant and indecisive when it comes to fulfilling his oath to the ghost of his father. Murder as a task is far from noble as well. It could be that Hamlet doesn’t want to commit murder and irreparably damage his soul. This is again reversed by Hamlet’s murders: Polonius and his friends.
It is worth mentioning that Hamlet, when he encounters the ghost (Act 1, scene 5), says: “I will wipe away all trivial fond records”: he wants to erase everything else in his mind and only focus on his father’s revenge. Freud would in fact interpret this statement as an example of fixation. But even if we don’t follow this interpretation, how is it possible for Hamlet to be willing to go to such extremes to avenge his father, but in the end to be so hesitant to do that very act? Why can’t he kill the man who murdered his father only to take his place on the throne and on the queen’s side?
To answer the above questions, Freud proposes that Claudius in fact represents to Hamlet his repressed childhood dreams. Hamlet’s childhood wish is fulfilled by another man, one that Hamlet must hate. In doing so though, he has to hate himself too, because essentially his uncle and himself share the same incestuous motives (“he himself is literally no better than the sinner whom he is to punish”). Hamlet is filled with self-loathing, indecisiveness and madness, because these childhood dreams, which were supposed to remain into his unconscious, begin to surface and paralyze Hamlet’s will.
Source: “The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism”: Sigmund Freud: The Interpretation of Dreams: Chapter V. The Material and Sources of Dreams
Elle Papadopoulou
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