Haunting in Shakespeare’s Hamlet takes many forms. While much of the play’s action is defined by Hamlet’s encounter with his father’s ghost in Act One, there are clearly many more aspects of haunting addressed throughout the play. Hamlet is a character whose primary characteristic is his obsession with mortality and the past, and through this, Shakespeare presents haunting as something both externally produced—as by the ghost—and internally experienced. In this paper, I will discuss how Hamlet’s encounter with the ghost affects his mental state, and how this is presented onstage. I will then explore the ways in which haunting is presented in Act Three, at the reappearance of the ghost when Hamlet is with his mother.
When the ghost first appears, it is to Hamlet, Horatio and Marcellus. It is not immediately recognisable, and Hamlet first prays for deliverance, saying “Angels and ministers of grace defend us” (1.4.668). However, Hamlet then continues, “Thou com’st in such a questionable shape / that I will speak to thee. I’ll call thee Hamlet, / King, father, royal Dane” (1.4.672-74). By calling the shape of the ghost “questionable,” Shakespeare is presenting a kind of ambiguity of identity in this scene. It is possible that Hamlet is not so much encountering the ghost of his father as he is projecting the image of his father onto the unidentifiable shape of this apparition. This idea is reinforced by the phrase, “I’ll call thee Hamlet,” as this does not identify the ghost as Hamlet in terms of certainty that the ghost is King Hamlet, but shows that the young Hamlet is choosing to identify him as such, and to call him King Hamlet. This is one way in which Shakespeare presents haunting as both an external and internal presence of the ghost, as although there is a visual representation of the ghost on stage, it is identified only by the internal haunting of Hamlet.
There is a deep sense of symbolism in the encounter that follows between Hamlet and the ghost. Its act of beckoning (1.4.687, 720) being directed only to Hamlet shows Hamlet’s susceptibility to insanity and obsession, reaffirming the turmoil he already suffers upon the death of his father. By then setting him on a course of revenge, the ghost feeds into Hamlet’s passion for mortality, first marked by the beckoning of a ghost. This is therefore symbolic of the way in which Hamlet is gradually drawn away from the society of the living in order to pursue a task that eventually leads to his own death. Horatio observes this acutely, questioning, “What if it tempt you toward the flood… Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff,” and suggesting that the ghost might “deprive [Hamlet] of reason / And draw [him] into madness” (1.4.706-7). As Hamlet’s mental state deteriorates over the course of the play and makes him question the possibility of ending his own life, the significance of this speech from Horatio becomes clear, hinting at the continuation of this haunting beyond the literal apparition of the ghost onstage.
The effects of this encounter can also be seen in Hamlet’s reactions throughout their dialogue, most of which appear to be passionate exclamations. For example, the ghost’s speech is at times punctuated by such short lines as “Alas, poor ghost!” (1.5.739), “O, my prophetic soul!” (1.5.778), and “O, horrible! O, horrible! most horrible!” (1.5.818). This shows that Hamlet is in a state of shock or terror, and the extreme difference in the length of his lines and the ghost’s shows that he is in a position of relative disempowerment, showing the influence that the ghost can exercise over him.
The internalisation of haunting is shown even more clearly in a later scene in which the ghost appears to Hamlet while he is with his mother. The ghost enters “in his nightgown” (3.4.249), and although it can be seen by Hamlet, Gertrude appears to have no knowledge of its existence. Because of this, her response is to say that “he’s mad” (3.4.253), saying to Hamlet, “Alas, how is’t with you, / That you do bend your eye on vacancy, / And with th’ encorporal air hold discourse?” (3.4.255). This is again symbolic of Hamlet’s total obsession, and these lines can be read in two ways. On the one hand, Gertrude is seen to be responding directly to the fact that Hamlet appears to be speaking to empty air, and in this way, the “vacancy” on which he bends his eye is the empty space to which he directs his speech. However, Shakespeare also uses this passage to indicate the internalisation of Hamlet’s haunting, as not only is he literally speaking to vacant space, but he is blinded to all realities outside of the death of his father. His father’s death, and absence, is also represented by this “vacancy,” and Gertrude’s comment can therefore be seen as representative of Hamlet’s single-minded obsession with his father’s absence in the play.
Shakespeare makes use of this dual nature of haunting in order to demonstrate the prevalence of King Hamlet’s death throughout the play. While he is literally shown to be present onstage, this represents his pervading presence in the lives and deaths of the live characters of the play. Furthermore, the fact that he only speaks to Hamlet shows that Hamlet is the character most haunted, and this shows how he is drawn away from the living.
- Shakespeare W. Hamlet. Simon & Schuster; 1992.
