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Brian Lam

Mr. Ryan Gallagher

AP Literature

13 March 2011

Hamlet’s Soliloquy

David Tennant’s rendition on Hamlet’s famous “To be, or not to be” (III.I.55) soliloquy

portrays a hopeless individual talking to himself about the suffering in a world he views as

painful. The soliloquy poses two options for Hamlet’s life and death examination: to suffer or to

die. Hamlet’s dilemma is a clash between religious and philosophical ideas that prevent him

from making this decision. Tennant’s acting style accurately presents the mental suffering in

Hamlet’s thinking.

Hamlet explores the condition of suffering and ending in one’s life. In the beginning of

the video, Tennant approaches to and leaning against the wall facing behind the audience. This

depiction artistically shows Hamlet’s sense of surrender through Tennant’s upward posture, and

the camera view that show a black coloring around his face. These features of the video are

important because viewers are captured by how Hamlet should react in this soliloquy. Tennant

(Hamlet) accurately says the “Whether’tis nobler in the mind to suffer / The slings and arrows of

outrageous fortune,” which shows great emotion to his pondering of human existence (III.I.56-

57). Suffering, as Tennant evokes, is a conscious breakdown before the end of life. The suffering

makes the person feel it and affects the person’s ability to make a conscious decision whether to

slowly expose to pain or end life (not having to deal with that pain). Suffering becomes a

sickness that slowly impairs a person’s judgment until his death. This sickness keeps the person
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wondering about the values of life; the sickness manipulates the psychological being by posing a

sudden dismay of why a person should continue to live after he has been exposed to pain.

Tennant characterizes Hamlet’s lost of consciousness. The video now shows Tennant

closing his eyes, while the camera turns and zooms closer to him. At this moment, the audience

can picture in their mind by what Hamlet said: “To die, to sleep - / No more, and by a sleep to

say we end / The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks. . .” (III.I.59-61) Tennant shows the

relation between sleep and death by closing his eyes, and his mouth slightly open, adding to his

moment of suffering. The quote implies that Hamlet wants to kill himself, claiming that “Tis a

consummation / Devoutly to be wish’d” (III.I.62-63). Shakespeare develops Hamlet here by

introducing his religious and philosophical views. The words “consummation” (62) and

“devoutly” (63) are unique words that have religious and philosophical connotations. Religious

to a sense that the “consummation” of despair is a spiritual neglect that causes Hamlet to feel

detach from his consciousness; the spiritual neglect is something that Hamlet fears about, not just

the human conception of fear (62). Shakespeare incorporates Christian belief that there is life

after death, and one can live eternally through heaven. Moreover, Shakespeare hints that one has

to believe in God by embracing his spiritual being as a way to avoid suffering and to avoid the

fear of the uncertain afterlife.

Tennant continues to develop mental suffering. In the video, he opens his eyes as to have

a sudden realization of what dreams can do following the sleep of death. Tennant says that

dreams are what humans consider as something to worry about during suffering. Shakespeare

describes in-depth of instances by which human suffering is apparent such as “for who would

bear the whips and scorns of time. . .the pangs of despis’d love.” (III.I.69-71) Shakespeare

questions what the purpose of living is if these terrible circumstances happen to humans. Dream
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is an unknown feature that causes people to feel worry because they cannot anticipate what can

could happen. In Christianity, if one fear the unknown then one is certainly going to fear what

will happen, thereby, preventing one from killing oneself to stop the excruciating pain in life.

This, weakness and sensitivity, which humans have, undermines them to act accordingly “thus

conscience does make cowards [of us all]. . .” (III.I.82) Humans are prone to hold back and “lose

the name of action” by their own lack of guidance, causing them to fail to carry out their actions

(III.I.87).

The “To be, or not to be” (III.I.55) soliloquy represents rational thought about life and

death inclusive to religious and philosophical concepts. Hamlet’s struggle and failure to find an

answer to his dilemma leaves him frustrated that both religious and philosophical inquiry was

unable to do that for him. The “To be, or not to be” (III.I.55) soliloquy is essentially an either-or

choice that a person must decide. A choice that have no answer; it is an unending debate between

suffering and death.

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Works Cited

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Ed. Susanne L. Wofford. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1994.

Print.