Synopsis

King Hamlet is dead. The Queen, Gertrude, has remarried within months of her husband’s death to the former King’s brother, Claudius. The young Hamlet is grief-stricken and deeply shocked at his mother’s “o’er hasty marriage.” Hamlet’s sole friend, Horatio, brings him news that the old King Hamlet haunts the battlements of Castle Elsinore.

Hamlet determines to confront the spirit and learns of his father’s “foul and most unnatural murder” at the hands of Hamlet’s uncle and now step-father, Claudius. Hamlet is sworn to avenge his father’s death and whilst deciding the course of his vengeance feigns madness, claiming he is “but mad in craft”.

Hamlet’s strange behaviour causes his love, Ophelia, great distress. Her isolation in Elsinore is made all the worse when her brother, Laertes, leaves for France and she is alone with her overbearing father, Polonius.

Claudius enlists the help of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern, Hamlet’s old ‘schoolfriends’, to determine the cause of Hamlet’s lunacy. Hamlet , enlivened by the arrival of some players, entreats them to perform a play with a similar plot to that of his father’s murder so that he may observe Claudius’ reaction and “catch the conscience of the King”. Polonius believes Hamlet is maddened by the apparent unrequited love of Ophelia and uses his daughter to prove his theory to Claudius. Hamlet’s unfixed mind confesses his love for Ophelia then subsequently spurns her.

The performance takes place and as Hamlet hoped, Claudius cannot bear to watch, thus revealing his guilt. Hamlet’s suspicions are confirmed and his mind is resolved to kill Claudius but hecannot bring himself to perform the final deed. Polonius seeks Gertrude in her chamber, hiding when Hamlet enters rebuking his mother for marrying the murderous Claudius. On hearing Polonius, Hamlet kills him, mistaking him in “a rash and bloody deed” for Claudius.

Claudius, keen to put distance between himself and Hamlet, orders him “to England” accompanied by the hapless Rosencrantz & Guildenstern . Rosencrantz & Guildenstern carry with them a letter to the King of England. Unbeknown to them, the letter orders Hamlet’s execution.

Upon hearing of his father’s murder and subsequent madness of his sister, Laertes returns to Elsinore determined to kill Hamlet. Overcome with grief, betrayed and abandoned by her love, Ophelia drowns herself.

Hamlet returns to Elsinore upon discovery of Claudius’ letter. He escapes during a furious sea battle but not before he rewrites the execution letter to send Rosencrantz & Guildenstern to their death. Claudius plots with Laertes to kill Hamlet in a fencing contest, poisoning the tip of his foil and the wine. During the contest both men are wounded with the poisoned foil and Laertes confesses that the treacherous “king’s to blame”. Gertrude, mistakenly, drinks from the poisonous cup of wine intended for Hamlet and dies. Hamlet seizes the poisoned foil and stabs Claudius, then forces him to drink the wine. Hamlet exchanges forgiveness with the dying Laertes and then he dies himself. “The rest is silence.”

Matthew Bartlett