Examples Of Grief In Hamlet
Hamlet: Stages of Grief
Grief is a ubiquitous emotion felt by everyone at some point or another during the course of his or her lives. The effects of grief can be various and untimely, causing many people to act differently than others. There are five famous steps or stages to grief. Originally written by Swiss psychologist Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in 1969 in her book “On Death and Dying.” The theme of grief is very protruding throughout William Shakespeare’s most well known play, “Hamlet.” Roughly every character in the play encounters it. Even though these stages were not identified until the 20th century one of the earliest examples we can look at is in Hamlet. A major doctrine of the five stages theory is that a person is not obligated to go through the five stages in order, nor is one required to go through all the stages. The Danes all go through the stages of grief but individually not together. Denial is the first stage of Kubler-Ross’ grief map. Denial is a defense mechanism in which a person unconsciously rejects thoughts, feelings, needs, …show more content…
The largest insinuation of them being in the stage of denial is their concentration with Fortinbras’ distinguished anger rather than Hamlet’s sadness. They are in denial about their son’s and their own guilt and trauma that they do not help or address the grief at all. Gertrude, as I stated in my response essay, is a perfect example of being in denial. She is lying to herself and telling herself that everything is the way it should be and it is all back to normal when it is definitely not. Ophelia goes through denial in the first act. Losing Hamlet, her love, because of Polonius’ orders. Her denial gets stronger as the play progresses when she loses her father. She felt as Hamlet thought he felt, and she does nothing until she commits suicide because of her denial about her ability to
Grief is a ubiquitous emotion felt by everyone at some point or another during the course of his or her lives. The effects of grief can be various and untimely, causing many people to act differently than others. There are five famous steps or stages to grief. Originally written by Swiss psychologist Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in 1969 in her book “On Death and Dying.” The theme of grief is very protruding throughout William Shakespeare’s most well known play, “Hamlet.” Roughly every character in the play encounters it. Even though these stages were not identified until the 20th century one of the earliest examples we can look at is in Hamlet. A major doctrine of the five stages theory is that a person is not obligated to go through the five stages in order, nor is one required to go through all the stages. The Danes all go through the stages of grief but individually not together. Denial is the first stage of Kubler-Ross’ grief map. Denial is a defense mechanism in which a person unconsciously rejects thoughts, feelings, needs, …show more content…
The largest insinuation of them being in the stage of denial is their concentration with Fortinbras’ distinguished anger rather than Hamlet’s sadness. They are in denial about their son’s and their own guilt and trauma that they do not help or address the grief at all. Gertrude, as I stated in my response essay, is a perfect example of being in denial. She is lying to herself and telling herself that everything is the way it should be and it is all back to normal when it is definitely not. Ophelia goes through denial in the first act. Losing Hamlet, her love, because of Polonius’ orders. Her denial gets stronger as the play progresses when she loses her father. She felt as Hamlet thought he felt, and she does nothing until she commits suicide because of her denial about her ability to