o this day cannot be deciphered in its entirety, for nunnery is a place where nuns live, yet it is also a brothel. Hamlet seems to knowingly cast a shade of confusion into the minds of the audience…or is it in fact clarity within confusion. That is, the audience is able to better understand the thoughts and inner struggle of Hamlet via these conflicting terms.After Hamlet has visited his mother "all alone" in her closet and killed Polonius, after she has begged him to "speak no more", and after his father's ghost has reappeared, Hamlet repeats "Good night" five times, with still fewer changes in the phrase than "Get thee to a nunnery" and those among accompanying words only.So Hamlet seems to be struggling to contain his thoughts even by use of these simple words, rather than enforcing a single and simple message as a first reading of the text might suggest; and the words come to bear deeper, more ironic or more blatant meanings. It is from these phrases, which even manage to confuse the complex mind of Hamlet that we begin to get a glimpse into the intentions of Hamlets mind, and seeing just exactly the way he ticks.Much of the dramatic action of this tragedy is within the head of Hamlet, and wordplay represents the amazing, contradictory, unsettled, mocking nature of that mind, as it is torn by disappointment and positive love, as Hamlet seeks both acceptance and punishment, action and stillness, and wishes for consummation and annihilation within a world he perceives to be against him. He can be abruptly silent or vicious; he is capable of wild laughter and tears, and also playing polite and sane. The narrative is a kind of mystery and chase, so that, underneath the various guises of his wordplay, we are made keenly aware of his inner dissatisfaction, and come to expect some resolution at the end of the tragedy, some unambiguous "giving out" which will report Hamlet and his cause aright to the unsatisfied among the reader / aud...
