ted out of the goodness of his heart. One of these acts consisted of drinking the remainder of the poison left in the glass that Claudius and Gertrude had already drank from, to prevent Horatio sipping from this glass and dying as well. Madness is a mental illness that does not come and go as it pleases and, therefore, Hamlet could not have been truly mad as he simply interrupted his antic disposition once again acting completely sane. Hamlet was a great individual, who when confronted with a number of tragedies in his life, as well as with the proposition that his uncle killed his father, he did not lose Williams 5 control of his conscious mind, but instead, knew exactly how to resolve his pending maladies. There is no question that his apparent madness was his own concoction devised to aid in his efforts in revealing the truth behind his father’s death and seeking out to revenge it. His motives for doing so were to keep his investigation hidden for as long as possible, to drive away all other aspects of his life that might interfere with his task and to absolve himself of all guilt he may acquire while on his quest. There is proof in his actions that his madness was feigned as he continued thinking rationally and speaking logically to characters like Horatio and Gertrude. A madman’s thought are not composed of logical rationale and he does not speak sanely to some, while at the same time, insanely to others. Hamlet then suddenly drops his antic disposition right after his dispute with Laertes in the graveyard as he began speaking and acting completely normal at all times which was illustrated while he mocked the courtier, Osric. The absence of hamlet’s madness was exemplified further as he confessed feelings of remorse towards Laertes for killing Polonius and Hamlet also performs extremely noble acts as his life was waning. True madness is an illness that inhibits the mind of an individual and assumes total control o...
