Hamlet

After reading Hamlet, viewing at least one production, and reading the lecture, you are now ready to discuss elements of the play here in discussion board virtual space. Choose just 2 of the questions below to write a 100 word minimum response to each question, quoting at least once from the play, citing the Act, Scene, and Lines. Use standard formatting for this--for example: (2.3.44-47) means Act Two, Scene Three, Lines 45 to 47.
Once you have posted two responses, then respond with a substantive answer to two of your classmates (not a compliment or a criticism per se, but a response to the content of the play as viewed by a classmate).

1. Hamlet is written around or about 1600, when England has only recently changed from being officially Catholic to Protestant. Respectively, views differ between them as to the existence of purgatory, the nature of what is a ghost, etc…. How does Hamlet, the play, negotiate the differences between Protestant and Catholic views?
2. Hamlet is hands-down the most philosophical of all of Shakespeare's works. What makes it so? Give at least three examples to explain and be sure to cite from the text.
3. Hamlet was written during a time of political uncertainty and fear, which has parallels in both the mood and the events of the play. How does Hamlet capture contemporary fear that irresponsible rulers and uncertain succession were destroying the country?
4. Audiences watching Hamlet at the time it was first performed would recognize the play as belonging to a particular genre: they didn’t have a name for it, but modern scholars call it “revenge tragedy.” In a revenge tragedy the hero has suffered a great wrong, usually the murder of someone he loves, and the plot is driven by his desire for revenge. At the end of the play, the hero murders the person who has wronged him, and typically the hero also dies. But how does Hamlet subvert many of the tropes of a typical revenge play in order to call into question the genre of revenge tragedy (as he clearly did in Titus Andronicus, as well), and the nature of revenge itself?