It would make sense if Hamlet was only talking about the players, because who else would the 'whipping' refer to? But at the same time it seems more like a general phrase to me, which might possibly even refer to EVERYONE - it might be like one of his other internal conceptions, like 'After your death you were better have a bad epitaph than their ill report while you live.' 'Use every man after his desert and who shall scape whipping?' is one of the my favourite phrases from Hamlet, but I've possibly been reading too much into it for some time now: Hamlet: God's bodkin, man, much better! Use every man after his desert and who shall scape whipping? Use them after your own honor and dignity - the less they deserve the more merit is in your bounty. Polonius: My lord, I will use them accoding to their desert. The results of his limited choices culminate in the tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark.-Submitted by Anonymous The play is famous for its soliloquies, where Hamlet presents the audience privately with his perceived choices. Throughout the play Hamlet is presented with choices, of belief, of action, of love, of justice and of conscience. Hamlet is portrayed as being uncertain as to whether he is the prince of the title, or student. One constant theme of the English renaissance is the development of personal character and fame. One of the more accessible Renaissance/early modern period texts. We also see the problems of lack of self-confidence, misjudgement, and betrayal.-Submitted by imran.įirst performance at the end of 15th century, ~ timeline, death of Elizabeth I and accession of James VI and I. The play trembles with conflicts: one being identity, which shows all the characters in different disputes of their own. In this play Shakespeare has portrayed young Hamlet to convey the two sides to him one side shows his insane behaviour towards his family, the other side determines his thoughts of either doing right or wrong according to what he has seen.

Throughout Shakespeare's plays, the maintenance of identity is a very common conflict, as it was shown in Macbeth and now in Hamlet.

First performed between the years 1600-01, first printed in 1603.

Hamlet was written by shakespeare