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Horatio mistakenly assumes that King Hamlet's ghost is an ominous portent of the looming war (1.1.109). 3. King Claudius addresses the threat from Prince Fortinbras, and he reveals that Fortinbras is seeking his revenge on Denmark without the knowledge of the sitting king of Norway, Fortinbras' uncle: Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras,
- Hamlet
- Claudius
- Gertrude
- Polonius
- Ophelia
- Laertes
- The Ghost
- Horatio
- Fortinbras
- Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
The Prince of Denmark, the title character, and the protagonist. About thirty years old at the start of the play, Hamlet is the son of Queen Gertrude and the late King Hamlet, and the nephew of the present king, Claudius. Hamlet is melancholy, bitter, and cynical, full of hatred for his uncle’s scheming and disgust for his mother’s sexuality. A ref...
The King of Denmark, Hamlet’s uncle, and the play’s antagonist. The villain of the play, Claudius is a calculating, ambitious politician, driven by his sexual appetites and his lust for power, but he occasionally shows signs of guilt and human feeling—his love for Gertrude, for instance, seems sincere. Read an in-depth analysis of Claudius.
The Queen of Denmark, Hamlet’s mother, recently married to Claudius. Gertrude loves Hamlet deeply, but she is a shallow, weak woman who seeks affection and status more urgently than moral rectitude or truth. Read an in-depth analysis of Gertrude.
The Lord Chamberlain of Claudius’s court, a pompous, conniving old man. Polonius is the father of Laertes and Ophelia. Read an in-depth analysis of Polonius.
Polonius’s daughter, a beautiful young woman with whom Hamlet has been in love. Ophelia is a sweet and innocent young girl, who obeys her father and her brother, Laertes. Dependent on men to tell her how to behave, she gives in to Polonius’s schemes to spy on Hamlet. Even in her lapse into madness and death, she remains maidenly, singing songs abou...
Polonius’s son and Ophelia’s brother, a young man who spends much of the play in France. Passionate and quick to action, Laertes is clearly a foil for the reflective Hamlet. Read an in-depth analysis of Laertes.
The specter of Hamlet’s recently deceased father. The Ghost, who claims to have been murdered by Claudius, calls upon Hamlet to avenge him. However, it is not entirely certain whether the Ghost is what it appears to be, or whether it is something else. Hamlet speculates that the Ghost might be a devil sent to deceive him and tempt him into murder, ...
Hamlet’s close friend, who studied with the prince at the university in Wittenberg. Horatio is loyal and helpful to Hamlet throughout the play. After Hamlet’s death, Horatio remains alive to tell Hamlet’s story.
The young Prince of Norway, whose father the king (also named Fortinbras) was killed by Hamlet’s father (also named Hamlet). Now Fortinbras wishes to attack Denmark to avenge his father’s honor, making him another foil for Prince Hamlet.
Two slightly bumbling courtiers, former friends of Hamlet from Wittenberg, who are summoned by Claudius and Gertrude to discover the cause of Hamlet’s strange behavior.
Read our modern English translation . The Prince of Norway. A young leader motivated to conquer foreign lands, make a name for himself, and avenge his father’s death at the hands of Hamlet ’s own father, Fortinbras is Hamlet’s opposite in every way. Fortinbras’s actions—heard of consistently throughout the play, even though Fortinbras ...
King Fortinbras (father) Fortinbras / ˈfɔːrtɪnbræs / is the name of two minor fictional characters from William Shakespeare 's tragedy Hamlet. The more notable is a Norwegian crown prince with a few brief scenes in the play, who delivers the final lines that represent a hopeful future for the monarchy of Denmark and its subjects.
- Hamlet (by the end)
- William Shakespeare
- King Fortinbras (father)
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"Go, captain, from me greet the Danish king" (4.4.1), says Fortinbras, as he marches across the stage on his way to Poland. To Hamlet, the Norwegian Captain expresses disgust with Fortinbras' objective, "a little patch of ground / That hath in it no profit but the name" (4.4.18-19).
Fortinbras, Hamlet. Fortinbras, frequently referred to in the play, Hamlet, as “young” Fortinbras, is one of Shakespeare’s most minor characters. He has no dramatic relevance and hardly appears in the play at all. However, he is an important idea in the play and has a major function in the meaning of it. He is a man of action and a ...
Prince Fortinbras is a foil to Hamlet because he decisively takes action to win back the territories that his father, King Fortinbras, lost to Denmark's King Hamlet. On the other hand, Prince ...
