To die, to sleep: perchance to dream:" He is doomed to a sleep that is plagued by fear and reprisal, to seek out revenge for worldly actions against him. Hamlet knows that if he were to die today he would likely be doomed to walk the halls, as his father dreaming of the day that he was killed and the betrayal that ended his life, "ay there's the rub; / for in that sleep of death what dreams may come." Hamlet knows that reaching out to seek the sleep and dream of death he would be dooming himself to an eternal seeking of revenge, not unlike that of his father who reached out to him in death to tell his story of betrayal and exact revenge upon the wife (mother) and brother. The soliloquy reveals that Hamlet is mortal, that he is afraid of the un-avenged death and that he is now willing to let himself die in an act of avenging his father. He is also clearly willing to take the eternal scorn that will likely be waged against him in life and death with regard to the wrong he did to the fair Ophelia. In this passage he is more honest with his feelings about Ophelia than at almost any other time in the work. He has previously lamented that the fair Ophelia has been used, as he has to try to cover the story of his father's death, by allowing those who follow to live on without revenge. He takes responsibility for his actions against her, knowing that he and others have caused her death and that...
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