Hamlet
Recognition is one of the most effective tools that an author can use to attract the reader. Not only is it effective in the way that it makes you want to continue reading, but also read it once again, and again. Much ancient literature is still being read today, but why is it like that? How can such antiques still have a big value and be something we can benefit from today? How can they appeal to us nowadays considering how different our daily life is? The answer to these questions is recognition. The existence of a theme, character or plot that we can relate to is what makes it timeless, the ability to write about "the general". Whether itôs a factor of recognition that arouses a good or a bad feeling, it is the existence of the factor that matters.
Hamlet (1600-1601) by William Shakespeare is a play that we still read even though it was written more than four hundred years ago.
A circa 1884 poster for William Shakespeare's Haml...
English: Birth place of William Shakespeare, Strat...
List of titles of works based on Shakespearean phr...One might think that the factors of recognition in Hamlet arenôt that many since Hamlet is a psychological instable human whose thoughts belong to a psychopath. The truth is that these intangible thoughts expressed in Hamletôs complicated soliloquies contain a number of factor for each reader to relate to. Therefore, Hamlet is a timeless play, because of the countless numbers of factors of recognition that are reflected in Hamletôs thoughts.
One thing that is noticeable in Hamlet is Hamletôs constant strive for answers to the eternal question. The classic and most famous existential questions from Hamlet are when Hamlet asks himself: "To be, or not to be?" (3.1.56-60). He questions the meaning of life. Is it better to be dead than to be alive? Would it be nobler to be dead, if that existence would...