Only the faithful Horatio knows that; elsewhere Hamlet “keeps aloof” from the topic with true madman’s instinct, whenever his state is mentioned. The King pretends to Polonius that while the disease is not so serious as it seems, only Hamlet’s absence from Denmark can prevent it from becoming so. In this way he
gets him removed. But throughout the play, whether in his attempts to deceive the Court or in his foiling of the King’s design, Hamlet acts with what might be called the craft of true madness.
It is unnecessary to insist on the complexity and the lifelike truth of Hamlet’s character. No personage in the world’s drama has excited more criticism. The Prince of Denmark is on all sides acknowledged to be supreme. And for that reason it is needless to attempt to prove what otherwise would be the main contention of this chapter—that Hamlet is in every way the greatest of the Pretenders whom we have studied, and, indeed, of the madmen, true and false, who form the subject of this essay.
FOOTNOTES:
[167:1] Act iv., scene 2.
[169:1] “The Changeling,” v., 3.
[169:2] Ibid., iii., 3.
[171:1] “Honest Whore,” v., 13.