Ranking of Characters in Hamlet Based on Morality

The characters in Hamlet vary greatly in their moral character. At the bottom of the ladder, King Claudius wallows in his evil. He kills his brother treacherously and steals his wife. Thus he breaks four of the ten commandments in one fell swoop: murder, adultery, coveting, and stealing. He knows that for God to “Forgive [him his] foul murder? That cannot be, since [he] [is] still possessed of those effects for which [he] did the murder” (Shakespeare 3.3.56-58). He must turn himself in if he is truly repentant and he is unwilling to do that, so he removes the idea of repentance from his mind. Queen Gertrude comes next on this ladder of wickedness. Although it seems at first that she is a hapless victim of King Claudius and has had no part in his great crime, Hamlet’s tirade evokes a guilt that leads her to see “into [her] very soul,/ And there [she sees] such black and grained spots/ As will not leave their tinct” (Shakespeare 3.4.100-102). This suggests something more than marrying her husband’s brother, which, despite Hamlet’s rage, is not wrong. Hamlet comes next on this ladder because he conducts his revenge inappropriately. He wants to kill Claudius at the worst time possible without anyone knowing, just like his father was killed, so that Claudius will go to hell. This is the type of vengeance that can easily spiral out of control and leave a monarchy reeling in disorder. Because Hamlet struggles with indecision, he because reckless in his efforts to overcome his inaction and confuses motion with progress. He rashly kills Polonius in an inappropriate fit of rage. Laertes seeks vengeance in a slightly more honest way by confronting King Claudius with the common people at his back to find out what really happened. Unfortunately, he then conspires treacherously to kill Hamlet. Unlike Hamlet, he does not attempt to send anybody to hell at least. Ophelia and Polonius are a distant first and second compared to the rest of these. They conspire to kill nobody, but simply provide assistance and mourn over the unfortunate occurrences of which they must be a part. Each of them do have their faults, however, as Ophelia’s death is suspiciously suicidal and Polonius is somewhat of a hypocrite, but neither of these are within the same order of magnitude of wickedness as the other characters.