The Inner and Outer Hamlet
The inherent nature of drama consists of the back and forth — the thrust and repulsion — of conflict. Without conflict, a work of dramatic literature suffers from a lack of movement or flow that allows the narration to crescendo and move the audience or reader to a state animation. Weaving conflict effortlessly throughout drama is necessary to make the work interesting and able to speak to the person sitting on the receiving end of the dramatic work.
The notion that the reader/audience of any particular work of drama is passive contradicts the very condition of the human experience and its relationship with dramatic works. Drama reflects life and by reflecting life it mirrors the struggles, problems, and circumstances of the reader. Therefore, drama necessarily works in conflict at various levels to the same effect that the human experience reflects conflict at different levels.
William Shakespeare achieves the necessary elements of conflict throughout Hamlet by creating an inward conflict focusing on Hamlet’s struggle to avenge his father. In this case, Shakespeare focuses on Hamlet’s powerful oedipal complex. Externally, Shakespeare sketches the outward conflict around the legitimacy of Hamlet’s claim to the crown.
INTERNAL CONFLICT
