The Ghost

In Hamlet, the ghost is what sets the entire story off. Without the ghost, there would be nothing -- Hamlet would simply continue to mourn the loss of his father until eventually, as we all do, he would move on. The scorn for his mother would likely leave a lasting scar, but he would have no cause for revenge; at least, not in the way that so conflicts him throughout the play.

Over the summer I became very interested in the supernatural and ethereal nature of ghost. It's likely from all the DV-Red episodes of Paranormal State that I watched on A&E after Intervention, but nonetheless, seeing these supposedly real people deal with supposedly real hauntings makes me want to believe. Paranormal Sate, in case you have yet to experience its brilliance, is a show where paranormal investigators from Penn State University travel around the country investigating severe hauntings that take place around the country. They research the history of the home and its occupants, host seances, install surveillance within the home, and even rely on the aide of mediums and psychics at times. The show truly entrances you into believing that they make contact with the spirits with whom they're attempting to reach; often times unexplained noises can be heard, thermal-imaging cameras will pick up mysterious hand prints, and even once two light bulbs were hurled across a room and crashed to the floor without any explanation.

From what I have seen of the paranormal through television, it seems as though the only people who remain on earth as ghosts are those with anger problems, a controlling nature, or those who died suddenly, leaving unresolved hurt in their wake. It appears to me that Hamlet's father exhibits ALL of these qualities. He speaks of walking for a determined amount of time through the fires of purgatory during the day due to his previous sins. Hamlets father talks of purgatory in the Catholic sense, yet cannot describe them to his son because he is forbidden to speak to mortals of it.

This long conversation that they have differs from what I will call "real-world" ghost interaction. I feel as though this scene, had it happened for real, would take place in a dream state. The video I posted above was chosen for this, for I believe the clip is edited so that it seems more dream-like than any other interpretation that I've seen. On Paranormal State, spirits speak to people in dreams or quick whispers, not long soliloquies. That, or they don't speak at all. From this, I like to think that Hamlet's father must have a nasty temper to remain so tied to the Earth so that he might see his revenge unfold. Granted, his death was untimely and, as the audience is lead to assume, uncalled for; however, why would the King's spirit be condemned to purgatory if not for other unspoken digressions that transpired during the course of his life.