The Poison Motif in Hamlet

Hamlet is a tragic drama that tells the story of a bewildered young prince, a thinker who must contend with vengeful impulses riled by his father’s ghost and subsequently by the prince’s own agonized sensibility to the decorum of revenge. Shakespeare manages to induce Hamlet’s sensibilities in many ways, not the least of which is the “poison in the ear” motif that courses the length of the drama. Indeed, in Act 1 Scene 5 Shakespeare introduces the literal act of Claudius pouring poison into the “porches” of old King Hamlet’s ear, as related to the prince by old Hamlet’s ghost. But the extent to which ear-poisoning plays a role in the play is, at the juncture of Act 1.5, only beginning to take root. Even in Act 1.4, before the truth of King Hamlet’s death is ever known or even suggested by the play’s action, Shakespeare alludes to the overwhelming power of envenomed sound and poisonous aural suggestion. Likewise in the following 2.1, Shakespeare subtly elaborates on the motif, which, once given its literal form in Act 1.5, is only in its infancy, though by the drama’s conclusion it’s structurally crucial has been made increasingly apparent.

In Act 1.4 the Ghost makes its second appearance in the play, though it is the first time Hamlet has witnessed him. Besides furthering the plot, Act 1.4 also serves as a prelude to the pivotal 1.5 wherein the Ghost reveals to Hamlet the secret that rules the action of the remainder of the play-the murderous deed of Claudius. It is of no surprise, then, that hints and suggestions of the upcoming revelation are worked into the drama. Certainly the audience is aware of some building moment, some approaching revelation that will stagger Hamlet to the core, for when the Ghost beckons Hamlet away from Horatio and Marcellus it can be inferred that he has a message meant specifically, if not solely, for the prince. What Hamlet does not know in 1.4 is that the Ghost’s message is tainted with a poison-the poison of compulsory revenge-a toxin that will eat at his faculties and tax his mind and personal relationships to the limit. And though this information is yet to be revealed in 1.4, Horatio, in protest of Hamlet following the Ghost, suggests the dangers of being led away and thereby begins the pattern of perilous, death-inducing suggestion begot by sounds or words:

What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,

Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff. . . .

The very place puts toys of desperation,

Without more motive, into every brain

That looks so many fathoms to the sea

And hears it roar beneath. (

Hamlet 1.4.69-78)

Horatio here advises Hamlet that, if the Ghost were to lead him to the sea, the mere sound of the waves crashing beneath the cliff may induce in him “toys of desperation,” fancies or imaginings of harmful or desperate acts-such is the power of sound. Horatio’s plea is more rhetorical than anything else, a desperate attempt to stay Hamlet, but it is no accident that he petitions Hamlet with an argument on the insidious nature of sound. It is also no accident that Hamlet overlooks Horatio’s reasonable words, for though Horatio throughout speaks honey to his beleaguered friend, Hamlet is almost always consumed with fighting off the effects of venom, poured into his ears from nearly every other character.

Enter the Ghost, who in Act 1.5, mere lines after Horatio’s innocent warning, puts “toys of desperation” into Hamlet’s reeling brain by relating his murder and ordering Hamlet to carry out a fitting revenge. But by the same token, Hamlet apparently feels duty-bound to attend to whatever the Ghost has to say, for in Act 1.5 when he first bids Hamlet to “lend thy serious hearing” to what he needs to tell, Hamlet recognizes the coercive nature of sound: “Speak. I am bound to hear” (1.5.7). Shakespeare builds the foundation further with the Ghost’s own prelude to his startling revelation, wherein he intimates that the “lightest word” regarding his daily torments would “harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood, / Make thy two eyes start from their spheres . . . .” (1.5.17-18), events which, apparently, upon hearing would prove lethal. Continuing in this vein, the Ghost unwittingly harkens back to Marcellus’ portentous words in 1.4 of the rotten state of Denmark when he tells Hamlet “So the whole ear of Denmark/ Is by a forgèd process of my death/ Rankly abused” (1.5.37-39). Over and over again, Shakespeare gives ample evidence that the old adage “words never hurt” is not only patently untrue, but dangerously so, for in

Hamlet words have the power to slay the young or even putrefy an entire nation.

It is at this key moment that Shakespeare finally introduces Claudius’ deed, the literal act of poison-pouring, and has the Ghost command that Hamlet exact revenge. And since Shakespeare has so subtly imparted the poisonous nature of sound, we are thus introduced to two poisons-the literal act of Claudius, and the revelation of that act by the Ghost. This is not to say that the Ghost’s intent was malicious, nor that the Ghost is somehow wrong for demanding revenge of his son; however, Hamlet is already dealing with his father’s death and his mother’s hasty marriage, terrible events that would damper the most optimistic of minds, and the added disclosure of a murderous plot within the family is a poison in and of itself-poison to hear and fatal to contemplate. So noxious, in fact, that as Hamlet deals with this unwelcome information for the remainder of the act, the Ghost’s continual moaning from somewhere below is increasingly despised and scorned by the frantic prince: “Rest, rest perturbèd spirit!” (1.5.191). Hamlet, the unfortunate thinker, yet recognizes the awful consequences of words.

In fact, while making Horatio and Marcellus swear oaths of silence, Hamlet also warns them against being too loose in speech, telling them not to reveal his put on “antic disposition” by indirect prattle-the exact performance of which is mimed by Polonius, the master of bombast and prattle, in the following scene, Act 2.1. In his anxiety over the behavior of his son in Paris, Polonius unknowingly illustrates exactly the kind of conduct Hamlet had cautioned his friends against, but instead of advising his man, Reynaldo, against such behavior, Polonius actively encourages it:

Marry, sir, here’s my drift. . . .

He closes thus: “I know the gentlemen,

I saw him yesterday,” or “th’other day,”

Or then, or then, with such or such, “and as you say,

There was ‘a gaming,” . . . . (2.1.40, 57-60)

This shift in character and scene is a fitting transition, highlighting the vast chasm that separates the minds and actions of Hamlet, who is all too familiar with the poisonous effects of words, and Polonius, willfully ignorant of the potential consequences of lies and specious exploits. Overtly, this parallel between the end of 1.5 and the beginning of 2.1 is important insofar as it illustrates the utter pettiness of Polonius’ character while reinforcing the gravity of Hamlet’s. If each scene were performed without the benefit of the other, each would lose something essential. Polonius’ intent is only made ludicrous because the audience has just been exposed to a scene of intense significance, and the fortitude with which Hamlet demands his oaths be kept contrasts with the triviality of Polonius’ objective.

Thus, Acts 1.4, 1.5, and 2.1 are three consecutive scenes that, while accomplishing direction in the all important plot, are at the same time a commentary on the strength of words. Shakespeare, centering this motif on Claudius’ actual act, makes palpable what in the remainder of the play he insidiously insinuates: words have the power to maim or destroy, and only the foolish wield them with indiscretion. Such indiscretion spells doom for the pretentious and grandiloquent Polonius, presages the eventual murder of the original poisoner Claudius, and even portends the death of Hamlet, whose mind is infiltrated with the venom of revenge, poured into the porches of his ear by his father’s Ghost in the very first act.

Works Cited

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. In Shakespeare’s Tragedies. Ed. David Bevington. New York:

Pearson, 2007: 1097-1149.