¶ … ghosts in two literary works. The Spanish Tragedy and Hamlet each have a ghost which guides and drives the action of the story. The writer works to compare and contrast the ghosts in each story and tell how they relate to the story. There were two sources used to complete this paper. Throughout history writers have used unusual methods to illustrate points if their work that they want the reader to understand. In two classic works of literature a ghost was used to provide many of the needed details to the story that would have been unknown otherwise. In The Spanish Tragedy and in Hamlet there were ghosts to provide the foundation for many of the stories actions. Without the ghosts much of the things that occurred would not make any sense to the reader. While they each uses a ghost for the purpose of information provision the ghosts and the use of the ghosts have differences as well as similarities.

Thomas Kyd penned The Spanish Tragedy in the 1500's. It was a time where time travel was not a common idea, and there was no electricity or technology to speak of. Perhaps the most innovative method of providing certain strands of information came by way of ghosts, and the ghost Kyd used worked well within the frame work of the story. In The Spanish Tragedy the author invents a ghost called Andrea. Andrea was slain by Balthazar and the story is built around this event and tragedy. This is the first and most obvious difference between the ghost of the Spanish Tragedy and the ghost of Hamlet. In Hamlet the ghost is a king and does not do personal battle, but ordered his men into battle on his behalf during his career and life.

In the Spanish Tragedy the ghost of Andrea remains on the stage for almost the entire play. The ghost serves the same purpose that the off stage chorus of yesteryear used to serve. The days when there were only one or two actors allowed on the stage at the same time the chorus was off stage and provided information and tidbits that were needed to advance the story. In the Spanish Tragedy the ghost of Andrea is on stage almost throughout the entire play so that certain needed bits of information can be provided though the occasional comments made by the ghost as the play advances in plot.

SIMILARITIES

There are several similarities between the two ghosts. One of the most obvious similarities is that the ghosts' nemesis is offered the opportunity to wed the widow of the ghost. In both Hamlet and the Spanish Tragedy the ghosts were well to do men with an active and powerful life. When they are killed, the person responsible for their death is then given the chance to marry the wives of the men that they murdered.

Another similarity between the two ghosts is the idea of a play to re-enact and portray the death of the ghosts. Each of them uses a play to exact revenge though the plays are used in different manners.

One of the most overlooked but most obvious similarities that are evidenced in the plays when it comes to the ghosts is the reason they are there. The ghosts want revenge. The are each angry that they have been killed by those who should not have killed them and each of them wants to find revenge before they can let go of this world and move on to the next world, as specified and believed in by society at the time of the writing of the literature. That desire for revenge is what drives the entire story, but it plays out differently for each ghost. The ghost of Hamlet has to endure the knowledge that his widow falls in love and married the man who killed him, because she had no idea that he had killed her husband, whereas the ghost of Andrea was comforted with the knowledge that Bel-Imperia not only knew who murdered the love of her life, but also shared in his desire to exact revenge for such actions.

This is the difference in how they came to be ghosts. In the instance of Hamlet the King became a ghost when his brother poisoned him to death, while the ghost of Andrea existed because he was stabbed to death in a battle of anger and revenge. One poisoned, the other stabbed but both killed and now ghosts for the purpose of the respective works that they appear in. Another main differences between the two ghosts is the fact that the women react differently to the idea of marrying the person who killed their loved ones. One of the reasons this difference may exist is because the wife of Hamlet (Gertrude) had no idea that Claudias was responsible for the death of her husband King Hamlet. The lover of Andrea was aware and was extremely upset that it would ever be suggested that she marry the killer of the man she had loved with all her heart. Bel-Imperia is then kidnapped in the hopes she will learn to love the killer of Andrea. This is another difference in the ghosts of the story. While Andrea is on stage and wants revenge, he does not become as active or as serious about the act as King Hamlet. On the other hand the ghost of Hamlet wants nothing more than revenge and seems only to exist for the purpose of getting is son, also named Hamlet to exact revenge for the death of his father. The fact that Hamlet was married and Andrea was not married is another difference but one that makes very little difference in the story lines or the final reactions of the characters in the story.
While there are many differences that are obvious there is one that may be easily overlooked in the examination of the plays. The ability of Hamlet to speak to his son, while Andrea never speaks to his loved ones is one of the central differences between the ghosts and a difference that drives the plots along. It is interesting to note the differences in the way the authors chose to utilize their ghosts in this manner. Shakespeare takes a most direct route when he allows King Hamlet to talk to his son. It is something that paves the way for the playwright to be able to convey many things that otherwise would be hard to convey. This was used perhaps because it was the most simple and direct method. Shakespeare was well-known for using the most direct method to get things done and allowing the ghost to talk directly to his son was a way for the audience to be told exactly how he died. The audience would not know how he died otherwise, because of the fact he was poisoned. Having him come back as a ghost and be able to convey this to his son was one of the only ways it could have been told. The other difference is that Andrea was angry, but that anger was not displayed as openly as it is in the ghost if King Hamlet. Hamlet not only shows anger at the man who poisoned him but also at his son for being nervous about what his father wants him to do.

Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.

Murder most foul, as in the best it is,

But this most foul, strange, and unnatural."(I.v.25-28)

The few above words by the ghost of King Hamlet tells the audience and the son that his death was not natural by the furthest stretch of the imagination. This underscores another difference between the two ghosts. It centers much of the play of Hamlet on the way he died while the play of The Spanish Tragedy works more to illustrate the aftermath of his death and also includes many sub-plots that have nothing to do with the direct cause of the death of Andrea. These differences may appear subtle at first but if one peels the top coat off and examines the underpinning of these differences one will see that these differences cause the plays to be what they are. Individualize accounts of a family tragedy with a twist to make each one its own story.

HOW WOULD THE PLAYS HAVE BEEN DIFFERENT WITHOUT THE GHOSTS?

While each play tells a story that might survive without the ghost to prod it along the story of Hamplet would suffer the most without the ghost of King Hamlet. Without the ghost of King Hamlet it woud be much more difficult to tell the same story. This play was written in the days that there was no technology. There were mo forensic capabilities and it would have been impossible to know that King Hamlet had been poisoned unless the new…