This paper compares Shakespeare's Hamlet and Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, arguing that the two plays share central themes of patricide, hubris, and family loyalty while differing in crucial ways that reveal their respective moral universes. The analysis traces how Oedipus' crimes are redistributed in Hamlet — transferred onto Claudius while Hamlet retains the role of avenger — and examines how each protagonist's hubris shapes his relationship with his mother and his ultimate fate. The paper concludes that Hamlet represents an evolution of the Oedipus myth: freed from guilt yet still afflicted by pride, Hamlet achieves a form of justice that Oedipus, trapped by divine predestination, can never attain.
Though written centuries apart, Sophocles' Oedipus Rex (also known as Oedipus the King) and William Shakespeare's Hamlet touch upon many of the same themes and images, albeit with slightly different results. Both feature protagonists seeking to avenge the murder of their father but who end up causing the death of their mother, as a result of the hubris that defines their respective characters. However, they also differ in important areas, and it is these areas of difference that reveal the most about what either play seems to be saying about hubris, family relations, and the question of fate.
By comparing and contrasting the characters of Hamlet and Oedipus — with an eye toward how their hubris affects their relationship with their parents and the course of either play — one can see how Hamlet represents a kind of evolution of the Oedipus myth, wherein the actions of Oedipus' curse are transferred onto Hamlet's uncle while the hubris that defines him remains. As a result, Hamlet is far more successful in his quest for justice than Oedipus, even as he is brought down by the same tragic flaw.
The first obvious connection between Hamlet and Oedipus is either character's relationship — or lack thereof — with his father. At the beginning of both plays, the titular character's father is dead, although Oedipus is not yet aware of this fact. This does not really matter for Oedipus, however, because even though he is not yet aware that Laius is his father, he nevertheless decides to seek vengeance for Laius and says, "since chance / has driven me into that one's powers, / therefore I shall fight for him in this matter, / as if for my own father, and I shall try / everything, seeking to find the one who / committed the murder" (Sophocles 270–275). Hamlet decides much the same thing when he learns of his father's murder at the hands of his uncle, remarking "The time is out of joint: O, cursed spite, / that ever I was born to set it right!" (Shakespeare 1.5.188–190).
Both characters feel an innate sense of duty to their fathers and a need to right the injustice done to them, even as these fathers are revealed to be less than ideal. Laius bears some responsibility for his own death due to his arrogance, and Hamlet's father is "doomed for a certain term to walk the night, / and for the day confined to fast in fires, / till the foul crimes done in [his] days of nature / are burnt and purged away" (Shakespeare 1.5.10–13). Of course, Oedipus is himself responsible for his father's death while Hamlet's uncle is the villain in the latter case, but this distinction cannot be properly understood until one considers either character's relationship with his mother.
Oedipus' relationship with his mother is well known, as it is perhaps the defining feature of the play. Although patricide is widely considered a grave offense, the taboo against incest seems to run deeper and often evokes a more visceral response. This is likely why, when the ghost of Hamlet's father reveals the truth of his death, he calls his brother "that incestuous, that adulterate beast," and claims that "with witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts, / [he] won to his shameful lust / the will of my most seeming-virtuous queen" (Shakespeare 1.5.42–46). Oedipus' crime, then, is transferred onto Hamlet's uncle, while Hamlet retains the role of investigator and avenger.
This represents the first key difference between Hamlet and Oedipus, because while Oedipus unknowingly marries his mother and thus commits a grave offense, he loves her and treats her with kindness. Hamlet, on the other hand, knows the truth about his father's death and treats his mother with contempt, exclaiming "O, most wicked speed, to post / with such dexterity to incestuous sheets!" (Shakespeare 1.2.156–157). The importance of this difference in regards to their mothers will become clearer when one considers the final, and perhaps most crucial, similarity between the two characters: their hubris. As scholars of Greek tragedy have long noted, the mother–son dynamic in Oedipus sets a template that later dramatists repeatedly revisited and transformed.
"Pride drives both heroes toward tragic downfall"
"Hamlet defeats human enemy; Oedipus cannot beat fate"
Though written in wildly different historical contexts, Sophocles' Oedipus Rex and William Shakespeare's Hamlet have a great deal to say about each other, because the titular characters have so much in common. Both characters' stories revolve around the search for vengeance for a murdered father of dubious moral quality, and both characters take on this task with gusto even as it becomes clear that attaining justice will be extremely difficult. However, this key similarity also contains a key difference: Oedipus is ultimately responsible for his father's death while Hamlet is innocent, and this difference represents a kind of evolution on the part of the latter, because the crime and perversion have been drawn out and placed into another character — that of Hamlet's uncle.
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