Cause and Effect Essay – Elizabethan Target Audience
“Always mystify, torture, mislead, and surprise the audience as much as possible (Roff).” Hamlet is a dramatic production written by William Shakespeare. “The play, set in the Kingdom of Denmark, recounts how Prince Hamlet exacts revenge on his uncle Claudius for murdering the old King Hamlet, Claudius's own brother and Prince Hamlet's father, and then succeeding to the throne and marrying Gertrude, the King Hamlet's widow and mother of Prince Hamlet ("Hamlet”).” Shakespeare’s main objective was to impress his Elizabethan audience because entertainment through theater was extremely important to everyone in the era ("Elizabethan Theater"). Shakespeare successfully captivated an Elizabethan audience with this production (“Hamlet”). This essay will explain how an Elizabethan audience was targeted by Hamlet’s final monologue (act 4, lines 32-66). This speech effectively targeted and engaged an Elizabethan audience because its format, mentions of revenge and exciting nature caused the audience to sympathise with Hamlet’s decisions and feelings, and become enthusiastic and involved in the play.
The format of this speech is a key factor which explains why the Elizabethan audience is effectively targeted. This speech is written and delivered in the form of a soliloquy. This means that it is an “uninterrupted speech delivered by a single character to the audience but not to other characters” (Jaber Al-Ogaili 48). Soliloquies are a literary device that is most often used as a technique to express the character’s inner most thoughts and feelings in a realistic and personal way. The audience feels connected with the character because they are sharing their inner conflicts and progression through crises with only them (Jaber Al-Ogaili 48). It is this format that allows the audience to get to know and understand Hamlet on a