"Crazy" is a word not easily defined. What one person considers abnormal behavior, another might just consider eccentricity. It is difficult to determine when a person has gone from simply acting on impulse and not thinking rationally to truly becoming "mad." This is a subject explored thoroughly in William Shakespeare's play, Hamlet. The plot of the play centers around the supposed madness of its title character, Hamlet, but he is not the only character who displays irrational behavior. Hamlet, Laertes, and Ophelia are all loyal children who exhibit varying degrees of madness after their fathers" untimely deaths.
Hamlet thought highly of his father, as a king and as a man, better than Claudius "so excellent a king; that was, to this / Hyperion to a Satyr; so loving to my mother / That he might not beteem the winds of heaven / Visit her face too roughly" (1. 2. 139-142). Here he is saying that comparing his father and Claudius is like comparing a god to a beast. Hamlet cannot believe that his mother could so quickly fall in love with Claudius when she seemed so in love with Hamlet Senior as well. When he finds out from his father's ghost that Claudius murdered him, he exclaims, "O my prophetic soul! / My uncle?" (1. 5. 41). This means that he already had a feeling that this was true, and makes Hamlet feel justified in having all the other bad feelings he has had about his uncle.
Hamlet comes up with a plan to find out if what he has heard from the ghost is true. He tells Horatio he plans to put an "antic disposition" on, which means he will act crazy. Hamlet meets with Ophelia, acting very strangely, so she goes and tells her father, Polonius, then he goes to the king claiming Hamlet is lovesick. The king and queen send Hamlet's old school chums, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to find out what is wrong with their son, promising them the king's favor in return. Hamlet then talks crazy to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, the king's spies, who are pretending to just be concerned about Hamlet's well-being.
