The background scum — Polonius
One of the most famous tragedies, in written history, Hamlet by Shakespeare. It’s packed with, defiance sadness, murder, madness, love and torture. It’s an amazing play, that has been adapted in so many ways, uncovering the voluminous truths behind Polonius and the deceiving acts he commits.
Polonius is quite an unknown and cunning character in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, he is generally described as sly, devious, political, and immoral. He is the father to his two children, Ophelia, and Laertes and he is the chief counsellor to the king. Furthermore, he is most probably the most deceitful out of any character in hamlet, He cannot be trusted as he completely overlooked his comrades for his own benefit.
Polonius is perceived to be a loving and caring father, in act 1 scene 3, and in my speech, he was extremely caring for his son, giving him advice about what to do and not do when he is gone in France. Shortly after Laertes leaves, he asks Ophelia what Laertes and herself were talking about, after Ophelia says, it was about her loving hamlet he responds with. “You do not understand yourself so clearly, as it behoves my daughter and your honour. What is between you? give me the truth “after Ophelia said that he has given affection to her, Polonius responds with “Affection? Pooh! You speak like a green girl”
Gives a sense that he doesn’t trust hamlet already. Moreover, we were able to gain a small glimpse of how cunning he is with this example of asking what Ophelia and Laertes are. I was able to understand that Polonius as a character feels his daughter's feelings and emotions are irrelevant, which was displayed with the quote “Affection? Pooh! You speak like a green girl”.
Polonius most definitely told Ophelia to stop seeing Hamlet, as he knew it would ruin his appearance towards King Claudius and Gertrude. This is one of many examples where he put himself and his appearance in front of his children.
When giving my speech, on Polonius’ soliloquy, I initially thought he was a good person, someone that was trustworthy and a loving and respectful father. However, digging deeper into his character allowed me to really understand how he is a very political and arrogant character. I wasn’t able to fully understand his character through the play or the film either. After researching I understood that he was a terrible father that only wanted to be dominant over his children. If I was to put it into modern terms, he was an over-overprotective father who had horrific motives. Further in the play, we get to see that he is truly deceiving, using his daughter to spy on hamlet, getting Reynaldo to spy on his own son, and him spying and eavesdropping on hamlet and his mother talking.
Moving on, deception is rife throughout Hamlet, particularly with Polonius. As previously indicated, he gave his son permission to study in Paris, but soon after, he met Reynaldo, and told him to go and spy on Laertes and make sure Reynaldo let Laertes “ply his strings”. Polonius wanted to reveal his son’s true behaviour and find out what bad things he does, he even told Reynaldo to even lie about what his son does to trap Laertes. “They're put on him what forgeries you please”. Polonius, shows that he doesn’t trust his son, but what for? When evaluating the character, it was found that there was never any solid and confirmed reason that he was suspicious of his children. Instead, it was more of Polonius getting lost in his own irrational and unstable thoughts. These thoughts progress through the story and almost always impacted his children negatively. Whilst Polonius sent Reynaldo to spy on his son, we see Polonius being extremely close and loyal to the king, but as stated before, if he sees an opportunity that benefits himself, he will put himself first.
In the 2009 Hamlet film, it was seen that when Ophelia was talking to Hamlet in private, there was a view of a camera, facing the couple, listening closely. When originally watching the film, had no clue what, after rewatching it I understood it was Polonius. Polonius was trying to undercover the madness of Hamlet. His first plan of sending his friends to uncover the truth didn’t work. He then thought of a new plan which was to use Ophelia. Ophelia was always being used; this was just one of the main reasons she ended up taking her own life. Moving on, this plan was used to see if hamlet was lovesick and if that was making him mad. In the play that we watched, Hamlet was sat at the front of the stage, giving his famous ‘to be or not to be’ soliloquy, with Ophelia sitting ‘reading’ a book. Polonius made sure that Ophelia was pretending to read her book so that her being alone wouldn’t be unusual or suspicious. Another example of the deceit that surrounds Polonius. After the two discuss for a while, hamlet hears a noise, he then asks Ophelia “where is your father?” Ophelia responded with a quick and simple lie “at home my lord” trying not to blow her cover. 2009 film of Hamlet, hamlet abruptly turns to look around the room and eventually finds the camera.
Polonius’s death. One that was not expected but I would say most people wanted. His death ultimately came upon him due to his sneaky nature. In the Act that he died, he was speaking to Gertrude, about hamlet, and then whilst in the middle of the conversation, hamlet’s footsteps were heard, leading Polonius to ‘hide behind the arras. Before hiding behind the arras, Polonius says “he will come straigh straight. Look you lay home to home. Tell him his pranks have been too broad to bear with.” This essentially means that he was telling Gertrude to lie about how she has been affected by the way Hamlet has been behaving and acting recently. Gertrude then proceeds to tell Polonius to ‘withdraw’ as hamlet could be heard coming. Gertrude and Hamlet begin to have a talk together where Gertrude asks if hamlet has forgotten her. In the play, when hiding behind the arras, the facial expression of the character was expressing how engaged he was in the conversation that was going on in front of him. As if he was trying to understand every little bit of it. Hamlet then continues to threaten his mother for her sins, resulting in her being scared for her life and Polonius calling for help behind the arras. Hamlet hears this and assumes that it is Claudius and rightfully so. He screeches ‘how now! A rat?’ and attacks the arras, ultimately stabbing Polonius and killing him.
In conclusion, Polonius was a very interesting character to analyse. When I first watched the 2009 film, I didn’t fully grasp the nature of his acts, nor did I grasp that it was him committing those acts. After watching the play and it was then, that I truly understood him as a character. Polonius very much so deserved his death. He was sneaky, sly, unloving let alone unlovable and a very dirty and scrappy character.