Our group will perform part of Act I scene ii and as we were reading the scene, we found a particular line intriguing and significant. Hamlet states, " A dream itself is but a shadow". When we first read this line, we wondered why a dream would be compared to shadow. We asked ourselves why wasn't nightmare compared to a shadow. Usually, if not always, nightmares are closer to a shadow than a dream, well that's how we saw it. We described nightmares as unconscious thoughts concerning or dealing with anything bad, horrific, or catastrophic; something dark, just like a shadow. But then we realized Hamlet's meaning behind this verse. He isn't necessarily comparing a dream to a shadow in the sense of an actual dream but by action. And what we mean by that is a dream, just like a shadow, follows you around. It is something that you withhold everywhere you go. But why a shadow and not something else with a more negative connotation?
Well, Hamlet refers to dreams as ambitions. Previous to the line " A dream itself is but a shadow" Hamlet speaks to Guildenstern and Rosencrantz about ambitions. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern both believe ambitions are " a shadow of a dream", but Hamlet explains that dreams, in general, are shadows. Explaining how ambitions do not make a person better, they are just something that follow a person, and can eventually keep them from obtaining a "substantial body". All in all, this comparison caused us to contemplate on the idea of a dream being a shadow, and brought forth a new interpretation of ambitions. So, a new question to contemplate about: how does this depict Hamlet's psychological state, this far into the play?
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