His uncle– now King Claudius–murdered King Hamlet, his father. Now Hamlet realizes that he cannot trust anyone– not even his best friends. In Act 3 Scene 2 Hamlet is talking with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and he asks Guildenstern to play the recorder for him. He denies the request, but Hamlet keeps pushing and pushing him to play it. Hamlet is using the recorder as a metaphor for Guildenstern and Rosencrantz playing him for a fool. The only reasons that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are seeing Hamlet is because Claudius asked them too and are most likely getting paid.
Hamlet asks, “Will you play / upon this pipe” (3. 2 358-59), a question he really intends to mean, “Go ahead and try to find out what is really on my mind. ” When Guildenstern refuses to play the recorder Hamlet says, “It is as easy as lying” (3. 2 365). Not only have Rosencrantz and Guildenstern been constantly lying to Hamlet about their true motives for being there, but they also have been lying about their friendship.
When Guildenstern repeatedly denies playing the recorder he breaks their friendship again and again.
Hamlet then tells them that he is the recorder, revealing to them that he has figured them out. When one plays a recorder they put their fingers over the correct holes and blow and the music plays. Hamlet says that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern think they know exactly where to place their fingers to get the information of why Hamlet is going insane, but they underestimate Hamlet. Hamlet uses this play on words as a weapon to tell them he truly knows, and to tell them that they are no true friends of his.
With each person double crossing him, Hamlet’s world is continuously filling with lies. Since Hamlet realizes Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are working for the King, he knows now that the King has ordered the people closest to him to figure out why Hamlet has gone mad. In Act 2 Scene 2 Hamlet calls Polonius a fishmonger. With one little word Hamlet describes the entirety of Polonius’s true self. A fishmonger is someone who is very suspicious and smelly.
Hamlet does not like Polonius because he knows he is working closely with King Claudius, who is trying to get information out of him. Hamlet also knows that Polonius is doing this solely for the reason to be on the good side of King Claudius, and with this, we see that Polonius is a type of man who cares significantly about what people think about him. Hamlet knows that he told Ophelia to stop talking to him because he was going crazy, and Polonius did not want people to think his daughter was dating a mad man.
Polonius also sent spies on his son Laertes to make sure he was not doing anything that would tarnish their family name. Polonius is desperate for recognition of his superiors, especially King Claudius, and Polonius feels his life needs to be picture perfect in order for that to happen. When Hamlet calls Polonius a fishmonger, it also means that Hamlet is calling him a procurer. Hamlet is suggesting the fact that Polonius has complete control over everything Ophelia does, and uses her, just like a pimp does with a prostitute.
In 2. 1 when Polonius is talking to Ophelia he asks “What, have you given him any hard words of late,” then Ophelia replies “No, my good lord; but as you did command, / I did repel his letters and denied / his access to me” (2. 1 106-10). We can tell from this that Polonius has forced Ophelia to never speak to Hamlet again, and she obliges. Despite Polonius’ efforts to deceive him, Hamlet truly knows what kind of person Polonius is, and he knows that he will try and coax information out of him.
Hamlet also knows that Polonius is too oblivious to understand what is truly being said. In Act 3 Scene 2, after Hamlet reveals Rosencrantz and Guildenstern true motives, he talks to Polonius. He points out clouds that look like a camel, then a weasel, and then a whale (3. 2 384-90). With this Hamlet is slyly letting on the plan he has to kill Claudius. A camel is pack animal that is used to carry heavy things on their back. Hamlet is referring to himself because he has all the anger to avenge his father.
He has also just found out that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are not his true friends, that Ophelia will not see him anymore, and that his mother has married his uncle. Hamlet is carrying all of the emotions that have overcome him after all that has happened to him. The clouds then transition into a weasel–implying that Polonius is the weasel. As we were able to see before, Polonius only cares about him and becoming powerful, and is trying to weasel information out of Hamlet because the King asked him to.
This is also what Rosencrantz and Guildenstern do to Hamlet. The weasel then becomes a whale. The whale is one of the biggest animals in the world, and Hamlet is eluding to the big task he has at hand– the task to oust Claudius as the murderer of his father. People often tend to hunt whales, so he could also be referring to Claudius as the whale and he is hunting him down. Here, Hamlet is essentially telling Polonius his master plan. Polonius, however, just thinks Hamlet is still going crazy so he looks right passed it.
This pun can also be seen as an outlet that Hamlet uses to tell someone what is going on. He is all alone and has no one to talk to, and with all of the craziness around him needs to get this off his chest. Hamlet knows that Polonius will not catch what he is saying, so Hamlet is able to express this and become a little saner to take on the task at hand. Whether or not Hamlet has ever been sane is a question that no one can ever really answer. What we do know, however, is that with all of the craziness surrounding his life he uses his speech in a crafty way.
He uses puns, metaphors and double-entendres because they aren’t completely true–just like the people around him. His whole life is flooded with confusion, and his words are too. Throughout the play, Hamlet is believed to be going insane. He has formed two different personalities; the crazy one which everyone believes (including himself at times), and the one where he knows what he needs to do. He is split into two different people, with two different meanings. Hamlet has become a pun himself, filling two conflicting roles at the same time, never able to adequately fill either one.
