1. Describe Claudius. Is he purely evil, or is he merely a flawed human being? Could the play also be called “The Tragedy of Claudius, King of Denmark”? 2. Characterize Horatio. Why does Hamlet trust and admire him? How is he different from Rosencrantz and Guildenstern? Are these characters round or flat? How can one justify Hamlet’s arrangement for the deaths of R & G? 3. Hamlet is full of conflicts that oppose people to other people, to society, and to themselves. List all the conflicts you can find in the play. Decide which of these is the central conflict, and explain your choice. 4. What is the crisis of Hamlet? When does it occur? Whom does it affect? What is the catastrophe? The resolution? 5. In Act 4, Claudius notes that “sorrows come … in battalions.” By the end of the play these sorrows include the deaths of all the major characters except Horatio. To what degree can Claudius be held responsible for the sorrows of the play? Which sorrows may be particularly traced to Hamlet? 6. How does Shakespeare demonstrate that Hamlet is a tragedy of the state as well as the individual? Is the condition of Denmark better or worse at the end of the play than at the beginning? Hamlet: http://www.willyson.com/hamlet/?p=act1scene1 .