Freud's Awkward Analysis

Oh! Joy! Sigmund Freud is on the packet that Mr. Tangen gave us! and somehow it was the first essay I wanted to read, coincidence?  I doubt it.

There is something about Freud that has always called my attention, his looks?  

No, definitely not. Simply the way he interprets the unconscious understanding human behavior. Something quite useful in Hamlet's case. The guy was completely out of his mind. But why? What was wrong with the dude? Freud would have won millions if he had psychoanalyzed him.

Even if 200 years had passed he actually tried, and he defines Hamlet's character through this essay. Freud discusses how Hamlet's case is very similar to Oedipus Rex's. That is, the guy had repressed desires to sexually posses his mother. Wait what?

Yeah Freud said that, and I completely agree. Hamlet wanted to avenge his father's death as a way to avenge his uncle from stealing his mother. When his father was alive, Hamlet felt that he still, in a way, possessed his mother, because she was part of their nuclear family. Once his father died, he had to completely give her up. Now his mother did not belong to his father rather to his uncle, even further away from him, making it impossible for him to posses her. 

Although both Oedipus and Hamlet suffer from the same complex, Hamlet's complex is repressed, he is never able to possess his mother, and compel his task. He is unable to fulfill his goal because he over thinks too much. This made him realized that his uncle took away his mother from him, just as his father did, representing the repressed wishes of his childhood, thus showing him that "he is no better than the sinner whom he is to punish" (Sigmund Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams).

So what does this mean? Simply that Hamlet realized that it is not worth to kill his uncle, since he will never achieve what he deeply wanted. He accepts that he will never be able to possess his mother, and lets nature takes its natural course. Although not fulfilling his task he did act upon things, by expressing his anger and repressed desires, but somehow he sacrificed them by realizing it would be a worthless fight.

So Freud, even if you made it a bit awkward, I find it quite accurate.