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What happens in Act 3, Scene 3 of Hamlet?
Polonius plans to eavesdrop on Hamlet and Gertrude. Hamlet sees Claudius praying and considers killing him but worries that if he kills Claudius while he seeks forgiveness, Claudius might go to heaven.
Read our Summary & Analysis of Act 3, Scene 3. (2-minute read)
Why is Hamlet so hesitant to kill Claudius?
Multiple times throughout the play (and most directly in Act 3, Scene 3) Hamlet has opportunities to comply with the Ghost’s demand that he kill Claudius but does not follow through—for a variety of reasons. These reasons (including the reason in this scene that he fears that killing Claudius while he is praying will send him to heaven, where he has no right to be) may seem rational separately, but taken together suggest that deep down he is too uncertain about too many things to follow through despite his promise to the Ghost of his father.
Read our Q&A for “Why doesn’t Hamlet kill Claudius right away?” (1-minute read)
Read about the Impossibility of Certainty as the central theme of Hamlet. (2-minute read)
Was Hamlet an original work by William Shakespeare?
Like many of Shakespeare’s most famous plays, Hamlet likely has its roots in earlier works that Shakespeare encountered. We know that there were at least two works with basic stories similar to that of Hamlet—a 12th-century recounting of a Scandinavian legend of a revenge-seeking prince named Amieth written in Latin by Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus that was the basis for a prose work by the French writer François de Belleforest entitled Histoires Tragiques—that might have given Shakespeare inspiration and ideas. However, the play that Shakespeare published in 1603 varies significantly from these works in many ways, including many ideas that Shakespeare created (especially the emphasis on uncertainty added to what was a straightforward revenge tale) that continue to make Hamlet such a compelling work for over 500 years after it appeared.
