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Hamlet: Man of Action or…ah…A Man Not of Action? When Hamlet receives his order for revenge from the ghost of his dead father, he is shocked and outraged. He vows to avenge his father by the death of Claudius. However, the following scenes do not show the undying dedication to the avengement of a father, but the unproductive meandering of a man unsure, a reluctant son. When compared to the actions of Laertes …

…are thinking. But beside his positive attributes, Hamlet is not one to take chances, to do before thinking. And because of this reluctance and over-analyzing, he does not get things done. He talks about them, he thinks about them, but it takes him a much longer time to actually do them. And in contrast, he is nothing like Laertes and Fortinbras, too men who put their lives on the line without thought for their fathers.