Hamlet's premise?

Question:Does anybody know what is the premise in Hamlet?
This is Hamlet the play, not the charachter; I'm looking for the premise of the whole play.

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Does anybody know what is the premise in Hamlet?
This is Hamlet the play, not the charachter; I'm looking for the premise of the whole play.

The son of a murdered father seeks revenge.

Shakespeare's premise was, "This is an interesting story with lots of blood and guts, it will make a great play for my fellow actors and some coin for me."

The premise is that a man murders his brother [the king] and marries his widow. But the murdered king's son has trouble reconciling himself to the situation, and is further confused when he receives a message from the ghost of his father that he was murdered. This places the title character in the position of having to find a way to choose the right course of action. His murdered father cries out for revenge, but revenge is a sin. Hamlet must figure out how to achieve justice.

It reminds me in many ways of the second play from Aeschylus's Orestia, where the son must choose between avenging his murdered father and killing his mother [the murderer]. It is an unreconcilable situation. Whatever action is taken leads to injustice.