Hamlet and Turnus Compared: Their Views of Death

Abstract

It is generally acknowledged that we have two Hamlets in Hamlet: young Hamlet and old. It is Hamlet’s view of death that distinguishes between the two. After undergoing his sea suffering and sea change on his way to England, Hamlet accepts death as inevitable and tries to reconcile himself with it. Here Shakespeare alludes to Virgil’s Turnus as Hamlet’s precedent model. In Virgil’s national epic, Turnus insists on war despite Latinus’ misgivings of death and replies to Latinus that death is cheap at the price of glory (12.49). Turnus puts the soldier’s glory and honour before death, saying that “If I am to die, it is not in my power to / Postpone the hour of it” (neque enim Turno mora libera mortis, 12.74). This stoic acceptance of death characterizes both Turnus and Hamlet as soldier. Unlike the young Hamlet in the first half of the play who is fearful of death and the after-life, the physically rather old and mentally mature Hamlet manifests himself as a soldier and challenges death and accepts its necessity quite positively, not to renounce himself to the course of events. When Hamlet says to Horatio “Let be” (5.2.220), he means more than just a break off of the conversation or the futility of Horatio’s persuasive efforts. When we understand Hamlet as a stoic soldier standing in the shadow of Turnus, we can easily grasp the significance of Hamlet’s funeral as a soldier defying the apprehension of death and Hamlet’s apparent kinship with Fortinbras. Latinus is to Turnus what Horatio is to Hamlet. Shakespeare’s Hamlet is the play of remembrance haunted by and still haunting the Renaissance English education of Virgil.