Rating: 
Summary: Masterpiece or Disasterpiece?
Review: There's an old joke about a woman who saw Hamlet performed for the first time. "I don't know what anybody sees in that play," she said, "it's just a bunch of cliches strung together." Whether Hamlet spawned or merely perpetuated cliches, the play abounds with phrases that have passed into the common speech. From beginning to end, from "There's something rotten in Denmark" to "goodnight sweet prince", familiar language assaults the ear. The long life of these sayings attests to Shakespeare's powerful plotting and powerful language. Critics have hailed "Hamlet" as Shakespeare's masterpiece, prompting Oscar Wilde to ask "Are the critics mad or merely pretending to be?" It is a complex and paradoxical play, with complex, paradoxical protagonists engaging in complex, illogical behavior. Whether the play is a masterpiece or a disasterpiece, good or bad, is fairly debatable. But good or bad, it commands our attention and entertains us.The Dover Thrift Edition provides quality reading at a rock bottom price. Inexpensive, but not cheap!
Rating:
Summary: Good stuff
Review: This edition of Hamlet, with its accompanying critical essays is a good introduction to literary theory (in fact, my lit interpretation professor used it as exactly that). Wofford's essay on the critical history of Hamlet is clear and concise, with an interesting focus on the performance of the play. The critical essays' perspectives include feminist and Marxist theory.
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Summary: Ghosts, guilt, and graveyards
Review: Ah, yes. Hailed by many as Shakespeare's Magnum Opus (is that right?), this is certainly one of his most significant dramatic works. Hamlet is an atmosperic story of internalization - of feelings (guilt, love, hatred), of people, thoughts, and actions. Marked by indecision and a strong sense of self-pity and self-consciousness, Hamlet makes the slow transition from fear to determination in his quest to avenge his father's death. Oedipal complex, supernatural powers, royal incest, revenge - these are all explored in the play. Several famous questions are posed and thoughts explored - of existence, suicide, meaning, value. Hamlet is just packed with philosophy, psychology, and humanity. A must-read in which you will find many of the most famous soliloquies in all of Shakespeare. Thrown in Yorick's skull, poor Ophelia, good Horatio, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, you've got yourself one awesome play.
Rating:
Summary: A Wonderfully Intricate work by Shakespeare
Review: Hamlet is a very intricate book that requires very in-depth reading or even a little help from essays written on Hamlet or something of that nature. It is a very good book with a nice blend of puns and paradoxes to foreshadowing. It is a story of a Danish prince caught in the middle of an uncle who recently became king at the death of Hamlet's father, a mother who married Hamlet's uncle after Hamlet's father's death, and a girlfriend who is a bit crazy. This all sets up a Shakespeare's classic. It is a reference of the monarchies of the late 1500's early 1600's when family members killed other family members for the monarchy. Their is the outside conflict Hamlet has with his mother and uncle but also their is the intricate inner conflict in Hamlet of what to do. This discussion leads to the question is Hamlet crazy. This all sets up one of the most famous speech in literature, "To be or not to be? That is the question."
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Summary: One of the best...
Review: While my all time favorite piece of Shakespeare is MacBeth, I also really enjoied this one as well. I would praise it more, but really, its written by Shakespeare, that says enough. :)
Rating:
Summary: Take care read and think
Review: It is obvious that a work of this kind may simplify Shakespeare's masterpiece, but I understand that it is necessary, just like translations; I am Brasilian and one of my first books ever read was Hamlet, in a translation to portuguese. Trying the original text was a pleasure achieved years later.
Rating:
Summary: To be or not to be
Review: "Hamlet" is one of the most famous literary works, about which millions of words have been written. There are even Marxist, feminist, and psychoanalitical interpretations of it. That fact, alone, says much about the depth and width of "Hamlet". In this immortal tragedy, the Danish Prince Hamlet is extremely sad and suspicious about the death of his father, the King. His mother has remarried to the King's Brother, Claudius. Hamlet's suspicions are confirmed by the ghost of his father, in an unforgettable scene: yes, Claudius is the murderer of his brother. Hamlet goes mad with pain and fury, and starts to plot his revenge. Its outcome will prove fatal for many people. This peak of drama is an exploration into the human soul, emphasizing emotions such as remorse, rancour, the need for revenge, and folly. Long before existentialism, Hamlet asks for the meaning of existence: what it is and why existence exists. The dramatic tension is perfectly crafted and sustained; Shakespeare's sentences are also perfect and magnificent; the scenes eternal: Hamlet's encounter with the ghost of his father; his monologue on "to be or not to be"; Ophelia's death and burial; the theatrical representaiton of Claudius's sin; the climax at the duel. Hamlet is one of those works of art which have done the magic of becoming part of the popular, "subconscious" culture, much as "Don Quixote", the "Divine Comedy" or the classic Greek tragedies. Without regard to the actual number of people that read them, these works belong to us all because they have been determinant in the shaping of our culture.
Rating: 
Summary: Shakespeare's worst
Review: I am hardly a fan of any Shakespeare: I find that his characters overact, talk too much about nothing, and spend most of their plays inserting extra words in to sentences that could be said in four words or less. Hamlet, however, reaches a new level of Shakespearean lackluster: This one is simply boring, with lifelessly dull characters that can never seem to figure out what they want. It follows the standard Shakespearean tragedy plotline (Guy has stuff happen to him that's either really good or really bad, two little subplots, and then everybody dies), but this one lacks spark, or even a pulse for that matter. Well, there's my two cents... Go ahead, find my review unhelpful if you want... but seriously, if it's Shakespeare you want, go buy a different play than this.
Rating:
Summary: Hamlet: Timeless Classic
Review: If you could read only one thing in your lifetime Hamlet should be that one thing. It is Shakespeare's best work by far, and within its pages is more meaning than you could find within the pages of an entire library full of books, or plays as the case may be. A mere review, a couple words, cannot do Hamlet justice. At times I realize that the language of Shakespeare can be difficult that is why I recommend the Folger version because it helps to make the images expressed by Shakespeare's characters clear to the reader, and allows them to get their own deep personal meaning from Hamlet, Shakespeare's greatest work, with out being bogged down in trying to decipher and interpret his antiquarian English. Don't just listen to what I say, or read what I write, read the play on your own outside the cumbersome restraints of a classroom and see for yourself what I mean.
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Summary: Glorious Read - And EASY believe it or not
Review: Shakespeare comes with a reputation and for some students, a stigma. I would like to say, first of all, that anyone can understand and even enjoy Hamlet. Macbeth was written in Latin compared to Hamlet. It's plot is well-known and the story is punctuated with humor and even sensuousness that everyone will catch. You should not be daunted by the 'stigma' surrounding Elizabethan Shakespeare. Hamlet was an excellent read, and very short at that, only 100 pages. ...
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