The Gravediggers

Like most Shakespearean fools, the Gravediggers are peasants or commoners that use their great wit and intellect to get the better of their superiors, other people of higher social status, and each other.

They are first encountered as they are digging a grave for the newly deceased Ophelia, discussing whether she deserves a Christian burial after having killed herself.

The beat ends with Hamlet's speech regarding the circle of life prompted by his discovery of the skull of his father's beloved jester, Yorick.

The dialogue between the two ends when the First Gravedigger is unsatisfied by the answer to the riddle "What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?"

It is shortly thereafter that the Gravedigger points out a skull that used to belong to Yorick, the king's jester and Hamlet's caretaker.

"The Aged Lover Renounceth Love" [1] Many important themes of the play are discussed and brought up by the Gravediggers in the short time they are on stage.

"[2] For example, although the First Gravedigger is definitely in the fictional world of the play (he is digging Ophelia's grave), he also asks his fellow to "go, get thee to Yaughan, fetch me a stoup of liquor".

[4] Likewise, the First Gravedigger is in the same world as the English audience of the time when he jokes "...[insanity] will not be seen in [Hamlet] there [in England]; there the men are as mad as he".

[5] This gives enough of a distance from Elsinore [for the audience] to view what the clowns say as discreet parallels, not direct commentaries.

This makes it possible for the characters to look at the subject of death objectively, giving rise to such speeches as Hamlet's musings over the skull of Yorick.

The characters in Act 5 scene 1 approach the topic this time with dark comedy, and in doing so bring up an entirely different theme.