Evidence of Margaret Avison’s “The Swimmer’s Moment” in William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”: Hamlet’s Swimmer’s Moment

Hamlet, the main character of William Shakespeare’s play of the same name, struggles prodigiously throughout the show with a dilemma. “The Swimmer’s Moment” as characterized by Margaret Avison greatly parallels this very quandary. Hamlet’s “swimmer’s moment” is his need to decide what to do about his father’s death: Hamlet can seek revenge and lose his own life in the process, or he can choose inaction and watch his life crumble. In essence, Hamlet’s dilemma is his “swimmer’s moment.”

Avison’s “The Swimmer’s Moment” both creates and defines the term “swimmer’s moment” as the instant at which one is about to face inevitable destruction, or instead choose to opt for ignorance. At this moment, one must choose either to “turn and turn” (Avison 9) around the edge of the whirlpool or to challenge “The deadly rapids” (Avison 7) and “penetrate their secret” (Avison 18). Ultimately, the “swimmer’s moment” is imperfect; neither outcome of the choice can yield a distinguishably desirable result. Given the choice of entering “the whirlpool,” (Avison 4) or choosing to ignore “the black pit” (Avison 6) it is impossible to really say whether “one or two have won” (Avison 20). Primarily this is because, even upon entering the whirlpool one will inevitably be “whirled into the ominous centre” (Avison 13); the whirlpool leads to death, but it also allows the swimmer to achieve te majestic secret that lies in the “eternal boon of privacy” (Avison 15). To conclude, the “swimmer’s moment” is the moment that one must choose to enter the whirlpool or to ignore the rapids, and lie forever on the precipice of achieving what dwells inside of what one has chosen to disregard.

Hamlet’s dilemma in “Hamlet” is that he must decide what to do, and ultimately how to execute it. The character’s circumstance is illustrated in his fourth soliloquy:

How stand I then,

That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd,

Excitements of my reason and my blood,

And let all sleep? (IV.iv.56-59).

Principally, Hamlet must determine if he should avenge his father’s death or instead ignore his feelings toward the supposed murder of King Hamlet and move on like the rest of Denmark has done. However, this is not as simple as it appears; Hamlet is notorious for his over thinking of almost everything, “To be, or not to be, that is the question” (III.i.56). Consequently, Hamlet has spent months analyzing the question of whether he should seek revenge, or listen to his morals. If Hamlet chooses to avenge the death of King Hamlet he has two basic options: murder, or prove King Claudius’s guilt. Whereas, to ignore his feelings towards the ultimate destruction of his beloved family simply requires him to forget the testimony the Ghost gave of the “Murder most foul” (I.v.27) committed by “ that incestuous, that adulterate beast” (I.v.42). However, Hamlet encounters a problem with the ghosts testimony:

The spirit that I have seen

May be the devil: and the devil hath power

To assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps

Out of my weakness and my melancholy,

As he is very potent with such spirits,

Abuses me to damn me (II.ii.600-605).

This possibility adds complexity to Hamlet’s dilemma as he is now presented with an alternative hypotheses in which he must now determine whether it would be right, let alone morally right , to in fact kill King Claudius, the alleged murdered of Hamlet’s father. Therefore, Hamlet’s dilemma of deciding whether to kill Claudius, or to let him live has become complicated as factors such as the Ghost and Hamlet’s tendency to overanalyze have been presented.

Furthermore, Hamlet’s dilemma is his “swimmer’s moment.” This moment for Hamlet is his need to decide to seek revenge on Claudius, and thus plunge into the whirlpool, or to ignore his mourning and become one of the “bland-blank faces” (Avison 9).To begin with, Hamlet is dearly afraid of the ramifications of entering the whirlpool. This is evident clearly throughout the play, “Conscience does make cowards of us all” (III.i.83). This forces him to make a choice that is very much like that of a swimmer. Just like a swimmer, if Hamlet does choose to enter “the whirlpool, then” (Avison 4) he will be facing something that he is truly fearful of in hope of possibly exchanging this fear for some enlightenment, whether it is to discover “The silver reaches of the estuary” (Avison 21) or to achieve the justice and the closure that will evidently come with the death of King Claudius. In conclusion, the dilemma that Hamlet faces seems to model the qualifications of a “swimmer’s moment” as has been presented by Margaret Avison.

Also, just as in “The Swimmer’s Moment” Hamlet must make a choice that will yield negative results regardless of his solution. Firstly, Confucius once stated that “Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves” this seems to be very true to Hamlet’s situation. In order for Hamlet to carry out his plan to murder Claudius he must inevitably confront the possibility that he could fatally fail in the act, or he could succeed in his revenge but in the end suffer from his very own brand of justice, in the hands of another. Simply stated, Hamlet must risk his own life in his pursuit to end the life of King Claudius. Secondly, if Hamlet successfully ignores his desire to avenge the death of his father he will remain “forever on the rim of suction” (Avison 10). As both the play and Hamlet’s inaction move further on in time Hamlet’s life turns to shambles. As a result of Hamlet’s tardiness in executing a plan, he has started to lose his friends; Ophelia has drowned, “Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia” (V.vii.186), along with Rosencratz and Guildenstern being killed, and Hamlet has lost his Mother, Gertrude, to King Claudius. It is clear that as the story goes on, and Hamlet further delays his decision, dire consequences continue to be realized. Thereupon, Hamlet’s decision parallels “The Swimmer’s Moment” in its imperfectness and inability to produce a rewarding result.

Thus, Hamlet’s dilemma is one in which exemplifies a “swimmer’s moment” as both offer a decision that is apparently impossibly hard to answer, and completely undesirable to the one who must answer it. Both “Hamlet” and “The Swimmer’s Moment” feature a choice that is between self destruction and ignorance; between achievement and an artificial life excluding what could be. For Hamlet to ignore the whirlpool he will not only lose a part of his life, his friends and family, he will also remain nescient. However, If Hamlet does choose to enter the “gaping vertical” (Avison 14) he will fulfill his natural desire to avenge his father, but he will face his inevitable defeat. Accordingly, Hamlet’s “moment at the whirlpool comes” (Avison 2) not to create action, but to create drama. Shakespeare has indefinitely used this moment as a means to create one of his most well known and revered works of his great canon of drama.

Works Cited

Avison, Margaret. “The Swimmer’s Moment.” Winter Sun. Toronto: University of Toront Press, 1962. pp.36.

Shakespeare, William. “Hamlet.” Mississauga: Canadian School Book Exchange, 1996.

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Why must Hamlet die?

After all of the wonderful presentations on the various interpretations of Hamlet, I must say that I was most moved by G. Wilson Knight ideas about the Shakespearean play. Knight managed to come up with some very meaningful, and relevant renderings of Hamlet that I feel do a great job of answering many of the lingering questions one may have after studying the play.

I agree very much so with Knight in that the play's theme is death, and that the character Hamlet is very much surrounded by the numerous examples of human kind's mortality. Shakespeare also ties in themes of good and evil that make the play equally balanced in terms of thematic differentiations.

In terms of both G. Wilson Knight's interpretation, to which I also sceptically agree, Hamlet must die because he has "soul-sickness." This "soul-sickness" comes from the fact that he is no longer mentally healthy, he has lost his father to murder and his mother to incest, and cannot seem to function properly. This dysfunction creates a Hamlet that is "inhuman" and incapable of thinking much more than of death, it also fills him with meaninglessness so much so that he has really already died. The real Hamlet, the one that we never meet, is no longer there; the Hamlet that the play knows is one that is infected and confused. Hamlet's infection soon comes to effect the whole play and all of its characters, eventually to the point that everyone dies. Thus Hamlet must die because he can no longer live; he cannot live because his life has been ruined, and he has ruined every other person's lives. Hamlet's disease is why he must die, and it is why he is already dead.