In the Tragedy of Hamlet, Shakespeare uses dramatic irony to keep the audience engaged in the play. A good example of dramatic irony in Shakespeare’s Hamlet is found in Act I Sc.5. The king’s ghost appears to Hamlet and reveals to him the truth about his death. The whole country of Denmark knows that the king had been bitten by a snake, but only Hamlet and two of his friends know that in reality it was the king’s own brother Claudius who killed him. Through this incident, Shakespeare manipulates audience’s sympathies, develops character and the conflict of the play.

Claudius is a character that awakes antipathy in the audience from the beginning of the play, because of reasons such as him marrying his brother’s wife and being insensitive at Hamlet’s mourning the loss of his father. Finding out that Claudius was the one who killed the king intensifies the audience’s feelings of antipathy towards Claudius. At the same time, Shakespeare uses the same incident to awake in the audience feelings of sympathy towards Hamlet, who is deeply affected by his father’s death and by finding out that his father was killed by his uncle. By revealing to the audience emotionally charged incidents, Shakespeare manages to manipulate the audience’s sympathies.

Shakespeare develops Hamlet’s character in this scene, as his feelings of anger and sorrow are intensified. He expresses that he has had a suspicion about his uncle even before the Ghost could tell him what he did. Following the encounter with the Ghost, Hamlet is starting to plan his revenge. He cautions his friends that he will be acting unlike himself from that moment on. Through this incident, the audience gains some insight about the motives for Hamlet’s behaviour to