1. AGAINST Madness:

I’m not sure if you mean “acting” as in “pretending” or “appearing”. In the latter case, Hamlet does appear mad to those around him; they do not know how to interpret his sudden outbursts and paranoia. And, naturally, Polonius’s murder seems unprovoked and conniving, much as how we respond to murders today.

But in my interpretation of the play, Hamlet is not mad, nor is he pretending to be mad. His actions and seemingly irrational speech can be considered a logical reaction to his father’s death and the events surrounding it, such as his mother’s betrayal of her former husband, Polonius’s accusations, and the friends-turned-spies Rosencrantz and Guildenstern dogging his every step. Furthermore, while coping with these stresses, Hamlet must also address his love affair with Ophelia, who is too naïve to provide any true comfort.

Hamlet is depressed and confused, suicidal and plagued by vengeful desire. I think that many if not most would react similarly.

His monologue in Act I is the best example for the case against madness, depicting his agony and desire to escape a “foul” world:

“O, that this too too sullied flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!
Or that the Everlasting had not fixed
His canon ‘gainst self-slaughter! O God, God,
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world!
Fie on ‘t, ah fie! ‘Tis an unweeded garden
That grows to seed. Things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely. That it should come to this!
But two months dead—nay not so much, not two.
So excellent king, that was to this
Hyperion to a satyr, so loving to my mother
That he would not besteem the winds of heaven
Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth,
Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him
As if increase of appetite had grown
But what it fed on, and yet within a month—
Let me think on ‘t; frailty, thy name is woman!—
A little month, or ere those shoes were old
With which she followed my poor father’s body,
Like Niobe, all tears, why she, even she—
O God, a beast, that wants discourse of reason,
Would have mourned longer—married with my uncle,
My father’s brother, but no more like my father
Than I to Hercules. Within a month,
Ere et the salt of most unrighteous tears
Had left the flushing in her galled eyes,
She married. O, most wicked speed, to post
With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!
It is not, nor it cannot come to good.
But break my heart, for I must hold my tongue. (1.2.129-159)

Act II finds Hamlet preoccupied with morbid imagery and witty insult. In a conversation with Polonius, he says, “For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog,/being a good kissing carrion—Have you a daughter?”, which is admittedly a peculiar comparison (2.2181-182). But at the end of the conversation, Polonius says, “(Aside) Though this be madness, yet there is method in ‘t,” demonstrating that though Hamlet’s mind is disjointed by grief and hate, he retains the faculties of logic and reason.

2. FOR Madness:

One of the major “madness” arguments theorizes that King Hamlet’s ghost is a hallucination. In 1.4.39-85, there is a back and forth between Hamlet, Horatio and Marcellus in which the latter two urge Hamlet not to follow the ghost, but Hamlet brushes them off. After he has departed, Horatio says, “He waxes desperate with imagination” (1.4.87).

During Hamlet’s conversation with the ghost, he agrees to murder Claudius at the ghost’s command:

“Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.” (Ghost, 1.5.26)

“Haste me to know’t, that I, with wings as swift
As meditation or the thoughts of love
May sweep to my revenge.” (Hamlet, 1.5.30-32)

Additionally, there is an instance where Hamlet confesses to being mad:

“I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw.” (2.2.272)**

This quote suggests that any instance of “sanity” is fleeting and that his mind’s primary state is madness. However, in context, this quote can be interpreted as sarcasm, in which case he is only “acting” mad.
Source(s):
1. Knowledge of the play
2. Citations are from the David Bevington edit of Hamlet. ISBN: 0-553-21292-3
3. ** = I couldn’t find the quote in my copy. Citation can be found at http://www.bartleby.com/70/4222.html.

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