happiness in hamlet? that IS a paradox

I feel so happy. The air is so clear. It is almost as if my eyes were compressed into the back of my skull, shadowed by the lurking thoughts nearby- and now they are straight-seeing. God, if this be truth, then Hamlet was wrong; if not, God, let me live in illusion. It is infinitely better here.

Surely, such a question takes its place on that well-worn edge that all those great questions reside; from which haunted philosophers- amateurs and proffesionals - pick up from time to time to study, to ponder, to learn much, but know no more. Whether to live in happy ignorance, or to admit oneself to the dangerous quest of truth. We all strive to be rational creatures- and can only do this by adjusting a world view on absolute reality. And yet- we all know how destructive the truth can be. A further complication- truth is mecurious. It is a parallel flux with not only time, but with country, opinion, class. How can there be a single truth to anything?

And anyway...who knows what truth is anyway? Who knows what is right? Who has the authority to say what is reality, what is moral, what is actual? No one.

Don't worry, i am still happy. I feel...invigourated. I feel like i felt in the old days. I feel young, that's it! I feel young. I've been so old of late...
"i feel thin...sort of stretched. Like butter scraped over too much bread." -- Bilbo, Lord of the Rings, when he has worn the One Ring too long, unaware of how it is taking him (he is going along the same path of Golem. We see the resemblence in a few scenes.)

Let's see if i can remember...
"To be or not to be; that is the question.
Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer
the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
or to take arm against a sea of troubles
and by opposing, end them."

Obviously, Hamlet is contemplating suicide. To be- to live, or not to be- to die. That is basic. The world about him has become rank and pestilent in his eyes, and when we review the events preceding this soliloquy, we can hardly wonder why. The residing King, his uncle, has committed fratricide. His mother has "post[ed] with such dexterity to incestuous sheets" i.e., she has chosen to assuage her sexual desires over morality and virtue that her husband, recently deceased, deserves. His two supposed friends from college care not for the pleasure of Hamlet's company- they are instead clandestine envoys of the kind and queen, who purpose to spy on him. His girlfriend, Ophelia ignores him, and return his gifts, seemingly without reason. He has no faith left in life.
When the bumbling Polonious expresses he will "take leave of him", Hamlet says "there is nothing that i would more gladly part with; except my life, except my life, except my life."
Ha, it was rather side-tickling in the movie (for we're watching it instead of reading it in class) Hamlet said the last "except my life" with a mad glint in his eye. Polonious thinks he lost the plot, but Hamlet is actually affecting madness; a facade to cloak the purpose of revenging his father, and killing the king.

i'm going now. ciao.