Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead opens in undisclosed wilderness, the equivalent of the literary boondocks. The bleak emptiness of the play’s initial setting places emphasis upon the absurdity and subjectivity of the plot; Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are entirely alone with each other and their thoughts as they wander through the nameless hinterlands. With no defined, recognizable setting, how is one to know if they are not merely hallucinating or dreaming?
The play moves to the king’s court in Denmark at Elsinore, where the plot of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead coalesces with the original plot of Hamlet. The court is bustling, with Hamlet and Claudius and Gertrude running about in their respective schemes, yet the bumbling pair of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern remain stagnant, unable to keep pace with the flurry of courtly life. Incapable of thinking for themselves, they merely stand around, waiting for instruction from one wiser than their dimwitted selves.
Finally, the plot moves aboard the ship bound for England. The ship is a powerful symbol in the play; the ship’s chartered course towards the English shore – and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s execution – is a literal interpretation of the fatalistic view that life is merely an inexorable march towards death, one that begins at the moment of birth. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern symbolically resign themselves to their inability to control or alter the ship’s course; they realize they have little, if any, control over their lives and deaths.
The play moves to the king’s court in Denmark at Elsinore, where the plot of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead coalesces with the original plot of Hamlet. The court is bustling, with Hamlet and Claudius and Gertrude running about in their respective schemes, yet the bumbling pair of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern remain stagnant, unable to keep pace with the flurry of courtly life. Incapable of thinking for themselves, they merely stand around, waiting for instruction from one wiser than their dimwitted selves.
Finally, the plot moves aboard the ship bound for England. The ship is a powerful symbol in the play; the ship’s chartered course towards the English shore – and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s execution – is a literal interpretation of the fatalistic view that life is merely an inexorable march towards death, one that begins at the moment of birth. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern symbolically resign themselves to their inability to control or alter the ship’s course; they realize they have little, if any, control over their lives and deaths.