【正文】
iterary detective work, the exact year of writing remains in dispute. Three different early versions of the play have survived: these are known as the First Quarto (Q1), the Second Quarto (Q2) and the First Folio (F1). Each has lines, and even scenes, that are missing from the others. Shakespeare probably based Hamlet on the legend of Amleth, preserved by 13thcentury chronicler Saxo Grammaticus in his Gesta Danorum and subsequently retold by 16thcentury scholar Franois de Belleforest, and a supposedly lost Elizabethan play known today as the UrHamlet. Given the plays dramatic structure and depth of characterization, Hamlet can be analyzed, interpreted and argued about from many perspectives. For example, scholars have debated for centuries about Hamlets hesitation in killing his uncle. Some see it as a plot device to prolong the action, and others see it as the result of pressure exerted by the plex philosophical and ethical issues that surround coldblooded murder, calculated revenge and thwarted desire. More recently, psychoanalytic critics have examined Hamlets unconscious desires, and feminist critics have reevaluated and rehabilitated the often maligned characters of Ophelia and Gertrude. Hamlet is Shakespeares longest play and among the most powerful and influential tragedies in the English language. It provides a storyline capable of seemingly endleretelling and adaptation by others. During Shakespeares lifetime, the play was one of his most popular works, and it still ranks high among his mostperformed, topping, for example, the Royal Shakespeare Companys list since 1879. It has inspired writers from Goethe and Dickens to J