Hamlet: A Revenge Tragedy William Shakespeare's Hamlet can be defined as a revenge tragedy. In Shakespeare's tragedies the reader sees a noble, heroic central character who is destroyed because a defect in his character either causes him to involve himself in circumstances which overpower him, or makes him incapable of dealing with a destructive situation caused by another character or by circumstances. The play ends with the death of the central character. But before he dies, he achieves insights which make him a more perceptive human being than he was when the play began. This central character, Hamlet, shows his love direct