] I've never really had a lot of time for the general idea,

Me either. Seems to me that Hamlet has plenty enough reasons to be full of angst without manufacturing ones. Though he clearly has major issues with Gertrude, I don't think there was a problem before she married Claudius. He is obsessed with the idea of Gertrude and Claudius having sex, but I don't think this is because he wants to marry his mommy.

First of all, every child has problems with the idea of their parents as sexual beings. I think Hamlet would be surprised at Gertrude remarrying anyone (after all, at her age the heyday of the blood is tame!) but the idea that it is his uncle just undoes him.

First of all it is considered incest, Hamlet harps on the incestuous nature of the marriage many times (they must have had to get special dispensation to marry?) so I think Hamlet has real, moral issues with it. And secondly the fact that she went from her husband to a, in Hamlet's opinion, lesser version of her husband grates as well. But perhaps most important was the speed, the haste with which the marriage took place. He's got to be confused and angry at that. Does this mean that she never loved his father? That her Niobe tears were all an act? If she pretended a loyalty and love for her husband, can her love of himself be a sham as well?

] I'll try to summarize a piece of the argument Adelman makes:

I can accept more of this arguement than a straight Freudian interpretation. ;-)

] Adelman says that the outcome of this scene is shown to us after Hamlet comes back from the sea. Hamlet has definitely changed. There are lots of possible reasons why, but he has. He seems to have put aside all of his melancholy, his indecision, and even his intellectualizing. All of this is because he's finally worked out his relationship with his mom.