IN Hamlet, arguably Shakespeare’s most famous, if not greatest work, the play begins with the title character’s friend, Horatio, visiting the royal castle, Elsinore, going out on to the battlements because he has heard that the ghost of the recently murdered king, Hamlet’s father, has appeared to the officers on guard duty.

While he’s there, the ghost appears, dressed in battle armour. When the officers challenge it, it refuses to talk to them and leaves.

Horatio tells Hamlet about it and Hamlet goes out on to the battlements to see for himself. The ghost appears and beckons Hamlet, who follows it. The officers all tell him not to go but he insists and threatens them with violence if they try and stop him.

While he is away, one of the officers, Marcellus, commenting on what the ghost’s appearance may mean, observes, “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.”

The line is one of Shakespeare’s most famous quotes. Commentators say it points to two basic things: the body politic which the word “state” alludes to; and a corroding, decaying, unhealthy condition the word “rotten” indicates.

Political corruption is a major theme in the play, as revealed in the actions of the characters but also in the imagery. Images of corruption – decay, rotting, disease – “proliferates” throughout the play. Images of ill health, with weeds overwhelming healthy plants, everything decaying and rotting, and with poison killing wholesome things, reflect the rottenness in the state of Denmark.

When one of the officers on guard duty, Francisco, says “I am sick at heart”, you know what he means by that.

English actor and dramatist H. Granville Barker (1877-1946), noted for his productions of Shakespearean plays, wrote: “Where, before Hamlet, can we find such a ‘setting’ contrived as that for the first scene at the battlements?”

Malaysian academic and Islamic scholar, the late Professor Emeritus Mohd Kamal Hassan, did not say he was sick at heart. But he used words like “most frustrating”, “very disgusting” and “appalling” to describe the political corruption in the country.

About a year before his death in February, in conversation with Astro Awani’s “Consider This” he said: “I realise I am not the only person. There have been many other intellectuals and intelligentsia Muslims, as well as non-Muslims, expressing their dismay with the corruption and the hypocrisy in politics.

“The phenomenon (of corruption) is so well-entrenched it has become cancerous. And maybe it is at the terminal stage.”

It led to the distinguished scholar writing the book “Corruption and Hypocrisy in Malay-Muslim Politics – The Urgency of Moral-Ethical Transformation” (Emir Research, 2021) about the country’s moral trajectory and what might reverse its tragic decline.

It is a must-read.

Corruption is “fasad” in the Quran and mentioned 50 times in 47 verses. So, here’s reflecting on Nuzul al-Quran: beware – something is rotten in the state. – April 9, 2023. 

* Hafiz Hassan reads The Malaysian Insight.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.