The first character to notice Hamlet’s insanity is Polonius, Ophelia’s father, who accosts Claudius and Gertrude, saying their “noble son is mad.” (89) Polonius first suspects this when he intercepts a love letter intended for Ophelia, and contemplates why such a highborn individual such as he would take an interest in one so lowly as Ophelia. Presently, Polonius concludes that Hamlet is mad with love and anguish over his father’s death; anon he concludes Hamlet is well along t

he path into love-madness—“And he, repelled (a short tale to make), fell into a sadness, then into a fast, thence to a watch, thence to a weakness, thence to lightness, and, by this declension, into the madness wherein now he raves, and all we mourn for.” (91) In dialogue with Hamlet, Polonius observes that Hamlet converses with “a happiness that often madness hits on, which reason could not so prosperously be delivered of.” (97) In seeing Hamlet speak so irrationally happy to him, Polonius concludes that Hamlet may be insane with love for his daughter, and indeed, Ophelia concurs.

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