# Hamlet

**Author:** William Shakespeare
**Grade range:** Grades 11–12
**Age range:** 15–18
**First published:** 1603
**Page count:** 368
**Genre:** Drama
**ISBN-13:** `9780743477123`
**ISBN-10:** `074347712X`
**Canonical URL:** https://readinglist.school/book/hamlet
**License:** [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) — please credit ReadingList.school when citing.

## About this book

Prince Hamlet, returning to Elsinore, confronts his uncle Claudius — his father's killer and his mother's new husband. The play is frequently anchor-text for AP Literature and IB DP Literature for its soliloquies, tragic structure, and meta-theatrical play-within-a-play, and is one of the most frequently cited texts on the AP Lit free-response question.

## Themes

- revenge
- madness and grief
- mortality
- appearance vs reality
- political corruption
- indecision

## Content notes

- suicide
- sword violence
- poisoning
- mental illness themes

Common Sense Media age recommendation: 14+

## Where this book is assigned

### AP English Literature & Composition

- **required** · 12th grade — [source: AP Lit — one of the most frequently cited FRQ3 texts](https://apcentral.collegeboard.org/courses/ap-english-literature-and-composition)

### Common Core State Standards (ELA)

- **recommended** · 12th grade — [source: CCSS ELA Appendix B, grades 11-CCR drama exemplar](https://achievethecore.org/page/2699)

### IB Diploma Programme — English A: Literature

- **required** · 12th grade — [source: IB DP English A Literature Prescribed Reading List](https://www.ibo.org/programmes/diploma-programme/)

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