In the ending to Shakespeare's Hamlet, each of the main characters fatal flaws leads them inevitably to their destruction.  The process of the play could not lead one anywhere else but to their ultimate fate.  Claudius is basically an opportunist whose blind ambition erases his moral sense.    Gertrude, through the eyes of Hamlet, is to eager to remarry her husbands brother.  Hamlet himself, driven both by his need for vengeance and his inability to act was perhaps as guilty as anyone else in the play because his behavior indirectly resulted in the deaths of Ophelia, Rosencratz and Goldenstein.  In each of these characters, the lack of the firm moral structure leads them in only one direction which is toward their death.  In the ending of the play, then, is both inevitable and fitting given the evidence that precede it.

In the...