Claudio's Soliloquy in Hamlet Claudius's soliloquy about his remorse for the murder of Hamlet's father is important to the play because it is the only place where we learn how Claudio feels about what he did. The rest of the play focuses on Hamlet's feelings about what Claudius has done, and I think it completes the play to see him from a different perspective. From the soliloquy I can see that Claudio is sorry for the murder, but not sorry. Enough. He says, “Oh, my offense is disgusting, it stinks to heaven.” He wants to pray for forgiveness of his offense, but laments, "I cannot pray," for "I still possess those effects for which I committed murder: my crown, my ambition, and my queen." He killed Hamlet's father to get those things and is not willing to give them up. He realizes that true repentance would be willing to give up, and therefore he is not truly repentant. This is why at the end of his prayer he says: "Words without thoughts never go to heaven." There's no point in saying he's sorry because God knows he doesn't mean it. So, the best thing he can do is pray that God will make him repent, pleading, “Heart with wires of steel, be as soft as the nerves of a newborn baby.” All this shows that Claudio is introspective and honest. with himself. He also does things that are contradictory to my opinion of him. Depending on how I look at it, this prayer can make me feel sympathetic towards Claudius as I learn about the internal torture he is going through and how terrible he feels about killing Hamlet's father. On the other hand, it also makes me more angry at him because I realize that he fully understood how terrible what he did was, but he chose to do it anyway, and now he knows he should repent, but he refuses to. As terrible as his feelings of guilt are, they are obviously not severe enough to make him change. Claudio, however, still has some hope for himself, saying "Everything could be fine." But he shows that there really isn't much hope when, a few acts later, he plans Hamlet's murder to preserve the very things he killed Hamlet's father for..