The Performative Utterance in Hamlet

• ultimately hamlet seems to spend the play speaking but not doing
• his utterances betray little to no wavering in his understanding of his duty
• the divide between what is said and what is done is like Austin's theory of performativity
• certain language does not merely describe action, but acts in being spoken
• the locutionary force - the ability of language to deliver a message 
• the illocutionary force - what is done in being said
• perlocutionary force - what is achieved by being said
• Bloom argues that Shakespeare's characters develop through "self-overhearing"
• a man incapable of realizing the power of his own agency, but capable of using the spoken word, could come to learn of his agency by realizing that his speech has power to create change in the world
• the uncertain distance between what is sincere and what is not
• mimesis - a subtle kind of play acting like how Hamlet pretends to be crazy to throw everyone off