The Hamlet Project

Walked right into that one, Gertie.
I mean, really, even if we set aside a possible complicity in his murder, her hasty marriage to her dead husband’s brother could not help but be offensive to Hamlet, Senior. As far as Hamlet’s actual father goes, Hamlet himself has only offended him by not revenging his death right away. He’s about to turn up actually – to scold him on that point.
But offense is funny. It’s a word that shows up a lot in this play. It’s how Claudius describes his crimes as well.
It’s funny in the world of murder and revenge that offense takes on as much weight as it does in the contemporary world, offense is most often used in the context of small slights, of language that feels disrespectful. It’s gotten rather a lot smaller. It retains its former power only in the formal language of courts and law enforcement. But mostly we only talk about offending someone when we’ve told an off color joke.