Stoppard's absurd comedy, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead is a transformation of the Shakespeare's revenge tragedy Hamlet. They both contain common characters and events but are separated by their historical, social and literary contexts. The plays are also different in language, theatrical style, values, character and themes.

Shakespeare's Hamlet and Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead are different because of the different time periods. Shakespeare's Hamlet was written in the 1602, in the Elizabethan times, when the Church of England was well established and the start of the renaissance period had occurred. Whereas Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead was written in the 1960's a time of absurdism, existentialism and experimentation; life and authority were questioned and sex, drugs and rock and roll were in; everything was against the norm and there was no church or monarchy dominant.

The aim's of the two plays is also very alternate. In...