The clowns of death

In Act V of Hamlet, Hamlet is returning to the palace in Denmark when he meets two gravediggers.  Shakespeare describes them as clowns, which suggests a sense of situational irony. Why would clowns be in a graveyard? It’s ironic that they are there since clowns are perceived as happy and uplifting while a graveyard is usually identified with sadness. However it can also be a play on the relationship between life and death since they are very closely related. In this case life would be represented by the clowns and death by the graveyard. 

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