A version of the vanitas or memento mori motif, the pose of Hamlet can be seen in three distinct though interrelated forms: a man or woman contemplating a skull, a man contemplating the head of a statue, and a woman gazing at a mirror. The skull and mirror function interchangeably as truth-tellers and reminders of time and death.

The graveyard scene has long been recognized as one of the most significant in Hamlet. As Maynard Mack suggests, "here, in its ultimate symbol, [Hamlet] confronts, recognizes, and accepts the condition of being man." The scene provides us with "the crucial evidence of Hamlet's new frame of mind"(Mack 62), which will enable him, finally, to engage in the "contest of mighty opposites"(Mack 63) awaiting him at court. Cast in a sober prose rather than the heated verse of the earlier soliloquies, the scene objectifies Hamlet's resignation to the human condition through the vanitas motif of a man holding a skull.