HAMLET         How say you then – would heart of man once think it? – But you’ll be secret? HORATIO / MARCELLUS                  Ay, by heaven. HAMLET         There’s never a villain dwelling in all Denmark But he’s an arrant knave. HORATIO        There needs no ghost, my lord, come from the grave To tell us this. HAMLET         Why, right, you are in the right! And so without more circumstance at all I […]

Enter HORATIO and MARCELLUS. HORATIO        My lord, my lord! MARCELLUS                           Lord Hamlet! HORATIO                                            Heavens secure him! HAMLET         So be it. MARCELLUS               Illo, ho, ho, my lord! HAMLET         Hillo, ho, ho, boy, come and come! MARCELLUS   How is’t, my noble lord? HORATIO                                What news, my lord? HAMLET         O, wonderful. HORATIO                                Good my lord, tell it. HAMLET         No, you will reveal it. HORATIO                                Not I, my lord, […]

HAMLET                     Yes, by heaven, O most pernicious woman, O villain, villain, smiling damned villain, My tables! Meet it is I set it down That one may smile and smile and be a villain – At least I am sure it may be so in Denmark. So, uncle, there you are. Now to my word. It is ‘Adieu, adieu, remember me.’ I have sworn’t.           […]

HAMLET                     Remember thee? Ay, thou poor ghost, whiles memory holds a seat In this distracted globe. Remember thee? Yea, from the table of my memory I’ll wipe away all trivial fond records, All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past That youth and observation copied there And thy commandment all alone shall live Within the book and volume of my brain Unmixed with baser matter. […]

GHOST                        Fare thee well at once: The glow-worm shows the matin to be near And ’gins to pale his uneffectual fire. Adieu, adieu, adieu, remember me. [ Exit.] HAMLET         O all you host of heaven, O earth – what else? – And shall I couple hell? O fie! Hold, hold, my heart, And you, my sinews, grow not instant old But bear me swiftly up.         (1.5.88-95) Fare thee […]

GHOST            O horrible, O horrible, most horrible! If thou hast nature in thee bear it not, Let not the royal bed of Denmark be A couch for luxury and damned incest. But howsomever thou pursues this act Taint not thy mind nor let thy soul contrive Against thy mother aught; leave her to heaven And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge To prick and sting her.          (1.5.80-88) O […]

GHOST                        So did it mine And a most instant tetter barked about Most lazar-like with vile and loathsome crust All my smooth body. Thus was I sleeping by a brother’s hand Of life, of crown, of queen at once dispatched, Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin, Unhouseled, disappointed, unaneled, No reckoning made but sent to my account With all my imperfections on my head.      (1.5.70-79) […]

GHOST            But soft, methinks I scent the morning air. Brief let me be. Sleeping within my orchard – My custom always of the afternoon – Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole With juice of cursed hebona in a vial And in the porches of my ears did pour The leperous distilment whose effect Holds such an enmity with blood of man That swift as quicksilver it courses through The natural gates and alleys of the body […]

GHOST            O Hamlet, what a falling off was there, From me whose love was of that dignity That it went hand in hand even with the vow I made to her in marriage, and to decline Upon a wretch whose natural gifts were poor To those of mine. But virtue, as it never will be moved Though lewdness court it in […]

HAMLET         O my prophetic soul! My uncle! GHOST            Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast, With witchcraft of his wits, with traitorous gifts – O wicked wit and gifts that have the power So to seduce – won to his shameful lust The will of my most seeming-virtuous Queen.       (1.5.40-46) O my prophetic soul! My uncle! I knew it! says Hamlet, I knew it in my very bones. (He has given […]