Enter FORTINBRAS [and a Captain] with his army over the stage. FORTINBRAS Go, Captain, from me greet the Danish King: Tell him that by his licence Fortinbras Craves the conveyance of a promised march Over his kingdom. You know the rendezvous. If that his majesty would aught with us We shall express our duty in his eye, And let him know so. CAPTAIN                    I will do’t, my […]

CLAUDIUS      And England, if my love thou hold’st at aught As my great power thereof may give thee sense, Since yet thy cicatrice looks raw and red After the Danish sword, and thy free awe Pays homage to us, thou mayst not coldly set Our sovereign process, which imports at full By letters congruing to that effect The present death of Hamlet. Do it, England! For like […]

HAMLET         Farewell, dear mother. CLAUDIUS                              Thy loving father, Hamlet. HAMLET         My mother. Father and mother is man and wife. Man and wife is one flesh. So – my mother. Come, for England! (Exit.) CLAUDIUS      Follow him at foot. Tempt him with speed aboard. Delay it not – I’ll have him hence tonight. Away, for everything is sealed and done That else leans […]

CLAUDIUS      Hamlet, this deed for thine especial safety – Which we do tender, as we dearly grieve For that which thou hast done – must send thee hence. Therefore prepare thyself: The bark is ready and the wind at help, Th’associates tend and everything is bent For England. HAMLET                     For England? CLAUDIUS                                                      Ay, Hamlet. HAMLET                                                                     Good. CLAUDIUS      So is it if thou knewst our purposes. HAMLET         I see a […]

HAMLET         A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm. CLAUDIUS      What dost thou mean by this? HAMLET         Nothing but to show you how a king may go a progress through the guts of a beggar. CLAUDIUS      Where is Polonius? […]

[Enter HAMLET and Attendants.] CLAUDIUS      Now, Hamlet, where’s Polonius? HAMLET         At supper. CLAUDIUS      At supper! Where? HAMLET         Not where he eats but where ’a is eaten. A certain convocation of politic worms are e’en at him. Your worm is your only emperor for diet. We fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat […]

Enter ROSENCRANTZ [and GUILDENSTERN] and all the rest. CLAUDIUS      How now, what hath befallen? ROSENCRANTZ          Where the dead body is bestowed, my lord, We cannot get from him. CLAUDIUS                  But where is he? ROSENCRANTZ          Without, my lord, guarded, to know your pleasure. CLAUDIUS      Bring him before us. ROSENCRANTZ                      Ho! Bring in the lord!                        (4.3.11-15) How now, what hath befallen? They had ONE job […]

Enter CLAUDIUS and two or three. CLAUDIUS      I have sent to seek him and to find the body. How dangerous is it that this man goes loose! Yet must not we put the strong law on him: He’s loved of the distracted multitude, Who like not in their judgement but their eyes, And where ’tis so th’offender’s scourge is weighed But never the […]

ROSENCRANTZ          My lord, you must tell us where the body is, and go with us to the King. HAMLET         The body is with the King, but the King is not with the body. The King is a thing. GUILDENSTERN        A thing, my lord? HAMLET         Of nothing. Bring me to him.             (Exeunt.)         (4.2.23-28) Rosencrantz tries […]

HAMLET         Besides, to be demanded of a sponge! What replication should be made by the son of a king? ROSENCRANTZ          Take you me for a sponge, my lord? HAMLET         Ay, sir – that soaks up the King’s countenance, his rewards, his authorities. But such officers do the King best service in the end: he keeps […]