GERTRUDE                I shall obey you. And for your part, Ophelia, I do wish That your good beauties be the happy cause Of Hamlet’s wildness. So shall I hope your virtues Will bring him to his wonted way again To both your honours. OPHELIA                    Madam, I wish it may. [Exit Gertrude.]        (3.1.36-41) I shall obey you: there can be a considering pause before she says this, even […]

CLAUDIUS      Sweet Gertrude, leave us two. For we have closely sent for Hamlet hither That he, as ’twere by accident, may here Affront Ophelia. Her father and myself – We’ll so bestow ourselves that, seeing unseen, We may of their encounter frankly judge And gather by him as he is behaved If’t be th’affliction of his love or no That thus he suffers for.        (3.1.28-36) Claudius […]

POLONIUS                  ’Tis most true, And he beseeched me to entreat your majesties To hear and see the matter. CLAUDIUS      With all my heart, and it doth much content me To hear him so inclined. Good gentlemen, give him a further edge And drive his purpose into these delights. ROSENCRANTZ          We shall, my lord. Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN [and Lords].             (3.1.21-28) Polonius isn’t going to […]

GERTRUDE     Did he receive you well? ROSENCRANTZ          Most like a gentleman. GUILDENSTERN        But with much forcing of his disposition. ROSENCRANTZ          Niggard of question, but of our demands Most free in his reply. GERTRUDE     Did you assay him to any pastime? ROSENCRANTZ          Madam, it so fell out that certain players We o’erraught on the way. Of these we told him And there did […]

Enter CLAUDIUS, GERTRUDE, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN [and] LORDS. CLAUDIUS      And can you by no drift of conference Get from him why he puts on this confusion, Grating so harshly all his days of quiet With turbulent and dangerous lunacy? ROSENCRANTZ          He does confess he feels himself distracted But from what cause ’a will by no means speak. GUILDENSTERN        Nor do we find him forward to be sounded But with a crafty madness keeps aloof When […]

HAMLET         The spirit that I have seen May be a devil, and the devil hath power T’assume a pleasing shape. Yea, and perhaps Out of my weakness and my melancholy, As he is very potent with such spirits, Abuses me to damn me! I’ll have grounds More relative than this. The play’s the thing Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King. (Exit.)         […]

HAMLET                     Hum, I have heard That guilty creatures sitting at a play Have by the very cunning of the scene Been struck so to the soul that presently They have proclaimed their malefactions. For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak With most miraculous organ. I’ll have these players Play something like the murder of my father Before mine uncle. I’ll […]

HAMLET                     For it cannot be But I am pigeon-livered and lack gall To make oppression bitter, or ere this I should ha’ fatted all the region kites With this slave’s offal – bloody, bawdy villain, Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain. Why, what an ass am I: this is most brave, That I, the son of a dear murdered, Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell, Must like a whore unpack my heart with words And […]

HAMLET                                 Yet I, A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause, And can say nothing. No, not for a king Upon whose property and most dear life A damned defeat was made. Am I a coward? Who calls me villain, breaks my pate across, Plucks off my beard and blows it in my face, Tweaks me by the nose, gives me the lie i’th’ throat As deep as to […]

HAMLET         What’s Hecuba to him, or he to her, That he should weep for her? What would he do Had he the motive and the cue for passion That I have? He would drown the stage with tears And cleave the general ear with horrid speech, Make mad the guilty and appal the free, Confound the ignorant and amaze indeed The very faculties of eyes and ears. (2.2.494-501) I mean, […]