| Mad as the sea and wind, when both contendWhich is the mightier. In his lawless fit, Behind the arras hearing something stir,Whips out his rapier, cries ‘A rat, a rat!”,And in his brainish apprehension killsThe unseen good man. | Gertrude to ClaudiusIV.i. after Hamlet kills PoloniusGertrude is telling Claudius that Hamlet killed Polonius. |
| Oh heavy deed!It had been so with us had we been there.His liberty is full of threats to all,To you yourself, to us, to everyone.Alas, how shall this bloody deed be answered?It will be laid to us, whose providenceShould have kept short, restrained, and out of haunt,This mad young man. But so much was our love,We would not understand what was most fit,But like the owner of a foul disease,To keep it from divulging, let it feedEven on the pith of life. Where is he gone? | Claudius to GertrudeIV.i. After Hamlet kills Polonius and after Gertrude tells Claudius that Hamlet killed PoloniusClaudius is telling Gertrude that Hamlet is dangerous. He is also telling Gertrude that he loves and is concerned about Hamlet. |
| To draw apart the body he hath killed,O’er whom his very madness, like some oreAmong a mineral of metals base,Shows itself pure’ a weeps for what is done. | Gertrude to ClaudiusIV.i. After Hamlet kills Polonius and after Gertrude tells Claudius that Hamlet killed Polonius. Also after Claudius says he loves Hamlet.Gertrude tells Claudius that Hamlet feels guilty for murdering Polonius. |
| Oh [***], come away!The sun no sooner shall the mountains touchBut we will ship him hence, and this vile deedWe must with all our majesty and skillBoth countenance and excuse. | Claudius to GertrudeIV.i. after Gertrude tells Claudius that Hamlet killed Polonius. Claudius decides to send Hamlet away. |
| Come [***], we’ll call up our wisest friendsAnd let them know both what we mean to doAnd what’s untimely done. … …[Whose whisper o’er the world’s diameter, As level as the cannon to his blank,Transports his poisoned shot, may miss our nameAnd hit the woundless air.] Oh come away,My soul is full of discord and dismay. | Claudius to himself.After Gertrude tells Claudius that Hamlet killed Polonius.Claudius is hoping that he can avoid being accused of the murder of Polonius. |
| 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 them like an ape in the corner of his jaw, first mouthed to be last swallowed. When he needs what you have gleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, you shall be dry again. | Hamlet to R&GAfter R&G come in on Claudius’ request to ask Hamlet where he hid Polonius’ body.Hamlet is telling R&G that Claudius is using them to get what he wants. |
| I have sent to seek him, and to find the body.How dangerous is it that this mad goes lose,Yet must not we put the strong law on him; He’s loved of the distracted multitude,Who like not in their judgement, but in their eyes;And where ’tis so, th’offender’s scourge is weighed,But never the offence. To bear all smooth and even,This sudden sending him away must seemDeliberate pause. Diseases desperate grownBut desperate appliance are relieved,Or not at all. | Claudius soliloquyAfter he sends R&G to find Polonius’ body.Claudius is saying how he can’t punish Hamlet severely because of how well liked and popular he is. He also says that he has to to use desperate methods to get rid of 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 all fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots. Your fat king and your lean beggar is but variable service, two dishes, but to one table; that’s the end. | Hamlet to ClaudiusAfter R&G ask Hamlet where he hid Polonius’ body.He is telling Claudius what happened to Polonius’ body and saying how people set themselves up for death. |
| [***], this deed, for thine especial safety,Which we do tender, as we dearly grieveFor that which thou hast done, must send thee henceWith fiery quickness. Therefore prepare thyself.The bark is ready and the wind at help,Th’associates tend, and everything is bentFor England. | Claudius to HamletAfter Hamlet tells Claudius where he put Polonius’ body.He is telling Hamlet that a ship is waiting to send him away to England. |
| Follow him at foot, tempt him with speed aboard.Delay it not, I’ll have him hence tonight.Away, for everything is sealed and doneThat else leans on th’affair. Pray you make haste. | Claudius to R&GAfter he sends Hamlet off to England.Claudius is telling R&G to make sure Hamlet makes it to the ship. |
| And England, if my love thou hod’st at aught,As my great power thereof may give thee sense,Since yet they cicatrice looks raw and redAfter the Danish sword, and they free awePays homage to us– though mayst not coldly setOur sovereign process, which imports at full, Bu letters congruing to that effect,The present death of Hamlet. Do it England,For like the hectic in my blood he rages,And thou must cure me. Till I know ’tis done,Howe’er my haps, my jous were ne’er begun. | Claudius to himselfAfter he sends Hamlet off to England and after he sends R&G off to make sure Hamlet gets on the ship to England.Claudius and saying how he wrote letters ordering Hamlet’s execution in England. |
| Go captain, from me greet the Danish king. Tell him that by his license, [***]Craves the conveyance of a promised marchOver 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. | Fortinbras to a captainAfter Claudius sends Hamlet off to England.Fortinbras is ordering a captain to ask for permission to pass through Denmark. |
| Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducatsWill not debate the question of this straw.This is th’impostume of much wealth and peace,That inward breaks, and shows no cause withoutWhy the man dies. I humbly thank you sir. | Hamlet soliloquyAfter Fortinbras asks Claudius if him and his army can pass through Denmark.Hamlet reflects on how corrupt society is and how leaders send off men to die in war for money (?). |
| How all occasions do inform against me,And spur my dull revenge! What is a manIf his chief good and market of his timeBe but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more.Sure he that made us with such large discourse,Looking before and after, gave us notThat capability and god-like reasonTo fust in us unused. Now whether it be Bestial oblivion, or some craven scrupleOf thinking too precisely on th’event–A thought which quartered hath but one part wisdomAnd ever three parts coward– I do not knowWhy yet I live to say this thing’s to do,Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and mean To do’t. | Hamlet soliloquyAfter Fortinbras passes through Denmark with his army. Before he shipped off to England.He is saying how he is smart, but he keeps delaying his plan take revenge on Claudius/ avenge his father. |
| … Examples gross as earth exhort me. Witness this army of such mass and charge,Led by a delicate and tender prince,Whose spirit with diving ambition puffedMakes mouth at the invisible event,Exposing what is mortal and unsureTo all that fortune, death and danger dare,Even egg-shell. Rightly to be great Is not to stir without great argument,But greatly to find quarrel in a strawWhen honour’s at the stake. | Hamlet soliloquyAfter Fortinbras passes through Denmark with his army.After seeing Fortinbras’ army it makes him think about how honour must be defended and justice must be dealt with. |
| … How stand I then,That have a father killed, a mother stained,Excitements of my reason and my blood,And let all sleep, while to my shame i seeThat imminent death of twenty thousand men,That for a fantasy and trick of fameGo to their graves like beds, fight for a plotWhereon the numbers cannot try the cause,Which is not tomb enough and continentTo hide the slain. Oh from this time forth,My thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth. | Hamlet soliloquiy.After he sees Fortinbras’ army pass through Denmark.Hamlet has a reason to kill, yet he hasn’t yet killed Claudius when thousands of men die all the time for trivial causes. He decides that from now on, he will take revenge on Claudius. |
| She speaks much of her father, she says she hearsThere’s tricks i’th’world, and hems, and beats her heart,Spurns enviously at straws, speaking thing in doubtThat carry but half sense. Her speech is nothing,Yet the unshaped use of it doth moveThe hearers to c0llection. They yawn at it,And both the words up fit to their own thought,Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily. | Gentleman to Gertrude.After she refuses to see Ophelia, but before Gertrude sees how mad Ophelia has gotten.He is explaining that Ophelia has gone mad and that she needs pity because no one cares that she’s gone mad. |
| To my sick soul, as sin’s true nature is,Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss.So full of artless jealousy is guilt,It spills itself in fearing to be spilt. | Gertrude to herself.After the Gentleman tells her how mad Ophelia is.She is saying how she is apprehensive about the future. |
| How should I your true love knowFrom another one?By his cockle hat and staffAnd his sandal shoon…. Say you? Nay, pray you mark.He is dead and gone lady,He is dead and gone;At his head a grass-green turn,At his heels a stone. | Ophelia to GertrudeAfter it is revealed by the Gentleman that she has gone mad.She is singing about the death of her father. |
| White his shoud as the mountain snow–… Larded all with sweet flowers,Which bewept to the grave did not goWith true-love showers. | Ophelia to GertrudeAfter it is revealed by the Gentleman that she has gone mad.She is singing about the death of her father. |
| Tomorrow is Saint Valentine’s day,All in the morning betime,And I a maid at your window,To be your Valentine.Then up he rose and donned his clothesAnd dupped the chamber door;Let in the maid that out a maid Never departed more. | Ophelia to ClaudiusAfter it is revealed by the Gentleman that she has gone man and after Claudius first enters.She is singing about the loss of virginity or having sex in general (?) |
| By Gis and by Saint Charity,Alack and fie for shame,Young men will do’t if they come to’t–By Cock, they are to blame.Quoth she, ‘Before you tumbled me,You promised me to wed.’He answers– So would I ha’ done, by yonder sun,And though hadst not come to my bed. | Ophelia to Claudius and GertrudeAfter it is revealed by the Gentleman that she has gone man and after Claudius first enters.She is singing about being betrayed by someone you love. |
| …When sorrows come, they come not single spies,But in battalions. First, her father slain;Next your son gone, and he most violent authorOf his own just remove; the people muddied,Thick and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispersFor good Polonius’ death– and we have done by greenlyIn hugger-mugger to inter him; poor OpheliaDivided from herself and her fair judgement,Without the which we are picture, or mere beats;Last, and as much containing as all these,Her brother is in secret come from France,Feeds on his wonder, keeps himself in clouds,And wants not buzzers to infect his earWith pestilent speeches of his father’s death,Wherein necessity, of matter beggared,Will nothing stick our person to arraignIn ear and ear. Of my dear [***], this,Like to a murdering piece in many placesGives me superfluous death. | Claudius to GertrudeAfter Ophelia sings are song about betrayalClaudius and saying how sorrows always come all at once. |
| That drop of blood that’s calm and proclaims me bastard,Cries cuckold to my father, brands the harlotEven here, between the chaste and unsmirched browOf my true mother. | Laertes to Claudius and GertrudeAfter the angry mob comes in saying that Laertes should be king.Laertes is demanding to know what happened to his father. |
| What is the cause, [***],That thy rebellion looks so giant-like?–Let him go, [***], do not fear our person.There’s such divinity doth hedge a kingThat treason can by peep to what it would,Acts little of his will. — Tell me [***],Why thou art thus incensed. — Let him go [***].–Speak man. | Claudius to GertrudeAfter Laetres and an angry mob bursts in and Laertes asks what happened to his father.He tells her not to be afraid of Laertes wrath because he is protected by his kingship. |
| How came he dead? I’ll not be juggled with.To hell allegiance, vows to the blackest devil,Conscience and grace to the profoundest pit!I dare damnation. To this point I stand,That both the worlds I give to negligence,Let come what comes, only I’ll be revengedMost throughly for my father. | Laertes to ClaudiusAfter Claudius tells him that his father is dead.Laertes asks how his father died and says that he will get revenge on the person who killed his father. |
| Good [***],If you desire to know the certaintyOf your dear father, is’t writ in your revengeThat, soopstake, you will draw both friend and foe,Winner and loser? | Claudius to LaertesAfter Claudius tells him that his father is dead and Laertes says he will get revenge on whoever killed his father.He is telling Laertes to distinguish between friend and enemy when deciding how to avenge his father. |
| Why now you speakLike a good child and a true gentleman.That I am guiltless of your father’s death,And am most sensibly in grief for it,It shall as level to your judgement pierceAs day does to your eye. | Claudius to LaertesAfter Claudius tells him that his father is dead and Laertes says he will get revenge on whoever killed his father.Claudius is telling Laertes that he did not kill his father. |
| O heat dry up my brains, tears seven times saltBurn out the sense and virtue of mine eye!By heaven, thy madness shall be paid with weightTill our scale turn the beam. O rose of May,Dear maid, kind sister, sweet [***]–O heavens, is’t possible a young maid’s witsShould be as mortal as an old man’s life?Nature is fine in love, and where ’tis fine,It sends some precious instance of itself After the thing it loves. | Laertes to OpheliaAfter he says he will get revenge on whoever killed his father and he sees Ophelia for the first time since he left for France.Laetes is horrified by Ophelia’s madness. |
| They bore him bare-faced on the bierHey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny,And in his grave rained many a tear–Fare you well my dove. | Ophelia to Laertes (?)After they see each other for the first time after he left for France.She is singing about death. |
| There’s fennel for you, and columbines. There’s rue for you, and here’s some for me; we may call it her of grace a Sundays. Oh you must wear your rue with a difference. There’s a daisy. I would give you some violets, but they wither all when my father died. They says a made a good end. For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy. | Ophelia to Laertes (?)After they see each other for the first time after he left for France.She is distributing different flowers and herbs to people in her babble. |
| And will a not come again?And will a not come again?No, no, he is dead,Go to they death-bed,He never will come again.His beard was as white as snow,All flaen was his boll,He is gone, he is gone,And we cast away a moan,God-a-mercy on his soul. | Ophelia to Laertes (?)After they see each other for the first time after he left for France and after she gives out flowers and herbs.She is singing about her father’s death. |
| [***], I must commune with your grief,Or you deny me right. Go but apart,Make choice of whom your wisest friends you will,And they shall hear and judge ‘twixt you and me.If by direct or by collateral handThey find us touched, we will our kingdom give,Our crown, our life, and all that we call ours,To you in satisfaction. But if not,Be you content to lend your patience to us,And we shall jointly labour with your soulTo give it due content. | Claudius to Laertes.After Ophelia sings a song about their father’s death.Claudius says that if he is found to be guilty of murder, Laertes can be king, but if he is found to be innocent, he will help Laertes avenge his father’s death. |
| Let this be so.His means of death, his obscure funeral,No trophy, sword, nor hatchment o’er his bones,No noble rite, nor formal ostentation,Cry to be heard, as ’twere from heaven to hearth,That I must call’t in question. | Laertes to ClaudiusAfter Claudius makes an offer with him. After Ophelia leaves singing her song about death.Laertes agrees with Claudius’ offer because his father did not die a noble death because he was murdered. |
| Now must your conscience my acquittance seal,And you must put me in your heart for friend,Sith you have hear, and with a knowing ear,That he which hat your noble father slainPursued my life. | Claudius to LaertesAfter Laertes agrees to Claudius offer and they agree to work together.He is telling Laertes that Hamlet not only killed his father, but he is out to get Claudius too. |
| Oh for two special reasons,Which may to you perhaps seem much unsinewed,But yet to me they’re strong. The queen his motherlives almost by his looks, and for myself,My virtue of my plague, be it either which,She’s so conjunctive to my life and soul,That as the star moves not but in his sphere,I could not but by her. The other motive,Why to a public count I might not go,Is the great love the general gender bear him,Who, dipping all his fault in their affection,Work like the spring that turneth wood to stone,Convert his gyves to graces, so that my arrows,Too slightly timbered for sou loud a wind,Would have reverted to my bow again,And not where I had aimed them. | Claudius to LaertesAfter Laertes agrees to Claudius offer and they agree to work together.He is telling Laertes that he didn’t punish Hamlet: because he loves Gertrude and because he is popular. |
| And so have I a noble father lost,A sister driven into desperate terms,Whose worth, if praises may go back again,Stood challenger on mount of all the ageFor her perfections. But my revenge will come. | Laertes to ClaudiusAfter Laertes agrees to Claudius offer and they agree to work together. After Claudius explains why he didn’t kill Hamlet.Laertes says he is similar, but more woeful that Hamlet. |
| Break not your sleeps for that. You must not thinkThat we are made of stuff so flat and dullThat we can let our beard be shook with dangerAnd think it pastime. You shortly shall hear more.I loved your father, and we love ourself,And that I hope will teach you imagine– | Claudius to LaertesAfter Laertes agrees to Claudius offer and they agree to work together. After Claudius explains why he didn’t kill Hamlet.Claudius assuring Laertes that he will punish Hamlet for his actions. |
| I’m lost in it my lord. But let him come–It warms the very sickness in my heartThat I shall live and tell him to his teeth’Thus didest thou!’ | Laertes to ClaudiusAfter Claudius reads a letter from Hamlet.Laertes says that he will kill Hamlet. |
| To thine own peace. If he be now returned,As checking at his voyage, and that he meansNo more to undertake it, I will work himTo an exploit, now ripe in my device,Under the which he shall not choose but fall,And for his death no wind of blame shall breathe,But even his mother that uncharge the practiceAnd call it accident. | Claudius to LaertesAfter Claudius reads a letter from Hamlet and Laertes says that he will kill Hamlet.Claudius makes a new plan to kill Hamlet. |
| It falls right.You have been talked of since your travel much,And that in [***] hearing, for a qualityWherein they say you shine. Your sum partsDid not together pluck such envy from himAs did that one, and that in my regardOf the unworthiest siege. | Claudius to Laertes.After Claudius reads a letter from Hamlet and Laertes says that he will kill Hamlet.Claudius is trying to get Laertes to want ot kill Hamlet even more by telling him that Hamlet is envious of him. |
| A very riband in the cap of youth,Yet needful too, for youth no less becomesThe light and careless livery that it wearsThan settled age his sables and his weedsImporting heath and graveness. Two months sinceHere was a gentleman of Normandy.I’ve seen myself, and served against, the French,And they can well on horseback, but this gallantHad witchcraft in’t. He grew unto his seat,And to such wondrous doing brought his horseAs had he been incorpsed and demi-naturedWith the brave beast. So far he topped my thought,That I in forgery of shapes and tricks Come short of what he did. | Claudius to LaertesAfter Laertes makes a final decision to kill Hamlet.Claudius tells Laertes about a courageous French soldier (indirectly telling him to get revenge on Hamlet and not be a weenie.) |
| He made confession of you,And gave you sucha masterly reportFor art and exercise in your in your defence,And for your rapier most especial,That he cried out ‘twould be a sight indeed If one could match you [Th’escrimers of their nationHe swore had neither motion, guard, nor eye,If you opposed them.] Sir, this report of hisDid [***] so envenom with his envyThat he could nothing do but wish and begYour sudden coming o’er to play with you.Now out of this– | Claudius to LaertesAfter Claudius reads a letter from Hamlet and Laertes says that he will kill Hamlet.He is blowing up Laertes ego and self esteem”Go kill Hamlet, you have the skills for it.” |
| Now that I think you did not love your father,But that I know love is begun by time,And that I see, in passages of proof,Time qualifies the spark and fire of it.[There lives within the very flame of loveA kind of wick or snuff that will abate it,And nothing is at a like goodness still,For goodness, growing to a plurisy,Dies in his own too much. That we would do,We should do when we would, for this ‘would’ changes,And hath abatements and delays as many As there are tongues, are hands, are accidents;And then this ;should; like a spendthrift sigh,That hurts by easing. But to the quick of th’ulcer–][***] comes back; what would you undertakeTo show yourself in deed your father’s sonMore than in words? | Claudius to LaertesAfter Laertes makes a final decision to kill Hamlet.He is talking about love fades over time. And asks if Laertes will actually kill Hamlet and if he’s more than just talk |
| No place, indeed, should murder sanctuarize;Revenge should have no bounds. But, good [***],Will you do this, keep close within your chamber;[***], returned, shall know you are come home;We’ll put on those shall praise your excellence,And set a double varnish on the fameThe Frenchman gave you, bring you in fine together,And wager on your heads. He being remiss,Most generous, and free from all contriving,Will not peruse the foils, so that with ease,Or with a little shuffling, you may chooseA sword unbated, and in a pass of practiceRequite him for your father. | Claudius to LaertesAfter Laertes makes a final decision to kill Hamlet.While they plan to kill Hamlet.Claudius makes a plain to have a botched duel where one of the swords is not blunted |
| I will do ‘t.And for that purpose I’ll anoint my sword.I bought an unction of a mountebank,So mortal that but dip a knife in it,Where it draws blood no cataplasm so rare,Collected from all simples that have virtueUnder the moon, can save the thing from deathThat is but scratched withal. I’ll touch my pointWith this contagion, that if I gall him slightlyIt may be death. | Laertes to ClaudiusWhile they plan ways to kill Hamlet.He suggests to poison the unblunted blade that Claudius suggested. |
| Let’s further think of this,Weigh what convenience both of time and meansMay fit us to our shape. If this should fail,And that our drift look through our bad performance,’Twere better not assayed. Therefore this projectShould have a back or second that might holdIf this should blast in proof. Soft, let me see.We’ll make a solemn wager on your cunnings.—I ha ‘t! When in your motion you are hot and dry,As make your bouts more violent to that end,And that he calls for drink, I’ll have prepared himA chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping,If he by chance escape your venomed stuck,Our purpose may hold there. | Claudius to LaertesWhile they plan ways to kill Hamlet.Claudius plans to poison Hamlet’s drink just in case he doesn’t die even after all the other stuff. |
| There is a willow grows askant a brook,That shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream.There with fantastic garlands did she make,Of crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples,That liberal shepherds give a grosser name,But our cold maids do dead men’s fingers call them.There, on the pendant boughs her coronet weedsClamb’ring to hang, an envious sliver broke,When down her weedy trophies and herselfFell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread wide,And mermaid-like a while they bore her up,Which time she chanted snatches of old laudsAs one incapable of her own distress,Or like a creature native and induedUnto that element. But long it could not beTill that her garments, heavy with their drink,Pulled the poor wretch from her melodious layTo muddy death. | Gertrude to Claudius and LaertesAfter Claudius and Laertes plan ways to kill Hamlet.She talks about how Ophelia died after falling off a willow tree branch while trying to hang flowers. |
| Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,And therefore I forbid my tears. But yetIt is our trick. Nature her custom holds,Let shame say what it will. When these are gone,The woman will be out.—Adieu, my lord.I have a speech of fire that fain would blaze,But that this folly doubts it. | Laertes to Claudius and GertrudeAfter he finds out that Ophelia is deadLaertes tries to hold back his tears. |
Hamlet IV
August 12, 2019