Act 2 Scene 2 Hamlet's soliloquy

Question 1

What happens in Hamlet’s soliloquy?

Answer 1

After the performance Hamlet reflects on his inability to take decisive action. He is left feeling emasculated and inogble

Question 2

What does Hamlet refer to himself as ‘a rouge and peasant slave’?

Answer 2

He is behaving in an inferior manner because he can’t make decisions.

Question 4

Hamlet feels ashamed that he ‘must like a whore unpack my heart with words’, What does Shakespeare suggest with this simile?

Answer 4

A whore had to confess everyday for their sins - confession is futile just like Hamlet’s inaction

Question 5

Why does Shakespeare use the word ‘unpregnant’ to describe Hamlet’s missing motivation?

Answer 5

Women who weren’t reproducing were deemed powerless as it is their natural role. This suggests Hamlet is not fulfilling his natural role

Question 6

Towards the end of the soliloquy, what does Hamlet begin to consider about the nature of the ghost?

Answer 6

He considers that the ghost may be a devil. ‘The spirit that I have seen may be a devil’

Question 7

Why is the soliloquy ended with a rhyming couplet - ‘The play’s the thing/wherein i’ll catch the consienceness of the King’

Answer 7

Rhyming couplet emphasises the dramatic end to the scene and introduces that we are now at the climax of the play.
-shows reasoned and logical thought

Question 8

What critics can be connected to this scene?

Answer 8

-‘Hamlet seems incapable of deliberate action’ (Hazlitt)
-‘Hamlet’s delay is due to a form of melancholy’ (Bradley)

Question 9

A03 connected to this scene?

Answer 9

-Elizabethan Doctors believed that certain personality traits stemmed from an excess of specific fluids in the body.
-An excess of black bile was thought to be the cause of what we now call depression.