Hamlet 3:2 Flashcards
metatheatre
play within a play (the one in scene 3 is old-fashioned)
- deceit and performance
Hamlet in 3:2
- break in his antic disposition
- becomes genuinely interested in the theatre and players
Hamlet’s advise to the players
‘Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand’
‘Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion be your tutor’
- don’t over-act or under-act
- shows his knowledge and enthusiasm for acting
‘it out-…’
‘it out-herods Herod.’ - Hamlet to players
- more evil than Herod
- Herod was a tyrannical ruler who marries his brothers’ wife
‘Suit the action to…’
‘Suit the action to the word, the word to the action’ - Hamlet
- chiasmus
‘to hold, as ‘twere…’
‘to hold, as ‘twere, the mirror up to nature’ - Hamlet
- theatre should reflect the world it portrays
- represents Hamlet’s attempt to hold ‘the mirror’ up to Claudius
‘they imitated…’
‘they imitated humanity so abominably.’ - Hamlet to players
- inhumane
- criticises Claudius’ performative nature
theme of acting
- Claudius
- Hamlet
- spies
- players
‘Nay, do not think I…’
‘Nay do not think I flatter;/ For what advancement may I hope from thee,/ That no revenue hast but thy good spirits/ To feed and clothe thee? Why should the poor be flatter’d?’ - Hamlet to Horatio (monologue)
- nothing to gain, genuine appreciation of Horatio
- AO5 (possible homosexual interpretation)
‘No, let the candied…’
‘No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp’ - Hamlet to Horatio (monologue)
- ‘absurd pomp’ - the kind of people who get flattered
- insulting Denmark and the court system under his uncle (and therefore insulting the english court that it reflects)
‘Since my dear soul..’
‘Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice’ - Hamlet to Horatio (monologue)
- authenticity
- made the conscious choice to have Horatio as a friend (not circumstance due to the court)
- comparison to R+G (furthered by the ‘Fortune’ metaphor’s return)
what does Hamlet admire about Horatio?
- self-control (‘not passion’s slave’)
- reserve
- ‘blood and judgement are so well comeddled’
- ability to take the ups with the downs (‘A man that Fortune’s buffets and rewards/ Hast ta’en with equal thanks’)
- cannot be played or controlled (‘not a pipe for Fortune’s finger/ To sound what stop she please’)
‘A man that Fortune’s buffets…’
‘A man that Fortune’s buffets and rewards/ Hast ta’en with equal thanks’ - H to Horatio (monologue)
- takes the ups with the downs
‘…are so well comeddled…’
‘Whose blood and judgement are so well comeddled/ That they are not a pipe for Fortune’s finger to sound what stop she please.’ - Hamlet to Horatio (monologue)
- passions and judgement are balanced
- cannot be played or controlled
‘I prithee, when thou…’
‘I prithee, when thou seest that act afoot,/ Even with the very comment of thy soul/ Observe my uncle.’ - Hamlet involves Horatio in his plan to expose claudius (monologue)
- leans on Horatio for support
‘If his occulted guilt…’
‘Even if his occulted guilt/ Do not itself unkennel in one speech,/ It is a damned ghost that we have seen’ - Hamlet to Horatio (monologue)
- ‘occulted guilt’ = “hidden guilt”
- if C doesn’t react, the Ghost is devilish
‘If ‘a steal aught…’
‘If ‘a steal aught the whilst this play is playing/ And scape detecting, I will pay the theft.’ - Horatio in reply to H’s monologue and plan
- accepts responsibility
‘They are coming to the…’
‘They are coming to the play; I must be idle.’ - Hamlet
- ‘idle’ could mean unoccupied (to greet guests) or mad (‘antic disposition’)
‘Excellent, i’ faith; of the chameleon’s…’
‘Excellent, i’ faith; of the chameleon’s dish. I eat the air, promise-cramm’d; you cannot feed capons so.’ - Hamlet to King
- idea of empty being given nothing/nothing to feed on
- chameleons were believed to ‘eat the air’
- filled with promises only
‘I did enact…’
‘I did enact Julius Ceaser; I was kill’d i’ th’ Capitol;/ Brutus kill’d me.’ - Polonius to Hamlet
- their dynamic is represented
- Polonius’ death
‘No, good mother, here’s…’
‘No, good mother, here’s metal more attractive.’ - Hamlet
- magnetic
- rather sit by Ophelia (rejects Gertrude)
- trying to evoke jealousy?
‘Lady, shall I lie in…’
‘I mean, my…’
‘Do you think…’
‘Lady, shall I lie in your lap?’ - H to O
- ‘lap’ = sexual organs
‘I mean, my head upon your lap?’ - H to O
- trying to trip her up
‘Do you think I meant country matters?’ - H to O
- she responds politely, ‘I think nothing, my lord.’
‘That’s a fair thought…’
‘That’s a fair thought to lie between the maid’s legs.’ - Hamlet to Ophelia
- its fair for him to be sexual to her
‘Nothing’
‘Nothing’ - Hamlet
- in conversation to O after making innuendos about sexual organs
- “thing” = penis “no thing” = female
‘For look you how cheerfully my…’
‘For look you how cheerfully my mother looks, and my father died within’s two hours.’ - Hamlet
- again the time-warp
- player version of his father is about to die
‘So long? Nay then…’
‘So long? Nay, then, let the devil wear black, for I’ll have a suit of sables. O heavens!’ - Hamlet to O
- sarcasm about his mourning
- that he can leave the dark clothes and wear something more showy
‘die two months ago, and…’
‘die two months ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there’s hope a great man’s memory may outlive his life half a year’ - Hamlet to O
- continue his sarcasm about his father’s death
- response to Ophelia’s correction about the time frame
‘The Dumb Show’
‘The Dumb Show’ - SD
- silent
key points from ‘The Dumb Show’
- ‘King and a Queen, very lovingly’
- ‘makes show of protestation’
- ‘seeing him asleep, leaves him’
- ‘a Fellow, takes off his crown, kisses it, pours poison in the sleeper’s ears’
- ‘The Poisoner woos the Queen’ ‘she seems harsh awhile, but in the end accepts his love.’
‘Ay, or any show that you will…’
‘Ay, or any show that you will show him. Be not asham’d to show, he’ll not shame to tell you what it means’ - Hamlet to O
- ‘show’ the actor something intimate
- again sexualising Ophelia
- generalising
‘And thou shalt live in this…’
‘And thou shalt live in this fair world behind,/ Honour’d, belov’d; and haply one as kind/ For husband shalt thou -‘ - Player king
- shows the king (representing H sr.) as happy for her to remarrry
‘None wed the..’
‘None wed the second but who kill’d the first.’ - Player Queen
‘A second time I kill my…’
‘A second time I kill my husband dead,/ When second husband kisses me in bed.’ - Player Queen
‘The passion…’
‘The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.’ - Player King
- lose motivation once emotions calm
- will move on from the king
‘Whether love lead…’
‘Whether love lead fortune or else fortune love.’ - Player King
- love determines destiny or destiny determines love
‘So think thou wilt no…’
‘So think thou wilt no second husband wed; But die thy thoughts when they first lord is dead.’ - Player King
- thoughts will change once he dies
‘The lady doth…’
‘The lady doth protest too much, methinks.’ - Queen talking about the player queen
- Hamlet focuses on Gertrude’s reaction ahead of Claudius’
- distrust and misogyny
what does Hamlet say the play is called (3:2)?
‘The Mouse-trap.’
‘Your majesty, and we that have…’
‘Your majesty, and we that have free souls, it touches us not. Let the galled jade wince’ - Hamlet
- targeting it at Claudius, making him acutely aware of his guilt
- it won’t bother those with clear consciences
‘It would cost you a…’
‘It would cost you a groaning to take off mine edge.’ - Hamlet to Ophelia
- innuendos, Ophelia is aware
‘Still better…’
‘So you…’
‘Still better, and worse.’ - O
‘So you mis-take your husbands.’ - H
- marriage vows
- expresses anger
'’A poisons him…’
'’A poisons him i’ th’ garden for his estate’ - H (referring to the play but also Claudius)
- what H thinks the motivation is
- ‘[Pours the poison in his ears.]’
Hamlet’s reaction to ‘The King rises.’ - O
‘What, frighted with false fire!’ - H
- “just a play” - pushing it
- indication of guilt
- ‘Let the galled jade wince’
symbolism of the King’s ‘Give me some light’
- wants clarity and hope
‘Why, let the stricken…’
‘Why, let the stricken deer go weep’ - H about C
Horatio and Hamlet’s reflection on C’s reaction to the play
‘Half a share’ - Horatio
‘A whole one, I.’ - Hamlet (certainty)
‘for for me to put him…
‘for for me to put him to his purgation would perhaps plunge him into far more choler.’ - Hamlet
- H is not the right person to relieve the King’s temper
- ‘purgation’ - absolve of sins
‘If it shall please you to make me a…’
‘If it shall please you to make me a wholesome answer, I will do your mother’s commandment’ - Gil
- getting frustrated with Hamlet
‘Make you a wholesome…’
‘Make you a wholesome answer; my wit’s diseas’d’ - H
- antic disposition
‘We shall obey…’
‘We shall obey, were she ten times our mother.’ - Hamlet
- royal we (distances him from his former friends, stepping into kingship)
- H doesn’t think she deserves to be followed
‘My lord, you once…’
‘My lord, you once did love me.’ - Ros to H
- shows that Hamlet has chafed
- R attempts to win Hamlet’s confidence again, reminding him of better times and past friendship
‘You do surely bar…’
‘You do surely bar the door upon your own liberty, if you do deny your griefs to your friend.’ - Ros
- trying to reach Hamlet
- referring to the ‘Denmark’s a prison’ line earlier
‘Sir, I lack…’
‘Sir, I lack advancement.’ - H
- he is not able to progress politically or socially (as heir to the throne)
- sense of frustration (perhaps hinted to earlier in his talk to Claudius of empty ‘promises’
‘How can that be, when you have…’
‘How can that be, when you have the voice of the King himself for your succession in Denmark?.’ - Ros
- how can that be when the king has named you successor
- means little given Claudius took the throne
‘Ay, sir, but ‘While the…’
‘Ay, sir, but ‘While the grass grows’ - the proverb is something musty.’ - Hamlet
- refers to ‘While the grass grows, the seed starves’
- while Claudius prospers, Hamlet cannot
- ALLUSION
‘why do you go about to…’
‘why do you go about to recover the wind of me, as if you would drive me into a toil?’ - H
- holding one of the ‘recorders’ (idea of being played)
- “Why are you maneuvering the conversation, as if you’re trying to take advantage of me, like a hunter moving upwind of his prey to drive it into a net?”
What does Hamlet say when Gil says he cannot play one of the ‘recorders’?
‘It is as easy as lying: govern these ventages with your fingers and thumb’ - H
- how naturally lying comes to those at court
- ‘govern’ implies control
‘But these cannot I…’
‘But these cannot I command to ant utterance of harmony; I have not the skill.’ - Guil after H points out he is playing the instrument
- this offends Hamlet who expressed anger that Guil claims not to have the skill to play the pipe but presumes to ‘play’ him
‘Why, look you now, how…’
‘Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me! You would play upon me’ - H
- can play Hamlet but not the pipe (‘I have not the skill’)
- ‘do you think I am easier to be play’d on than a pipe?’ - H
‘do you think I am…’
‘do you think I am easier to be play’d on than a pipe?’ - H
- Guil saying he doesn’t have ‘the skill’ to play the pipe but (as Hamlet says) attempts to ‘play’ H
‘Call me what instrument…’
‘Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you cannot play upon me.’ - Hamlet to Guil
- ‘fret me’ - make him angry/fret the strings
‘Then I will come to…’
‘Then I will come to my mother by and by. [Aside] They fool me to the top of my bent.’ - Hamlet
- obeys Polonius’ request to see his mother
- ‘top of my bent’ - pulled to his extreme/full extent
'’Tis now the very witching…’
'’Tis now the very witching time of night,/ When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breathes out/ Contagion to this world.’ - H (soliloquy)
- ‘witching time of night’ - uses the same phrase in Macbeth before he kills Duncan (the king)
- referring to souls of the dead (like the Ghost) - is he one of the contagions
- personification of hell
- belief that night caused illness
‘Now could I drink…’
‘Now could I drink hot blood,/ And do such bitter business as the day/ Would quake to look on.’ - Hamlet (soliloquy)
- witches were believed to ‘drink hot blood’
- Hamlet gets carried away here with increasingly violent imagery, the caesura ‘to look on. Soft!’ shows him collecting himself and the change of course of the soliloquy
- can do things in the night that you could not in the day
‘O heart, lose not…’
‘O heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever/ The soul of Nero enter this firm bosom.’ - Hamlet (soliloquy)
- will not behave like the Roman emperor nero (power struggles w/ his mother may have led to him murdering her)
- chooses to turn away from the anger
- refuses to stoop to Claudius’ level
‘Let me be cruel…’
‘Let me be cruel, not unnatural:/ I will speak daggers to her, but use none.’ - Hamlet (soliloquy)
- will be harsh but not violent (the Ghost’s request)
- Gertrude in 3:4 says ‘These words like daggers enter into my ears’ to H
‘My tongue and…’
‘My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites’ - Hamlet (soliloquy)
- separating the parts of him: tongue represents rational discourse, his soul the emotional side
- ‘hypocrites’ implies these two sides lead him different ways and is not happy about softening his words
