Hamlet

1
Hamlet

• Act IV

2
Act IV Scene i

• Queen informs Claudius Hamlet is crazy- he killed
  Polonius
• Gertrude
• 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 this brainish apprehension,
  killsThe unseen good old man (IV.i. 7-12) pg.
  189

3
Act IV Scene i

• Claudius
• O heavy deed!It had been so with us, had we
  been thereHis liberty is full of threats to
  allTo you yourself, to us, to every one.Alas,
  how shall this bloody deed be answer'd?It will
  be laid to us, whose providenceShould have kept
  short, restrain'd and out of haunt,This mad
  young man but so much was our love,We would not
  understand what was most fitBut, like the owner
  of a foul disease,To keep it from divulging, let
  it feedEven on the pith of Life (IV.i.13-24)
  pg. 189-191

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Act IV Scene i

• Claudius claims that they are in danger
• Ship him to England
• Tell everyone so they dont blame us b/c we
  didnt stop him
• Hamlet is a direct threat to the King
• well call up our wisest friends
• and let them know both what we mean to do
• And whats untimely done
• Whose whisper oer the worlds diameter,
• As level as the cannon to his blank
• Transports his poisened shot, may miss our name
• And hit the woundless air. O come away!
• My soul is full of discord and dismay
  (IV.i.39-46) pg. 191

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Act IV Scenes ii

• G R meet with Hamlet to find Polonius body
• Indicates their betrayal
• Calls them sponges, nuts in an apes mouth
• They are using him
• Hamlet
• Ay, sir, that soaks up the king's countenance,
  hisrewards, his authorities. But such officers
  do theking best service in the end he keeps
  them, likean ape, in the corner of his jaw
  first mouthed, tobe last swallowed when he
  needs what you havegleaned, it is but squeezing
  you, and, sponge, youshall be dry
  again(IV.ii.15-21) pg. 193

6
Act IV Scene iii

• King says that Hamlet is dangerous but people of
  Denmark love him so we cant jail or kill him-
  excuse
• 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
  himHe's loved of the distracted multitude,Who
  like not in their judgment, but their eyesAnd
  where tis so, the offender's scourge is
  weigh'd,But never the offence. To bear all
  smooth and even,This sudden sending him away
  must seemDeliberate pause diseases desperate
  grownBy desperate appliance are relieved,Or not
  at all (IV.iii. 1-11) pg. 195

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Act IV Scene iii

• King sends G R to take Hamlet to England
• Says to give them letters- England to kill Hamlet
  
• 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
  redAfter the Danish sword, and thy free awePays
  homage to us--thou mayst not coldly setOur
  sovereign process which imports at full,By
  letters congruing to that effect,The present
  death of Hamlet. Do it, EnglandFor like the
  hectic in my blood he rages,And thou must cure
  me till I know 'tis done,Howe'er my haps, my
  joys were ne'er begun (IV.iii.67-77) pg. 199

8
Act IV Scene iv

• Hamlet runs into Fortinbras on his way back to
  Denmark
• Fortinbras going to attack Poland
• Soliloquy

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Act IV Scene v

• Ophelia has gone mad pg. 205
• Ophelia enters singing
• How can tell the difference between true love
  some other?
• Her dead father
• Sex
• He is dead and gone, lady,He is dead and
  goneAt his head a grass-green turf,At his
  heels a stone (IV.v. 34-37) pg. 207
• By Gis and by Saint Charity,Alack, and fie for
  shame!Young men will do't, if they come to'tBy
  cock, they are to blame.Quoth she, before you
  tumbled me,You promised me to wed.So would I
  ha' done, by yonder sun,An thou hadst not come
  to my bed (IV.v.63-68) pg. 209

10
Act IV Scene v

• King says b/c of Hamlet, death of dad by Hamlets
  hand
• People are talking b/c we buried him so quickly
• Laertes has returned is upset

11
Act IV Scene v

• Claudius
• O, this is the poison of deep grief it
  springsAll from her father's death. O Gertrude,
  Gertrude,When sorrows come, they come not single
  spiesBut in battalions. First, her father
  slainNext, your son gone and he most violent
  authorOf his own just remove the people
  muddied,Thick and unwholesome in their thoughts
  and whispers,For good Polonius' death and we
  have done but greenly,In hugger-mugger to inter
  him poor OpheliaDivided from herself and her
  fair judgment,Without the which we are pictures,
  or mere beastsLast, and as much containing as
  all these,Her brother is in secret come from
  FranceFeeds on his wonder, keeps himself in
  clouds,And wants not buzzers to infect his
  earWith pestilent speeches of his father's
  death(IV.v.81-98) pg. 211

12
Act IV Scene v

• She sings of flowers- symbolic
• Ophelia further upsets Laertes
• Ophelia
• Theres rosemary, thats for remembrance/
• And there is pansies
• thats for thoughts
• There's fennel for you, and columbines there's
  ruefor you and here's some for me we may call
  itherb-grace o' Sundays O you must wear your
  rue witha difference. There's a daisy I would
  give yousome violets, but they withered all when
  my fatherdied they say he made a good
  end,--(IV.v.198-209) pg. 217

13
Act IV Scene v

• Rosemary- remembrance
• Fennel- adulatory
• Columbines- unfaithfulness
• Daisy- unhappiness
• Violets- faithful (withered when her fathered
  died)

14
Act IV Scene v

• King says he is not to blame
• Claudius
• Laertes, 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 meIf by direct or by
  collateral handThey find us touch'd, we will our
  kingdom give,Our crown, our life, and all that
  we can 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 (IV.v.226-236) pg. 219

15
Act IV Scene vi

• Horatio- reading letter from Hamlet
• 'Horatio, when thou shalt have overlookedthis,
  give these fellows some means to the kingthey
  have letters for him. Ere we were two days oldat
  sea, a pirate of very warlike appointment gave
  uschase. Finding ourselves too slow of sail, we
  put ona compelled valour, and in the grapple I
  boardedthem on the instant they got clear of
  our ship soI alone became their prisoner. They
  have dealt withme like thieves of mercy but
  they knew what theydid I am to do a good turn
  for them. Let the kinghave the letters I have
  sent and repair thou to mewith as much speed as
  thou wouldst fly death. Ihave words to speak in
  thine ear will make theedumb yet are they much
  too light for the bore ofthe matter (IV. Vi.
  13-26) pg. 221

16
Act Scene vi

• Horatio enters with a letter from Hamlet
• His ship attacked by pirates- jumped aboard their
  ship
• They treated him fairly as a prisoner
• Is coming with news- G R still on their way to
  England

17
Act IV Scene vi

• Claudius to Laertes
• The queen his motherLives almost by his looks
  and for myself--My virtue or 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 himWho,
  dipping all his faults in their affection,Would,
  like the spring that turneth wood to
  stone,Convert his gyves to graces so that my
  arrows,Too slightly timber'd for so loud a
  wind,Would have reverted to my bow again,And
  not where I had aim'd them (IV. Vii. 13-26) pg.
  223

18
Act IV Scene vii

• King tells Laertes that Hamlet is to blame
• Asks why Hamlet wasnt killed
• Loves mom
• People love him
• Vows to revenge his fathers death

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Act IV Scene v

• Letter from Hamlet to Claudius - he is to return
  next day
• Claudius plan kill Hamlet make it look like
  an accident
• Letter
• 'High and mighty, You shall know I am set naked
  onyour kingdom. To-morrow shall I beg leave to
  seeyour kingly eyes when I shall, first asking
  yourpardon thereunto, recount the occasion of my
  suddenand more strange return. 'HAMLET.'What
  should this mean? Are all the rest come back?Or
  is it some abuse, and no such thing?(IV. Vii.
  49-55) pg. 225
• Claudius
• To thine own peace. If he be now return'd,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 fallAnd for his death no wind of
  blame shall breathe,But even his mother shall
  uncharge the practiceAnd call it accident (IV.
  Vii. 69-76) pg. 227

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• People have talked about your fencing skills-
  Hamlet envious (108-120 pg. 229)
• Claudius duel and you will choose the better
  sword (148-158 pg. 231)
• Laertes poison the tip of his sword to make sure
  (159-168 pg. 233)
• Claudius hell have a drink with poison in it
  for him to drink (169-185 pg. 233)
• Claudius needs to get rid of Hamlet to save
  himself- he uses Laertes

21
Act IV Scene vii

• Queen enters- Ophelia has drowned
• Suicide
• There is a willow grows aslant a brook,That
  shows his hoar leaves in the glassy streamThere
  with fantastic garlands did she comeOf
  crow-flowers, nettles, daisies, and long
  purplesThat liberal shepherds give a grosser
  name,But our cold maids do dead men's fingers
  call themThere, on the pendent boughs her
  coronet weedsClambering to hang, an envious
  sliver brokeWhen down her weedy trophies and
  herselfFell in the weeping brook. Her clothes
  spread wideAnd, mermaid-like, awhile they bore
  her upWhich time she chanted snatches of old
  tunesAs 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,Pull'd the poor
  wretch from her melodious layTo muddy death
  (VI.vii.190-208) pg. 233-235

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Soliloquy

• Act IV
• Page 203

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• How all occasions do inform against me,And spur
  my dull revenge! What is a man,If 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.
• How everything seems to work against me in
  getting revenge
• What good is man if he only eats sleeps- makes
  him a beast
• God gave us the ability to reflect learn from
  it
• Didnt not give it to us to let it go to waste

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• Now, whether it be Bestial oblivion, or some
  craven scruple Of thinking too precisely on the
  event, A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one
  part wisdom And ever three parts coward, I do
  not know Why yet I live to say 'This thing's to
  do' Sith I have cause and will and strength and
  means To do't.
• What is stopping me? Animal unable to understand
• Or am I being to precise? Thinking too much about
  it- his wisdom is one quarter wisdom and three
  quarters cowardice
• He didn't know why he was saying, 'this still has
  to be done' since he had the reason and the
  desire and the strength and the means to do it.
• Examples as weighty as the earth keep urging him.

25

• Witness this army of such mass and charge Led
  by a delicate and tender prince, Whose spirit
  with divine ambition puff'd Makes mouths at the
  invisible event, Exposing what is mortal and
  unsure To all that fortune, death and danger
  dare, Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be great
  Is not to stir without great argument, But
  greatly to find quarrel in a straw When honour's
  at the stake.
• Look at young Fortinbras - puffed with divine
  ambition, scorning everything that fortune, death
  and danger could throw at him, leads this huge,
  expensive army to gain a piece of land that was
  nothing more than an eggshell.
• True greatness wasn't a matter of rushing into
  action for any trivial cause but when honor was
  at stake it was noble to act, no matter how
  trivial the cause was.

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• How stand I then, That have a father kill'd, a
  mother stain'd, Excitements of my reason and my
  blood, And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I
  see The imminent death of twenty thousand men,
  That, for a fantasy and trick of fame, Go to
  their graves like beds, fight for a plot Whereon
  the numbers cannot try the cause, Which is not
  tomb enough and continent To hide the slain? O,
  from this time forth, My thoughts be bloody, or
  be nothing worth!
• Where did he stand, then, his father murdered,
  his mother stained - two huge incentives - and
  not do anything?
• Shameful that he watched the imminent death of
  men as easily as one would go to bed, for almost
  no reason, fighting for a small piece of land -
  they wouldn't even fit on it, not even big enough
  for the fallen to be buried on.

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Analysis

• He is ready to do what is expected of him seek
  revenge
• Rid himself of sadness uncertainty by proving
  Claudius guilt confronting his mom- no longer
  has frustration- confident
• Hamlet admires Fortinbras, even if it means
  certain death
• He should be able to take action despite any
  consequence- his thoughts will reflect this