The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by George MacDonald (read out loud books .TXT) 📖

at my death thy Son
Shall shine, as he shines now and heretofore.]

[Footnote 3: 'Wintred garments'- As You Like It , iii. 2.]

[Footnote 4: He is the only one who has not for the wedding put off his mourning.]

[Footnote 5: lowered , or cast down: Fr. avaler , to lower.]

[Footnote 6: 'Plainly you treat it as a common matter-a thing of no significance!' I is constantly used for ay , yes .]

[Footnote 7: He pounces on the word seems .]

[Footnote 8: Not unfrequently the type would appear to have been set up from dictation.]

[Footnote 9: They are things of the outside, and must seem , for they are capable of being imitated; they are the natural shows of grief. But he has that in him which cannot show or seem , because nothing can represent it. These are 'the Trappings and the Suites of woe ;' they fitly represent woe, but they cannot shadow forth that which is within him-a something different from woe, far beyond it and worse, passing all reach of embodiment and manifestation. What this something is, comes out the moment he is left by himself.]

[Footnote 10: The emphasis is on might .]

[Footnote 11: Both his uncle and his mother decline to understand him. They will have it he mourns the death of his father, though they must at least suspect another cause for his grief. Note the intellectual mastery of the hypocrite-which accounts for his success.]

[Footnote 12: belonging to obsequies .]

[Page 22]

Of impious stubbornnesse. Tis vnmanly greefe, It shewes a will most incorrect to Heauen, A Heart vnfortified, a Minde impatient, [Sidenote: or minde] An Vnderstanding simple, and vnschool'd: For, what we know must be, and is as common As any the most vulgar thing to sence, Why should we in our peeuish Opposition Take it to heart? Fye, 'tis a fault to Heauen, A fault against the Dead, a fault to Nature, To Reason most absurd, whose common Theame Is death of Fathers, and who still hath cried, From the first Coarse,[1] till he that dyed to day, [Sidenote: course] This must be so. We pray you throw to earth This vnpreuayling woe, and thinke of vs As of a Father; For let the world take note, You are the most immediate to our Throne,[2] And with no lesse Nobility of Loue, Then that which deerest Father beares his Sonne, Do I impart towards you. For your intent [Sidenote: toward] [Sidenote: 18] In going backe to Schoole in Wittenberg,[3] It is most retrograde to our desire: [Sidenote: retrogard] And we beseech you, bend you to remaine Heere in the cheere and comfort of our eye, Our cheefest Courtier Cosin, and our Sonne.

Qu. Let not thy Mother lose her Prayers Hamlet : [Sidenote: loose] I prythee stay with vs, go not to Wittenberg. [Sidenote: pray thee]

Ham. I shall in all my best Obey you Madam.[4]

King. Why 'tis a louing, and a faire Reply, Be as our selfe in Denmarke. Madam come, This gentle and vnforc'd accord of Hamlet [5] Sits smiling to my heart; in grace whereof, No iocond health that Denmarke drinkes to day, [Sidenote: 44] But the great Cannon to the Clowds shall tell,

[Footnote 1: Corpse .]

[Footnote 2: -seeking to propitiate him with the hope that his succession had been but postponed by his uncle's election.]

[Footnote 3: Note that Hamlet was educated in Germany-at Wittenberg, the university where in 1508 Luther was appointed professor of Philosophy. Compare 19. There was love of study as well as disgust with home in his desire to return to Schoole : this from what we know of him afterwards.]

[Footnote 4: Emphasis on obey . A light on the character of Hamlet.]

[Footnote 5: He takes it, or pretends to take it, for far more than it was. He desires friendly relations with Hamlet.]

[Page 24]

And the Kings Rouce,[1] the Heauens shall bruite againe, Respeaking earthly Thunder. Come away.
Exeunt [Sidenote: Florish. Exeunt all but Hamlet. ]

Manet Hamlet.

[2] Ham. Oh that this too too solid Flesh, would melt,
[Sidenote: sallied flesh[3]] Thaw, and resolue it selfe into a Dew: [Sidenote: 125,247,260] Or that the Euerlasting had not fixt [Sidenote: 121 bis ] His Cannon 'gainst Selfe-slaughter. O God, O God!
[Sidenote: seale slaughter, o God, God,] How weary, stale, flat, and vnprofitable [Sidenote: wary] Seemes to me all the vses of this world? [Sidenote: seeme] Fie on't? Oh fie, fie, 'tis an vnweeded Garden [Sidenote: ah fie,] That growes to Seed: Things rank, and grosse in Nature Possesse it meerely. That it should come to this:
[Sidenote: meerely that it should come thus] But two months dead[4]: Nay, not so much; not two, So excellent a King, that was to this
Hiperion to a Satyre: so louing to my Mother, That he might not beteene the windes of heauen [Sidenote: beteeme[5]] Visit her face too roughly. Heauen and Earth Must I remember: why she would hang on him, [Sidenote: should] As if encrease of Appetite had growne By what it fed on; and yet within a month? Let me not thinke on't: Frailty, thy name is woman.[6] A little Month, or ere those shooes were old, With which she followed my poore Fathers body Like Niobe , all teares. Why she, euen she.[7] (O Heauen! A beast that wants discourse[8] of Reason [Sidenote: O God] Would haue mourn'd longer) married with mine Vnkle, [Sidenote: my]

[Footnote 1: German Rausch , drunkenness . 44, 68]

[Footnote 2: A soliloquy is as the drawing called a section of a thing: it shows the inside of the man. Soliloquy is only rare, not unnatural, and in art serves to reveal more of nature. In the drama it is the lifting of a veil through which dialogue passes. The scene is for the moment shifted into the lonely spiritual world, and here we begin to know Hamlet. Such is his wretchedness, both in mind and circumstance, that he could well wish to vanish from the world. The suggestion of suicide, however, he dismisses at once-with a momentary regret, it is true-but he dismisses it-as against the will of God to whom he appeals in his misery. The cause of his misery is now made plain to us-his trouble that passes show, deprives life of its interest, and renders the world a disgust to him. There is no lamentation over his father's death, so dwelt upon by the king; for loving grief does not crush. Far less could his uncle's sharp practice, in scheming for his own election during Hamlet's absence, have wrought in a philosopher like him such an effect. The one makes him sorrowful, the other might well annoy him, but neither could render him unhappy: his misery lies at his mother's door; it is her conduct that has put out the light of her son's life. She who had been to him the type of all excellence, she whom his father had idolized, has within a month of his death married his uncle, and is living in habitual incest-for as such, a marriage of the kind was then unanimously regarded. To Hamlet's condition and behaviour, his mother, her past and her present, is the only and sufficing key. His very idea of unity had been rent in twain.]

[Footnote 3: 1st Q . 'too much grieu'd and sallied flesh.' Sallied , sullied: compare sallets , 67, 103. I have a strong suspicion that
sallied and not solid is the true word. It comes nearer the depth of Hamlet's mood.]

[Footnote 4: Two months at the present moment.]

[Footnote 5: This is the word all the editors take: which is right, I do not know; I doubt if either is. The word in A Midsummer Night's Dream , act i. sc. 1-

Belike for want of rain; which I could well
Beteem them from the tempest of mine eyes-

I cannot believe the same word. The latter means produce for , as from the place of origin. The word, in the sense necessary to this passage, is not, so far as I know, to be found anywhere else. I have no suggestion to make.]

[Footnote 6: From his mother he generalizes to woman . After having believed in such a mother, it may well be hard for a man to believe in any woman.]

[Footnote 7: Q. omits 'euen she.']

[Footnote 8: the going abroad among things.]

[Page 26]

My Fathers Brother: but no more like my Father, Then I to Hercules . Within a Moneth? Ere yet the salt of most vnrighteous Teares Had left the flushing of her gauled eyes, [Sidenote: in her] She married. O most wicked speed, to post[1] With such dexterity to Incestuous sheets: It is not, nor it cannot come to good, But breake my heart, for I must hold my tongue.[2]

Enter Horatio, Barnard, and Marcellus.
[Sidenote: Marcellus, and Bernardo. ]

Hor. Haile to your Lordship.[3]

Ham. I am glad to see you well:
Horatio , or I do forget my selfe.

Hor. The same my Lord, And your poore Seruant euer.

[Sidenote: 134] Ham. [4]Sir my good friend, Ile change that name with you:[5] And what make you from Wittenberg Horatio ?[6]
Marcellus. [7]

Mar. My good Lord.

Ham. I am very glad to see you: good euen Sir.[8] But what in faith make you from Wittemberge ?

Hor. A truant disposition, good my Lord.[9]

Ham. I would not haue your Enemy