Style in Hamlet 9781400879212

Table of contents :
Acknowledgments
Contents
Key to References
Introduction
PART ONE: IMAGERY
1. War, Weapons, and Explosives
2. Secrecy and Poison
3. Corruption
Animals
Disease
Food
Gardens
4. Limits
Confinement
Money and Numbers
5. Art, Acting, and the Theater
PART TWO: STAGING AND STRUCTURE
6. Gesture and Stage Action
7. Sound Effects and Music, Costumes, and Stage Properties
8. "The Very Cunning of the Scene"
PART THREE: DRAMATIC CHARACTER
9. Claudius: "Break not your sleeps for that"
10. Polonius: " 'Beautified' is a vile phrase"— " 'Mobled queen' is good"
11. Hamlet: "How pregnant sometimes his replies are"
Hamlet as Artist and Critic
The Self-Conscious Style
The Witty Style
The Passionate Style
The Simple Style
Conclusion
Index

Citation preview

S T Y L E IN

HAMLET

STYLE IN HAMLET BY M A U R I C E C H A R N E Y

Princeton University Press Princeton, New Jersey 1969

Copyright © 1969 by Princeton University Press All

Rights

Reserved

L. C. Card: 68-56306 S.B.N. 691-06148-3 This book has been composed in Linotype Baskerville Printed in the United States of America by Princeton University Press Princeton, New Jersey

For Benjamin and Sadie Charney les jideles

Acknowledgments I A M obliged to Terence Spencer, Director of the Shakespeare Institute, for permitting me to read two short papers to the Shakespeare Conference at Stratford on Avon: "Hamlet Without Words" (1964) and "Parody in Hamlet" (1966); I have gratefully profited from the comments of the audience. T h e earlier paper was published in an expanded form in ELH, X X X I I (1965), 457-77, whose editor has given permission to use it, much revised, in the present book. T w o chapters of Style in "Hamlet" have been presented in the Renaissance Seminar of Columbia University, and its members offered many good suggestions. T h e Research Council of Rutgers University and its gracious Associate Director, C. F. Main, have given generous support to this project at all stages of its progress. I wish to thank Bridget Gellert and S. F. Johnson for reading the manuscript and making copious comments. Both James G. McManaway and Donald M. Frame offered valuable observations by letter, and Louise Cason was also notably helpful. Among many books on Hamlet, I must record a special debt to Harry Levin's The Question of Hamlet (New York, 1961), which makes an eloquent contribution to the study of Shakespeare's style without insisting on that particular word. Finally, my intellectual wife should be remembered for tirelessly and tactfully putting me out of my humor.

— vii —

Contents Acknowledgments

vii

Key to References Introduction

xi xv

P A R T ONE:

IMAGERY

1. War, Weapons, and Explosives

6

2. Secrecy and Poison 3. Corruption Animals Disease

31 53 63 75

Food Gardens 4. Limits Confinement Money and Numbers

89 102 114 115 123

5. Art, Acting, and the Theater

137

PART TWO: STAGING AND

STRUCTURE

6. Gesture and Stage Action 7. Sound Effects and Music, Costumes, and Stage Properties

161

8. " T h e Very Cunning of the Scene"

196

PART THREE: DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

9. Claudius: "Break not your sleeps for that" 10. Polonius: " 'Beautified' is a vile phrase"— " 'Mobled queen' is good" 11. Hamlet: " H o w pregnant sometimes his replies are" Hamlet as Artist and Critic —

fx

—

177

221 242 258 258

CONTENTS

The The The The

Self-Conscious Style Witty Style Passionate Style Simple Style

267 286 295 305

Conclusion

314

Index

321

— x —

Key to References A L L quotations from Hamlet are from the edition by Edward Hubler in the Signet Shakespeare (New York, 1963). This edition, based on Quarto 2, is especially useful for its scrupulous handling of the stage directions. A l l significant departures from Hubler's text are indicated in the notes, and some proofreading errors of the first edition have been corrected. Other works of Shakespeare are quoted from the one-volume T u d o r edition by Peter Alexander

(London, 1951), except where

otherwise noted. I have also used facsimile editions of the First Folio edited by Helge Kokeritz (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1954) ; Quarto 2, 1604

(San

Marino, Calif.: Huntington Library, 1938); and Quarto 1 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1931). Quotations from these texts have been modernized. Information about the incidence of words is based on A New and Complete

Concordance

to Shakespeare by

John Bartlett (London, 1896). Although there are a striking number of words that occur more often in Hamlet

than in any other play, it is well to keep in

mind that this is Shakespeare's longest play. T h e section on Hamlet

in Marvin Spevack's new, computer-made

concordance (A Complete and Systematic

Concordance

to the Works of Shakespeare, Volume III [Hildesheim, Germany, 1968]) appeared too late for me to use in this study. It is apparent from Spevack's data that Bartlett's entries are extremely incomplete. Dates of Elizabethan plays are given from Alfred Harbage, Annals of — xi —

KEY

TO

REFERENCES

English Drama 975-ijoo (rev. S. Schoenbaum; London, 1964). Standard dictionaries such as the Oxford English Dictionary (abbreviated OED), C. T . Onions' A Shakespeare Glossary, and Alexander Schmidt's ShakespeareLexicon (3 edn., rev. Gregor Sarrazin) have been used freely, without quotation marks or footnote references. T h e following frequently cited works are indicated in abbreviated form: 1. Kittredge: for The Tragedy of Hamlet, ed. George Lyman Kittredge (Boston, 1939). 2. Parrott and Craig: for The Tragedy of Hamlet: A Critical Edition of the Second Quarto, ed. Thomas Marc Parrott and Hardin Craig (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1938). 3. Tilley: for Morris Palmer Tilley, A Dictionary of the Proverbs in England in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1950). 4. Travers: for Shakespeare: Hamlet, ed. R. Travers (Paris, [1934]). In the Hachette series of Classiques Anglais. 5. Variorum: for A New Variorum Edition of Shakespeare: Hamlet, ed. Horace Howard Furness (2 vols.; New York: Dover reprint, 1963). First published, 1877. 6. Wilson: for Hamlet, ed. John Dover Wilson (Cambridge, Eng.: Cambridge University Press, 1957) . New Cambridge edition. First published, 1934; 2nd edn., i936-

— xii —

KEY

TO

REFERENCES

Frequently cited periodicals are abbreviated as follows: 1. PMLA:

for Publications

of the Modern

Association of America. 2. RES: for Review of English 3. SQ: for Shakespeare

Studies.

Quarterly.

4. SS: for Shakespeare Survey.

— xiii —

Language

Introduction HAMLET has become a cultural manifestation, a showcase for the historically conditioned madness of critics. When Coleridge says, "I have a smack of Hamlet myself, if I may say so," 1 and Hazlitt tells us, "It is we who are Hamlet," 2 and Freiligrath exclaims, "Deutschland ist Hamlet!", 3 we know that we have crossed from the secure domain of art into the perilous precincts of life. T h e word "Hamlet" is defined in most reference books in a way that reflects the cultural tradition of Hamletism. From Webster's New International Dictionary (second edition) we learn that " T h e ghost of the murdered king lays upon Hamlet the duty of avenging him, but Hamlet's habit of mind leads only to repeated postponing of action." Funk and Wagnall's Standard College Dictionary (1963) informs us that Hamlet is "a Danish prince whose indecision conflicts with his efforts to avenge the murder of his father." A n d The Oxford Companion to English Literature (fourth edition) offers the most explicit statement of this point of view: "Hamlet vows obedience [to the Ghost]; but his melancholy, introspective, and scrupulous nature makes him irresolute and dilatory in action." This is not the Hamlet of Shakespeare's play, but 1

Coleridge's

Writings

on

Shakespeare,

(New York, 1959), p. 140. From Table 2

William Hazlitt, Characters

Liber 3

Amoris

and

Dramatic

ed. Terence

Talk,

of Shakespeafs

Criticisms

Hawkes

June 24, 1827. Plays

(1817), in

(London, 1948), p. 247.

Quoted in T.J.B. Spencer, " T h e Decline of Hamlet," in

let, Stratford upon Avon Studies 5 (London, 1963), p. 194.

— xv —

Ham-

INTRODUCTION

the more empathic and transcendental hero produced by Romanticism. Conceived on the tragic model of the poet, he is a brooding procrastinator and ineffectual intellectual, whose reflective nature hamstrings his ability to act, and who is constantly affirming how impossible it is for a sensitive and creative spirit to live in this world. According to this version, hesitation about murdering your uncle is the product of a deliciously morbid introspection, so that Laertes is an altogether healthier and more natural young man than Hamlet. I believe, of course, that the Romantic Hamlet is a mythical figure, but myths are different from literary criticism, and cultural manifestations do not depend upon an accurate reading of literary texts. Style in "Hamlet" is not intended to explode our traditional notions, but only to take another close look at the play. I try to track puns to their most secret hiding places, to revive significances in the language and in the staging that may have long since faded, and to indicate relationships and inner coherences that may not be immediately apparent to reader or spectator. My commitment is strongly historical throughout—it is, in other words, to a Hamlet "possible" at the turn of the seventeenth century in England—but I do not tremble at the notion of an anachronistic palimpsest consciously laid on by a modern critic. As much as we may try to work within the meaningful limits of historical truth, there is no way of "fixing" Hamlet at one moment of time. Style has generally been neglected by critics of Shakespeare, as if it could only be studied impressionistically — xvi —

INTRODUCTION

as a branch of belletristics, or objectively as an aspect of linguistic description. I steer a middle course between the schools of admiration and of computation, although I am certainly closer to the former. Brevity may be the soul of wit, but I have knowingly developed Style in "Hamlet" as fully as possible in order to present a sample analysis of a Shakespearean play. My secret wish is that this book, through its persistence and comprehensiveness, may suggest an approach suitable to other plays of Shakespeare. I choose to interpret style in its widest sense, which includes all the means of expression used by an author to accomplish his purposes; in this broad meaning it would designate the imaginative embodiment of a theme in an individual and distinctive manner. A n author's style is his authentic, personal mark, but one that can develop and change in significant ways over the course of his work. In Shakespeare's career, for example, his style is never self-consistent or homogeneous for very long. Even at the height of his powers, he seems to have had the uncontrollable urge to experiment, perhaps only to emulate his colleagues, as in the social realism of The Merry Wives of Windsor—a style in which Jonson and Dekker were then scoring their most notable successes. W e need to take some account of the fact that Shakespeare does not always choose to do things that he is good at, nor does he seem to have the impulse to produce a large number of similar and safe masterpieces. In Julius Caesar, for example, he seems to be trying out a special "Roman" style, limited in diction, imagery, — xvii —

INTRODUCTION

and imaginative devices, almost at the very moment that he is composing Hamlet, which is certainly his most unlimited, most unconventional, and most stylistically inventive play. As Alfred Hart informs us, Hamlet has more than 600 fresh or previously unused words, nearly 400 of which do not recur in any later play. About 170 of these fresh words appear for the first time in English literature, and the 3,882 words of Hamlet constitute the "largest and most expressive vocabulary" in Shakespeare.4 T h e sense of infinite variety in Shakespeare's style should suggest that he was much more deliberate about the effects he was trying to achieve than we now generally believe. I would not want to broach the question of whether Shakespeare knowingly created patterns of imagery or developed elaborate contrasts and analogies between characters. Luckily, we don't need to establish Shakespeare's purposiveness before we can speak about his style. It would be more profitable to look at the limiting preconditions within which he worked. In considering Hamlet, for example, we must begin with the fact that it is an Elizabethan tragedy, written primarily in blank verse. It is also a revenge play, which has a strong but puzzling relation to the conventions and traditions of other revenge plays. Style in "Hamlet" is divided into three parts. Imagery is the topic of the long first section, which attempts to fill a need recently noted by Kenneth Muir: "It is curious that no one has made a detailed investigation of the * Alfred Hart, "Vocabularies of Shakespeare's Plays," RES, (1943)>

!35-

— xviii —

XIX

INTRODUCTION

imagery of Hamlet and Macbeth."* I owe an obvious debt to Heilman's admirable books on King Lear and Othello.6 My earlier book, Shakespeare's Roman Plays (Harvard University Press, 1961) , emphasized the function of imagery in the drama, but Style in "Hamlet" is freer from methodological commitment. I now believe that the study of imagery cannot be separated from a larger concern with style. T h e first part of the present book explores the symbolism of war, weapons, and explosives, as well as of secrecy and poison, in both their verbal and nonverbal development. Weapons, for example, are the subject of metaphors and nonfigurative references, but they are also stage properties that enter directly into the action. Secrecy may be studied in this same double way, since the eavesdropping scenes on stage support the verbal theme. T h e longest chapter, on the imagery of corruption, grows out of the familiar order-disorder symbolism of animals, disease, food, and gardens, and tries to suggest some new possibilities. T h e chapter on limits, dealing with the imagery of confinement, money, and numbers, is itself designed to test the limits of criticism in explicating a play. Part One ends with a speculative chapter on art, acting, and the theater, in which I consider Shakespeare's terms of art and professional allusions. 6

Kenneth Muir, "Imagery and Symbolism in Hamlet,"

Anglaises, 6

XVII

Robert

Structure

Bechtold

in King

Heilman,

Lear

This

Great

Stage:

Image

and

(Baton Rouge: Louisiana State Univer-

sity Press, 1948), and Magic in Othello

Etudes

(1964), 352.

in the

Web:

Action

and

Language

(Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1956).

— xix —

INTRODUCTION

T h e middle section of the book, on staging and structure, continues the discussion of imagery in nonverbal, presentational terms. Our elusive "Hamlet without words" is made up of gesture and stage action, sound effects and music, costumes, stage properties, and the sequences of contrasted scenes. A l l these topics represent style in its theatrical aspect. T h e sounds of Hamlet, for example, may be as significant a part of the play as the words—they are not in any sense a mere adjunct of the production. T o understand Claudius, one must take account of his noisy and flamboyant rouses, when he drinks healths to the accompaniment of drums, trumpets, and the firing of cannon outside the theater. These sound effects work together with verbal themes to establish Claudius as a dominating presence in the play. Dramatic character is the subject of the final section, and in it I try to resuscitate the valetudinarian topic of character analysis by separating character from psychological motivation. Once the dramatis personae are no longer burdened by the need to be real people, we can look at their typical modes of expression as devices of characterization. W e can thus approach the roles in Hamlet from the standpoint of the actor in order to see in what ways they have been individualized. Brief chapters on the styles of Claudius and Polonius lead up to a long chapter on Hamlet, who is presented in terms of his self-conscious, witty, passionate, and simple styles. As a character, he represents Shakespeare's most sustained stylistic experiment. T h e drama as a form raises difficult questions about style, since many of its effects are a matter of presenta— xx —

INTRODUCTION

tion rather than language, and the momentary realization of these effects on stage has an elusive, unverifiable quality very different from that of words on the printed page. Readers and critics alike generally solve this problem by agreeing among themselves to ignore Shakespeare the dramatist in favor of Shakespeare the poet. W e applaud, tacitly at least, the judgment of Lamb, with its emphasis on soliloquy: Why, nine parts in ten of what Hamlet does, are transactions between himself and his moral sense, they are the effusions of his solitary musings, which he retires to holes and corners and the most sequestered parts of the palace to pour forth; or rather, they are the silent meditations with which his bosom is bursting, reduced to words for the sake of the reader, who must else remain ignorant of what is passing there. These profound sorrows, these light-and-noise-abhorring ruminations, which the tongue scarce dares utter to deaf walls and chambers, how can they be represented by a gesticulating actor, who comes and mouths them out before an audience, making four hundred people his confidants at once?7 Hazlitt, therefore, is only echoing received opinion when he says: " W e do not like to see our author's plays acted, and least of all, Hamlet. There is no play that suffers so much in being transferred to the stage."8 7

Charles Lamb, " O n the Tragedies of Shakspeare, considered

with reference to their fitness for Stage Representation" in Shakespeare

Criticism:

A Selection,

don: Oxford University Press, 1916), p. 195. 8

Hazlitt, Characters

of Shakespear's

— xxi —

(1811),

ed. D. Nichol Smith (LonPlays,

p. 254.

INTRODUCTION

This point of view may perhaps be justified by Shakespearean productions of the early nineteenth century, but the divorce between the theater and dramatic literature is also responsible for the worst vagaries of Romantic criticism. W e would not today have the audacity to put these arguments in the same form as Lamb and Hazlitt, but our assumptions about Shakespeare and the theater are similar to theirs. This is unfortunate, especially for our understanding of style, since by separating Shakespeare's plays from their natural and life-giving context in the theater, we rob them of their most characteristic excellences.

X X t> %

P A R T ONE IMAGERY

Y T H I S time, we should have recovered from the sanguine hopes of early students of Shakespeare's imagery to pluck out the heart of his mystery and show "the very age and body of the time his form and pressure" (3.2.24-25). T h e tables and bar graphs (in color) of Caroline Spurgeon's Shakespeare's Imagery and What It Tells Us cannot conceal the fact that everything depends not on the counting of images, but on Miss Spurgeon's intuition. I believe that the statistics in this book are completely erroneous, partly because they are based on a limited notion of what an image is and partly because of overlapping and vaguely defined subject-matter categories. Yet the book retains its enormous value for students of Shakespeare because Miss Spurgeon is such an astute critic. T h e images do not provide the inductive data from which conclusions may be drawn, as she would like us to believe, but rather serve to support and to illustrate her understanding of the plays. In her discussion of Hamlet, Miss Spurgeon's concern with the imagery of disease and corruption reflects a standard nineteenth-century interpretation, and her preoccupation with Hamlet himself, almost to the exclusion of all other characters, is a part of this approach. It is not from any objective count of the images that Miss Spurgeon reaches the following conclusion:

B

T o Shakespeare's pictorial imagination, therefore, the problem in Hamlet is not predominantly that of will and reason, of a mind too philosophic or a nature

PART

ONE

temperamentally unfitted to act quickly; he sees it pictorially not as the problem of an individual at all, but as something greater and even more mysterious, as a condition for which the individual himself is apparently not responsible, any more than the sick man is to blame for the infection which strikes and devours him, but which, nevertheless, in its course and development, impartially and relentlessly, annihilates him and others, innocent and guilty alike. That is the tragedy of Hamlet, as it is perhaps the chief tragic mystery of life. 1 I do not wish to dispute the truth of this statement, since I believe that the imagery of disease helps to set the tone of Hamlet,

but I would take issue with the

sense of morbid passivity that this paragraph conveys. It seems to have more relevance to the tragic universe of Thomas Hardy than to that of Shakespeare. Even such a careful study as W . H. Clemen's The

Develop-

ment of Shakespeare's Imagery shares Miss Spurgeon's narrow emphasis on disease. It is only recently that Kenneth Muir has ventured to challenge the dominance of disease imagery in Hamlet.2 By studying the images in context, he has shown that they have a meaning different from that supposed 1

Caroline F. E. Spurgeon, Shakespeare's

Tells

Us

Imagery

and

What

It

(Boston, 1958), pp. 318-19. First published by Cam-

bridge University Press, 1935. 2

Muir, "Imagery and Symbolism in Hamlet,"

pp. 352-63. See

also Muir's brief volume in the Studies in English series

(No. 13): Shakespeare:

Hamlet

— 4 —

Literature

(London, 1963), esp. pp.

IMAGERY

by Spurgeon and Clemen: "It is apparent from this analysis of the sickness imagery in the play that it throws light on Elsinore rather than on Hamlet himself. He is not the diseased figure depicted by a long line of critics — o r , at least, the imagery cannot justifiably be used in support of such an interpretation." 3 T h e theory of a sick Hamlet in a sick world is not an objective, scientific truth arrived at by assembling all the relevant data, but a familiar notion that suggests itself quite independently of any concern for images. I cannot claim that my interpretation of Hamlet is the inevitable product of an inductive study of its imagery. In the discussion that follows I stress certain symbolic themes rather than others partly because of the iterative patterns I find in the play, but also partly because of what I am looking for. Different critics, starting with different preconceptions and different values, are likely to arrive at very different results even in so factual a topic as the subject matter of the images. In short, one cannot separate the image from what it images, the vehicle from the tenor. T o claim otherwise would be to give the image a spuriously autonomous status. 3

Muir, "Imagery and Symbolism in Hamlet,"

— 5 —

p. 356.

1. War, Weapons, and Explosives IF W E believe that Hamlet is a vigorous and active play, an exciting and at times vicious struggle for survival between Hamlet and Claudius and their allies, then we must logically begin our discussion not with disease, but with war, weapons, and explosives. This imagery enters Miss Spurgeon's book only in the appendix, 1 and in Clemen there is no more than a passing mention of "the soldier's trade and strategy." 2 By Kenneth Muir's reckoning, however, the largest group of images in Hamlet is derived from war: " T h e images of war and violence should have the effect of counteracting some interpretations of the play, in which the psychology of the hero is regarded as the centre of interest." 3 I strongly agree with Muir, and I shall try in this chapter to show how the military imagery establishes a point of view. T h e most important subject matter is weapons and explosives, with emphasis on their ability to destroy. This imagery forces us to see the action of the play as a relation between antagonist and protagonist, "the pass and fell incensed points/ Of mighty opposites" (5.2.6162), and not as a dramatized projection of a single character. W e are not allowed to forget "that Claudius and 1

Spurgeon, Shakespeare's

2

W. H. Clemen, The

Imagery,

p. 369.

Development

of Shakespeare's

Imagery

(London, 1951), p. 108. First published in German in a longer version 3

R.

(Bonn, 1936).

Muir, "Imagery and Symbolism in Hamlet," A.

Foakes's

Elsinore," SS, I X

admirable

essay,

"Hamlet

and

p. 363. See also the

Court

of

(1956), 35-43, which calls our attention to the

"frequent imagery of war"

(p. 36).

— 6 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

Hamlet are engaged in a duel to the death, a duel which does ultimately lead to both their deaths." 4 Let us begin with Hamlet's sword, and it is worth dwelling on this humble property if only to dispel those perfumed clouds that still hang about the "sweet Prince" (5.2.360). W e should remember the Hamlet so vividly evoked for us by Ophelia, the "courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword" (3.1.154), and we ought not to be surprised that he acquits himself so well with his weapon. In his first encounter with the Ghost, he breaks away from the grip of Horatio and Marcellus and threatens to draw his sword to support his menacing pun: "Unhand me, gentlemen./ By heaven, I'll make a ghost of him that lets me!" (1.4.84-85) . In Elizabethan English there is a quibble on the contradictory meanings of "lets": hinders and allows. Hamlet is saying that he will run through whoever tries to obstruct him, if indeed that person is so foolhardy as to permit himself to be made a ghost. T h e punning suggests the bravado so strong in Hamlet's murder of Polonius. A t the end of the scene with the Ghost, Hamlet insists that his companions swear a formal oath of secrecy on his sword, whose hilt forms a cross, and the Ghost seconds him from "under the stage": "Swear by his sword" (1.5.148 s.d., 161). In Hamlet's " T o be, or not to be" soliloquy, he debates the alternatives of suffering "outrageous fortune," or taking "arms against a sea of troubles" (3.1.58-59). T h i s image has caused undue grief to pictorially minded persons, who want the "sea of troubles" to be an actual 4

Muir, "Imagery and Symbolism in Hamlet," —

7

—

p. 361.

IMAGERY

sea and Hamlet a Celtic warrior combating the foamy flood with sword in hand. The unheroic alternative to taking arms is the "bare bodkin" (76), a diminutive weapon, a pocket dagger, a stiletto, or perhaps only a long hairpin or an instrument for piercing holes in cloth. It is a "bare bodkin," a mere bodkin, in the sense that even with a bodkin one "might his quietus make" (75) -one doesn't need a sword. In Richard II, Death "with a little pin/ Bores through his castle wall, and farewell, king!" (3.2.169-70). "Bodkin" is also the familiar diminutive of the oath "God's bodkin" (2.2.540) or "bodikin," meaning the dear little body of God. Hamlet's use of sword imagery follows the dramatic action to a climax after The Mousetrap, when he is intent upon his revenge. In a strongly homicidal mood, which begins with the soliloquy at the end of Act III, Scene ii and continues through the soliloquy in Act IV, Scene iv and his departure for England, Hamlet attempts to play the swaggering role of stage revenger. More than a verbal link connects "Now could I drink hot blood" (3.2.398) and "0, from this time forth,/ My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worthl" (4-4-6566) . At the end of Act III, Scene ii Hamlet is wrestling with the active possibility that he may, like Nero, be tempted to kill his mother. He needs to curb his own murderous impulses by an act of will: "Let me be cruel, not unnatural; / I will speak daggers to her, but use none" (403-4); and Gertrude then confirms her symbolic stabbing in almost the same image: "These words like daggers enter in my ears" (3.4.96). Hamlet's soliloquy at the end of Act III, Scene ii is -8-

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

continued in the soliloquy of the next scene, less than seventy-five lines away, in which he debates with himself whether to stab Claudius in the back while he is praying. Hamlet draws his sword quickly and unthinkingly, and, as he considers the possibilities of a satisfying revenge, he keeps the sword poised in his hand to emphasize his murderous intent. When he sheathes it at line 88—"Up, sword"—it is not from any tenderness of conscience, but only to wait for "a more horrid hent," or a more damnation-provoking occasion to seize it again. According to the accepted canons of the stage revenger, it is not enough just to kill a man: "Why, this is hire and salary, not revenge" (3.3.79). One must do it quaintly, ingeniously, artistically, and if possible damn both body and soul at one stroke, as Laertes hopes to do with Hamlet: " T h e devil take thy soul!" (5.1.260). Hamlet imagines scenes that are histrionically and aesthetically fitting for his "more horrid hent": W h e n he is drunk asleep, or in his rage, Or in th' incestuous pleasure of his bed, A t game a-swearing, or about some act T h a t has no relish of salvation i n ' t — T h e n trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven, A n d that his soul may be as damned and black As hell, whereto it goes. (3.3.89-95) In tripping up his enemy from behind at just the moment that will send him headfirst hellwards, Hamlet puts himself in the company of Gamaliel Ratsey, Black Will and Shakebag of Arden of Fever sham (1591), and the redoubtable Cutwolfe of The Unfortunate —

9 —

Traveller

IMAGERY

(1594). Samuel Johnson was surely right in principle when he thought that " T h i s speech, in which Hamlet, represented as a virtuous character, is not content with taking blood for blood, but contrives damnation for the man that he would punish, is too horrible to be read or to be uttered." 5 T h e upshot of Hamlet's mood comes in the next scene, with the murder of Polonius. By invincible logic, after Gertrude and Claudius have been ruled out, Polonius becomes the obvious victim. This killing appeases for the moment Hamlet's desire to . . . drink hot blood And do such business as the bitter day6 Would quake to look on. (3.2.398-400) 5

"Notes to Hamlet"

in Johnson's

Notes

to Shakespeare,

ed. Ar-

thur Sherbo, Augustan Reprint Society, Publication 73 (Los Angeles:

1958), p.

"Hamlet"

170. See also A . Clutton-Brock,

Shakespeare's

(London, 192a), pp. 69-70, and Eleanor Prosser,

let and Revenge

Ham-

(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967), pp.

183-91 and Appendix B. 6

T h i s is the reading of Quarto 2; Folio reads: "And do such

bitter business as the day," which almost Steevens prefer

(see Variorum,

all

editors

except

I, 273). It is curious that even

such strong partisans of Quarto 2 as Parrott and Craig, Wilson, and Hubler reject " A n d do such business as the bitter day" without any comment, or with only the most perfunctory explanation, such as Parrott and Craig's claim that it is "a common printer's error of transposition" (p. 164). If the "bitter day" is Doomsday, then the phrase is particularly

appropriate for Hamlet's dire

imprecations in this soliloquy. A t the "very witching time of night," "churchyards yawn" (3.2.396-97), and graves yield up the spirits of their dead, as they will do on the Day of Judgment. Hamlet means that he could now do such bloody "business" as even Doomsday would quake with fear to look upon.

— 10 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

T h e fact that it is not the king is only one of those unpredictable ironies that fall between the intent and the deed. Hamlet acts with all the swagger of the professional swordsman. On the first sound behind the arras, he "Whips out his rapier" (as we are told at 4.1.10) and strikes without any reflection, hesitation, or fear. He celebrates the death of his unseen opponent with a gambling image: "How now? A rat? Dead for a ducat, dead!" (3.4.25). W e might almost be listening here to " T h e fiery Tybalt, with his sword prepar'd" (Romeo and Juliet 1.1.107). It is not until the final scene of the play that Hamlet is fully convinced of the justice of his revenge. After a summary indictment of Claudius, he asks Horatio: "is't not perfect conscience/ T o quit him with this arm?" (5.2.67-68). Hamlet's "arm" with which he will give Claudius his "quietus" (3.1.75) is both his limb and his sword, and the wordplay recalls the Clown's not-so-innocent pun in the graveyard: " 'A was the first that ever bore arms" (5.1.34)—a reference more appropriate to Cain than to Adam. In this same prefiguring passage in Act V, Scene ii, Hamlet's curious assertion that "a man's life's no more than to say 'one' " (74) may refer to "the single thrust of a rapier," 7 since he indicates his first hit in the fencing match with the exclamation " O n e " (281). This is the single stroke of justice with sword in hand. Just before the encounter with Laertes, a sword image draws our attention to an obvious point: that Claudius, and not Laertes, is Hamlet's real antagonist. In Hamlet's 7

Wilson, p. 243.

— 11 —

IMAGERY

icy comment on the fate of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, he imagines himself engaged in deadly rapier play with Claudius: 'Tis dangerous when the baser nature comes Between the pass and fell incensed points (5.2.60-62) Of mighty opposites. "Pass" is a technical term from dueling, as in the "dozen passes" (166-67) the king's wager and in the lethal "pass of practice" by which Laertes is to "requite" Hamlet (4.7.138-39). Despite all provocations, Hamlet is never capable of regarding Laertes as his enemy, even in the outrageous scene in Ophelia's grave. There is genuine bewilderment in his question: "What is the reason that you use me thus?/ I loved you ever" (5.1.29192). This is a good example of the way in which the dramatic action can move in an opposite direction from the facts of the plot. Laertes' sword enters directly into the action during the fencing match, and his poor showing there has led some tenderhearted persons to believe him hampered because he is fighting "almost against my conscience" (5.2.297). But this supposed sensibility of Laertes runs counter to his ranting and diabolic tone as stage revenger. T o show himself his father's son in deed "More than in words," he is ready " T o cut" Hamlet's "throat i' th' church" (4.7.126), which completes his declaration from the rebellion scene: "I dare damnation" (4.5.133). A n d Laertes is the one who, not to be outdone by Claudius, suggests anointing his unbated sword with "an unction of a mountebank,/ So mortal that, but dip a — 12 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

knife in it," nothing "can save the thing from death/ T h a t is but scratched withal" (4.7.141-42, 145-46). Polonius would have been proud of his son's ingenuity, since it was he who had advised him to Beware Of entrance to a quarrel; but being in, Bear't that th' opposed may beware of thee. (1.3.65-67) There is something direly prophetic in this, and Laertes' intense preoccupation with keeping his "name ungored" (5.2.251) seems also to stem from his father's precepts. One explanation for Laertes' weak fencing in Act V, Scene ii, then, is that the king has cozened him with flattery of his skill. " T h o u know'st we work by wit, and not by witchcraft," says Iago (Othello 2.3.360), echoing the "witchcraft" of Claudius' "wits" (1.5.43). T h e armed figure of Pyrrhus in the Player's speech8 offers a striking analogy to Hamlet and Laertes and the sword imagery associated with them. Here, early in the play, in the passionate rhetoric of Aeneas' tale to Dido, is set forth the type figure of the revenger, emotionless and inhuman, intent only on slaughter. It is a nonpsychological, flat portrait, but it is meant to provide an extreme by which to measure both Hamlet and Laertes, who at times come dangerously close to Pyrrhus. In Hamlet's opening lines, the "sable arms" of the "rugged Pyrrhus" (2.2.463) suggest the same wordplay 8

See the elaborate explication of this speech in Harry

vin, The

Question

of Hamlet

Le-

(New York, 1961). First published

by Oxford University Press, 1959.

— 13 —

IMAGERY

that we have noticed in 5.2.68: arms are both limbs and weapons, although here the former sense predominates. Pyrrhus is heraldically decked out in the "total gules" (2.2.468) of slaughter. His "fell sword" (484) is matched with the "antique sword" of old Priam, which, "Rebellious to his arm, lies where it falls,/ Repugnant to command" (480-82). "Antique" and "antic," two spellings of the same word, play on the related meanings of ancient and grotesque: this is Priam's "antic disposition" (1.5.172). Pyrrhus presses on like an irresistible, inhuman force, so that with the mere "whiff and wind of his fell sword/ T h ' unnerved father falls" (2.2.484-85). There is a momentary histrionic pause when Pyrrhus' sword, "Which was declining on the milky head/ Of reverend Priam, seemed i' th' air to stick" (489-90). T h e image anticipates the prayer scene, where Hamlet stands over the kneeling Claudius with his sword drawn, "And like a neutral to his will and matter/ Did nothing" (492-93). Pyrrhus' "roused vengeance" (499) as a swordsman is heightened by mythological allusions: A n d never did the Cyclops' hammers fall On Mars's armor, forged for proof eterne, With less remorse than Pyrrhus' bleeding sword Now falls on Priam. (2.2.500-3) T h e rhetoric of this passage is Marlovian, especially the Latinism "bleeding sword" for "bloody sword," and the feeling of invidious comparison about the whole figure ("with less remorse than"). There is a final reflection of Pyrrhus at work as seen through the eyes of the "mobled — 14 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

queen" (513) : "When she saw Pyrrhus make malicious sport/ In mincing with his sword her husband's limbs" (524-25). T h e cruelty of this "malicious sport" is much tempered by the formality of the style, although not, of course, for the First Player, whose strong emotions are intensified by the figures of speech. T h e violence of swordplay in Hamlet is extended in a group of images derived from the sharpening of weapons, especially sword, knife, or ax. In his instructions to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, Claudius advises them to give Hamlet "a further edge" (3.1.26), as if he were the blade of a knife. During The Mousetrap,

Hamlet

uses the image of the knife-edge or sword-edge in a specifically phallic way; to Ophelia's "You are keen, my lord, you are keen," he replies provocatively: "It would cost you a groaning to take off mine edge" (3.2.254-56). T h e transferred sense of sword is also present in the Ghost's admonition: " T h i s visitation/ Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose"

(3.4.111-12).

Purpose

should be a keen sword whetted by the will; the Ghost will not let Hamlet forget that, Shylock-like, he must sharpen his blade. T h e most amusing image of this sort occurs in Hamlet's report to Horatio of the fate prepared for him in England: T h a t on the supervise, no leisure bated, No, not to stay the grinding of the ax, My head should be struck off.

(5.2.23-25)

Hamlet's revulsion at being killed with a dull ax is an aesthetic detail comparable in quality to his feeling for — 15 —

IMAGERY

the lawyer in the graveyard now being knocked "about the sconce with a dirty shovel" (5.1.103). T h e battle between the "mighty opposites" (5.2.62), Hamlet and Claudius, generates one of the primary images of Hamlet, whose reverberations are felt in most of the other characters, even " T h e fair Ophelia" (3.1. 89). Her chastity is represented in the Petrarchan conceit of a fortified castle assaulted by amorous knights. T h i s sort of talk endows Act I, Scene iii with a good deal of military imagery. If "Virtue itself scapes not calumnious strokes" (38), what then is poor Ophelia to do? Both Laertes and Polonius think of Hamlet as an invincible ravisher, and Laertes imagines his sister yielding up her virginity in an alarmingly specific image: "or your chaste treasure open/ T o his unmastered importunity" (31-32), which suggests the opening of the gates in a besieged town that has just capitulated. Laertes tries to terrify his sister into retreating from the line of battle: Fear it, Ophelia, fear it, my dear sister, And keep you in the rear of your affection, Out of the shot and danger of desire. (i-S-38-35)

Desire is the enemy, well armed and aggressive, as Hamlet tells his mother: "Proclaim no shame/ W h e n the compulsive ardor gives the charge" (3.4.86-87). In characteristic fashion, Laertes gives his sister the same sort of prudent and worldly advice that he is soon to receive from Polonius, but his speech is more longwinded and platitudinous than his father's: "Be wary — 16 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

then; best safety lies in fear; / Youth to itself rebels, though none else near" (1.3.43-44). In short, youth is a volatile substance that can explode even without contact. Hamlet is a conspicuously noisy and active play, with more cannonading than any other work of Shakespeare.9 T h e cannonading is particularly associated with the "rouses" (or carouses) of Claudius, his pledging of toasts and drinking of healths. T h e sound effects which accompany the "rouse" are carefully enumerated by the king just before the fencing match: Give me the cups, A n d let the kettle to the trumpet speak, T h e trumpet to the cannoneer without, 10 T h e cannons to the heavens, the heaven to earth, " N o w the King drinks to Hamlet." (5-2.275-79) T h e sequence begins with a roll on the kettledrums, which is followed by a trumpet fanfare, which is followed in turn by a firing of the theater cannon or "chambers." T h e extra rebounds from cannon to heaven 9

See

Sounds 10

Frances A n n

Shirley,

Shakespeare's

Use

of

Off-Stage

(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1963), p. 83.

T h e "cannoneer without" seems to indicate that he is not

only outside the castle of Elsinore, but also that he is firing his "chambers" from just outside the Globe theater. T o fire even a small cannon in the "huts" of the theater would seem to offer, at the least, a serious hazard to the plaster, if not to the building itself. See Shirley, Shakespeare's

Use of Off-Stage

Sounds,

pp. 30-

31. T h e Globe theater was burned down on June ag, 16x3, when its thatched roof was ignited by

"shooting off certain

bers in way of triumph" (E. K. Chambers, The

Elizabethan

[London: Oxford University Press, 1923], II, 4x9).

— 17 —

chamStage

IMAGERY

and from heaven to earth are meant to show the "hubris" of Claudius, who thinks of himself as Jupiter tonans: N o jocund health that Denmark drinks today, But the great cannon to the clouds shall tell, A n d the King's rouse the heaven shall bruit again, Respeaking earthly thunder. (1.2.125-28) W e remember the familiar association of thunder with the wrath of the gods. It is a significant dramatic irony that we hear the king's rouse offstage just before the Ghost appears in Act I, Scene iv. T h e Quarto 2 stage direction reads: "A flourish of trumpets and two pieces goes off" (1.4.6 s.d.), and there are also kettledrums in Hamlet's description: T h e King doth wake tonight and takes his rouse, Keeps wassail, and the swagg'ring upspring reels, A n d as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down T h e kettledrum and trumpet thus bray out T h e triumph of his pledge. (1.4.8-12) T h e drunken braying and brawling of Claudius and his court offstage prepare us for the confrontation with another king, "that was to this/ Hyperion to a satyr" (1.2.139-40). It is a bold study in contrasts, similar in effect to the offstage sounds of Caesar playing to the mob that punctuate Cassius' persuasion of Brutus in Act I, Scene ii of Julius Caesar. T h e firing of cannon is strongly emphasized in the final scene of Hamlet. After the first hit in the fencing — 18 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

match, the Quarto 2 stage direction calls for "Drum, trumpets, and shot. Flourish; a piece goes off" (5.2.282 s.d.). This is part of the formal asseveration, almost like applause, that the king has arranged to mask the realities of the scene: If Hamlet give the first or second hit, Or quit in answer of the third exchange, Let all the battlements their ordnance fire. (5.2.269-71) It is a powerful and startling effect, a finely ironic celebration of one who is "Most generous, and free from all contriving" (4.7.135). After Hamlet has been mortally wounded by Laertes, the denouement is announced by the offstage sounds of Fortinbras and his army: "March afar off, and shot11 within" (5.2.350 s.d., Folio), at which Hamlet asks, "What warlike noise is this?" Osric, the factotum of the scene, announces: Young Fortinbras, with conquest come from Poland, T o th' ambassadors of England gives This warlike volley.

(5-2-351-53)

These martial sounds are almost the last thing that Hamlet hears, and they give him assurance of a new order of truth and justice in Denmark: "I do prophesy th' election lights/ On Fortinbras" (356-57). A t the end of the play, it is Fortinbras who prepares 11

T h e Folio reads "shout,"

which was emended to "shot"

by

Steevens. Most modern editors, on the basis of 5.2.350 and 353, follow Steevens.

— 19 —

IMAGERY

Hamlet's military funeral: "Let four captains/ Bear Hamlet like a soldier to the stage" (5.2.396-97). This answers Horatio's request, "give order that these bodies/ High on a stage be placed to the view" (378-79); a "stage" is a raised platform or dais like the one on which Caesar's body rests during the orations of Brutus and Antony. Hamlet will be accorded all military honors, "all quality,/ Pride, pomp, and circumstance, of glorious war!" (Othello 3.3.357-58). As Fortinbras says in his final eulogy: For he was likely, had he been put on, T o have proved most royal; and for his passage T h e soldiers' music and the rite of war Speak loudly for him. T a k e up the bodies. Such a sight as this Becomes the field, but here shows much amiss. (5.2.398-403) Fortinbras, in uniform, returning from the Polish wars, knows what "Becomes the field" and what "shows much amiss" in civil society. T o restore reason, morality, and order to Denmark, one must "Take up the bodies" and bury Hamlet "like a soldier" (397). " T h e soldiers' music" is presumably the dead march, beat on muffled drums, and "the rite of war" is the military pageantry prescribed for dead heroes, such as fulldress uniform, trailing pikes, and slow-step march. W e should also add to these indications the lowered "colors" —those flags and banners that would identify an army moving in procession. In the Folio direction, Fortinbras enters this scene "with Drum,, Colors, and Attendants" — 20 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

(5.2.362 s.d.). There are some useful specifications for staging a soldier's funeral in Aufidius' speech at the end of Coriolanus: T a k e him [Coriolanus] up. Help, three o' th' chiefest soldiers; I'll be one. Beat thou the drum, that it speak mournfully; Trail your steel pikes. (5.6.148-51) T h e last line of Hamlet suggests another possibility for "soldiers' music": "Go, bid the soldiers shoot," followed by the Folio direction "Exeunt marching; after the which a peal of ordnance are shot off." In Joseph Papp's open-air production of Hamlet during the summer of 1964, these sounds created an awesome effect, as the peals of ordnance echoed and reechoed in the Gothic wildness of Central Park. T h e play's aggressive content is embodied in other references to cannon, most notably in Hamlet's anguished cry after his encounter with the new king and queen: " O r that the Everlasting had not fixed/ His canon 'gainst self-slaughter" (1.2.131-32). T h e pun is underscored by the spelling "cannon" in Quarto 2 and Folio, but the word "fixed" also suggests stationary guns like those guarding the harbor of Elsinore. God's "canon" is pointed one way, and Claudius' "cannon," just six lines before, is pointed another, calling on the heavens to respeak his "earthly thunder" (128). Hamlet's soliloquy is almost a direct answer to the rodomontade of his uncle-father's rouse. After Polonius' death, Claudius fears that his reputation may be destroyed by secret artillery: — 21 —

IMAGERY

[So, haply, slander,]12 Whose whisper o'er the world's diameter, As level as the cannon to his blank Transports his poisoned shot, may miss our name A n d hit the woundless air. (4.1.40-44) If it hits its target or "blank," the "poisoned shot" will explode and reveal Claudius' guilt. T h e main emphasis of the imagery of ordnance and explosives is on a shattering destructiveness, as in that haunting passage about Claudius' "sorrows" (4.5.78) just before Laertes and his armed rabble are heard at the door: O my dear Gertrude, this, Like to a murd'ring piece, in many places Gives me superfluous death. (4.5.94-96) " T h i s " refers to the reports of Laertes' insurrection, but, more generally, it marks that tragic sense in Claudius that "all occasions do inform against" him (4.4.32). T h e "murd'ring piece" or "murderer" was a small cannon filled with shrapnel, which was designed to scatter its shot and inflict maximum casualties. "When sorrows come, they come not single spies,/ But in battalions" (4.5.78-79), and so death, too, comes superfluously with the "murd'ring piece"—it is the "plurisy" that "Dies in his own too-much" (4.7.117-18). Claudius' plot against Hamlet is similarly multiple. As he tells the rapt Laertes: 12

T h i s is Capell's conjecture to fill a lacuna in the text. —

22

—

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

Therefore this project [the unbated and poisoned rapier] Should have a back or second, that might hold If this did blast in proof. (4.7.152-54) T h e image is probably drawn "from the trying or proving of fire-arms or cannon," 13 and it is ironic that although Claudius works by poison, his most characteristic image should be the exploding missile. Hamlet taunts the king with an ordnance image when he rises to interrupt the play: "What, frighted with false fire?" (3.2. 272). Shakespeare uses the technical term "false fire" for the blank discharge of weapons, powder without shot, merely the murder of a Player King—"poison in jest" (3.2.240). Claudius presumably thinks that Hamlet's "false fire" will be followed by more dangerous explosives. As for the king's agents, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, Hamlet will fight them with all the cunning of booby-trap warfare: For 'tis the sport to have the enginer Hoist with his own petar, and 't shall go hard But I will delve one yard below their mines And blow them at the moon. (3.4.207-10) T h e ordnance words are used in both their technical and general senses. For example, an "enginer" is not just a demolition expert, but a contriver, a Machiavel; "hoist" suggests hanging as well as being blown into 13

Variorum,

I, 369.

— 23 —

IMAGERY

the air by an explosive; "mines" are sapping and undermining; and "petar" is "an engine, made like a bell or mortar, and filled with explosives, used especially for blowing up gates," 14 and derived from the French word peter, meaning to fart. In Hamlet's image, he pictures himself working, like the Ghost in the cellarage, " A worthy pioner" (1.5.163), to delve beneath the mines of his enemies and set off their explosives unawares. He, too, will be a crafty and unpredictable "old mole," who can "work i' th' earth so fast" (162). W e may match the imagery of offense (sword, cannon, and explosives) with the imagery of defense, especially armor. W e think first of the Ghost, who is "in arms" (1.2.255) > who, "in complete steel,/ Revisits thus the glimpses of the moon" (1.4.52-53). "Complete" suggests not only full armor, but also an ethical sense: perfect in nature or quality. " 'A was a man, take him for all in all" (1.2.187), says his son, and in the first act his "slow and stately" "solemn march" (201-2) and his "martial stalk" (1.1.66) about the stage show him as the exemplary soldier, sent untimely to an unquiet grave. Even Claudius speaks of him as "our most valiant brother" (1.2.25). T h e Ghost's costume is historically identified as "the very armor he had on/ W h e n he the ambitious Norway combated" (1.1.60-61). Horatio's report supplies Hamlet with the details so necessary in this sort of narration: the Ghost was "Arm£d at point exactly, cap-a-pe" (1.2. 200), which is explained some lines further as "From top to toe" and "from head to foot" (228). There is another definition of "cap-a-pe" in Rosencrantz and " T r a v e r s , p. 161.

— 24 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

Guildenstern's description of their relations with the goddess Fortuna; they are neither "the very button" " O n Fortune's cap," "Nor the soles of her shoe" (2.2. 232-33). T h e Ghost also carried a truncheon or marshal's baton (1.2.204), and "wore his beaver u p " (230); the "beaver" is the movable visor of the headpiece. Despite all of this descriptive detail, the Ghost's stage armor was probably made of a supple, silvered leather, the traditional "leather pilch" of the Induction to A Warning for Faire Women (1599): . . . a filthie whining ghost, Lapt in some fowle sheete, or a leather pilch, Comes skreaming like a pigge halfe stickt, And cries Vindicta, reuenge, reuenge. . . This may be a reference to the sensational Ur-Hamlet, on which Shakespeare's play is thought to be based. Although there was much literal realism of costume on the Elizabethan stage, the Ghost did not wear actual armor because the actor—and there is a tradition that Shakespeare himself played the Ghost 16 —needed to be nimble enough to ascend and descend the stage traps, and to be able, without superfluous clanking, to fade "on the crowing of the cock" (1.1.157). T h e martial figure of the Ghost dominates the first act 15

See William J. Lawrence, " 'Hamlet' as Shakespeare Staged

It," Pre-Restoration

Stage

Studies

(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard

University Press, 1927). pp. 108-9. ^ Warning quoted from J. S. Farmer, Old English Edition

Plays,

for Faire Student's

Women

is

Facsimile

(London, 1909-14), Vol. C L X I I I . T h e text reads "pelch"

for "pilch." 16

See E. K. Chambers, William

and Problems

Shakespeare:

A Study

of

Facts

(London: Oxford University Press, 1930), I, 84.

— 25 —

IMAGERY

of Hamlet. He appears in the midst of a national emergency in Denmark (indicated by soldiers on guard duty), a frantic armaments race, and a general atmosphere of anxiety and foreboding. T h e workers in the defense industries are now on a twenty-four hour shift, "the night joint-laborer with the day" (1.1.78), and the "sore task" of the impressed shipwrights "Does not divide the Sunday from the week" (75-76) . There is a suggestion of forced labor in the presence of the military guard, the "most observant watch," that "So nightly toils [i.e., makes to toil] the subject of the land" (7172). Into this military context of cold war and national hysteria enters the Ghost, as the recently dead war hero of the Danes who comes not to offer them reassurance, but to insist that " T h e time is out of joint" (1.5.188) and that "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark" (1.4.90). It is worth noting that in the closet scene the Ghost does not appear to Hamlet in armor (despite the notorious illustration in Rowe's 1709 edition of Shakespeare) , but "in his habit as he lived" (3.4.136). This change in costume marks an important distinction between the Ghost's public and private roles. Quarto 1 has the Ghost enter in its "nightgown," which makes good sense if one remembers that the Elizabethan nightgown was a warm, lined garment, sometimes trimmed with fur, that is the equivalent of our dressing gown (although it could be worn both indoors and out). Julius Caesar and Brutus both appear in nightgowns for drafty scenes in Julius Caesar (2.2 and 4.3). In Hamlet, Act III, Scene iv takes place in the queen's — 26 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

"closet," or private room, 17 where it would be inappropriate, as well as bad manners, for even her deceased husband to show himself in armor. In the closet scene, Hamlet uses an extended metaphor of armor for the heart still assailable by sense: Peace, sit you down And let me wring your heart, for so I shall If it be made of penetrable stuff, If damned custom have not brazed 18 it so T h a t it be proof and bulwark against sense. (34-35-39) 17

T h e Elizabethan word "closet" means simply a private room

or apartment, as distinguished from a public room. Thus the king's private secretary is called the "clerk of the closet" rum,

(Vario-

I, 125). "Closet" does not mean "bed chamber," and the

ponderous marriage bed that usually dominates Act III, Scene iv is entirely out of place. This lexicographical distinction is significant because it bears directly on the criticism of the closet scene. A. C. Bradley, for example, constructs his sentimental stage picture from the theatrical practice of his time; if Hamlet's "heart ever found relief, it was when those feelings [of horror and loathing for his uncle], mingled with the love that never died out in him, poured themselves forth in a flood as he stood in his mother's chamber beside his father's marriage-bed" (Shakespearean Tragedy

[2 edn.; Lon-

don, 1905], p. 119). Significantly, Bradley substitutes "chamber" for "closet," but no marriage bed is needed to reinforce Hamlet's blatantly sexual harangue. In the same tradition, J. Dover Wilson calls Act III, Scene iv the "bedroom scene" and locates it in the "Queen's bedchamber"

( W h a t Happens

in

Hamlet

[3 edn.;

Cambridge, Eng.: Cambridge University Press, 1959], pp. 246, 250—first published, 1935). 18

T h e word in Quarto 2 is "brasd," which some modern edi-

tors (Wilson, for example) give as "brassed." But "brasd" seems to be only a variant spelling of Folio's "braz'd," rather than a word with a separate meaning.

— 27 —

IMAGERY

"Damned custom," " T h a t monster custom, who all sense doth eat" (3.4.162), is trying to harden Gertrude's heart, to plate it with brass, so that it will be armed against the onslaughts of feeling and good sense. This is one of the most striking images in the play for the complacency (and complaisance, too) of " T h ' imperial jointress to this warlike state" (1.2.9), a n d its terms are drawn specifically from metalworking. "Proof" is the quality of armor that makes it capable of withstanding blows, as in "Mars's armor, forged for proof eterne" (2.2.501) of the Player's speech, so that, by metonymy, "proof" can refer to the proved, impenetrable armor itself. "Bulwark" is a bastion or fortification, and it completes an Old Testament emblem of sensibility warring against the hardened heart. Later in the scene, Gertrude represents her contrition in an equally emblematic figure: " O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain" (3.4.157). T h e "brazed" heart and the heart cleft in twain are pictorial opposites, and Hamlet continues in this illustrative mode with what is perhaps the most painfully didactic image in the play: "O, throw away the worser part of it,/ And live the purer with the other half" (158-59). T h e prominence of the Ghost in the first act is matched by the emergence of Fortinbras at the end of the play as new king of the Danes, so that both the beginning and the end of Hamlet have a strong military emphasis. Fortinbras, whose name derives from the knights of medieval romance, shows many traces of his origin, and his Polish expedition raises for Hamlet the question of honor so passionately debated in Troilus and Cressida. Hamlet is forced, like Hector, to admit — 28 —

WAR,

WEAPONS,

AND

EXPLOSIVES

the heroic and romantic truth of Troilus and Paris: "When honor's at the stake," one may find "great argument" even "in a straw" (4.4.54-56), "an eggshell" (53), "a fantasy and trick of fame" (61). It is a point of honor just because it is so unreasonable and so unrelated to worldly standards of profit and loss: "a little patch of ground/ T h a t hath in it no profit but the name" (18-19). "What's aught but as 'tis valued?" asks Troilus in a searing question (Troilus and Cressida 2.2.52). A n d "a delicate and tender prince," "with divine ambition puffed" (4.4.48-49), goes to fight in Poland as an exercise in spirit necessary to all future kings of Denmark. Fortinbras is indeed the "adventurous knight" of Hamlet's stage types, who knows how to "use his foil and target" (2.2.329-30), a chivalric warrior "Of unimproved mettle hot and full" (1.1.96). But he is disappointingly undeveloped in the play, and he seems to be created only for his one great moment at the end. Hamlet never aspires to the military virtue of the Ghost or of Fortinbras, and certainly not to the corrupted mixture of valor and bravado represented by Laertes. He also dissociates himself from the nonheroic, practical, and politic Claudius, who is rigorously excluded from any military attributes at all. Hamlet dies "like a soldier" (5.2.397) without having lived like one, but we are meant to believe Fortinbras when he tells us in the final speech of the play that Hamlet "was likely, had he been put on,/ T o have proved most royal" (39899). In Ophelia's earlier eulogy, he was the perfect combination of courtier, soldier, and scholar, " T h ' ex— 29 —

IMAGERY

pectancy and rose of the fair state" (3.1.155). W e should not gloss over these flattering assertions, which indicate a very different Hamlet from the brooding intellectual of Romantic criticism. T h e important imagery of war, weapons, and explosives calls attention to the issues of public life, to the state of the nation, to politics, morality, and kingship, and forces us to abandon our unhealthy preoccupation with the psychology of the hero. This imagery also reminds us that Hamlet can be assimilated to the dramatic structure of the English history plays, which it follows by only a few years. T h e feeling of tragedy is heightened by the historical background of Denmark and the court of Elsinore, which makes the "truths" that "are told" in "the swelling act" (Macbeth 1.3.127-28) so much more immediate and persuasive.

—

30—

2. Secrecy and Poison IN T H E recent prolific growth of studies of imagery, there has been an unfortunate turn to subtlety of interpretation. T h e image patterns have been heard singing their siren "undersongs" in despite of the main composition. I believe this emphasis is unfortunate, especially in the drama, because the leading imagery of a play has to be very obvious in order to accomplish its effects. If repetition is crucial to the idea of a symbolic theme, its workings must necessarily be cumulative and reinforcing rather than self-contained and self-expressive. I am, of course, simplifying the issues, but it would seem to me axiomatic that the imagery of a play must follow the movement of the dramatic action. W e can see in Hamlet certain primary images or symbols that exert an influence, radiate, reverberate, or echo throughout the play to form a pattern of references to a significant subject matter. T h e image of Claudius and Hamlet pitted against each other as "mighty opposites" lies at the heart of the previous chapter on war, weapons, and explosives. T h e theme of secrecy and poison, which is the subject of the present chapter, develops from Claudius' secret poisoning of Hamlet's father before the play opens. This is the hidden evil that must be brought to light, and Hamlet has much in common with the melodramatic structure of Sophocles' Oedipus,1 1

See H.D.F. Kitto, Form

and

Meaning

which also depends in Drama

(London,

i960). First published, 1956. See also Francis Fergusson, The

— 31 —

Idea

IMAGERY

upon the gradual revelation of a guilty secret and its tragic consequences for the kingdom of Thebes. T h e dramatic action in both plays moves away from secrecy and toward a purgation of those poisons that are destroying the body politic. This does not mean that Creon and Fortinbras are better kings than Oedipus was and Hamlet might have been, but they do represent the possibility of a new beginning. Secrecy indicates premeditation, deliberateness, artifice, and hypocrisy—all qualities that intensify our sense of the magnitude of evil in tragedy. " T h a t one may smile, and smile, and be a villain" (1.5.108), says Hamlet, and he inscribes it in his tables as the ultimate truth of the Ghost's narration. This is an apt example of how Hamlet is beginning to lose his innocence, as he stands poised on the threshold of new and forbidding insights. Contrary to Eliot's notorious judgment that the emotion of Hamlet is "in excess of the facts as they appear," 2 the crime on which the play is based has "the primal eldest curse upon't,/ A brother's murder" (3.3.37-38). of a Theater

(Garden City, N.Y., 1953), esp. pp. 130-32. First

published by Princeton University Press, 1949. 2

T.

S. Eliot, "Hamlet and His Problems"

Essays 1917-1932 with Hamlet

(1919),

Selected

(New York, 1932), p. 125. Eliot's dissatisfaction

may be paralleled in critics of the Scrutiny

such as L. C. Knights, An Approach and D. A. Traversi, An Approach

group

to "Hamlet"

(London, 1961),

to Shakespeare

(2 edn.; Garden

City, N.Y., 1956), pp. 81-107. Traversi, for example, says of the closet scene: "we must feel once more that there is something excessive about the emotion conveyed, that its roots lie not in the external facts of Hamlet's situation, but in an intense distortion, imperfectly understood by the speaker himself his creator) within his own experience" (p. 98).

— 32 —

(and perhaps by

SECRECY

AND

POISON

As Claudius says so lucidly, "it smells to heaven" (36). W e are never allowed to get that stink out of our nostrils, and it is disgustingly strengthened by "the rank sweat of an enseamed bed" (3.4.93). Claudius attempts to conceal his murder with regal and rhetorical unction, and there is a striking resemblance between him and Henry IV, who can never forget his butchery of Richard II at Pomfret. Both could say equally well, and with the same self-conscious irony, "Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown" (2 Henry IV 3.1.31). While Hamlet is trying to confirm the Ghost's revelation, Claudius is trying to find out how much Hamlet knows. There are plotter and victim, hunter and prey, set against each other and busily exchanging roles. As Hamlet says so energetically at the end of the closet scene: "O, 'tis most sweet/ When in one line two crafts directly meet" (3.4.210-11). T h e "crafts" are craftiness, although there may also be a quibble on naval warfare. W e do not learn the secret of what is "rotten in the state of Denmark" (1.4.90) until the Ghost's narration of its murder in Act I, Scene v. " O my prophetic soul" (40), exclaims Hamlet, and he corroborates the vague fears and anxieties we have had since the beginning of the play. T h e Ghost's account is unusually full and explicit. Its fifty lines (42-91) 3 are, after the "rogue and 8

There is no basis at all, either in Quarto 2 or Folio, for as-

signing line 80—"O, horrible! O, horriblel Most horrible!"—to Hamlet, as Rann and other editors do. Samuel Johnson confessed that the transposition "was ingeniously hinted to me by a very learned lady" ( J o h n s o n ' s Notes

to Shakespeare,

p. 161). See Kittredge's textual note, p. 302.

— 33 —

ed. Arthur Sherbo,

IMAGERY

peasant slave" longest speech style suggests a and the Player

soliloquy (2.2.559-617) of Hamlet, the in the play, and the formal, oratorical link with both the Player's tale of Troy King.

T h e elder Hamlet is poisoned with Italianate artfulness as he is taking his customary "after-dinner's sleep" (Measure for Measure 3.1.33). He is surprised upon his "secure hour" (1.5.61) by the thief Claudius, who "stole" into his "orchard" or garden. Significantly, Claudius pours his poison into "the porches" (63) of his sleeping brother's ears. This is the symbolic act that lies behind Hamlet and provides an archetype of evil, like original sin. In the Ghost's own report, he represents the body politic by the synecdoche of its ear: . . . the whole ear of Denmark Is by a forged process of my death Rankly abused. (1.5.36-38) A "forged process" is a legal deception, a poisoning of public opinion for which Hamlet must provide the antidote. T h e Ghost tells us that it was killed "With juice of cursed hebona in a vial" (1.5.62), which is a mysterious poison made from the ebony tree, or more likely from either yew or henbane. 4 T h e poison Lucianus uses in The Mousetrap

is more generally described:

"Thou

mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected" (3.2.263), as 4

See Wilson's notes, pp. 161 and 297, and the note in Parrott

and Craig, p. 100. Sir William T . Thiselton-Dyer makes a strong argument for henbane in his essay on plants in Shakespeare's land

(London: Oxford University Press, 1917), I, 509.

— 34 —

Eng-

SECRECY

AND

POISON

is the mountebank's "unction" (4.7.141) with which Laertes will anoint his sword. As we might expect, Claudius does not inform us what poison he uses for the "chalice" (4.7.160) of wine in the fencing match, although we do learn from the dying Laertes that "It is a poison tempered by himself" (5.2.329) —there is an enormous versatility in this king. In the Ghost's narration the poison is described primarily in terms of disease. It is " T h e leperous distillment" (1.5.64), and its physiological effects are precisely rendered: . . . swift as quicksilver it courses through T h e natural gates and alleys of the body, A n d with a sudden vigor it doth posset A n d curd, like eager droppings into milk, T h e thin and wholesome blood. So did it mine, And a most instant tetter barked about Most lazarlike with vile and loathsome crust A l l my smooth body. (1.5.66-73) T h e point of the imagery is that the poison turns something beautiful—"See what a grace was seated on this brow" (3.4.56) — i n t o something vile and loathsome, a leper covered with sores and scabs. T h e ugliness of the imagery externalizes the repulsiveness of Claudius' crime. T h e mingling of the themes of poison and disease (and of food, too, in lines 68-70) presents a typical problem in Shakespeare's imagery. What is the dominant subject matter here, and how shall we classify this passage about the elder Hamlet's murder? In Clemen's — 35 —

IMAGERY

discussion, which acknowledges a debt to Caroline Spurgeon, the passage expresses the "leitmotif" 5 of the imagery of sickness. It seems to me, however, that what is important in the whole context of the murder is not disease, but the poisonous duplicity of Claudius. "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark" (1.4.90) because this is a secret crime, a hidden evil. If there is indeed a leitmotif of disease imagery stemming from the Ghost's narration, it does not refer merely to disease in general, but to the hidden disease, the disease that is deliberately concealed. T h e most striking example of this imagery comes right after the Ghost's exit in the closet scene. Gertrude cannot see or hear the Ghost, "yet all that is I see" (3. 4.133), so that she can now conveniently think Hamlet mad and all his frenzied advice only the ravings of a lunatic. But Hamlet refuses to allow his mother any false comfort: Lay not that flattering unction to your soul, T h a t not your trespass but my madness speaks. It will but skin and film the ulcerous place Whiles rank corruption, mining all within, Infects unseen. (3.4.146-50) T h e "unction" applied to the "ulcerous place" will merely give the illusion of healing, a "skin and film," while the infection itself rages beneath. It is a "flattering" unction because it offers only the deceptive ap5

Clemen, The

Development

of Shakespeare's

Imagery,

p. 113.

See also Muir's comments on Clemen in "Imagery and Symbolism in Hamlet,"

pp. 352-53.

— 36 —

SECRECY

AND

POISON

pearance of cure. Claudius' crime is the prototype of the evil that "Infects unseen." Festering and ulceration dominate the theme of hidden disease, and there is symbolic appropriateness in the idea of a secret, inner corruption. Hamlet's comment on the Fortinbras expedition uses an image very like the "ulcerous place" of the closet scene: This is th' imposthume of much wealth and peace, T h a t inward breaks, and shows no cause without W h y the man dies. (4.4.27-29) Cotgrave's dictionary (1611) defines an "imposthume" as "an inward swelling full of corrupt matter," 6 to which we may add that it is a purulent abscess or cyst, not visible externally, but which, by suddenly bursting, pours its lethal poison into the body. T h a t the luxury and ease of peace is a disease which only war can cure is a familiar notion, but in this context Hamlet seems to be thinking of Claudius' "peace-rotten Denmark" 7 rather than of Norway or Poland. T h e imagery of hidden disease has an interesting reversibility for antagonist and protagonist. Thus, one of the symbolic ways that Claudius counters Hamlet is by thinking of him as the hidden disease that must be cured at any cost, even death. This is almost exactly what Claudius tells the king of England in his "sovereign process" importing " T h e present death of Hamlet" (4.3.63,65): 6

Variorum,

7

Paul A . Jorgensen, Shakespeare's

I, 324. Military

University of California Press, 1956), p. 205.

— 37 —

World

(Berkeley:

IMAGERY

Do it, England, For like the hectic in my blood he rages, And thou must cure me. (4.3.65-67) Hamlet has become Claudius' consumptive fever, which "rages" furiously in his blood and threatens to destroy him. Immediately after the death of Polonius, Hamlet is again to Claudius a secret and almost mortal disease. Instead of restraining " T h i s mad young man," . . . so much was our love W e would not understand what was most fit, But, like the owner of a foul disease, T o keep it from divulging, let it feed Even on the pith of life. (4.1.19-23) T h e identity of the "foul disease" is left deliberately vague, but it is one so abhorrent that it must be kept undivulged even at the risk of death. There is a similar image in the king's directions to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. T h e y are to find out from Hamlet "Whether aught to us unknown afflicts him thus, / T h a t opened lies within our remedy'' (2.2.17-18). "Opened" means disclosed or revealed, but in this context it suggests the opening of an ulcer, imposthume, or other festering sore by surgical incision. "Remedy" is also a threatening word, especially when spoken by Claudius, and the curative English voyage that he finally proposes will end with Hamlet's head "struck off" (5.2.25). A reversal of this imagery shows us Hamlet as Claudius' surgeon, with The Mousetrap as a therapeutic instrument: — 38 —

SECRECY

AND

POISON

I'll observe his looks, I'll tent him to the quick. If 'a do blench, I know my course. (2.2.608-10) A "tent" was a roll of lint used to search and cleanse a wound to keep it from becoming infected. T h e wound here is Claudius' guilty secret, which will be brought to light by the play, and Hamlet takes a cruel pleasure in probing his uncle's flesh "to the quick." T h e hidden disease is only one form of concealment in a play filled with secrecy, duplicity, and poisonous deception. T h e Ghost's narration of its murder in Act I, Scene v establishes the poison plot as central to the meaning of the play. After the exposition in Act I, the poison plot is grotesquely recapitulated in The Murder of Gonzago and its dumb show in Act III, then presented directly for the first time in the lethal fencing match of Act V. In their symmetrical control of the beginning, middle, and end of the play, these three poison plots shape the structure of Hamlet. W h e n the king asks his nephew-son if there is any "offense" (3.2.239) in The Mousetrap, Hamlet answers with the same pun as that used in the Ghost scene (1.5. 134-37) : "No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offense i' th' world" (3.2.240-41). "Poison in jest" separates the mimic play world from the real world of afternoon naps in the "orchard" and the dangers of a "leperous" distillment. W e have already seen the "poisoner" at work in the dumb show (140 s.d.) . He is "another man" in Quarto 2 (but a more sinister "Fellow" in Folio), who "takes off" the Player King's "crown, kisses — 39 —

IMAGERY

it, pours poison in the sleeper's ears, and leaves him." Claudius is seeing his crime exactly reenacted, with more explicit detail than the Ghost could provide in its narration. After the murder and the Player Queen's "passionate action," "The poisoner, with some three or four, come in again, seem to condole with her." W h e n the dead body is removed, "The poisoner woos the Queen with gifts; she seems harsh awhile, but in the end accepts love." T h e Player Queen may find hints for the acting of her part in Lady Anne of Richard III, who is sardonically wooed by Gloucester at the very coffin of her father-in-law (Act I, Scene ii) . T h e character called "The poisoner" in the dumb show becomes in the play Lucianus, who is, significantly, nephew to Duke Gonzago of Vienna, the Player King. T h e setting inevitably reminds us of another "knavish piece of work" (3.2.246) in process in the Vienna of Measure for Measure—there is even a Claudio in Hamlet (4.7.40). Lucianus is an obvious grotesque, a stage murderer in the style of the mustache-twirling villain of Victorian melodrama, and the events of the murder are consciously distanced and displaced, so that Claudius will not be allowed any easy psychological identification with the character. Hamlet, as stage manager of the show, must set the mugging Lucianus to his task: "Leave thy damnable faces and begin" (3.2.259). Lucianus' "Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing,/ Confederate season, else no creature seeing" (261-62) will seem absurd to all except the "galled jade," who may begin to "winch" (248) when the vial of poison is apostrophized, and be positively startled — 40 —

SECRECY

AND

POISON

when Lucianus "Pours the poison" (266 s.d.) into the ears of the Player King. As presenter or chorus, Hamlet continues the role of Lucianus: " 'A poisons him i' th' garden for his estate" (267), while the king rises to stop the performance. He has been touched home by this double reenactment of his secret crime, in dumb show and in play. "It will have blood; they say blood will have blood," says Macbeth, and even " T h e secret'st man of blood" will be "brought forth" (Macbeth 3.4.122, 125-26). It is a primitive notion of justice, yet one that is satisfying in its sense of inevitable retribution. Nothing can ultimately be concealed, "For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak/ With most miraculous organ" (2.2. 605-6). W e have the same idea in an early speech of Hamlet: "Foul deeds will rise,/ Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes" (1.2.257-58). "O'erwhelm" indicates something crushing and monumental, but time, although a destroyer (edax rerum), also brings all things to light. This idea is demonstrated in the staging, when the king, rising from the play, calls out: "Give me some light. Away!" (3.2.275), and his cry is echoed by Polonius and his attendants: "Lights, lights, lights!" ( 2 7 6 ) C l a u d i u s entered the scene "with his Guard carrying torches" (91 s.d.), a conventional way to represent night in an afternoon performance, and this Guard lights him out after the play. T h e ability to make 8

Quarto 2 gives this line to Polonius, as does Quarto 1 (under

the name of Corambis). Folio's speech prefix is All, to me to make for a better stage effect.

— 41 —

which seems

IMAGERY

metaphors out of the staging, and especially out of its limitations, is one of the characteristic strengths of Elizabethan drama. Here Claudius calls for the light of torches to take away the more lurid light of The Murder of Gonzago, and he needs those lights to show him his way in the dark castle of Elsinore. Now that there are no longer any secrets between Hamlet and him, the action of the play can enter a more openly aggressive phase. It is surely one of the most unexpected turns of the plot that Hamlet's triumph in the play scene should be so short-lived, and that, through the murder of Polonius, the initiative should so definitely pass to his enemies. T h e king's new plot, devised with amazing swiftness after Hamlet's escape, gives us a fascinating glimpse of Claudius at work. W e have the same sort of brilliance and inventiveness in this poison plot as was displayed in the murder of Hamlet's father, and the connection develops that sense of recapitulation so important to tragedy. There is special emphasis on "venom." Laertes' skill in fencing "Did Hamlet so envenom with his envy" (4.7.103), and Claudius reassures Laertes with mention of the poisoned drink, which will serve if Hamlet "by chance escape your venomed stuck" (161). T h a t violent monosyllable "stuck" is characteristic of Claudius' style and very different in sound and connotations from "stoccado," which it abbreviates (compare the equally menacing "push," at 5.1.297). In the match itself, the mortally wounded Laertes reveals that Hamlet is now holding the "treacherous instrument," "Unbated and envenomed" (5.2.317-18). Hamlet is amazed at the — 42 —

SECRECY

AND

POISON

complexity of his uncle's v i l l a i n y — " T h e point envenomed too?" (322)—but he will use the instruments provided by an "ordinant" (48) heaven: " T h e n , venom, to thy work" (323). Venom is an appropriate image for a play in which " T h e serpent that did sting thy father's life/ Now wears his crown" (1.5.39-40). T h e catastrophe in Hamlet

is precipitated by the

poisoning of Gertrude, which is only one in a series of ironic misdirections in the perfect plot of Claudius and Laertes, who, in the words of the Player King, " T h e i r own enactures with themselves destroy" (3.2.203). " T h e Queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet" (5.2.290), exclaims Gertrude. W h e n she raises the cup, the king says knowingly, "Gertrude, do not drink" (291), but he will go no further than that to save her life. Like Macbeth, he will "fight the course" "bear-like" to the very end (Macbeth 5.7.2). So Gertrude follows her first husband to a death by poison, accompanied by Hamlet, Laertes, and the redoubtable Claudius, impenitent and resourceful to the end. His last line is: "O, yet defend me, friends. I am but hurt" (5.2.325), as if he had no faith in the efficacy of Laertes' poison. But Hamlet forces on him, with a bitter pun, a dose of the "poison tempered by himself" (329): "Drink off this potion. Is thy union here?/ Follow my mother"

(327-28). Claudius' "un-

ion" is the beautiful pearl, presumably hollowed out to hold poison, that he threw into the cup to pledge Hamlet. Since his union with Gertrude was accomplished by poisoning her husband and his brother, all that remains of their guilty coupling is "in the cup." T h e — 43 —

IMAGERY

king's poisoned cup mocks the chalice of wine in the marriage sacrament. Concealment in Hamlet is an important verbal theme, especially in the three poison plots that shape the play, but it also becomes part of the stage action in the eavesdropping scenes of Act III: Scene i, where Ophelia is the decoy, and Scene iv, where Polonius "conveys" himself behind the arras and is stabbed to death for his pains. W e may follow the theme of secrecy in the first of these encounters, which is carefully developed out of a series of interlocking events. W h e n Ophelia tells her father of Hamlet's frightening appearance "as I was sewing in my closet" (2.1.77), Polonius' court mentality springs immediately into action: "Mad for thy love" (85), "This is the very ecstasy of love" (102). T h e father's first reaction is to proceed publicly and openly: Come, go we to the King. This must be known, which, being kept close, might move More grief to hide than hate to utter love. (2.1.117-19) There seems to be no possibility for secrets in Polonius' household, nor for any privacy either. "Close" means hidden or shut up, as in the king's advice to Laertes to "Keep close within your chamber" (4.7.129), or "lie low," until the plot against Hamlet is ripe. T h e complex syntax of Polonius' couplet should banish any doubts about his subtlety and sophistication; he may be tedious and labyrinthine, but he is no fool. — 44 —

SECRECY

AND

POISON

In the next scene, Polonius' offer to disclose his secret to the king becomes a momentous occasion, celebrated with all the pomp and ceremony of a classical oration. "What might you think," he asks, If I had played the desk or table book, Or given my heart a winking, mute and dumb, Or looked upon this love with idle sight? (2.2.136-38) He will write no secrets in his "table book," as Hamlet does after seeing the Ghost (1.5.107), nor wink—and the Folio reading gives us an apt word for a politician— to his heart to be "mute and dumb." There is irony in Polonius' vehement insistence on candor and openness, and his Baconian devotion to truth: If circumstances lead me, I will find Where truth is hid, though it were hid indeed Within the center. (2.2.157-59) From this passionate search for truth—"Hide fox, and all after" (4.2.30-31)—comes the eavesdropping plot, in which Polonius will "loose" his daughter to Hamlet while he is walking "Here in the lobby" (2.2. 162,161). "Loose" is one of the most offensive words in the play because, by calling up the scene of the cow loosed to the bull, it reminds us of the harsh vulgarities in the Polonian family circle. Ophelia will be the decoy for Hamlet, while Polonius and the king will place themselves "behind an arras" to "Mark the encounter" (163-64)—"encounter" continues the connotations of "loose," which end in the "farm and carters" (167) — 45 —

IMAGERY

image. T h e arras, or tapestry hanging at the back of the stage, suggests an Elizabethan interior, but it also served as a convenient curtain (in a theater that had no front curtains) , by means of which simple discoveries and concealments could be made. Because of all these preparations, the act of eavesdropping becomes an insidious plot, with not a few theatrical resemblances to a scene within a scene. T h e king has "closely sent for Hamlet hither" (3.1.29) — a n d the word "closely" implies deceit—"That he, as 'twere by accident, may here/ Affront Ophelia" (30-31). "Affront" is used in its etymological sense of "encounter," although it certainly carries a connotation of abuse to Hamlet as well as to Ophelia. T h e masterstroke of the stage manager is seen in the phrase "as 'twere by accident," whose calculating spontaneity gives us an insight into Claudius' role throughout the play. Claudius picks up the Polonian word "encounter" (2.2.164), which suggests combat, and he tries to give the whole affair a studied legality: Her father and myself (lawful espials) W i l l so bestow ourselves that, seeing unseen, W e may of their encounter frankly judge. . . . (3-1-32-34)

In contrast to other spies in the play, they will be "lawful espials" and "seeing unseen," a brilliant expression for the eavesdropper's position, with an inescapable connotation of one-way mirrors. "Rank corruption," we remember, "Infects unseen" (3.4.149-50), and Polonius dies as " T h e unseen good old man" (4.1.12). Hamlet, — 46 —

SECRECY

AND

POISON

however, is " T h ' observed of all observers" (3.1. 157), which, in a play with so much spying, must inevitably be meant in "more than one sense," as Foakes indicates.9 Hamlet has a large vocabulary of Machiavellian "policy" words that give the play a distinctive atmosphere of anxiety and danger. Most of these "policy" words are not significant in themselves, but we may take as examples two that have some thematic importance: "practice" and "shuffling." T h e details of the plot against Hamlet, as Claudius explains them to Laertes, have an attractive simplicity: . . . with ease, Or with a little shuffling, you may choose A sword unbated, and, in a pass of practice, Requite him for your father. (4-7-136-39) Claudius may be using the word "practice" in a general sense, for the sport of fencing, or specifically, for a skillful thrust (a "practiced pass"), but he is probably also thinking of the treachery of the plot itself. T h e king is so certain of his cunning that even Gertrude "shall uncharge the practice/ And call it accident" (67-68). There is an element of pride in one's work here, in the art that conceals art and convinces us that it is natural. By a familiar tragic turn, the plot against Hamlet depends upon his "being remiss,/ Most generous, and free from all contriving," so that he "Will not peruse the foils" (134-36). Hamlet thinks of Laertes as " A very noble youth" (5.1.226), and in his candor he 9

Foakes, "Hamlet

and the Court of Elsinore," p. 38.

— 47 —

IMAGERY

shares Othello's fatally "free and open nature/ T h a t thinks men honest that but seem to be so" (Othello 1.3.393-94). Magnanimity is the very quality that makes both men so vulnerable to tragedy. Claudius' disciple, Guildenstern, also plays on the neutral and Machiavellian senses of "practice." He welcomes his task of spying on Hamlet with a riddling enthusiasm: "Heavens make our presence and our practices/ Pleasant and helpful to him!" (2.2.38-39). Hamlet soon sees through the pun, and the pleasant court manners of Guildenstern and Rosencrantz become no more than informers' wiles. In a more literal sense, Laertes acknowledges his fatal duplicity: " T h e foul practice/ Hath turned itself on me" (5.2.318-19), but we make special allowances for him as the victim of Claudius' superior practice. Like "miching mallecho," the word "shuffling" also "means mischief" (3.2.142-43), and in relation to Claudius' plot it suggests the mountebank's skill by which one may find, with "ease," an unbated blade on a table of bated foils. This word conjures up for me the Folio staging of the fencing match: "In scuffling they change rapiers" (5.2.303 s.d.), where, by a trick of verbal and moral symmetry, the "scuffling" undoes the "shuffling." T h e word also carries an allusion to card-playing, especially in the sense of deceptive shuffling to produce the right cards in the right places.10 10

There may be similar wordplay on Claudius' "royal knavery"

(5.2.19): king and servant exist not only in the court, but also in the court cards (the "coat" or "picture" cards), and Hamlet means to say that at Elsinore the king is a jack, or base fellow.

—48—

SECRECY

AND

POISON

T h e r e is a s i g n i f i c a n t e x a m p l e o f s h u f f l i n g i n let's " T o be, o r n o t to b e "

soliloquy:

F o r in that sleep of death w h a t d r e a m s m a y When

Ham-

w e h a v e shuffled off t h i s m o r t a l

M u s t give us pause.

come

coil,

(3.1.66-68)

" S h u f f l e d o f f " is n o t a p l e a s a n t

image,

a n d a sense

d e c e p t i o n is a t t a c h e d t o i t f r o m i t s o t h e r c o n t e x t s . "this mortal

coil"

and

death"

their

reciprocal

have

the

"dreams"

of

the

Both

"sleep

unattractiveness,

n e i t h e r c a n possibly o u t b a l a n c e

so

In addition

of

that

the other, and we

left a t the e n d w i t h a puzzled will.

of

to

are its

o b v i o u s sense o f t u r m o i l , fuss, a n d d i s t u r b a n c e ,

"mor-

tal c o i l " c o u l d also m e a n t h e r o u n d g l o b e of t h e

earth,

as s y m b o l i z e d b y t h e c o n c e n t r i c coils of a pile of ship's rope.

"Shuffled,"

then, w o u l d refer to the evasive

mo-

tions o n e m a k e s in taking leave of this e a r t h a n d

this

life.11 The

most

unforgettable

shuffling

is

in

Claudius'

soliloquy: I n the c o r r u p t e d c u r r e n t s of this w o r l d Offense's gilded h a n d m a y

shove by

A n d o f t 'tis s e e n t h e w i c k e d p r i z e

justice,

itself

B u y s o u t t h e l a w . B u t 'tis n o t so a b o v e . T h e r e is n o s h u f f l i n g . . . .

(3-3-57"6i)

S h a k e s p e a r e defines t h e w o r d f o r us b y its c o n t e x t .

Its

r o o t m e a n i n g of a shambling or clumsy gait, a dragging of t h e feet, b e c o m e s t h e s y m b o l f o r all t h e

evasiveness,

See Wilson, p. xxxiv, and M. M. Mahood,

Shakespeare's

11

Wordplay

(London, 1957), p. 122.

— 49 —

IMAGERY

trickery, and deceit practiced "In the corrupted currents of this world," as contrasted with the straightness, openness, honesty, and candor required "above." Claudius sees himself for what he is, without any mitigation. He is the shuffler who knows how to "shove by" justice; he is the giver of bribes who knows how to pay part of the loot in order to keep the rest. These are the "uses of this world" (1.2.134), but Claudius makes no attempt to deceive himself about the uses of the other world. For all of its chilling lucidity, his soliloquy is still full of a cynical devotion to shuffling. Claudius is irresistibly intelligent, as Iago is, and like Iago he mimics in his plotting Shakespeare's own gift for setting characters in action and for creating exciting scenes. It is precisely this feeling that the antagonist is overwhelming, that the protagonist is in the grip of forces beyond his powers of resistance, that allows the element of chance or irony to come into play, as it does so powerfully in Hamlet. How can the hero escape this inevitable triple plot of unbated rapier, poisoned tip, and poisoned chalice? He cannot, of course, escape it, but heaven may show that it is "ordinant" (5.2.48) by making the evil purposes fall "on th' inventors' heads" (386). Things turn out differently from what Claudius and Laertes suppose, and their triumph is cut short at the very moment when it seems most assured. Ironic reversal 12 is the favorite plot device of poetic justice: the 12

See Thomas F. Van Laan, "Ironic Reversal in

Studies

in English

Literature,

VI

Hamlet,"

(1966), 247-62, and Warren V.

Shepard, "Hoisting the Enginer with His Own Petar," SQ, V I I (1956), 281-85. See also Tilley, W204 and F626.

— 50 —

SECRECY

AND

POISON

tables are turned, "the enginer/ Hoist with his own petar" (3.4.207-08), and the "woodcock" caught in his "own springe" (5.2.307). T h e tragic point of this peripeteia is made most tellingly by the Player King: Our wills and fates do so contrary run T h a t our devices still are overthrown; Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own. (3.2.217-19) T h e element of secrecy in Shakespeare's Hamlet reflects an important aspect of the source story, and although Shakespeare makes much less of it than do Saxo Grammaticus or Belleforest, it is still a crucial part of the dramatic action. Hamlet and his few friends are set against Claudius and his many agents. T h e struggle is obviously one-sided, yet we never have the impression that Hamlet is crushed. A t the most unlikely moment, just as he is being shipped under guard to his death in England, he is asserting boldly: I do not know W h y yet I live to say, " T h i s thing's to do," Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and means T o do't. (4.4.43-46) His assessment of his position is wildly illogical, yet forceful asseveration is, in the context of a play, itself a sign of force. Hamlet's secrecy, which he furthers by his "antic disposition" (1.5.172), is one of his most effective weapons against Claudius, who has at his command all the power and policy of the kingdom of Denmark, whereas Hamlet is limited to guerrilla warfare. If we are sensitive to the realities of Claudius' regime, — 51 —

IMAGERY

we understand why Hamlet needs to go into hiding after his escape from the English voyage. T h e mystification of Hamlet's letter to Horatio—"These good fellows will bring thee where I am" (4.6.27-28)—suggests a fear that he may be secretly murdered. There is similar mystification in the delivery of Hamlet's oracular letter to the king. In answer to Claudius' question, " W h o brought them?" (4.7.38), the anonymous messenger speaks in vague meanderings: Sailors, my lord, they say; I saw them not. T h e y were given me by Claudio; he received them Of him that brought them. (4.7.39-41) W h o is this cryptic Claudio, whose name is the Italian form of Claudius? T h e king suspects some "abuse" (50), but the handwriting is unmistakably authentic. In an earlier scene, Hamlet gives his uncle a start when he says that he sees a "cherub" (4.3.48) that sees all of the king's secret purposes, and he seems to survive his English voyage by the help of this same cherubic intelligence. In his pirate-posted letter, he appears to be writing of a miraculous deliverance, a rebirth: "High and mighty, you shall know I am set naked on your kingdom" (4.7.43-44). T h e king is stunned and incredulous: " 'Naked'!" (51). W e learn later that Hamlet still has his sturdy "sea gown scarfed about" him (5.2.13), so we need not worry about the state of his apparel. But that startling and simple word " n a k e d " — unprovided, bare, unarmed, open, plain, undisguised— seems by itself to negate all of Claudius' plots and poisoned imaginings. —

52

—

3. Corruption " H O W

WEARY,

s t a l e , flat, a n d u n p r o f i t a b l e /

m e all t h e uses of this w o r l d "

to

( 1 . 2 . 1 3 3 - 3 4 ) , says H a m l e t

in a n early scene, a n d later o n :

"this goodly frame,

earth, seems to m e a sterile p r o m o n t o r y ;

the

this m o s t

cellent c a n o p y , t h e air, l o o k y o u , this b r a v e firmament,

Seem

ex-

o'erhanging

this majestical r o o f fretted w i t h g o l d e n

fire:

why, it a p p e a r e t h n o t h i n g to m e b u t a foul a n d pestilent congregation

of

vapors"

(2.2.306-11).

Shortly

t h e c a t a s t r o p h e , h e is s t i l l t r o u b l e d b y t h e w a r between the bestial a n d angelic forces in What

is a

before

unresolved man:

man,

If his chief g o o d a n d m a r k e t of his t i m e B e b u t to sleep a n d feed? A beast, n o

more.

S u r e h e that m a d e us w i t h such large discourse, L o o k i n g before a n d after, gave us T h a t capability and godlike

not

reason

T o fust i n us u n u s e d .

(44-33_39)

T h e r e is n o s a t i s f y i n g r e s o l u t i o n t o t h i s c o n f l i c t , n o r a n y w a y to a v o i d t h e i n e v i t a b l e " t a i n t " t h a t t h e r e v e n g e r acquires in the course of his revenge. T h e Ghost's a d m o n i tion, " T a i n t n o t

thy m i n d "

obey

that

in a world

(1.5.85),

is a l r e a d y

verbial formula, pitch defileth

is i m p o s s i b l e

tainted.1

In

the

to

pro-

(Tilley, P 3 5 8 ) , and one's

" n a t u r e is s u b d u ' d / T o w h a t i t w o r k s i n , l i k e t h e d y e r ' s hand"

(Sonnet C X I ) .

Caroline 1

Spurgeon

But see Knights, An

has written

perceptively

Approach

"Hamlet,"

to

strong emphasis on Hamlet's "taint." —

55

—

of

"the

who puts a

IMAGERY

evil smell of evil deeds" 2 in Shakespeare, and Richard Altick has applied this dictum to Hamlet.3 Like Lear's hand, the play "smells of mortality" (King Lear 4.6.133) in much more than a figurative sense. As Foakes tells us, "the imagery of corruption, like much else in the play's language, needs to be seen as closely related to, and in some sense a part of it, a larger thematic structure concerned with seeming and being, with shows and the truths that they conceal, with fair appearance and ugly realities, and with the difficulties of interpreting what is seen." 4 This imagery is part of the extensive orderdisorder symbolism in Shakespeare that G. Wilson Knight has made the central concern of his criticism. In its broadest sense, the imagery of food and animals is used to express man's lapse from his rational, divinely endowed condition to the appetitive state of a beast. Disease imagery marks a malfunction in the human organism that may also reflect disorder in the body politic and in the cosmos itself, and the ideal symbolic garden, modeled on the garden of Eden, may become choked with weeds, "her wholesome herbs/ Swarming with caterpillars" (Richard II 3.4.46-47). These four themes—animals, disease, food, and gardens—all represent fundamental dualisms of good and evil, which are deeply embedded in the faded metaphors and proverbial wisdom of daily discourse. 2

Spurgeon, Shakespeare's

3

Richard D. Altick, "Hamlet

V

Imagery,

p. 162.

and the Odor of Mortality," SQ,

(1954), 167-76. 4

R . A. Foakes, "Character and Speech in 'Hamlet,'" in

let, Stratford upon Avon Studies 5, pp. 152-53.

— 54 —

Ham-

CORRUPTION

T h e familiarity of these patterns allows Shakespeare to work unexpected and ironic turns, as when Hamlet, refusing to kill Claudius, says, " T h i s physic but prolongs thy sickly days" (3.3.96). "Physic" may mean a cathartic, since Hamlet has just observed Claudius "purging" (85) his soul. But if one keeps to the more general sense of remedy, Hamlet seems to be indulging a cruel impulse to prolong Claudius' "sickly days" rather than cure him. Hamlet will eventually kill him in a more satisfyingly "horrid hent" (88), so that the only effect of the present delay will be to extend Claudius' torment. Thus, with a menacing quibble, the exit line (96) of the melancholy prince asserts the potency of Dr. Hamlet's "physic." Among general qualities of corruption, the most significant is rankness, and it should come as no surprise that Hamlet has more "rank" words than any other play in the canon. T h e "rank sweat of an enseamed bed" (3.4.93) is the most startling image here, because it is intended to shock Gertrude out of her lust. " R a n k " means noisome, rancid, having an offensively strong smell. In The Merry Wives of Windsor, Falstaff in his buck-basket was rammed in "with foul shirts and smocks, socks, foul stockings, greasy napkins, that, Master Brook, there was the rankest compound of villainous smell that ever offended nostril" (3.5.81-83). " R a n k " is also a word for an animal in heat, as in Shylock's description: "the ewes, being rank,/ In end of autumn turned to the rams" ( T h e Merchant of Venice 1.3.75-76). These sexual implications are present when Hamlet warns his mother against "rank corruption, mining all within" (3.4.149). — 55 —

IMAGERY

Another meaning of "rank" that lends itself to metaphor is excessive vigorousness in growth, over-luxuriance, like that of weeds, a sense that may also be illustrated from the closet scene: "do not spread the compost on the weeds/ T o make them ranker" (3.4.152-53). Presumably weeds are already rank enough without any aid from the compost heap, since they do not depend upon the niceties of human attention to flourish. "Most subject is the fattest soil to weeds" (2 Henry IV 4.4.54), says King Henry of Prince Hal, offering us a proverbial insight into the workings of the tragic fall (see Tilley, W 2 4 1 ) . In Henry VIII, Cranmer is "a rank weed" (5. 1.52) that must be rooted out, and in As You Like It Jaques advises the Duke to "weed your better judgments/ Of all opinion that grows rank in them" (2.7. 45-46). T h e garden sense of "rank" is very strong in Hamlet's first soliloquy. T h e smiling prosperity of Claudius' court belies the decay of the world on which it is based; reality is now . . . an unweeded garden T h a t grows to seed. Things rank and gross in nature Possess it merely. (1.2.135-37) Just as "the bloat King" (3.4.183) has Denmark in fee simple, so the garden of this world no longer follows the model of that first happy garden in Eden. A t the center of Hamlet's passionate disgust are "Things rank and gross in nature." "Rank and gross" is a familiar Elizabethan linkage. T h e connotations of "gross"— coarse, sensual, overfed, excessively material, wanting in — 56 —

CORRUPTION

fineness or delicacy—overlap with those of "rank," and one word helps to define the other. In the Ghost's report, . . . the whole ear of Denmark Is by a forged process of my death Rankly abused. (1.5.36-38) "Rankly" means grossly in this context, with the added sense of the virulent stink of foul play. W e remember that Claudius took Hamlet's father "grossly, full of bread,/ With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May" (3.3.80-81), and that "Examples gross as earth exhort" (4.4.46) Hamlet to his revenge. There are also the "long purples" of Ophelia's garlands, " T h a t liberal shepherds give a grosser name" (4.7.169-70) .5 T h e imagery of rankness is most striking at the beginning of Claudius' soliloquy, when he arraigns himself before the bar of eternal justice: O, my offense is rank, it smells to heaven; It hath the primal eldest curse upon't, A brother's murder.

(3-3-36"38)

" T h e evil smell of evil deeds" is presented not only by direct statement ("it smells to heaven"), but also by the strong connotations of "rank" and "offense." 6 Claudius' crime offends the senses as well as the spirit; it stinks like Abel's rotting corpse. There is a curious parallel to this passage in Iago's insinuations about Des5

See Edward A. Armstrong, Shakespeare's

Imagination

(rev.

edn.; Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1963), note 1 on pp. 94-95. This note was written for the revised edition. 6

See Altick's commentary on "offense" words in "Hamlet

the Odor of Mortality," pp.

173-75.

— 57

—

and

IMAGERY

demona's lust for a black man: "Foh! one may smell in such a will most rank,/ Foul disproportion, thoughts unnatural" (Othello 3.3.236-37). This is the abuse of the Moor "in the rank garb" (Othello 2.1.300), and we may see in Claudius' "rank" will a lust for power similar to Iago's. There is a sensuality of achieved ambition that operates more powerfully than any sensuality for merely physical objects, and therefore the secondary meaning of "rank" as one's official standing or degree of dignity in the world seems to me inescapable in Claudius' confession. His offense is rank, both as adjective and noun. Unlike "rank," "foul" is not a complex word, but its meanings help to support the imagery of corruption. It signifies ugly, dirty, impure, and may be used as a general negative term; in the sense of polluted and filthy it may also suggest stink. Above all, the killing of Hamlet's father is a "foul and most unnatural murder" (1. 5.25), a point which the Ghost drives home by repetition: "Murder most foul, as in the best it is,/ But this most foul, strange, and unnatural" (27-28). Hamlet's suspicions of "foul play" (1.2.256) have been justified, and "Foul deeds" (257) have indeed risen from their concealment. W h e n Claudius tries to pray, he sees at once how false his words are: " 'Forgive me my foul murder?" (3.3.52). Like Macbeth, he has played "most foully for't" (Macbeth 3.1.3) and therefore cannot pray. In the course of his revenge, Hamlet appears to Ophelia with his "stockings fouled" (2.1.79), he sees the firmament as "a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors" (2.2.311) , and his imagination may have become — 58 —

CORRUPTION

"as foul/ As Vulcan's stithy" 7 (3.2.85-86). T h e image of Vulcan's smoky forge has the same negative reference as Gertrude's "reechy kisses" (3.4.185), which derive their sense of filthy, squalid, and disgusting from the root idea of a smoking fire. In another instance, the "owner of a foul disease" (4.1.21) tries, even at the cost of his life, " T o keep it from divulging" (22); there is the same unidentified evil in this "foul" as there is in the "foul crimes" (1.5.12) or sins of the Ghost, which it must now try to purge away in its purgatorial "prison house" (14). A t the end of the play, Laertes' "foul practice" (5.2.318) turns against him, and he is caught "as a woodcock" in his "own springe" (307). N o single use of "foul" is of special importance, but all the examples together do say something about the world of Hamlet. T h e imagery of soiling and tainting adds another significant aspect to the idea of corruption in the play. T h e Ghost warns Hamlet: " T a i n t not thy mind" (1.5.85), and there is a combined sense of staining, infection, and even putrefaction in that use of the word. It is much less dire in Polonius' instructions to Reynaldo to breathe Laertes' "faults so quaintly/ T h a t they may seem the taints of liberty" (2.1.31-32). Here the sense of the word is closer to that of spot or blemish, through an etymological connection with the Latin tinctus. T h e "black and grained spots" in Gertrude's soul that "will not leave 7

Renaissance mythographers interpreted the image of

"Vul-

can's stithy" or forge as an archetype of the creative imagination, the "quick forge and working-house of thought" ( H e n r y V Prol. V, *s).

— 59 —

IMAGERY

their tinct" (3.4.91-92) are akin to this meaning. T h e y are indelible, dyed in grain, and they have infallibly tainted her son's mind. Hamlet speaks later of having "a mother stained" (4.4.57), which seems in its sexual connotations to bear some relation to those black soulspots of the closet scene. Hamlet's "sullied flesh" (1.2.129) would fit well into this imagery if one could prefer this much-debated reading of Quarto 2 to the "solid flesh" of Folio. 8 Death is the most literal aspect of corruption in Hamlet. There is much talk of death in the play, and many dead bodies, too, which must be removed in full view of the audience. Hamlet's slaying of the "unseen good old man" (4.1.12) may be an impulsive act, but the exertion required to "lug the guts into the neighbor room" (3.4.213) provides an objective correlative for death. T h e effort is indicated by the Folio stage direction: "Exit Hamlet, tugging in Polonius" (218 s.d.). T h e "tugging" begins with Hamlet's punning line: "Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you" (217), a matter more difficult to accomplish when the garrulous old counselor was 8

It is well to keep in mind that "sullied" is an emendation

and that it occurs in no authoritative text; Quarto 2 has "sallied" and Folio "solid." Hubler reads "sullied," for which Wilson offers a strong argument in The let

Manuscript

of Shakespeare's

Ham-

(Cambridge, Eng.: Cambridge University Press, 1934), II, 307-

15. See also Sidney Warhaft, "Hamlet's Solid Flesh Resolved," ELH,

XXVIII

(1961), 21-30; Samuel A. Weiss, " 'Solid,' 'Sullied'

and Mutability: A Study in Imagery," SQ, X

(1959), 219-27; and

Fredson Bowers, "Hamlet's 'Sullied' or 'Solid' Flesh: A graphical Case-History," SS, I X Solid Flesh," Studia

Biblio-

(1956), 44-48. In "This Sullied

Neophilologica,

XXX

Kokeritz objects strongly to Bowers' thesis.

— 60 —

(1958), 3-10, Helge

CORRUPTION

alive. T h e body of Polonius is the stage equivalent of the weary weight of mortality. There is another elaborate pun in Hamlet's prediction that "This man shall set me packing" (3.4.212). T h e obvious sense of "packing" is preparation for a journey, with a strong connotation of being in a hurry, but the context of the line suggests plotting and conspiracy. Hamlet is packing the deck against his enemies, as Antony suspects that Cleopatra has "Pack'd cards with Caesar, and false-play'd my glory/ Unto an enemy's triumph [=trump and victory procession]" (Antony and Cleopatra 4.14.19-20). Hamlet also exerts himself to pack away the body of Polonius in its temporary resting place, "as you go up the stairs into the lobby" (4.3.36-37). T h e theme of mortality reaches its climax in the graveyard scene of Act V. This is probably the boldest and most original scene in the play. Its irrelevance, by French neoclassical standards, to the main action prompted Garrick to omit it in his later version of Hamlet and to assert in a letter to Sir William Young: " I had sworn I would not leave the stage till I had rescued that noble play from all the rubbish of the fifth act. . . ."9 It seems to me, however, that the graveyard scene, in its abrupt change from everything that has preceded it, is a triumph in the Elizabethan art of contrast, especially difficult in a play that does not have a multiple plot. 8

Quoted in George Winchester Stone, Jr., "Garrick's Long Lost

Alteration of Hamlet,"

PMLA,

XLIX

(1934), 893. T h e letter is

dated January 10, 1773, and Garrick's altered version of the play was first presented on December 18, 1772, at Drury Lane.

— 61 —

IMAGERY

T h e imagery of mortality may be traced in the stage properties of this scene, beginning with the skull of the lawyer, who was "in's time a great buyer of land" (5. 1.105)» but who now in death finds himself scarcely able to cope with his present estate of coffin and tomb: " W i l l his vouchers vouch him no more of his purchases, and double ones too, than the length and breadth of a pair of indentures? T h e very conveyances of his lands will scarcely lie in this box, and must th' inheritor himself have no more, ha?" (109-14). "This box" means, of course, the skull itself, about which Wilson has an imaginative note. He points out that Hamlet turns the top of the skull "towards the audience as he speaks, displaying its parchment-like surface and its serrated sutures, strikingly similar to the indented lines which divide 'a pair of indentures' into its parts." 10 Those not close to the stage, however, would surely not be able to distinguish the cranial sutures. T h e Clown-gravedigger gives Hamlet the skull of Yorick, a fellow of ironically "infinite jest" (5.1.18687), for closer inspection. Hamlet's apostrophe demands a skull with at least the lower jaw intact, since the demonstrative "Here" requires a proper object to complete its meaning: "Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft" (189-91). T h e skull is further described as "grinning" and "chapfall'n," not "chapless" (90) like that of the imagined courtier. T o Hamlet its odor is overpowering: " A n d smelt so? Pah!" (202) . By this common stink, Hamlet equates the skull of Yorick with that of Alexander the Great, who may, like "a king," "go a progress through the guts of a beggar" 10 Wilson, p. 236.

— 62 —

CORRUPTION

(4.3.30-31) and wind up, with "Imperious Caesar" (5.1.215), "stopping a bunghole" (206) in a beer barrel or patching "a wall t' expel the winter's flaw" (218). There is more than curious interest in Hamlet's insistent questioning of the gravedigger: " H o w long will a man lie i' th' earth ere he rot?" (5.1.165). "Goodman Delver" (14) answers with professional circumspection, as if to give this unknown stranger a "taste" of his "quality" (2.2.441): "Faith, if 'a be not rotten before 'a die (as we have many pocky corses nowadays that will scarce hold the laying i n ) , 'a will last you some eight year or nine year. A tanner will last you nine year" (5.1.166-69). As the guardian of mortality, the gravedigger is exacting in his measurement of time. A tanner's corpse can resist decomposition because "his hide is so tanned with his trade that 'a will keep out water a great while, and your water is a sore decayer of your whoreson dead body" (171-73). With a student's diligence, Hamlet tries to inform himself about the grave he must shortly lie in, and the clown-show and wit-combat in the graveyard teach him something he could never have learned at the University of Wittenberg. Even if " 'Twere to consider too curiously, to consider so" (207-8), Hamlet reaches a new understanding of the nature of mortality in this scene. He has cleared his mind of illusions, and in the next scene he is prepared not only to die well, but also to kill well. Animals T h e animal imagery of Hamlet shares the predominantly negative tone of such imagery throughout Shakespeare. Although Hamlet has some noble animals such — 63 —

IMAGERY

as the lion or the eagle, and a few gentle creatures such as the dove, these are overwhelmed by a mass of gross, predatory, cunning, and filthy beasts which symbolize man's loss of the godlike faculty of reason and his reversion to a life of will and appetite. T h e chief aspects of animal imagery are hunting, trapping, snaring, netting, and angling, and we have an emphasis on aggression and prey similar to that which characterized the imagery of war. Both kinds of imagery imply a threat of attack that "craves wary walking" (Julius Caesar 2.1.15). One of the central facts of the play is that Claudius and his agents are hunting Hamlet, who taxes Guildenstern and Rosencrantz with their pursuit of him: "why do you go about to recover the wind of me, as if you would drive me into a toil?" (3.2.353-55). A "toil" is a net in which to catch large game such as deer. By getting on their windward side, one may entice them into the trap. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are attempting to "draw" Hamlet "on to pleasures" (2.2.15), to "drive his purpose into these delights" (3.1.27), and to "pluck out the heart" of his "mystery" (3.2.373-74). T h e insistent allusions to hunting convert even such a ceremonial phrase as "We'll wait upon you" (2.2.271) into a suggestion that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are lying in wait in order to snare Hamlet. O n his English voyage Hamlet is "benetted round with villains" (5.2. 29), but, like Laertes, they are the proverbially foolish woodcocks who are caught in their "own springe" (5.2.307). Laertes' image almost exactly matches his father's earlier phrase for Hamlet's "holy vows": "Ay, springes to catch woodcocks" (1.3.114-15). For all their — 64 —

CORRUPTION

cunning, the Polonius family does not have a good casualty record. Polonius hunts "the trail of policy" (2.2.47) most subtly in the pursuit of his own son in Paris, where the sport of "indirections" (2.1.66) has its own pleasures apart from any objective purpose. Both "encompassment" (10) and "windlasses" are "assays of bias" (65), circuitous and winding attempts to trap game. T h e idea of artful pursuit is also expressed in a fishing image: "See you n o w — / Your bait of falsehood take this carp of truth" (62-63), a difficult fish to land. W e remember that Hamlet accuses Claudius of throwing out his "angle," or fishing line, "for my proper life" (5.2.66) . Death is also a hunter, as he is personified by Fortinbras at the end of the play: This quarry cries on havoc. O proud Death, What feast is toward in thine eternal cell T h a t thou so many princes at a shot So bloodily hast struck? (5.2.365-68) "Quarry" refers to the heap of deer killed at a single hunting, and "havoc" is a military cry for indiscriminate slaughter, as in Antony's oration: "Cry 'Havoc!' and let slip the dogs of war" (Julius Caesar 3.1.274). "Proud Death" is hunting for game to supply its feast, and only princes are suitable. This image is an apt example of how the hunting and military themes both have a common purpose. There is a brief counter-imagery in which Hamlet figures as the hunter, especially with his play, The Mousetrap. T h e title is meant "Tropically" (3.2.243), — 65 —

IMAGERY

or figuratively, according to the medieval fourfold method of interpretation, and the pun on the title is underscored by the Quarto 1 spelling, "trapically." Hamlet designed his play to "catch the conscience of the King" (2.2.617), who is no woodcock to the springe, but a tough villain who can take an enormous amount of psychological punishment. T h e most significant animal imagery in Hamlet is that derived from falconry, a form of hunting that parallels the art of war. There is a riddling hawk image in Hamlet's explanation of his madness to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern: " I am but mad north-northwest: when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw" (2.2.387-88) . T h e phrase is proverbial, and "handsaw" (in both Quarto 2 and Folio) has been considered a corruption of "hernshaw" or heron, although both "hawk" and "handsaw" are also terms for familiar tools. Despite these distracting meanings, I think we are supposed to understand that Hamlet is not so mad but that he can distinguish preying hawks (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern) from one of their favorite quarries, the heron (Hamlet himself), and the mention of specific winds supports the idea of hunting. Earlier in the play, Marcellus and Hamlet exchange a bantering set of falconer's cries to bring the bird back to the lure or fist: Marcellus. Illo, ho, ho, my lord! Hamlet. Hillo, ho, ho, boy! Come, bird, come. (1.5.115-16) — 66 —

CORRUPTION

This is the beginning of Hamlet's "wild and whirling words" (133) . W e remember that he made his promise to the Ghost in a falcon image: Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swift As meditation or the thoughts of love, May sweep to my revenge. (1.5.29-31) "Sweep" seems to refer to the hawk's "swooping" or "stooping" to prey from its "pitch," or apex of its flight, as Richard II admires " H o w high a pitch" Bolingbroke's "resolution soars" (Richard II 1.1.109). Since the falcon reaches its "pitch" just before it strikes, "enterprises of great pitch and moment" can suddenly "turn awry,/ And lose the name of action" (3.1.86-88). Claudius records Hamlet's escape from certain death in England with another term from falconry: "If he be now returned,/ As checking at his voyage" (4.7.61-62). A hawk is said to "check" when it abandons its proper quarry to pursue other birds that cross its path. "Checking" is ironic in this passage, because Hamlet as hawk is not within the control of Claudius as falconer. Hamlet thinks of his uncle as the prey of kites, those base hawks that were believed to feed on carrion: But I am pigeon-livered and lack gall T o make oppression bitter, or ere this I should ha' fatted all the region kites With this slave's offal. (2.2.588-91) From the talk of the players, we learn that the competition of the children's companies has forced them to — 67 —

IMAGERY

take to the road: "an eyrie of children, little eyases, that cry out on the top of question and are most tyrannically clapped for't" (2.2.347-49). "Eyrie" is the falcon's nest, and "eyases" are the fledgling hawks trained from the nest. These domesticated birds are meant to be contrasted with "haggards," the wild hawks caught and then trained, whose fierceness was much prized by Renaissance falconers. Hamlet welcomes the players with sporting enthusiasm: "We'll e'en to't like French falconers, fly at anything we see" (439-40). Hawks were trained to fly at only one, or at most several, kinds of prey, and Hamlet is soon using his player-hawks in more orthodox fashion to "catch the conscience of the King" (617). After the success of his play, Hamlet makes an explosively satirical reference to Claudius as a peacock: For thou dost know, O Damon dear, This realm dismantled was Of Jove himself; and now reigns here A very, very—peacock. 11 (3.2.287-90) T h i s little doggerel poem is probably meant to be sung, and Hamlet's avoidance of the "was"-"ass" rhyme puts special stress on "peacock," a bird "no less undesirable morally than musically, fiend-voiced, serpent-headed, thief-paced, lecherous, and an unnatural father." 12 Hamlet's topical song offers a lesson in the "dismantling" of 11

Hubler and many other editors read "pajock," a moderniza-

tion of Quarto 2's "paiock"

(Folio also has "paiocke"), but this

is a nonexistent animal, and even those editors who object to "peacock" agree that it is the word intended, of which they claim "pajock" as a variant. 12

Travers, p. 134.

— 68 —

CORRUPTION

the realm similar to that in the closet scene, where Hyperion, Jove, Mars, and Mercury (3.4.57-59) are replaced by the animal equivalents of the peacock: "a paddock," "a bat, a gib" (191). Bird imagery is used to characterize Osric, whose name suggests "ostrich" (in Quarto 2 he is actually called "Ostricke" 1 3 ). W e remember that he is also a "waterfly" (5.2.83), one of the "diminutives of nature" among Thersites' worthless nothings (Troilus and Cressida 5.1.31-32). T h e contrast between waterfly and ostrich makes an excellent grotesque, especially in the light of Samuel Johnson's definition: " A water-fly skips up and down upon the surface of the water, without any apparent purpose or reason, and is thence the proper emblem of a busy trifler." 14 In Hamlet's contemptuous description, Osric is a "chough" (5.2.89) or jackdaw, a foolish chattering bird, and part of the "bevy ['breed' in Quarto 2] that I know the drossy age dotes on" (191). Osric's exit in this scene is marked by Horatio's satirical thrust: "This lapwing runs away with the shell on his head" (187-88). It is a triumph of subtlety on Claudius' part to use such a foolish, callow bird as messenger for his poison plot, and Hamlet and Horatio are successfully put off their guard. As Spurgeon argues in her discussion of the dog-lick13

Quarto 2's "Ostricke" may, of course, be a misprint, since

the scene also has "Osrick," and both Ostr. and Osr. appear in the speech prefixes. But the birdlike name does suggest a deliberate choice, if only on the part of an inspired compositor or presscorrector. See Wilson, The

Manuscript

of Shakespeare's

Hamlet,

I, 149. 14

Johnson's

Notes

to Shakespeare,

— 69 —

ed. Arthur Sherbo, p. 178.

IMAGERY

ing-candy sequence, 15 dogs almost always suggest something unpleasant to Shakespeare, a point she illustrates with Hamlet's refusal to flatter Horatio: W h y should the poor be flattered? No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp, A n d crook the pregnant hinges of the knee Where thrift may follow fawning. (3.2.61-64) Although there are no dogs mentioned in the passage, the imagery suggests a spaniel or greyhound "at table, licking the hands of the guests, fawning and begging for sweetmeats. . . ." 16 Horatio, who is "e'en as just a man" (56) as Hamlet has ever met, has none of these courtier's attributes, especially not that corrupted virtue of "thrift." T h e pejorative quality of the dog image usually occurs in passing or by association, and it is often expressed in proverbial form. T h u s Gertrude addresses Laertes' rebels as "false Danish dogs" who run "counter" (4.5. 110), or in a direction opposite to that which the game has taken, and Hamlet will allow Laertes to rant, since " T h e cat will mew, and dog will have his day" (5.1.294). Hamlet proposes a difficult analogy for Polonius: "For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a good kissing carrion—Have you a daughter?"

(2.2.181-83).

T h i s is the lesson of Measure for Measure, where Angelo takes responsibility for his fall: 16

See Spurgeon, Shakespeare's

16

Spurgeon, Shakespeare's

Imagery,

Imagery,

— 70 —

pp. 195-99.

p. 197.

CORRUPTION

. . . but it is I That, lying by the violet in the sun, Do as the carrion does, not as the flow'r, Corrupt with virtuous season. (2.2.165-68) But Ophelia has not the resilience of Isabella in coping with Angelo, and there is no bed-trick to save her from her watery death. T h e image of stinking carrion is recalled when Hamlet tells the king where he may "nose" (4.3.36) Polonius' corpse, as, at the end of the previous scene, a hound might smell out the hidden fox. "Truth's a dog must to kennel," says the Fool in Lear (1.4.110), but Hamlet will "unkennel" (3.2.83) his uncle's "occulted guilt" (82) with his "dozen or sixteen lines" (2.2.551) of The

Mouse-

trap. There is a suggestion of malodorousness in "kennel," through its derivation from "cannel" (or "channel") , an open drain or gutter. T h e references to horses are also familiar and proverbial, which has the advantage of generating a strong and deeply rooted response. Hamlet doesn't bother to complete the old saw, " 'while the grass grows,' " since "the proverb is something musty" (3.2.351-52). Whetstone's version of 1576 reads, "whilst grasse doth growe, For want of foode the steede doth sterve"

(Tilley,

G423). Hamlet's teasing assertion before Lucianus enters is also a proverb: " 'Tis a knavish piece of work, but what of that? Your Majesty, and we that have free souls, it touches us not. Let the galled jade winch; our — 71 —

IMAGERY

withers are unwrung" ( 3 . 2 . 2 4 6 - 4 9 ) W e think of that "poor jade" Cut in 1 Henry IV, who "is wrung in the withers out of all cess" (2.1.6-7), a condition produced by "the galling or pinching by a badly fitting saddle of the part where the shoulder-bones join the neck." 18 T h e physical soreness that galling produces (from rubbing or chafing) becomes an image of destructive contact. T h e salt of Gertrude's "most unrighteous tears" gives her "galled eyes" (1.2.154-55). Hamlet complains that "the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier he galls his kibe" (5.1.142-44), and Laertes advises his sister that " T h e canker galls the infants of the spring/ T o o oft before their buttons be disclosed" (1.3.39-40). In a more menacing sense, Laertes will anoint his foil with a poison so powerful that "if I gall him slightly,/ It may be death" (4.7.147-48). These additional examples should help us understand why a "galled jade" will "winch." T h e most brilliant equestrian passage in the play is Claudius' description of Lamord, 19 "a gentleman of Normandy" (4.7.82) : I have seen myself, and served against, the French, A n d they can well on horseback, but this gallant Had witchcraft in't. He grew unto his seat, And to such wondrous doing brought his horse As had he been incorpsed and deminatured 17

See Tilley, H700: "Touch (Rub) a galled Horse on the back

and he will wince 18

speare's 19

(kick)."

A. Forbes Sieveking, "Horsemanship, with Farriery," England,

Shake-

II, 426.

Lamord is the name in Quarto 2; in Folio it is Lamound. —

72

—

CORRUPTION

With the brave beast. So far he topped my thought T h a t I, in forgery of shapes and tricks, Come short of what he did.

(4.7.83-90)

This is Claudius' only lyric and exuberant passage, and it has a leisure and copiousness that are intended to distract Laertes and puff him up with self-love. T h e king puns on "topped" as overtopped, surpassed, as well as mounted on a horse. "Incorpsed and deminatured/ With the brave beast" indicates that Lamord is like the Centaurs, who were known for their skill in natural magic, especially in poisons. There is some occult link between Lamord's "witchcraft" and Claudius' (cf. 1.5.43). In Hamlet's inflamed imagination, Claudius himself is represented as a "paddock" or toad, a "bat," and a "gib" or tomcat (3.4.191), all animals that were considered the familiars of witches. It is worth insisting that this is a moral description of Claudius; it sets forth the fauna of the region of his soul. T o take these frenzied imaginings as an accurate account of the king's physical appearance, as some critics have done,20 seems to me to distort the dramatic context. T h e important point about Claudius is the contrast between his regal bearing—"Ay, every inch a king" (King Lear 4.6.107) — a n d his inner rottenness. Although the Ghost calls him "a wretch whose natural gifts were poor/ T o those of mine" (1.5.51-52), we should not translate this into objective, physical terms. T o make Claudius up as ugly and repulsive, like Richard III, would destroy the unctu20

See Bradley, Shakespearean

Babcock, Hamlet:

A Tragedy

Tragedy, of Errors

University, 1961), p. 55.

— 73 —

p. 169, and Weston

(Lafayette, Ind.: Purdue

IMAGERY

ous hypocrisy of the "smiling, damned villain" (1.5. 106). It does seem, however, as if Claudius is a large and powerfully built man, capable of overawing Laertes and others by the sheer bulk of his royal person. In his own role, Hamlet is troubled by the question of "Bestial oblivion" (4.4.40), or a beast's lack of concern for anything besides the satisfaction of its appetites: What is a man, If his chief good and market of his time Be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more. (4.4-33-35)

T h u s a man is in danger of becoming a beast when "reason panders will" (3.4.89). Hamlet seems acutely conscious throughout the play of this amphibious nature of man, placed in a middle state, a little lower than the angels and a little higher than the beasts. It is the great paradox of the age that man, who should be "the beauty of the world, the paragon of animals," is nevertheless the "quintessence of dust" (2.2.315-17). Around him Hamlet sees a human reality divorced from ethical values, where "a beast that wants discourse of reason/ W o u l d have mourned longer" (1.2.150-51) than his own mother. Therefore he can wonder, in an animal image, "What should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven?" (3.1.128-29), or he can speculate why man, like a willing ass, "would fardels bear,/ T o grunt and sweat under a weary life" (3.1.76-77). These doubts are by no means answered in the play, but the young Hamlet is like the old Lear in insisting so strenuously on the question "What is a man?" (4.4. SB)-

— 74 —

CORRUPTION

Disease Imagery of disease offers one of the most traditional ways of creating a sense of evil in tragedy. In the typical structural pattern, the dramatic action moves toward the discovery and expulsion of the disease and the return of the body politic to health. T h e antagonist who is the source of the disease is uncovered and destroyed, but the protagonist who sets the action in motion also becomes implicated in it and must inevitably die. I am, of course, tracing a general development, but the form of tragedy lends itself to medical and therapeutic metaphors, in which the movement is always from disease to health. T h e need for tragic persons to be of high station has a practical as well as snobbish basis, since there is an immediate analogy between the king's two bodies, the natural and the politic. In a king or prince, private and public may be played off against each other with interesting tragic possibilities. What is often surprising in disease imagery is how literally disorders of a symbolic nature may be described. " T h e time is out of joint" (1.5.188), says Hamlet. There is a dislocation in the body of the world, in the nature of reality as well as in the body politic of Denmark, and Hamlet curses the spite " T h a t ever I was born to set it right" (189). T h i s is the very same image (with a double reference to carpentry) that Claudius uses for the audacity of "young Fortinbras," "thinking by our late dear brother's death/ Our state to be disjoint and out of frame" (1.2.19-20). Is the kingdom in need of medical attention? Claudius obviously does not —

55

—

IMAGERY

think so, but we soon see that there may indeed be something "rotten in the state of Denmark" (1.4.90). T h e word "rotten" is also associated with disease in the sense, now lost, of putridity carried by the air. T h e general condition of rottenness in Hamlet finds its most powerful expression in the imagery of skin disease, which derives from the Ghost's description of its poisoning: And a most instant tetter barked about Most lazarlike with vile and loathsome crust All my smooth body. (1.5.71-73) "Tetter" is a strong word for any pustular, herpetiform eruption of the skin, such as eczema, herpes, impetigo, or ringworm. T h e "lazarlike" and "loathsome crust" of the "tetter" gives the elder Hamlet's "smooth body" a hideous, barklike rugosity, and it provides a model for all the other skin diseases in the play. I have already discussed the connection between poison and disease in the second chapter. Hamlet's father is killed by a "leperous distillment" (1.5.64), as if the poison were a perverse medicine that could produce the disease. T h e poisonous "unction of a mountebank" (4.7.141) with which Laertes will anoint his foil is another perverse medicine, more powerful than any existing antidote: So mortal that, but dip a knife in it, Where it draws blood, no cataplasm so rare, Collected from all simples that have virtue Under the moon, can save the thing from death T h a t is but scratched withal. (4.7.142-46) — 76 —

CORRUPTION

Romeo first noted his fatal apothecary "Culling of simples" (Romeo and Juliet 5.1.40), but in Hamlet these old-fashioned, uncompounded herb-medicines can have no effect against a "potent poison" (5.2.354). It is an "anti-medicine," administered to kill rather than to cure, and it is significant that Laertes also refers to his poison as "this contagion" (4.7.147). He will "touch" (146) his point with it in both senses of the word: "anoint" (140) and infect, as Claudius had earlier offered Laertes "our kingdom . . ./ Our crown, our life" if he and his judges could "find us touched" (4.5.205-6). T h e king is boastfully disclaiming any infection or guilt from Polonius' death. In this context, Laertes' admission in the fencing match, " A touch, a touch; I do confess't" (5.2.287), is full of irony. " N o med'cine in the world" (315) can do Hamlet any good after he is touched with Laertes' stronger medicine, which, like the mountebank's nostrum that it is, serves for its owner too. With a nice moral symmetry, the images of disease can be reversed between protagonist and antagonist. Just as Hamlet will "tent" or probe Claudius "to the quick" (2.2.609) with his play, so Claudius brings Laertes "to the quick of th' ulcer-—/ Hamlet comes back" (4.7.123-24), and Laertes must make his lethal demonstration of filial love. Both Claudius and Hamlet acknowledge the existence of disease, but they have contradictory claims about who is afflicted. Hamlet is "the hectic" (4.3.66), or consumptive fever, that "rages" in Claudius' blood and that he calls on England to "cure" (67) . W e know the nature of this attempted cure, which we can judge by Claudius' proverbial formula: —

77

—

IMAGERY Diseases desperate g r o w n By desperate appliance are O r n o t a t all.

relieved, (4-3-9*10

I n b o t h these images, H a m l e t

is t h e d i s e a s e a n d

Clau-

d i u s t h e b o d y , w h i c h h e w a n t s us to u n d e r s t a n d as b o d y politic. I n the

final

a u d i t o f C l a u d i u s ' evil,

the

Ham-

l e t is c o n f i d e n t t h a t h i s r e v e n g e is j u s t : A n d is't n o t t o b e

damned

T o let this c a n k e r of o u r n a t u r e c o m e I n f u r t h e r evil?

(5.2.68-70)

C l a u d i u s is n o w t h e " c a n k e r " o r c a n c e r — t h e t w o w o r d s were

used

interchangeably

until

the

eighteenth

cen-

t u r y — t h a t is i n f e c t i n g t h e b o d y o f D e n m a r k . T h e

dou-

bleness of the ulcer or canker image, w h i c h H a m l e t

and

C l a u d i u s apply to each other, m a k e s it a p a r t of

other

ambiguities in the play. The

persistence of the i m a g e r y of skin disease

be seen in a n u m b e r very beginning,

of u n e x p e c t e d

the advent of the Ghost bodes

strange eruption"

(1.1.69)

t o

may

examples. A t

the state, w h i c h

the

"some Wilson

glosses as " a n o u t b r e a k o f c a l a m i t y o r e v i l . " 2 1 B u t

"erup-

t i o n " also has a strong secondary m e a n i n g of skin ease, as i n H o t s p u r ' s i m p u d e n t m o c k i n g o f "Diseased nature eruptions"

oftentimes

breaks

(1 Henry IV 3.1.27-28).

Glendower:

forth/ The

dis-

In

strange

Clown-grave-

d i g g e r , w h o is a f t e r a l l n o s o c i a l h i s t o r i a n , is d i s t u r b e d by the fact that " w e h a v e m a n y pocky corses that will 21

scarce

hold

the

laying

in"

nowadays

(5.1.166-68).

Wilson, p. 270. For the disease sense see Mahood,

speare's

Wordplay,

p. 113.

— 78 —

As

Shake-

CORRUPTION

another aspect of "the late innovation" (2.2.341) in the Danish kingship, Hamlet notes that in the last three years "the age is grown so picked that the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier he galls his kibe" (5.1.142-44). A "kibe" is a chapped or ulcerated chilblain on the heel—the effort to keep one's kibes ungalled is not just a matter of social distinction. In Hamlet's "dram of evil" speech, the "mole of nature" (1.4.24) is not a benign or even an eccentric growth, but a "vicious mole" that, like a cancer, eats away all vigorous and healthy qualities. T h e point of the speech is to deny a symmetrical and balanced morality of "taints and honours" waging equally in a man (Antony and Cleopatra 5.1.30), since the smallest quantity of evil is able to spoil the largest quantity of "noble substance" (1.4.37). Gertrude's moral weakness is also represented in physiological terms. Thus, her "act" . . . takes off the rose From the fair forehead of an innocent love, A n d sets a blister there. . . . (3.4.43-45) Schmidt defines "blister" as a pustule or ulcer, a sense that is demanded by the strong contrast between blister and rose, even as Laertes' mother may be branded a harlot "between the chaste unsmirched brow" (4.5.119). Hamlet also means us to understand that Gertrude, at menopause, is too old for keen sexual excitement: Y o u cannot call it love, for at your age T h e heyday in the blood is tame, it's humble, A n d waits upon the judgment. . . . (3.4.69-71) — 79 —

IMAGERY

"Blood" was a common Elizabethan word for sexuality. Although Schmidt pleasantly glosses "heyday" as "frolicsome wildness," the context insists that Gertrude can no longer be one of those dangerous lovers (as Polonius thinks Hamlet) whose "blood burns" (1.3.116). By putting particular stress on the dullness of his mother's senses, Hamlet presents a physical analogue for her moral blindness. His comparison of the two portraits in the closet scene is punctuated by a series of alarming questions about Gertrude's capacity to perceive: "Have you eyes?" (3.4.66), "Ha! Have you eyes?" (68), which ends in a bleak, Beckett-like conclusion: Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight, Ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans all, Or but a sickly part of one true sense. . . . (34-79-8I)

This enumeration of the senses contributes to the grossness of the scene, in which Hamlet holds forth as a medical as well as a spiritual counselor. Gertrude's inability to understand any but literal meanings seems to assure us of her tragic end. W h e n Hamlet warns her, metaphorically, "You go not till I set you up a glass" (3.4.20), she apparently thinks that she will be forced to drink a glass of poison, and her frightened cry, "What wilt thou do? T h o u wilt not murder me?" (22), leads directly to the stabbing of Polonius. " T h a t monster custom" (162), or habit, may have something to do with Gertrude's obtuseness, since it eats "all sense" (162), all awareness or perception of what we are actually doing. Gertrude's faculties are cer— 80 —

CORRUPTION

tainly in good working order, "Else could you not have motion" (73), but, figuratively, her "sense/ Is apoplexed" (73-74). This is a strong word, meaning a sudden arrest of the powers of motion, a temporary paralysis. Hamlet is presenting his argument in neurological terms in order to mitigate his mother's moral offense. T h e most persistent verbal theme within the motif of disease is that of "blasting," a word that occurs more often in Hamlet than in any other play of Shakespeare. T h e basis for the image is the infection carried by the air, especially night air and air in unhealthful places such as swamps and cemeteries. There is some literal notion of infected air in Hamlet's first words to the Ghost: "Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damned,/ Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell" (1.4.40-41). In Laertes' warning to his sister, there is also a strong sense of baleful contagion carried by the wind: " A n d in the morn and liquid dew of youth/ Contagious blastments are most imminent" (1.3.41-42). Laertes sweetens his purpose with mellifluous platitudes, but what he fears is Hamlet's "hot love on the wing" (2.2.132) and its power to blast Ophelia's virginity. A blastment is a sudden pernicious influence that blights, withers, shrivels, and destroys—the "blasted a n expression of this heath" in Macbeth (1.3.77) cursed and desolating force. "Blast" is also the familiar word for an explosion, as in Claudius' plot, whose "back or second" will be ready if the first part "did blast in proof" (4.7.153-54) • Ophelia laments Hamlet as a "blown youth/ Blasted with ecstasy" (3.1.162-63). Madness is a disease, and "Blasted" carries with it the sense — 81 —

IMAGERY

of a sudden infectious gust, as of a wind, capable of extinguishing the reason. T h e image is supported by "blown," meaning both blooming and windswept. In the closet scene, Claudius is "like a mildewed ear/ Blasting his wholesome brother" (3.4.65-66). There is a quibble on that symbolic ear through whose porches old Hamlet was destroyed. His brother is now the diseased ear itself, spreading his blighting fungus to the healthy ears in the corncrib. T h e sense of blasting as a curse is most explicit in the description of Lucianus' poison, which is "With Hecate's ban thrice blasted, thrice infected" (3.2. 264), as if these processes were inseparable. Some of this meaning carries over to Horatio's determination to cross the Ghost, "though it blast me" (1.1.127). One has the impression of a demon Ghost with the power to destroy the good Horatio in body and soul. By combining the notions of disease, explosion, annihilating wind, and diabolic curse, "blasting" becomes a complex word which no single meaning can adequately explain. W e have yet to answer the most pressing question of all: What ails Hamlet? Among his many difficulties, the most grievous are melancholy, heartache, and shortness of breath. Hamlet's worst complaint is, of course, melancholy, 22 the predominance of black bile, possibly even adust, which Robert Burton thought the source of all madness and all genius in this world. As generations of Romantic critics have nostalgically pointed out, Hamlet's "native hue of resolution/ Is sicklied o'er with the 22

See Bridget J. Gellert, "Three Literary Treatments of Mel-

ancholy: Marston, Shakespeare and Burton," doctoral dissertation, Columbia University, 1966, esp. Chap. 4, on

— 82 —

Hamlet.

CORRUPTION

pale cast of thought" (3.1.84-85) . In its root sense, however, this image is physiological. T h e natural redness and sanguinity of resolution pales to a much lighter color ("cast") as the blood is drawn from the cheeks by the workings of thought, a process always associated with melancholy in the Renaissance. W e remember Enobarbus' advice to Cleopatra after her perfidy at Actium: "Think, and die," and in his own death, if "swift thought" cannot break his heart, "a swifter mean/ Shall outstrike thought; but thought will do't, I feel" (Antony and Cleopatra 3.13.1, 4-6.35-36). Ophelia gives pansies "for thoughts" (4.5.176), and to Gertrude, heaven itself, in imitation of the Day of Doom, is "thoughtsick" at her "act" (3.4.52). Hamlet fears that his "weakness" and his "melancholy" may have made him an easy prey to the devil, who, "As he is very potent with such spirits,/ Abuses me to damn me" (2.2.613-15). Heartsick matches thoughtsick as a description of what ails Hamlet. Death is "a consummation/ Devoutly to be wished" (3.1.63-64) because it ends the dominion of "outrageous fortune" (58) : T o die, to sleep— No more—and by a sleep to say we end T h e heartache, and the thousand natural shocks T h a t flesh is heir to! (3.1.60-63) This is the only example of "heartache" in Shakespeare, and the OED marks it as the first use of the word in English in its modern sense; it seems to have special relevance to Hamlet and his problems. Just before the fencing match, Hamlet has an intui— 83 —

IMAGERY

tion of disaster that gives, in Kitto's term,23 a "religious" dimension to the tragedy: "I shall win at the odds. But thou wouldst not think how ill all's here about my heart. But it is no matter" (5.2.212-14). There is conscious poetic artifice in those matched monosyllables, "ill-all's" and "here-heart," but the assonantal modulation is sustained by the intensity of the context. Hamlet vows to "defy augury" (220), even those oracular reports from the region of his heart, because to a true Christian "There is special providence in the fall of a sparrow" (220-21). Echoing Matthew 10:29, he also assents to its description of a "divinity that shapes our ends" (5.2.10) and an "ordinant" (48) heaven. Hamlet's ill-boding heart recalls the opening scene, where Francisco thanks Barnardo for relieving him (in a therapeutic as well as military sense) : " 'Tis bitter cold,/ A n d I am sick at heart" (1.1.8-9) • This serves as the keynote of the first scene and possibly of the entire play, in which more persons than Francisco will suffer from atmospheric Angst. T h e vulnerability of Hamlet's heart is particularly insisted on. A t the end of his first soliloquy, he says: "But break my heart, for I must hold my tongue" (1.2.159), and after the exit of the Ghost he exclaims, perhaps with a gesture: "Hold, hold, my heart" (1.5.93) • Horatio marks Hamlet's death with a lyrically physiological observation: " N o w cracks a noble heart" (5.2.360), which draws on the Elizabethan notion of death as a snapping of the heartstrings or sinews. In contrast to Hamlet, Claudius has a "heart with strings of steel," which he 23

See Kitto, Form

and Meaning

in Drama,

ligious Drama and its Interpretation."

— 84 —

esp. Chap. 8: "Re-

CORRUPTION

vainly hopes may become "soft as sinews of the newborn babe" (3-3-7 0 "? 1 )There is a significant imagery of breathing in Hamlet, especially difficult breathing, as if to emphasize how much of a burden it is " T o grunt and sweat under a weary life" (3.1.77). One of the signs of Hamlet's painful mourning for his father is his "windy suspiration of forced breath" (1.2.79) • Difficult breathing is a symptom of pursiness, a malady that lends itself to moral metaphor, as in Alcibiades' reform program for Athens: Now breathless wrong Shall sit and pant in your great chairs of ease, A n d pursy insolence shall break his wind With fear and horrid flight. (Timon of Athens 5.4.10-13) In the closet scene, Hamlet describes the corruption of the present age in terms of pursiness: Forgive me this my virtue, For in the fatness of these pursy times Virtue itself of vice must pardon beg, Yea, curb and woo for leave to do him good. (3-4-153-56)

Corpulence makes one "pursy," or short- and brokenwinded. Pleurisy (or "plurisy") is related to pursiness through the painful and difficult breathing common to both. There was some confusion over the word in Elizabethan English, since it could mean either specifically an inflammation of the pleura (the coverings of the lungs), or,

— 85 —

IMAGERY

through a popular derivation from the Latin plus, an illness caused by general superabundance and excess of humors. 24 T h e latter sense of superfluity is found in Claudius' discourse on the fickle nature of time and fortune: And nothing is at a like goodness still, For goodness, growing to a plurisy, Dies in his own too-much. (4.7.116-18) This idea leads to the next image in Claudius' speech. Delay in putting into effect that which we should do creates a morbid condition, " A n d then this 'should' is like a spendthrift sigh,/ T h a t hurts by easing" (12223). One of the reasons that the sigh may hurt is because in a pleuritic state any breathing at all is painful. T h e sigh is "spendthrift," since sighing was thought to draw drops of blood from the heart and thereby squander the body's vitality. By an effect of antithesis of which Claudius is fond, it at once hurts and eases the body. T h e physiological dangers of sighing may also be seen in Ophelia's description of the lovelorn Hamlet: He raised a sigh so piteous and profound As it did seem to shatter all his bulk A n d end his being. (2.1.94-96) T h e strongest examples of this theme are found in the last scene of the play, where the difficulty of breathing has more than a figurative importance. W e remember that Hamlet wrenches the poisoned chalice from Horatio in order to force him to be his "abstract and brief" chronicle (2.2.535) : 2i

See Wilson, p. xxxvii, and Variorum, —

86

—

I, 365.

CORRUPTION

Absent thee from felicity awhile, A n d in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain, T o tell my story. (5.2.348-50) However pleuritically and pursily, Horatio must continue to "draw" his "breath in pain" in order to clear his friend's "wounded name" (345). Difficult breathing seems to provide a metaphor for the human condition. By a fitting irony, Claudius will pledge the poisoned cup "to Hamlet's better breath" (272). During the fencing match, the queen answers Claudius' hollow assertion: " O u r son shall win," with a statement that has puzzled commentators: "He's fat, and scant of breath" (288), which seems to state two reasons why Hamlet cannot possibly win. T h e context supports the idea that "fat" means "sweaty," since Gertrude's next words are: "Here, Hamlet, take my napkin [^handkerchief], rub thy brows" (289), and she persists even after she has drunk the poisoned cup: "Come, let me wipe thy face" (295). Gertrude's affectionate gesture echoes the very words of Doll Tearsheet to Falstaff: "Ah, you sweet little rogue, you! Alas, poor ape, how thou sweat'st! Come, let me wipe thy face" (2 Henry IV 2.4.206-7). Despite this random association with Falstaff, Hamlet is not necessarily overweight (as Richard Burbage, the actor who played Hamlet, seems to have been), but he is panting and perspiring because he is "fat" in the sense of not quite being in shape. I know that this interpretation denies Hamlet's earlier assertion that he has been "in continual practice" (5.2.212) since Laertes went into France, but an audience is not supposed to — 87 —

IMAGERY

notice such contradictions. Hamlet's "fatness" may also have something to do with the physical-spiritual condition of both his father and the Player King, who are murdered after their midday dinner, when they are "full of bread" (3.3.80) ,25 Although critics are repelled by the notion of a corpulent Hamlet, it seems to me that there is an association, perhaps only figurative, between fatness and pursiness, as in Hamlet's indignation at the "fatness of these pursy times" (3.4.154). No one has questioned Gertrude's assertion that her son is "scant of breath," which makes Hamlet as a fencer rather different from the dashing, romantic figure one sees in most productions. W e have been carefully prepared for his tragic death in this scene, and we are presumably willing to agree that, like all revengers (except a few impossibly Christian ones), he has become tainted by the workings of his revenge. If the negative imagery of disease and physical impairment has any cumulative force, we should be able to postulate certain physical correlates of Hamlet's taint. By being a revenger, he may literally have become "fat, and scant of breath," so that now more than ever before he is ready " T o die, to sleep," and by a sleep to "end/ T h e heartache, and the thousand natural shocks/ T h a t flesh is heir to!" (3.1.60-63). 25

See R. J. Dorius, "A Little More than a Little," SQ,

XI

(i960), 13-26. See also Kittredge's judicious note, p. 295; M. P. Tilley, " T w o Shakespearean Notes," Journal manic

Philology,

XXIV

of English

and

Ger-

(1925), 315-24; J. C. Maxwell, " 'Fat and

Scant of Breath' Again," English

Studies,

and Waldo H. Dunn's letter to the Times May 26, 1927, p. 375.

— 88 —

XXXII

(1951), 29-30;

Literary

Supplement,

CORRUPTION

Food T h e imagery of food and eating, like that of animals and disease, also undercuts man's claim to be a rational being. By relating hunger to the instinctive needs of animals, this imagery emphasizes man's grossness and sensuality, and there is a familiar association between gluttony and lechery. "Appetite" is always a pejorative term in Shakespeare, as in Lear's defense of the proposition, "Let copulation thrive": Behold yond simp'ring dame Whose face between her forks presages snow, T h a t minces virtue and does shake the head T o hear of pleasure's n a m e — T h e fitchew nor the soiled horse goes to't With a more riotous appetite. (King Lear 4.6.118-23) "Yond simp'ring dame" might well be Gertrude, who certainly "minces virtue," and who, like Cleopatra, is "wrinkled deep in time" (Antony and Cleopatra 1.5. 29). Enobarbus, in fact, describes Cleopatra's paradoxical attraction in an image that seems to be picked up from Hamlet. Gertrude shows an exorbitant affection for her first husband: Why, she would hang on him As if increase of appetite had grown By what it fed on. . . .

(1.2.143-45)

A n d Cleopatra manifests her "infinite variety" in physical terms:

— 89 —

IMAGERY

Other women cloy T h e appetites they feed, but she makes hungry Where most she satisfies. . . . (Antony and Cleopatra 2.2.240-42) There is a feeling of disgust in the Hamlet passage quite different from anything in Antony and Cleopatra, where sexual attraction is fatal and incomprehensible to reason, but also imperative. 26 Gertrude's lust is the leading motif in the food imagery. T h e Ghost admonishes Hamlet not to let "the royal bed of Denmark be/ A couch for luxury and damned incest" (1.5.82-83), and throughout its revelation is preoccupied with the sensuality of the queen: But virtue, as it never will be moved, T h o u g h lewdness court it in a shape of heaven, So lust, though to a radiant angel linked, W i l l sate itself in a celestial bed A n d prey on garbage. (i-5-53'57) T h e imagery is drawn from the gross terms of animal feeding. "Sate" means to surfeit, as a beast might do, and to "prey on garbage" is the act of a scavenging animal. W e think of Hamlet's frustrated wish to "ha' fatted all the region kites" with Claudius' "offal" (2.2-590_91)» or those parts of a slaughtered animal unfit for human consumption. In the closet scene, Hamlet takes up the Ghost's gross terms of animal feeding when he asks his mother: "Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed,/ A n d 26

See Maurice Charney,

Shakespeare's

Roman

Plays

bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1961), pp. 102-7.

— 90 —

(Cam-

CORRUPTION

batten on this moor? Ha! Have you eyes?" (3.4.67-68). In the first, pastoral image, we think of sheep or cattle grazing "on a heaven-kissing hill" (60), whereas in the second the scene is a "moor," a fen or wasteland on which one "battens," or gluts oneself—this is a specifically animal word. There is an obvious quibble on Claudius as a Moor, a darkskinned and therefore ugly and sinister person (according to popular belief) as contrasted with his "fair" brother. Hamlet continues his moral disquisition with revolting, physical details of his mother's "compulsive ardor" (87):

Nay, but to live In the rank sweat of an enseamed bed, Stewed in corruption, honeying and making love Over the nasty sty. . . . (3.4.92-95) T h i s imagery reveals as much about Hamlet's "imaginations . . . foul/ As Vulcan's stithy" (3.2.85-86) as about the lovemaking of Claudius and Gertrude. Its sexual content is drawn from cooking: the middle-aged lovers in the royal marriage bed are being "stewed" in their own sweat and hog's lard ("enseam&d," "nasty sty"), or possibly their "honeying" with each other and "making love" causes them to perspire as a stewing-pot steams. T h e image is specifically sexual in a way that reminds us of the sex nausea of Troilus and Cressida, whose food imagery is more extensive than that of any other play of Shakespeare.27 27

See Spurgeon, Shakespeare's

Imagery,

VII.

— 91 —

pp. 320-24 and Chart

IMAGERY

Many other images of animal eating support the combined notions of grossness and prey. Fortinbras, for example, has Sharked up a list of lawless resolutes, For food and diet, to some enterprise T h a t hath a stomach in't. . . . (1.1.98-100) As Wilson points out, "voracious and promiscuous feeding was for Shakespeare the distinctive feature of the shark tribe." 28 By an associative link, the shark image suggests "food and diet," which in turn leads to "stomach," a word that means stubborn courage. In Guildenstern's "candy deal of courtesy" (1 Henry IV 1.3.251) to the king, there is an unintended hint of prey: Most holy and religious fear it is T o keep those many many bodies safe T h a t live and feed upon your Majesty. (3.3.8-10) If the king's body is indeed the body politic, then all of his subjects feed upon his sustaining favor, as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are doing in parasitic fashion — i n Elizabethan English "feeder" can also mean servant. N o matter how threatening they may appear as the king's agents, they will themselves be eaten in the end. Hamlet delights in deflating their aggressive postures: "But such officers do the King best service in the end. He keeps them, like an ape an apple,29 in the corner of 28

Wilson, p. xxxvi. T h e only other reference to shark in Shake-

speare is in the witches' brew of Macbeth 291

(4.1.23-24).

follow the reading of Parrott and Craig, after Fanner,

which is used by Alexander and which seems to me the only one

— 92 —

CORRUPTION

his jaw, first mouthed, to be last swallowed" (4.2.16-19). "Mouthed" is another gross word from animal eating, and it recalls the mouthing of game by hunting dogs. In his praise of Horatio, Hamlet uses the fastidious feeding of a dog at table as a sign of court corruption: No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp, A n d crook the pregnant hinges of the knee Where thrift may follow fawning. (3.2.62-64) "Candied" suggests the cloying sweetness of Polonius' image for Ophelia, set out with her prayer book to entrap Hamlet: 'Tis too much proved, that with devotion's visage A n d pious action we do sugar o'er T h e devil himself.

(3.1.47-49)

Candying is literally a process of "sugaring o'er," so that it makes an apt image for a deceptive appearance. W e think also of the excessive sweetness of Ophelia, sucking "the honey" of Hamlet's "musicked vows" (3.1.159) — the sound is too musical in this phrase and in the whole overwrought speech. Food imagery lends itself well to wordplay. W h e n asked by the king how he "fares" (3.2.94), Hamlet chooses to understand the word as "feeds," and answers darkly: "Excellent, i' faith, of the chameleon's dish: I eat the air, promise-crammed; you cannot feed capons so" (95-97) • Since the chameleon was fabled to live on that makes good sense out of the passage. Hubler reads "like an ape," from Folio.

— 93 —

IMAGERY

air, the rightful heir (the "air-heir" pun) 80 may thrive by cramming himself with promises, which are only of "so sweet breath composed" (3.1.98). But the fat and sexless capon, destined for the slaughter, must be fed on more substantial food; he too is "crammed," or forcefed, but not with promises. There is unsparing wordplay on the dead body of Polonius, beginning to putrefy. Hamlet reports that he is " A t supper" (4.3.17), but active and passive have changed places in the dining arrangements of man's mortality: "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. W e 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" (19-25). T h e present diet of worms quibbles on the one that Emperor Charles convoked in 1521, which pronounced its ban on Luther, Hamlet's fellow student from the University of Wittenberg—a name that itself suggests a pinnacle of wits. "Politic" worms attend on Polonius, who has always himself hunted "the trail of policy" (2.2.47) > a n d they celebrate, by feasting, the same triumph over him as over the "politician" who "would circumvent God" (5.1.79-81). As Delius points out, Hamlet may also sardonically mean that the worms become politic from feeding on so distinguished a diet. 81 Hamlet expounds these transformations in a mock 80

See

Helge

Kokeritz,

Shakespeare's

Pronunciation

Haven: Yale University Press, 1953), pp. 90-91. 81

Variorum, I, 318. — 94 —

(New

CORRUPTION

funeral sermon for Polonius: " A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm" (4.3.27-28)—words especially appropriate for a "fishmonger" (2.2.174). T h e upshot of this Pythagorean metempsychosis is that by eating fish, "a king may go a progress through the guts of a beggar" (4.3.30-31). In the stage action, Polonius is literally going a "progress" from behind the arras to behind the "stairs into the lobby" (37), where he may indeed be "nosed" like any "good kissing carrion" (2.2. 182). T h e "politic worms" of Polonius' feast reappear in the graveyard as subjects of Lady Worm (5.1.89), who rules all in that kingdom. There is a strong emphasis on eating and drinking to mark the end to which all flesh must come. T h e Clown-gravedigger recalls that this grinning skull of Yorick was "the King's jester," who "poured a flagon of Rhenish on my head once" (18082). He might well be thinking wistfully of that wasted flagon, since his fellow Clown, sent to the imperishable Yaughan's 32 to fetch "a stoup of liquor" (61), has not yet returned—and does not return within the time of the play. These somber thoughts about the king's jester work together with the real and imagined smells around him to turn Hamlet's stomach: "My gorge rises at it" (189). T h e "gorge" is the crop, especially of a hawk, but it could also mean what has been swallowed, especially the chewed and partially digested food in the stomach. T h e rising gorge indicates vomiting, and we 32

T h e name "Yaughan"

appears only in Folio. It is not in

Hubler's text.

— 95 —

IMAGERY

remember that the Ghost has been "cast up" by the "ponderous and marble jaws" of its sepulcher (1.4.5051) •

If we return now to the Ghost's unforgettable description of the murder, we discover that it contains a powerful and unexpected food image. T h e poison "courses" through the body "swift as quicksilver" (1.5.66) : A n d with a sudden vigor it doth posset A n d curd, like eager droppings into milk, T h e thin and wholesome blood. (1.5.68-70) Like the ale, wine, or other liquor put into hot milk (with sugar and spices) to make a posset, the poison is also an "eager dropping," or acid, that can curdle the blood. By a deliberate irony, Shakespeare takes a familiar and comforting drink, often used as a nightcap or as a remedy for colds, to represent the effects of a hideous poison. So Lady Macbeth has drugged the "possets" of Duncan's grooms (Macbeth 2.2.6) . W e remember that word "eager" from the scene in which Hamlet and Horatio await the Ghost: a "nipping and an eager air" "bites" (1.4.1-2) as an acid corrodes. T h e milk image is especially associated with mother's milk, and hence with the "milk of human kindness" that Lady Macbeth fears will mollify her husband's ambition. She will exchange her "milk for gall" and be ready to dash out the brains of "the babe that milks me" (Macbeth 1.5.14, 45; 1.7.55) • This is the most significant milk imagery in Shakespeare, and it should help us understand the three examples in Hamlet. As a parallel figure to the Ghost, old Priam is also cruelly — 96 —

CORRUPTION

murdered; but just before his death there is a curious pause in the action, as Pyrrhus' sword, "Which was declining on the milky head/ Of reverend Priam, seemed i' th' air to stick" (2.2.489-90). In this context, "milky" means not only mild, but also white-haired, "reverend." T h e effect of Priam's murder, as heard through the clamor of Hecuba, "Would have made milch the burning eyes of heaven/ And passion in the gods" (52829). T h e old form, "milch," and the conceit of tears as milk (as in Crashaw's " T h e Weeper"), are all part of the heightened rhetoric in this speech. Even if Hecuba's plaintive wail has no effect on the gods, it does make "milch the burning eyes" of the First Player, who is forced to break off his declamation. Set against the "milky head" of Priam and the "milch" tears expected from the gods, there is in this narrative a brutal food imagery like that of Seneca's Thyestes. Hamlet begins it with a description of Pyrrhus that mixes heraldry and cooking: Head to foot Now is he total gules, horridly tricked With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, Baked and impasted with the parching streets. . . . (2.2.467-70) Burning Troy bakes and "impastes," or makes a crust of, the blood of slaughter on the demonic Pyrrhus, who wears his "total gules" as the livery of the murderer. W e remember that the poison had covered the elder Hamlet's "smooth body" "with vile and loathsome crust" (1.5.72-73), and in Richard II's grotesque de— 97 —

IMAGERY

scription of the grave as a meat pie, the earth "serves as paste and cover to our bones" (Richard II 3.2.154). So Pyrrhus presses on toward his victim as if walking in a baking oven. He is "Roasted in wrath and fire" (2.2. 472), which suggests that both internal and external heat make him "thus o'ersiz£d with coagulate gore" (473). There is a further allusion to food in Hecuba's sight of Pyrrhus "mincing with his sword her husband's limbs" (525). This domestic imagery of cooking and food preparation adds a special touch of cruelty to horrors of mythological proportions. Before we leave the Ghost and its problems both in this world and the next, we should notice an odd cooking image in its account of purgatory: My hour is almost come, W h e n I to sulf'rous and tormenting flames Must render up myself. (1.5.2-4) In addition to the obvious meaning of "render" as return or yield, there is also a suggestion that the fat and dross of his "foul crimes done in my days of nature" (12) must be purged away or clarified by "sulf'rous and tormenting flames." This would make a link between old Hamlet and old Priam, between the fires of purgatory and those of burning Troy. Although there is much talk of food in Hamlet, there are no scenes of feasting either on stage or off. W e hear from Hamlet about two feasts that seem to have been planned as one: "Thrift, thrift, Horatio. T h e funeral baked meats/ Did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables" (1.2.180-81). This is the "thrift" of domestic — 98 —

CORRUPTION

management, the astute handling of leftovers, the sort of "base respects of thrift" that the Player Queen tells us are "instances that second marriage move" (3.2.18889) — a virtue from Poor Richard's Almanack. T h e juxtaposition of funerals and marriages is aptly expressed by the king's mindless oxymorons: With an auspicious and a dropping eye, W i t h mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage, In equal scale weighing delight and dole. . . . (1.2.11-13) Like the imagery of eating, drinking is also an appetitive theme. Hamlet makes a particular point of his uncle's carousing, which represents for him everything that is "rank and gross" (1.2.136) in the new regime. Almost his very first words to Horatio are: "We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart" (175). Claudius "drains his draughts of Rhenish down" (1.4.10) with public ceremony, as if insisting on his private vice as a national virtue. Hamlet is concerned with the slur to the Danish national character, the "dram of evil" (36) that corrupts all other aspects of reputation: T h i s heavy-headed revel east and west Makes us traduced and taxed of other nations. T h e y clepe us drunkards and with swinish phrase Soil our addition, and indeed it takes From our achievements, though performed at height, T h e pith and marrow of our attribute. (1.4.17-22) "Pith" is the vegetable equivalent of "marrow," and both words together mean the essential or vital part, the — 99 —

IMAGERY

quintessence, as when the undivulged "foul disease" feeds "Even on the pith of life" (4.1.23) . Throughout the play, Hamlet is preoccupied with the drunkenness of his uncle, the "bloat King" (3.4. 183), who is like Ophelia's "puffed and reckless libertine" (1.3.49). After The Mousetrap, Guildenstern reports that the king "Is in his retirement marvelous distemp'red" (3.2.307-8), to which Hamlet quips: "With drink, sir?" (309). In the prayer scene, Hamlet passes up his chance to kill Claudius in order to wait for a time "When he is drunk asleep, or in his rage" (3.3.89). In Hamlet's imagination, his uncle is a "satyr" (1.2. 140) , who "Keeps wassail, and the swagg'ring upspring reels" (1.4.9) • As Samuel Johnson thought, "upspring" seems to mean "blustering upstart," reeling with drunkenness, rather than that mysterious Germanic dance the "Hiipfauf," or the "upsy freeze," of which it would seem doubtful that Claudius could know the steps.33 Again, we need to insist that this is Claudius as Hamlet pictures him in his "mind's eye" (1.2.185). There is no trace of drunkenness or any other satyric, Corybantic, or centaur-like quality in the character the audience sees—not even a hangover. For his own drinking, Hamlet prefers potions other than the king's "Rhenish": Now could I drink hot blood And do such business as the bitter day Would quake to look on. 33

See Johnson's

159, and Variorum,

Notes

to Shakespeare,

I, 78-79.

— 100 —

(3.2.398-400) ed. Arthur Sherbo, p.

CORRUPTION

Hamlet is invoking strains of Teutonic warrior traditions, in which the hot blood of one's enemy is the only really satisfying beverage. 34 In this context, we should also remember the odd image Gertrude uses for Ophelia's death: . . . her garments, heavy with their drink, Pulled the poor wretch from her melodious lay T o muddy death. (4.7.181-83) Like the drunken grooms of Duncan in Macbeth, Ophelia's clothes are imagined as sodden rogues, who complete the "bloody deed" (3.4.28) begun by the "envious," or spiteful, "sliver" (4.7.173) of the willow branch. It is a strained conceit, but it is rescued from its own artifice by the matching of "melodious" and "muddy" and the consistent harmony of liquid and nasal sounds. In the final scene, the imagery of drinking enters directly into the stage action. Claudius depends upon the social situation, since Hamlet is honor-bound to answer the king's "health." But Hamlet sets by the cup and excuses himself from the "custom/ More honored in the breach than the observance" (1.4.15-16). Gertrude drinks and is poisoned, and her last exclamations put a strident emphasis on "the drink, the drink! O my dear Hamlet!/ T h e drink, the drink!" (5.2.310-11). There is a fitting reversal in Hamlet's forcing Claudius to "Drink off this potion" (327), the same euphemistic "chalice for the nonce" (4.7.160) that the king had prepared for his nephew. T h e catastrophe of Hamlet fulfills 34 See Prosser, Hamlet

and Revenge,

— 101 —

pp. 181-82.

IMAGERY

with an uncanny literalness the tragic criteria of Macbeth: This even-handed justice Commends th' ingredience of our poison'd chalice T o our own lips. (Macbeth 1.7.10-12) Macbeth is trying to convince himself that he should not murder Duncan, and, in this early scene, he already has a moral insight far beyond that of Claudius, on whom he is modeled. T h e religious overtones of "chalice" suggest the identification of blood and wine, so that drinking may become an appropriately symbolic means of death. Gardens T h e well-tended garden, free from weeds and flourishing in symmetrical order, reflects the perfection of that first happy place where Adam and Eve dwelt before the fall. T h u s the garden of paradise is the model by which to understand the corruption introduced into gardens by man's sin. Through analogy, the body politic can be represented in these same terms, as in the celebrated garden scene of Richard II:80 W h y should we, in the compass of a pale, Keep law and form and due proportion, Showing, as in a model, our firm estate, W h e n our sea-walled garden, the whole land, 35

See the appendix

on Shakespeare's garden symbolism

Wolfgang Clemen, Shakespeares

Bilder

ter does not appear in the English translation Terry

Allen

Comito,

"Renaissance

Gardens

(1951). See also and

Elizabethan

Romance," doctoral dissertation, Harvard University,

— 102 —

in

(Bonn, 1936). T h i s chap-

1968.

CORRUPTION Is full of weeds; her fairest flowers chok'd up, Her fruit trees all unprun'd, her hedges ruin'd, Her knots disordered, and her wholesome herbs Swarming with caterpillars? (3.4.40-47) Only by strong measures can the garden be restored to its former condition, its overgrowth pruned and the "caterpillars of the commonwealth" (Richard II 2.3. 166) destroyed. This is a normative symbolism, which, like that of disease and health, lends itself to simple antitheses. T h u s flowers may be set against weeds, nurture against neglect, and the gardener can be either diligent or slothful in his God-given work. As the setting for the murder of Hamlet's father— "Sleeping within my orchard" (1.5.59)—gardens have pejorative connotations almost from the beginning of the play. In Hamlet's first soliloquy, his "prophetic soul" (40) anticipates the dire garden imagery of the Ghost's revelation: How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable Seem to me all the uses of this world! Fie on't, ah, fie, 'tis an unweeded garden T h a t grows to seed. Things rank and gross in nature Possess it merely. (1.2.133-37) W e should not be misled by the luxuriance of growth in this garden, which indicates nature exerting its force apart from human agency or reason; it is this "naturalism" that breeds atheism, as in Edmund and Iago. Vile weeds are especially rank and vigorous, always threatening to choke the more noble and delicate plants, which — 103 —

IMAGERY need human care and divine benediction in order to flourish. If, as Iago says, " O u r bodies are our gardens to the which our wills are gardeners" (Othello 1.3.321-22), then weeds represent sins, as they did in popular iconography. Thus Hamlet exhorts his mother not to "spread the compost on the weeds/ T o make them ranker" (3.4. 152-53). Such weeds must either be plucked out by the roots or starved to death. T h e Ghost uses the weed image in a memorable way to spur Hamlet to his revenge: I find thee apt, A n d duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed T h a t roots36 itself in ease on Lethe wharf, Wouldst thou not stir in this. (1.5.31-34) As the river of forgetfulness, Lethe symbolizes spiritual torpor, so that the "fat weed" thriving on its banks or docks presents a revolting image of sloth. Aside from the weed, any lush growth may represent the effects of sin. T h e Ghost complains that it was " C u t off even in the blossoms" of its sin (1.5.76), and when Hamlet is about to murder Claudius, he echoes the Ghost's words: " 'A took my father grossly, full of 36

"Roots" is the reading of Quarto 2, but many editors follow

the Folio "rots" on the analogy of a passage in Antony Cleopatra

and

(1.4.44-47). T h i s seems to me, however, to make the

wrong image. See C. J. Sisson, New

Readings

in

Shakespeare

(London, 1956), II, 212, and Parrott and Craig, pp. 98-99. There is some orthographical confusion of "root" and "rot" and possible wordplay on "root," "rot," and "rut," as in Jaques' lines: " A n d so, from hour to hour, we ripe and ripe, / And then, from hour to hour, we rot and rot" Kokeritz, Shakespeare's

(As

You

Pronunciation,

— 104 —

Like

It

2.7.26-27). See

p. 238 and note 4.

CORRUPTION bread,/ With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May" (3.3.80-81). "Blown" means flowering, in bloom, as Ophelia calls Hamlet a "blown youth" (3.1.162) . T h e vigor of "flush" May is used pejoratively, for the rankness of the Ghost's "crimes" or sins. This image is another expression of the powerful energy of matter without the tempering control of spirit, which should curb and inhibit such a "flush." T h e "puffed and reckless libertine," who is committed in principle to naturalism, treads "the primrose path of dalliance," while the true Christian follows "the steep and thorny way to heaven" (1.3.48-50). These are the same spiritual thorns that the Ghost provides for Gertrude's conscience: Leave her to heaven A n d to those thorns that in her bosom lodge T o prick and sting her. (1.5.86-88) T h e symbolic garden in Hamlet seems to be a dangerous and threatening place. As Hamlet tells Ophelia in the nunnery scene, "virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it" (3.1.117-19). N o amount of grafting can obliterate the taste of the "old stock" of old Adam's sinful nature. T h e rose imagery in Hamlet indicates the beauty and love which have been destroyed in this new world created by Claudius' murder. T o Hamlet, his mother's "act" . . . takes off the rose From the fair forehead of an innocent love, A n d sets a blister there. . . . — 105 —

(3-4-43"45)

IMAGERY Therefore Ophelia must " T o a nunnery, go, and quickly too," since even the chaste and the pure shall "not escape calumny" (3.1.141-42, 138). Laertes warns his sister of the perils lurking in her garden: " T h e canker galls the infants of the spring/ T o o oft before their buttons be disclosed" (1.3.39-40). T h e cankerworm or the rose caterpillar was thought to be especially fond of buds, so that these spring roses of Ophelia, the "rose of May" (4.5.157), seem doomed to perish without ever being "disclosed"—the word is used in its etymological sense (cf. 5.1.289). Like most of the other garden images, the rose seems to mark a lost fulfillment and an unrealized possibility. It recalls the sweeter world that existed before the murder of Hamlet's father, in which young Hamlet was " T h ' expectancy and rose of the fair state,/ T h e glass of fashion, and the mold of form" (3.1. 1 55-56). Since the garden imagery is so generally pejorative in Hamlet, we shall find it difficult to sentimentalize Ophelia's flowers, although actresses playing this part rarely allow themselves to be photographed without at least a nosegay or disordered wreath about their persons. W e may begin with the violet image, which seems to show a pattern of development. Laertes launches his exhortation against Hamlet's love by calling it A violet in the youth of primy nature, Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting, T h e perfume and suppliance of a minute, N o more. (1.3.7-10) — 106 —

CORRUPTION T h e momentary quality of the violet's perfume is emphasized in the repetition of that fateful " N o more": Laertes. Ophelia.

N o more. No more but so?

Laertes.

T h i n k it no more. (1.3.10)

These words echo in Gertrude's pleas in the closet scene, just before the Ghost enters to protect her: " O Hamlet, speak no more," " O , speak to me no more," " N o more, sweet Hamlet," " N o more" (3.4.89, 95, 97, 102). Again, at Ophelia's funeral, we have the same formula of finality: Laertes. Must there no more be done? Doctor. No more be done. (5-1-237)

W e remember Lear's overwhelming, " T h o u ' l t come no more,/ Never, never, never, never, never" (King Lear 5.3.307-8). In her mad scene, Ophelia is still thinking of violets, although she has none to offer: "I would give you some violets, but they withered all when my father died" (4.5.182-84). Her erratic fancy presents images of mourning not only for her father, but also for herself and for her unfulfilled love, " A violet in the youth of primy nature." According to Clement Robinson, "Violet is for faithfulnesse." 37 For his sister's funeral, Laertes reverses his earlier violet image: 37

Quoted in Kittredge, p. 265.

— 107 —

IMAGERY Lay her i' th' earth, And from her fair and unpolluted flesh May violets spring! (5.1.240-42) Ophelia has managed to keep "her fair and unpolluted flesh" from the taint of a corrupt world by surrendering herself "mermaidlike" to "the weeping brook," "like a creature native and indued/ Unto that element" (4.7. 175, 176, 179-80). She has solved the problem of her "too too solid flesh" (1.2.129) in a way that is not possible for Hamlet. Almost by lyric style alone, she is able to obliterate all traces of involvement in her father's plots, and to convince us of her ruined perfection. Ophelia mentions many flowers in her mad scene, but although she distributes them with symbolic appropriateness, it seems doubtful whether we can ever identify the persons for whom they are intended. In an age when flower symbolism had become extremely complex, Ophelia helps us by naming some of the attributes: "There's rosemary, that's for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember. A n d there is pansies, that's for thoughts" (4. 5.174-76). Rue is "herb of grace o' Sundays" (181), the "sour herb of grace" of the Gardener's lament for King Richard's queen: "Rue, even for ruth, here shortly shall be seen,/ In the remembrance of a weeping queen" (.Richard II 3.4.106-7). Ophelia dwells on "Rue, even for ruth" for herself and for all others who feel sorrow mixed with repentance and the need for grace. This general significance goes beyond a narrow identification of rue as the flower intended for Gertrude. It also seems unlikely that Ophelia actually has specimens of rose— 108 —

CORRUPTION mary, pansies, fennel, columbines, rue, daisies, and violets in her hands to distribute to persons on stage.88 She is, after all, not a botanist like Friar Laurence, but a young maiden distracted in her wits; and most of the audience would not, at any rate, be able to distinguish exactly what flowers she is holding. Like Polonius, Ophelia dies "Larded all with sweet flowers" (4.5.38). In Gertrude's description, the fatal scene makes the most sustained lyric passage in the play: There is a willow grows askant the brook, T h a t shows his hoar leaves in the glassy stream: Therewith fantastic garlands did she make Of crowflowers, nettles, daisies, and long purples, T h a t liberal shepherds give a grosser name, But our cold maids do dead men's fingers call them. (4.7.166-71) T h e willow is the tree of forsaken lovers. In Lorenzo's evocation, Dido stood . . . with a willow in her hand Upon the wild sea-banks, and waft her love T o come again to Carthage. (The Merchant of Venice 5.1.10-12) Most memorably, Desdemona sings her "song of 'willow,' " learned from the maid Barbary, whose lover "prov'd mad,/ A n d did forsake her" (Othello 4.3.26-27). Ophelia makes her "fantastic garlands" of willow twigs decorated with meadow flowers, all of which have con38

See Variorum,

Theatre

I, 346, and William Poel, Shakespeare

(London, 1913), p. 172.

— 109 —

in

the

IMAGERY notations either of grossness or deception. T h e "dissembling" daisy is one of the flowers of the mad scene, and we know that the nettle is a "stinging" (Richard II 3.2.18) and an "idle" weed (King Lear 4.4.5). Apparently the long purple is the Phallus impudicus of Shakespeare's Warwickshire countryside; 88 its associations fit well with Ophelia's bawdy ballads. Gertrude describes the flowers that Ophelia has been preparing for her father's tomb as if they were garlands for Ophelia's own watery grave beneath the willow: There on the pendent boughs her crownet weeds Clamb'ring to hang, an envious sliver broke, W h e n down her weedy trophies and herself Fell in the weeping brook. (4.7.172-75) By a fanciful pathetic fallacy, the brook is already "weeping" as a mourner at her funeral. Real flowers are used in Ophelia's "maimed rites" (5.1.221); the literal and "churlish priest" 40 will allow her only "virgin crants" and "Her maiden strewments" (234-35). "Crants" (Kranz) is the German word for garland or wreath, and in Folio this unusual word is replaced by the colorless "Rites." There is an odd phonetic link between "virgin crants" 89

See p. 57, note 5.

40

He is a "Doctor,"

presumably of Divinity, in the speech

prefixes of Quarto 2. T h e Folio speech prefixes have "Priest,"

as

in 5.1.242. It seems unlikely that this difference is so crucial as Wilson represents it. "Priest" would not be at all unreasonable in a play with a vaguely

pre-Reformation setting, whose

Ghost

speaks of purgatory. In any case, there seems to be no consistent pattern of theological references in Hamlet.

See Parrott and Craig,

pp. 220-21, and Roland Mushat Frye, Shakespeare Doctrine

and

(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963).

— 110 —

Christian

CORRUPTION and the much maligned Rosencrantz. "Strewments" are the flowers laid on the grave by the mourners, who would presumably know how to express Ophelia's virginity in the flower symbolism of the time. Gertrude scatters flowers to accompany her line: "Sweets to the sweet! Farewell" (245). Her ceremonial act reminds us of that mingling of funerals and marriages so characteristic of this play: I hoped thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's wife. I thought thy bride bed to have decked, sweet maid, A n d not have strewed thy grave. (5.1.246-48) W e should not forget one other garden image, that old-fashioned stage property of the dumb show, "a bank of flowers," on which the Player King "lies him down" (3.2.140 s.d.) for his after-dinner nap. W e know from Henslowe's inventory of 1598 that he had "ij mose banckes" (two moss banks), which he lists together with one caduceus and a snake.41 This is probably the sort of resting place Hermia has in mind when she says: "For I upon this bank will rest my head" (A Midsummer Night's Dream 2.2.40), and is undoubtedly the same property that Titania offers to Bottom: "Come, sit thee down upon this flow'ry bed" (4.1.1). In The Merchant of Venice, Lorenzo woos Jessica with a similar invitation: 41

Henslowe's

Diary,

ed. R. A. Foakes and R. T . Rickert (Cam-

bridge, Eng.: Cambridge University Press, 1961), p. 320. See also George Fullmer Reynolds, The the Red

Bull

Theater

Staging

1605-1625,

of Elizabethan

Plays

At

Modern Language Association

(New York, 1940), pp. 73-75, and Percy Simpson, "Actors and Acting," Shakespeare's

England,

II, 269-70.

— Ill

—

IMAGERY How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank! Here will we sit and let the sounds of music Creep in our ears. . . .

(5-1-54-56)

These Elizabethan flower or moss banks probably resembled the vernal canvas and wood arrangements still used by florists, caterers, and ancient photographers to set off their wares. In the Quarto 1 staging of the dumb show, the Player King "sits down in an arbor," which is another old-fashioned pastoral property, best remembered as the scene of Horatio's death in The Spanish Tragedy (1587). It seems not at all unlikely that the bank of flowers (in Quarto 2 and Folio) was used together with the arbor of Quarto 1. T h e fact that garden imagery is of much less importance in Hamlet than the imagery of animals, disease, and food seems to point to the very limited role of nature in the play. In King Leari2 and Macbeth, for example, we feel that evil permeates the nature of things, or at least threatens to reestablish the dominion of Chaos and Old Night: Light thickens, and the crow Makes wing to th' rooky wood; Good things of day begin to droop and drowse, Whiles night's black agents to their preys do rouse. (Macbeth 3.2.50-53) King Lear on the heath is "unaccommodated man," engaging himself directly with the forces of nature, trying to "Crack nature's moulds, all germens spill at 42

See John F. Danby, Shakespeare's

Study

of King

Lear

(London, 1961).

— 112 —

Doctrine

of Nature:

A

CORRUPTION once,/ That makes ingrateful man" (King Lear 3.4. 106, 3.2.8-9). This universalizing dimension of nature is missing in Hamlet, which, like Othello, is a much more personal tragedy than either King Lear or Macbeth. There are hints in Hamlet of a wider perspective, especially at the end of the first scene, when dawn reasserts the primacy of God and nature over " T h ' extravagant and erring spirit" (1.1.154) as well as over the "bitter cold" (8) and fearful night. Shakespeare makes a determined lyric effort to modulate the anxious mood that opened the play. With leisurely and adoring fullness, Marcellus discourses about "that season . . . / Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated," when the cock "singeth all night long" (158-60). Horatio continues with his beautiful announcement of the dawn: But look, the morn in russet mantle clad Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill. (1.1.166-67) T h e god of morning, dressed as a peasant in "russet mantle," can once again make his accustomed rounds despite the portentous Ghost whose appearance bodes "some strange eruption to our state" (69). But this example of nature exerting its influence over the fears and limited concerns of man is very rare in Hamlet, and there is little in the play that is "hallowed" and "gracious" (164).

— 113 —

4. Limits IN I D E A L terms, "how infinite" man is "in faculties . . . , in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god" (2.2.313-15), whereas in actuality man is only the alchemist's "quintessence of dust" (317). " O God," says Hamlet, "I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams" (258-60). Man's infinity is questioned by these restrictive "bad dreams," very like those troubled "dreams" that "may come/ W h e n we have shuffled off this mortal coil" (3.1.66-67). " A dream itself is but a shadow" (2.2.264), says Hamlet, echoing Pindar, but in these quibbling exchanges with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, shadow may triumph over substance, and "monarchs and outstretched heroes" like Claudius and Laertes may be merely "beggars' shadows" (268-69). Man's infinite faculty of reason and imagination, that "large discourse,/ Looking before and after" (4.4.36-37), is "bounded in a nutshell," and the image suggests an association between the convoluted nut and the human brain. These references indicate a persistent sense of limits in Hamlet, where the hero is not alone in feeling himself "cabin'd, cribb'd, confin'd, bound in/ T o saucy doubts and fears" (Macbeth 3.4.24-25). W e may trace the idea of limits in two themes: confinement, and money and numbers, both of which show a range of possibilities between, on one end, man's finiteness and mortality and, on the other, his attempts to break out — 114 —

LIMITS of all confining boundaries with "thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls" (1.4.56). Confinement T h e most literal images of confinement are prisons, locked doors, or, in the stage action, physical restraint. T o Hamlet, "Denmark's a prison" (2.2.247)»

and

he

asks Rosencrantz and Guildenstern what they have "deserved at the hands of Fortune that she sends you to prison hither" (244-45) • These "privates" (237) of Fortune turn out to be her prisoners, who are eventually executed by order of a "changeling" (5.2.53) commission. As Claudius' spies, they are also Hamlet's jailers, who react with predictable objections to his feelings of constraint. Hamlet will agree that the whole world is a prison, " A goodly one, in which there are many confines, wards, and dungeons, Denmark being one o' th' worst" (2.2.249-51), but Rosencrantz and Guildenstern will not go beyond the political metaphor of ambition: " 'Tis too narrow for your mind" (257). "Denmark's a prison" (247) for Hamlet in much more than a figurative sense. W h e n the king refuses to allow him to go "back to school in Wittenberg"

(1.2.113),

it is because he wishes to have " O u r chiefest courtier, cousin, and our son" "Here in the cheer and comfort of our eye" (116-17) —Claudius' "kingly eyes" (4.7.45), one "auspicious" and one "dropping" (1.2.11), make a surrealistic link with the poisoned ear of his brother. T h e "cheer and comfort" is, of course, all on Claudius' side, and the phrase is a euphemism for surveillance. — 115 —

IMAGERY Hamlet must not be allowed to live abroad like Laertes, who eventually returns with "a list of lawless resolutes" (1.1.98) to stage a putsch. Claudius and his agents are constantly urging a stricter control for Hamlet. " T o

England send him,"

says

Polonius, "or confine him where/ Your wisdom best shall think"

(3.1.189-90). T h e voyage to England is

Claudius' "final solution" to the Hamlet problem: "For we will fetters put about this fear,/ W h i c h now goes too free-footed" (3.3.25-26). "Fetters" are the leg-irons or gyves that will not allow Hamlet's madness to "range" (2) . In a later scene, Claudius explains to Laertes why he could not go to a "public count" with Hamlet: the "general gender" "Would, like the spring that turneth wood to stone,/ Convert his gyves to graces" (4.7.17-21). W e also remember the Hamlet of Ophelia's description, with his stockings "fouled,/ Ungartered, and downgyv£d to his ankle" (2.1.79-80). In Hamlet's own report of the sea voyage, "Methought I lay/ Worse than the mutines in the bilboes"

(5.2.5-6); these were a kind

of shackle (used for mutinous sailors) that slid on an iron bar locked to the floor. Characteristically, Hamlet's imprisonment is represented as a fettering, and he himself is made to seem a dangerous person. A f t e r the death of Polonius, the action against Hamlet becomes more openly menacing, since the king now has the pretext to deal firmly with his nephew's "liberty," which "is full of threats to all" (4.1.14). Claudius fears that public opinion will blame him for Polonius' murder, — 116 —

LIMITS . . . whose providence Should have kept short, restrained, and out of haunt This mad young man. (4.1.17-19) As he tells his "two or three" trusted counselors at the beginning of Act IV, Scene iii, "How dangerous is it that this man goes loose!" (2), and we think immediately of the contrast between fast and loose throughout the play. A few lines further on Rosencrantz informs us that Lord Hamlet is "Without, my lord; guarded, to know your pleasure" (14). T h e surveillance of Act I, Scene ii has now become physical restraint; as Claudius' prisoner, Hamlet enters with guards at Rosencrantz's brusque command: "Ho! Bring in the lord" (4-3-15) •

In an analogous imagery of confinement, the Ghost speaks of purgatory as "my prison house" (1.5.14), and it describes its purifying torments in terms of secular punishment: Doomed for a certain term to walk the night, A n d for the day confined to fast in fires, T i l l the foul crimes done in my days of nature Are burnt and purged away. (1.5.10-13) T h e Ghost may be ubiquitous under the stage—"Hie et ubique" (156)—but in the otherworldly domain it is ruled by a power greater than itself. T h e attempt by Marcellus and Barnardo to stop it with their partisans proves to be only "malicious mockery," "For it is as the air, invulnerable" (1.1.145-46). W h e n the cock crows, however, " T h ' extravagant and erring spirit hies/ T o his confine" (154-55). "Confine" is here at once a syno— 117 —

IMAGERY nym for "prison house" and the literal means of restricting "extravagant and erring" spirits—both adjectives are used in their etymological senses. In his first address to the Ghost, Hamlet wants to know why it has not remained within the limits of the grave: W h y thy canonized bones, hears&d in death, Have burst their cerements, why the sepulcher Wherein we saw thee quietly interred Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws T o cast thee up again. (1.4.47-51) T h e Ghost is like Jonah, cast up from the belly of the whale, and the imagery reflects the popular iconography of resurrection. Hamlet also prescribes limits to the Ghost at the opening of Act I, Scene v: "Whither wilt thou lead me? Speak; I'll go no further." W h e n the Ghost asks Hamlet to "lend thy serious hearing/ T o what I shall unfold," he answers with alacrity, "Speak. I am bound to hear" (1.5.5-6). In true Elizabethan style, the Ghost then puns on Hamlet's word: "So art thou to revenge, when thou shalt hear" (7). Hamlet's "bound" means ready or prepared, as Claudius, attempting to pray, is "like a man to double business bound" (3.3.41). But the Ghost takes "bound" to mean obligated, which is also a sense in which Claudius uses the word: . . . and the survivor bound In filial obligation for some term T o do obsequious sorrow. (1.2.90-92) — 118 —

LIMITS One is "bound" by specific limits, as " T h e single and peculiar life is bound / With all the strength and armor of the mind" (3.3.11-12). W e also think of the king's diabolical advice to Laertes: "Revenge should have no bounds" (4.7.128), not even those imposed by Christianity or natural law. In the same kind of double image, when Horatio and Marcellus find the "escaped" Hamlet, Horatio says, "Heavens secure him!" (1.5.113), as if no mortal hand could either guarantee his safety or tie him up. Throughout the play, Horatio delights in these bantering quibbles based on man's unacknowledged limitations. He is constantly reminding Hamlet of that ordinary, commonsensical humanity he seems to have violated or forgotten. As one might expect, the repressed and overruled Ophelia has a significant imagery of limits, especially locks. Her brother's advice is in her memory "locked,/ A n d you yourself shall keep the key of it" (1.3.85-86), which is a characteristic way of surrendering responsibility. Her father's "prescripts" about Hamlet include: " T h a t she should lock herself from his resort" (2.2.143), and we already know that she repelled his letters and "denied/ His access" (2.1.109-10). One of Ophelia's mad songs sums up this imagery of constraint: T h e n up he rose and donned his clothes And dupped the chamber door, Let in the maid, that out a maid Never departed more.

(4-5-52-55)

It is a wish-fulfillment image of doors being "dupped" or opened for her. Claudius shows a more than per— 119 —

IMAGERY sonal interest in keeping an eye on the mad Ophelia: "Follow her close; give her good watch, I pray you" (4.5.74). W e recall the king's anxieties about his nephew-son: " H o w dangerous is it that this man goes loose!" (4.3.2). Like Hamlet, Ophelia represents a political danger to the new regime, especially when she threatens: " M y brother shall know of it" (4.5.70-71). W e may also consider the idea of limits as it is expressed in the symbolism of contraction or expansion: tightness and restriction versus freedom, boldness, and a refusal to be bound in. Claudius is the great constrictor in the play, who, like the players, attempts to be Hamlet's "abridgment" (2.2.429). In his official mourning speech for his brother, he represents the whole kingdom of Denmark as "contracted in one brow of woe" (1.2.4), a figure which is only one of the king's many grotesque images involving parts of the body. T h e secondary meaning of "contracted" is made explicit in the closet scene. Gertrude's "deed" . . . from the body of contraction plucks T h e very soul, and sweet religion makes A rhapsody of words!

(3-4-47"49)

"Contraction" is the marriage contract, and Hamlet means that the sacrament has become, through Gertrude's mockery of it, a mere verbal formula, a "minglemangle" (as Florio defines "rhapsody") -1 1

See Variorum,

I, 289. T h i s is the only use of "rhapsody" in

Shakespeare. Donald M. Frame informs me in a letter that Montaigne also uses "rapsodie" only once Essais),

and that Cotgrave's dictionary

(Book I, Chap. 13 of his (1611) defines it as "an

improper collection, a confused heaping up, of many sentences."

— 120 —

LIMITS T h e imagery of confinement and limits is represented literally by the stage doors. In the De Witt sketch of the Swan playhouse, 2 which shows that theater in about 1596, there are two massive, hinged double doors at the rear of the stage, both with prominent locks. Presumably Shakespeare's Globe was similarly constructed.

The

doors are used most significantly in the scene of Laertes' rebellion, where they provide a barrier more immediate than "divinity" to "hedge a king" (4.5.123). Suddenly, the king's "Switzers" can no longer "guard the door" (97), and Laertes and his "false Danish dogs" burst through: " T h e doors are broke"

(no)

( m ) . In the

final scene, after Hamlet discovers that Gertrude has been poisoned, he exclaims: "Let the door be locked" (5.2.312), and this stage action creates the Sartrian illusion of " N o Exit." Throughout Hamlet

there is an acute awareness of

man's limitations as a finite being, perhaps nowhere so brilliantly expressed as in Claudius' discussion of time and love: 2

T h e drawing is actually a copy of Johannes de Witt's sketch

(made during a visit to London) by his friend, Arend Van Buchell, who also recorded de Witt's comments on it. These names are sometimes modernized

to de Wit

and Van

Buchel.

The

manuscript is in the collection of the library of the University of Utrecht, Holland (MS 842, fol. 132 recto—for the drawing). See " A Note on the Swan Theatre Drawing," SS, I (1948), 23-24, and Plates II, III, and I V A . See also Richard Hosley's exacting essay, "Reconstitution du Theatre du Swan," Le Renaissance,

Lieu

Theatral

a la

ed. Jean Jacquot et al. (Paris: Editions du Centre

National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1964), pp. 295-316.

— 121 —

IMAGERY . . . I know love is begun by time, And that I see, in passages of proof, T i m e qualifies the spark and fire of it. There lives within the very flame of love A kind of wick or snuff that will abate it. . . . (4.7.111-15) In an age when people used candles and lamps for all their lighting, this flame was one of the most familiar images of mortality, and it appears repeatedly in emblem books. W e remember Macbeth's desolate image at his wife's death: "Out, out, brief candle!" (Macbeth 5.5.23), and in Sonnet L X X I I I the fire of youth is "Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by." T h e wick is essential to the flame, but the same process that makes the flame bright also chars the wick and creates the snuff that dims the flame. This is the principle of self-destruction that resides in all things and that leads Claudius to his carpe diem conclusion: " T h a t we would do/ W e should do when we would" (4.7.118-19), which is almost exactly the opposite of Hamlet's faith in the providence of time: "If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come. T h e readiness is all" (5.2.221-24). Hamlet's "readiness" and Claudius' are radically different. Hamlet is poised to respond to a purpose that man cannot shape for himself, whereas Claudius is brutally voluntaristic. T h e king's consciousness of limits seems to give him a momentary advantage over Hamlet's "large discourse,/ Looking before and after" (4.4 36-37), but in the framework of the tragedy, Claudius' antiheroic — 122 —

LIMITS practicality must yield to those "thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls" (1.4.56). Money and

Numbers

Man may be "infinite in faculties" (2.2.313), but the exigencies of daily life limit his scope. Numbers, quantities, and all measures (including money) remind us of some of the ways in which man's "Immortal longings" (Antony and Cleopatra 5.2.279) are circumscribed. T h e frequent reference to these topics in Hamlet is a significant aspect of the imagery of limits. Money, in particular, is a familiar sign of man's fallen state, which makes him subject to "cormorant devouring T i m e " (Love's Labour's Lost 1.1.4). T h e whole theme emphasizes man's fallible, measurable, material being, that condition of mortality which makes him vulnerable to tragedy. Money and numbers may be considered together in the mention of specific sums or in the use of coins of known value. Hamlet runs Polonius through with "Dead for a ducat, dead!" (3.4.25), and using this same price scale, Fortinbras' captain speaks to Hamlet of the Polish expedition with businesslike disdain: W e go to gain a little patch of ground T h a t hath in it no profit but the name. T o pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it, Nor will it yield to Norway or the Pole A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee. (4.4.18-22) T h e worth of that land is contemptuously pegged at — 123 —

IMAGERY five ducats—an absolute maximum, as the colloquial repetition seems to say—whether it be leased or rented ("farmed" in its old sense), or bought outright ("in fee," short for "in fee-simple"). This talk of money sets Hamlet a difficult problem about the nature of honor: " T w o thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats/ Will not debate the question of this straw" (4.4.25-26), which is actually the more specific question of the value of five ducats' worth of Polish land. T h e numbers exactly fix the disproportion between infinite thoughts of honor and material objectives. Incidentally, in Hamlet's soliloquy we suddenly hear about " T h e imminent death of twenty thousand men" (60), who were only a tenth of that number in line 25. T h e number of ducats seems to have attracted an equal number of troops.3 Hamlet also complains bitterly to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern about the inflation of values that Claudius has created in Denmark: "those that would make mouths at him while my father lived give twenty, forty, fifty, a hundred ducats apiece for his picture in little" (2.2.372-74). Gertrude seems to be wearing one of these sought-after miniatures in the closet scene, for the benefit of Hamlet's lecture on " T h e counterfeit presentment of two brothers" (34.55). It is ironic that Polonius should end with the shortest measure—"Dead for a ducat"—since he makes the most notable use of money imagery in the play. 3

For a comparable difficulty with money see Terence Spencer's

fascinating note, "Shakespeare Learns the Value of Money: T h e Dramatist at Work on Timon

of Athens,"

— 124 —

SS, V I (1953), 75-78.

LIMITS T h e largest sum mentioned in Hamlet is the "threescore thousand crowns in annual fee" (2.2.73) that old Norway gives to his penitent nephew, Fortinbras, which Folio economizes to "three thousand crowns," perhaps to help the meter. Scholars have calculated that if Fortinbras needs at least "twenty thousand ducats" (4.4.25) for his Polish expedition, he has to have the larger number of crowns as an "annual fee." 4 T h e smallest sum in the play may be found in Hamlet's acknowledgment of Rosencrantz and Guildenstem's visit: "Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks, but I thank you; and sure, dear friends, my thanks are too dear a halfpenny" (2.2.278-80). These two are obviously not interested in halfpennies, and their visitation turns out not to be "free" (281) in the sense either of voluntary or gratis. T h e y act, after all, not from disinterested love of the king, but to soak up his "rewards" (4.2.16). There is an apt recognition of this double role in Gertrude's greeting: If it will please you T o show us so much gentry and good will As to expend your time with us awhile For the supply and profit of our hope, Your visitation shall receive such thanks As fits a king's remembrance. (2.2.21-26) "Expend," "supply," "profit" are all commercial words, and we still use "remembrance" in this insinuating way, especially at Christmastime, to indicate gratuities. A "king's remembrance" bodes well for two aspiring cour4

See Wilson, p. 168.

— 125 —

IMAGERY tiers, who are, according to their own admission, the "privates" (2.2.237) Fortune—both soldiers and private parts. T h e word "remembrance" has a special irony in the context of the Ghost's cry: "Remember me" (1.5.91). Ophelia has "remembrances" of Hamlet that she has euphoniously "longed long to redeliver" (3.1.9394). These are tangible, stage-property "remembrances," which she returns to her lover at this point with a sententious jingle: " T a k e these again, for to the noble mind/ Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind" (100-1) . In Shakespeare's numerology, one thousand appears about four times more often than does one hundred, probably because one thousand of anything still seemed an impressive amount in Elizabethan England. I suspect that our million is the inflated equivalent of Shakespeare's thousand. A thousand pounds was a proverbial sum,5 the very amount that Falstaff owes Shallow (2 Henry IV 5.5.74). After the success of The Mousetrap, Hamlet jubilantly exclaims: " O good Horatio, I'll take the ghost's word for a thousand pound. Didst perceive?" (3.2.292-93). There is a quibble on "word," which in this context means a verbal assurance for a debt, but the play has also verified the Ghost's narration in Act I, Scene v, as well as Hamlet's own "word" or motto: " 'Adieu, adieu, remember me' " (1.5.111). Further, the thousand pounds may represent Hamlet's wager on the truth of the Ghost's word. In his " T o be, or not to be" soliloquy, Hamlet speaks of "the thousand natural shocks/ T h a t flesh is heir to" (3.1.62-63), then proceeds to enumerate only about half B

See Tilley, M217, and also C601, C687, and P520. — 126

—

LIMITS a dozen of them. When the Clown-gravedigger asks his conundrum—"What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?" (5.1.42-43) — h e is disconcerted by the Second Clown's obviously correct answer: " T h e gallowsmaker, for that frame outlives a thousand tenants" (44-45). W e would not be inclined today to think one thousand a very imposing number, and we would certainly not regard it as a synonym for an incalculable sum. Hamlet recalls that Yorick the jester "hath borne me on his back a thousand times"

(187-88), which, if one can reckon

that Hamlet was only seven years old when Yorick died, represents an average of one hundred and forty-three piggyback rides a year. Perpend! If we accept the normative use of a thousand, then ten thousand is an intensifier. Among other "pregnant" replies (2.2.211) , Hamlet tells Polonius: " T o be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten thousand"

(178-79), and we can supply a stress on

"this," referring to the new regime. In its usual form, the proverb reads: " A Man among a thousand" (Tilley, M 2 1 7 ) . Rosencrantz speaks of "ten thousand lesser things/ . . . mortised and adjoined" to the "huge spokes" of the king's "massy wheel" (3.3.19-20,17), as if to indicate the population of an entire kingdom. Numbers share in the inflation of rhetoric in Hamlet's wit-combat with Laertes at Ophelia's grave. As Hamlet says in his arithmetical imagery: I loved Ophelia. Forty thousand brothers Could not with all their quantity of love Make up my sum. (5.1.271-73) — 127 —

IMAGERY Laertes is the one who has been insisting on his "quantity of love," according to Cleopatra's formula: "If it be love indeed, tell me how much" (Antony and Cleopatra 1.1.14). Hamlet attempts to top Laertes' measures by making "Ossa like a wart" (5.1.285) : "And if thou prate of mountains, let them throw/ Millions of acres on us" (282-83). W e have now reached the hyperbolic number of a million, which Hamlet had used earlier to describe the reception of the Dido and Aeneas play, that "pleased not the million; 'twas caviary to the general" (2.2.446-47). Against the "million" of popular taste, Hamlet sets that small coterie of himself "and others, whose judgments in such matters cried in the top of mine" (448-49). W e think of Hamlet's claim just before the catastrophe: "the interim's mine,/ And a man's life's no more than to say 'one' " (5.2.73-74). This is the single number one that can exert its individual and heroic force against any odds. W e also remember Hamlet's ominous threat at the end of the nunnery scene: "I say we will have no moe marriage. Those that are married already—all but one—shall live" (3.1.149-51)-—a special solution to the problem of the one and the many. Monetary and enumerative themes have an important character function in Hamlet.

Polonius, for example,

thinks of worldly experience as knowing how to manage one's financial affairs. His famous "precepts" (1.3.58) to his son have a distinctly commercial flavor, suggesting that human relations are to be governed with the same discretion one uses in handling money: — 128 —

LIMITS Neither a borrower nor a lender be, For loan oft loses both itself and friend, A n d borrowing dulleth edge of husbandry. (1-3-75-77) Laertes seems to fulfill his father's advice when he tells Claudius threateningly: " A n d for my means, I'll husband them so well/ T h e y shall go far with little" (4.5. 138-39). This is "husbandry" in the sense of thrift, as in Banquo's description of the darkness: "There's husbandry in heaven;/ Their candles are all out" (Macbeth 2.1.4-5). Thrift, however, is a pejorative virtue in Hamlet, a sign of domestic pettiness. There is a memorable imagery of money in Claudius' soliloquy in Act III, Scene iii, where it becomes the symbol for "the corrupted currents of this world" (57) as contrasted with the incorruptibility of heaven. Claudius begins "like a man to double business bound" (41). He wants to persuade God to accept his prayer without his having to sacrifice any ill-won gains, and the word "double" immediately suggests duplicity. But Claudius' "stronger guilt" defeats his "strong intent" (40) : . . . I am still possessed Of those effects for which I did the murder, My crown, mine own ambition, and my queen. (3-3-53-55) It is curious that the king should list together all of his assets, both material and personal. In his confession, Claudius testifies unmercifully to his own double-dealing, especially his bribery: — 129 —

IMAGERY In the corrupted currents of this world Offense's gilded hand may shove by justice, A n d oft 'tis seen the wicked prize itself Buys out the law.

(3-3-57'6o)

T h e personified Offense does not have a golden hand, but only a "gilded" one, as alchemists counterfeited gold coins with the thinnest layer of gilding. So Ulysses establishes for Achilles the distortions of human judgment: men "give to dust that is a little gilt/ More laud than gilt o'er-dusted" (Troilus and Cressida 3.3178-79). " G i l t " also makes a familiar pun with "guilt," and it has a distant phonetic association with Guildenstern. "Offense's gilded hand" is, of course, a pleasant circumlocution for bribery, which is able violently to "shove" justice out of its path. In Claudius' brilliant machinations, "the wicked prize itself" provides the capital that "Buys out the law." Hamlet addresses the Ghost "in the cellarage" (1.5. 151) as "truepenny" (150), a coin honest though small and a trusty good fellow, the rough equivalent of Jay Gatsby's "old sport." T h e Ghost speaks of its murder in the imagery of bookkeeping: No reck'ning made, but sent to my account With all my imperfections on my head. (1-5-78-79) Hamlet echoes this earlier speech just as he is about to kill Claudius: 'A took my father grossly, full of bread, With all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May; — 130 —

LIMITS A n d how his audit stands, who knows save heaven? (3.3.80-82) "Audit" matches "reck'ning" and "account"; in the context of this imagery, to kill Claudius while he is praying would be like the "hire and salary" (79) of a paid assassin. W h e n Hamlet reflects that instead of bearing "the whips and scorns of time" (3.1.70) he "might his quietus make/ With a bare bodkin" (75-76), he is using a term from accounting similar to those favored by the Ghost. Quietus est is the standard Latin formula for being quit of a debt, as if the "bare bodkin" were wielded by a clerk who canceled one's mortal obligations. T h e word also suggests the quiet of death, after all the earthly turmoils mentioned in the preceding lines. In general, Hamlet's aristocratic virtue recoils in disdain from all talk of money or circumscribing measurement. As he tells Ophelia in his love letter: " I am ill at these numbers. I have not art to reckon my groans" (2.2.120-21). "Numbers" is a specific word for metrics, but one may see here a rejection of numbering and reckoning and all other petty limits. Of all the characters in Hamlet, Laertes has the most consistently developed imagery of measure and enumeration. As the subtle Claudius so well understands, Laertes can be made an easy dupe of that symmetrical sort of justice codified as " A n eye for an eye." T h e image invoked by Laertes when he sees the mad Ophelia is meant as a practical guide to his future conduct: "By heaven, thy madness shall be paid with weight/ T i l l our scale — 131 —

IMAGERY turn the beam" (4.5.156-57). Justice is usually represented with balance scales in one hand and a sword in the other, and Laertes intends to put the dead Hamlet in the empty pan to overbalance the weight of his mad sister and his murdered father. This quantitative approach to reality seems to be Laertes' tragic flaw, or, rather, the limitation that prevents him from ever seeming tragic at all. In his prohibitions to his sister, he stresses the need for circumspect weighing. Ophelia "must fear" that when Hamlet's "greatness" is "weighed, his will is not his own" (1.3.16-17), and she should "weigh what loss your honor may sustain/ If with too credent ear you list his songs" (29-30). Laertes is not only a weigher, but also, as we might expect, a hyperbolical enumerator—two aspects of the same point of view. His immediate reaction to the sight of his mad sister is an extremely formal apostrophe: " O heat, dry up my brains; tears seven times salt/ Burn out the sense and virtue of mine eye!" (4.5.154-55). W h y "seven times salt"? There is no obvious connection with the "seven ages" of man (As You Like It 2.7.i3gff.) or the "sevenfold shield of A j a x " (Antony and Cleopatra 4.14.38), so that we are forced to conclude that Laertes' use of the Biblical seven is only a magical intensifier for the salty virtue of tears. Hamlet had earlier spoken of "the salt of most unrighteous tears" "flushing" in Gertrude's "galled eyes" (1.2.154-55) and of her mourning "Like Niobe, all tears" (149). When Laertes says of the dead Ophelia, " T o o much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,/ And therefore I forbid my tears" (4.7.18586), we are meant to understand that his tears, with — 132 —

LIMITS their sevenfold potency, insist on appearing at his eyes despite his own efforts at self-control. Enumeration is only one of many devices of hyperbole in Laertes' ranting style at the burial of Ophelia: O, treble woe Fall ten times treble on that cursed head Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense Deprived thee of! (5.1.248-51) These enumerations are purely expressive, and they are meant to offer an emotionally arithmetical persuasion. W e see Laertes as the hyperbolic hero of his own fancy in his Jack Cade rebellion against Claudius. T h e messenger speaks in the appropriate high style of reported terror: T h e ocean, overpeering of his list, Eats not the flats with more impiteous haste T h a n young Laertes, in a riotous head, O'erbears your officers. (4.5.99-102) T h e first image seems to be that of an irresistible tidal wave that cannot be contained by its "list," or bounding shore; the word was most often used in the plural, for the enclosing barriers of a tournament. Further on, Laertes agrees to be "ruled" by Claudius only on condition that "you will not o'errule me to a peace" (4.7.59-60). This is a touch characteristic of his very submissive bravado, and the many words prefixed by "o'er" help to determine the degree of Laertes' rhetorical excess.® 6

According to Bartlett's Concordance, Hamlet

has more "o'er"

(and "over") prefix words than any other play of Shakespeare. The

"o'er" prefix group indicates excess, it is used most fre-

— 133 —

IMAGERY Laertes' quantifications are paralleled by those in The Murder of Gonzago, which begins with what is perhaps the most devastating enumerative circumlocution in Elizabethan drama. 7 T h e Player King announces: Full thirty times hath Phoebus' cart gone round Neptune's salt wash and Tellus' orbed ground, A n d thirty dozen moons with borrowed sheen About the world have times twelve thirties been, Since love our hearts, and Hymen did our hands, Unite commutual in most sacred bands. (3.2.160-65) T h e old-fashioned wit of this passage expects the audience to do the sums quickly in their heads and to admire the invention of the arithmetical synonyms. T h e couplet form also helps to convey the gravity of public statement, although we know that, by writing so wholeheartedly in an archaic style, Shakespeare is amusing both himself and us. T h e Player Queen continues the counting: So many journeys may the sun and moon Make us again count o'er ere love be done! (3.2.166-67) There seems to be a talismanic insistence on these thirty years of marriage between the Player King and his queen. T h e play within the play is full of quantitative measures, especially in the part of the Player Queen, who quently in hyperboles, and it has some connection with Marlowe's device of invidious comparison. There is a concentration of "o'er" prefix words in Hamlet's advice to the players, where they mark departures from the ideal of temperance or moderation. 7

See the analogues in Kittredge, p . 224.

— 134 —

LIMITS wants to order her reality with symmetrical thoroughness: And women's fear and love hold quantity, In neither aught, or in extremity. Now what my love is, proof hath made you know, A n d as my love is sized, my fear is so. Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear; Where little fears grow great, great love grows there. (3.2.173-78) These elaborate antitheses, driven home by alliteration, would normally be the matter of comedy in Shakespeare, but here they are meant as a simplified psychology of alternatives. T h e point of the imagery is that love can be "sized"—an unconscious pun on Walt Whitman's "adhesiveness." W e remember the figure of Pyrrhus, "o'ersized with coagulate gore" (2.2.473) > a s if his skin were a cloth or canvas overstiffened with the "total gules" (468) of clotting blood. T h e most specific enumerations in the play are the Gravedigger's calculations of Hamlet's age.8 T h e Clown became a "gravemaker" (5.1.144-45) on "that day that our last king Hamlet overcame Fortinbras" (146-47). This is established for us as "that very day that young Hamlet was born" (150). T h e Clown then tells us: " I have been sexton here, man and boy, thirty years" (16364). T h a t is an unmistakable number, which tallies with the thirty years proclaimed by the Player King and the 8

See Variorum,

let's Age,

I,

391-94.

See also V. 0sterberg, Prince

bernes Selskab. Historisk-filologiske Meddelelser

1924), 1956).

Ham-

Pamphlet VIII, Number 4, Det Kgl. Danske Videnska-

and

Carl Anders Dymling,

Hamlet's

— 135 —

Age

(Copenhagen, (Stockholm,

IMAGERY Player Queen. W e have further confirmation in the fact that the skull of Yorick, the king's jester, "hath lien you i' th' earth three and twenty years" (174-75). Shakespeare has obviously taken pains to tell us that Hamlet is now thirty years old. T h a t much is undeniable, but it seems to me to have no bearing at all on Hamlet's age as it may be worked out from chronological references in earlier parts of the play. He is a young man there, about the same age as all the other young men in the play: Horatio, Laertes, Fortinbras, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern. W e should bear in mind that we are dealing with a play, and that it is not possible for an audience to make fine discriminations about the ages of the characters. In a dramatic performance, age is comparative, and it takes on meaning only in relationships of characters, or when the dramatist insists on a certain number of years. I would agree that Shakespeare insists that Hamlet is thirty years old upon his return from his sea voyage, but how old was he when he left, and how long has the voyage taken? These are the kinds of questions that are impossible to answer and unfruitful to pursue by detective methods. Hamlet is now thirty because he has matured. He is no longer the melancholy youth of the beginning of the play, thinking seriously about "self-slaughter" (1.2.132). N o matter how long a time has elapsed since Act I, it is clear that Hamlet has now forever lost his impetuous innocence. After a long and bitter apprenticeship of doubts, hesitations, self-accusations, and fascination with violence, he is finally "ready; now or whensoever" (5.2.203-4). — 136 —

5. Art, Acting, and the Theater HAMLET is Shakespeare's most self-conscious play, as we may see in the quantity of professional allusions to art, acting, and the theater. 1 Instead of trying consistently to create and maintain an illusion, Shakespeare often breaks the illusion by letting us know that this is only a play and that the actors are not actually the persons they represent. Brecht would call this the Verfremdungseffekt, but luckily Shakespeare did not make any theoretical pronouncements about what he was doing. In terms of appearance and reality, we may say that Hamlet attempts to remind us of the practical realities behind its histrionic appearances. T h e play demands an ironic and skeptical awareness on the part of the audience, who must be able to distinguish between the persuasive truth of the dramatic fable and the artifice of the dramatic vehicle. Shakespeare's terms of art are all consistently negative or at best ambivalent in connotation, and he follows the popular conception of the actor as a dissembler and the artist as a creator of deceptive appearances. Art is an imitation of reality; it does not perfect and idealize it, but merely puts a good face on it, paints or colors it, as " T h e harlot's cheek" is "beautied with plast'ring art" There is a strong analogy in Shakespeare between painting 2 and acting, since both present appearances 1

See Anne Righter, Shakespeare

and the Idea of the Play

(New

York, 1962), esp. Chap. 5: " T h e Player King." 2

For an extensive discussion of the art of painting in Shake-

— 137 —

IMAGERY that "show fairly outwards" (2.2.382), and, as arts, they lend themselves to the Bastard's distinction between "Exterior form, outward accoutrement" and "inward motion" (King John 1.1.211-12). T h e painter's imitation or feigning of reality is like the actor's pretending to be the person whom he merely represents, and the set of terms for these two arts is steeped in moral condemnation. In the closet scene, for example, Hamlet refers to the portraits of his father and his uncle as " T h e counterfeit presentment of two brothers" (3.4.55). "Counterfeit" is a standard Elizabethan term for portrait, and Fairchild believes that it reflects the Platonic notion that a painting is always "an inferior representation of an original—an imitation of a perfect 'substance.' " 3 T h e painting itself is at least three removes from the Platonic reality, and all of Shakespeare's terms of art share in this unfavorable epistemology, even when there is no pejorative intention in the immediate context. In The Merchant of Venice, for example, when Bassanio opens the casket, he finds, to his triumphant joy, "Fair Portia's counterfeit!" (3.2.115). Portia herself is seductively genuine, but portraits in general are "counterfeits," as in Sonnet X V I , where "living flowers" are infinitely preferable to a "painted counterfeit." Shakespeare was well aware of the doubleness of "counterfeit." In Timon of Athens, where painting is speare see Arthur H. R. Fairchild, Shakespeare Design

(Columbia: University of Missouri,

and

the Arts

of

1937), Part Three.

See also Margaret Farrand Thorp, "Shakespeare and the Fine Arts," PMLA, 8

XLVI

(1931), 672-93.

Fairchild, Shakespeare

and

the Arts

— 138 —

of Design,

p. 117.

ART,

ACTING,

AND

THE

THEATER

used more significantly than in any other of his plays, T i m o n offers ironic praise to the rapacious Painter and Poet: Good honest men! T h o u draw'st a counterfeit Best in all Athens. Th'art indeed the best; T h o u counterfeit'st most lively. (5.1.78-80) There is wordplay on "lively" as signifying both animated and lifelike, or exactly represented in the painting. Shakespeare also has a series of references to counterfeit coins, which bear falsely imposed images and are therefore doubly imitations of the real thing. As a term for acting, to "counterfeit" means to present a false appearance, to dissemble. Buckingham, in his costume of "rotten

armour, marvellous

ill-favoured,"

boasts of his villainous ability to "counterfeit the deep tragedian" (Richard III 3.5 s.d. and 5), and Coriolanus in his "gown of humility" has contempt for his prepared role as humble suitor to the citizens: "I will practise the insinuating nod and be off to them most counterfeitly. T h a t is, sir, I will counterfeit the bewitchment of some popular man and give it bountiful to the desirers"

(Coriolanus 2.3.96-99). W e may

conclude

that the negative connotations of "counterfeit" are difficult to suppress even in its neutral senses, because art and acting in Shakespeare are feigning, deception, and illusion. "Shadow" is another deprecating Elizabethan word for a portrait, applied either to one's likeness in a mirror or a painted picture. In The Merchant of — 139 —

Venice,

IMAGERY Bassanio plays wittily on shadow and substance when he finds Portia's picture in the leaden casket: Yet look how far T h e substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow In underprizing it, so far this shadow Doth limp behind the substance. (3.2.126-29) T h e possibilities of this theme are more highly developed in Hamlet's talk with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Hamlet's commonplace, " A dream itself is but a shadow" (2.2.264), is topped by Rosencrantz's comment that "ambition [is] of so airy and light a quality that it is but a shadow's shadow" (265-66), to which Hamlet replies with impatient metaphysical subtlety: " T h e n are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs and outstretched heroes the beggars' shadows" (267-69). Since "shadow" is such a complex word, this talk has a specious air of profundity, although it is only the most elementary exercise in paradox. Its terms are not specifically those of art, but it draws on the familiar idea that a painting or a play is only a representation, an imitation, feigning, image, counterfeit, or shadow of some ulterior and objective reality. T h e actor, too, is a shadow, as Duke Theseus tells us: " T h e best in this kind are but shadows" (A

Midsum-

mer Night's Dream 5.1.210), and Puck, in this most critically self-conscious scene, makes his apologies directly to the audience, "If we shadows have offended" (412). W e also have Macbeth's more somber image for the deceptive illusion of life: — 140 —

ART,

ACTING,

AND

THE

THEATER

Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player, T h a t struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more. . . . (Macbeth 5.5.23-26) Macbeth may be thinking of the candles used to light the stage in the private theaters, and more spectacularly in court masques, so that the "strutting player whose conceit/ Lies in his hamstring" (Troilus and Cressida 1.3.153-54) would be unforgettably associated with his "walking shadow." T h e references to acting and the theater in Hamlet depend upon the same assumptions about appearance and reality as in Shakespeare's terms of art. Of all his works, Hamlet develops the most self-conscious contrasts between the world of the play and the real world. Its scenes from interpolated plays (the Player's speech and The Murder of Gonzago) are written in styles entirely different from that of the main action, and they serve to displace our awareness of what is Active and what is true. If there are plays within plays, there must also be scenes within scenes and acting within acting, so that we are immediately prevented from giving any simple answers about the nature of the dramatic illusion in Hamlet. There is a semantic difficulty in Shakespeare's theatrical terms, because they are often common words that would normally be understood in their general rather than technical senses. "Act," "scene," "plot," "play," "perform," "put on," "show," and "shape" all have this — 141 —

IMAGERY double reference, so that we need to discern whether such words are indeed theatrical terms in any particular context. This is a simple and unsatisfactory way of putting it, because certain key words tend to carry over their connotations into unfamiliar and even inappropriate contexts. In Hamlet's warning to Ophelia about her father: "Let the doors be shut upon him, that he may play the fool nowhere but in's own house" (3.1.133-34), "play the fool" is a general indication of folly as well as a specific dramatic role. Within the next hundred lines Hamlet has advice for "those that play your clowns" (3.2.40-41) that would apply admirably well to Polonius: let them "speak no more than is set down for them" (41-42). A n d in his farewell to the murdered counselor, Hamlet refers to him as a "wretched, rash, intruding fool" (3.4.32). Although there is no way of proving that Shakespeare meant to use "fool" in its theatrical sense, it seems to me that this is an inescapable secondary meaning. W e see the process working in the opposite direction, from the more specific meaning to the general one, in Hamlet's comment on the Clown, whose extemporized jesting "shows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it" (3.2.46-47). If this needs any explanation, we may say that the actor is both Fool and fool. In a more pointed allusion, Hamlet represents himself to the Ghost as one of the "fools of nature" (1.4.54), a bit of wordplay on naturals, or fools by birth, as distinguished from professionals like Yorick. T h e most overtly theatrical passage in the play is Hamlet's soliloquy at the end of Act II, after the First Player has broken off his passionate declamation. Ham— 142 —

ART,

ACTING,

AND THE

THEATER

let wonders what the Player would do "Had he the motive and the cue for passion/ T h a t I have?" (2.2.57172). " C u e " is an actor's word, which seems to assume that both Hamlet and the Player have only a stage existence. Hamlet's answer to his own question also equates the stage with the world: " H e would drown the stage with tears/ A n d cleave the general ear with horrid speech" (572-73), and he goes on to speak about the emotional effects of the Player on his audience. But Hamlet breaks off his own histrionics at the climactic " O , vengeance!" (593, Folio). He then begins to differentiate, ironically of course, between the play world and the real world, between "brave" (594) words and brave action. He is being "Prompted" to his "revenge by heaven and hell" (596), who are presumably dissatisfied with his "bad performance" (4.7.151). T h e whole soliloquy is Hamlet's most extended excursion into the psychology and sociology of the drama. T h e actor's deceptive appearance is represented by costume: "clothes do but cheat and cozen us." T h e double symbolism of clothing may be seen in the expression "put on," which means not only to dress oneself, but also to pretend. T h u s Hamlet tells us that he will "put an antic disposition on" (1.5.172) as if it were a costume, and the king wonders why his nephew-son "puts on this confusion"

(3.1.2). W e learn later that the

"monster custom" is like the wardrobe manager, who supplies costumes for different roles: . . . to the use of actions fair and good He likewise gives a frock or livery T h a t aptly is put on. (3.4.164-66) — 143 —

IMAGERY "Actions" is another of those ambiguous common words that may or may not have a theatrical reference, but in this context it resembles Hamlet's own "actions that a man might play" (x.2.84), or the advice to the players: "Suit the action to the word, the word to the action" (3.2.18-19). T h e most significant of these common words with theatrical overtones is "shape," which could be used in Shakespeare's time to mean the makeup and costume suited to a particular part, as well as the part itself or the character impersonated. "Shape" and "form" are close in meaning and often paired, so that we may think of shape as an external, visible form—a sense in which it appears in Love's Labour's Lost, when we learn that the suitors, "Disguis'd like Muscovites, in shapeless gear," "will again be here/ In their own shapes" (5.2. 303, 287-88). Costume is usually the most important aspect of a "shape," but the word denotes the entire appearance or effect. T h e strongest example of "shape" is in the king's disclosure of his plot to Laertes: Let's further think of this, Weigh what convenience both of time and means May fit us to our shape. If this should fail, And that our drift look through our bad performance, 'Twere better not assayed. (4.7.148-52) T h e imagery is theatrical, and Claudius uses the familiar trope of the villain as an actor, who plays his role according to his ingenious and aesthetically satisfying plot. Like Iago and Marlowe's Barabas, Claudius takes pleas— 144 —

ART,

ACTING,

AND

THE

THEATER

ure in contrived effects; he and Laertes can only be fitted to their proper "shape" by the "convenience both of time and means." In this context, "shape" means not only the proper costume, but the whole deceptive role the two must play. It is a "performance," and one which will turn out badly if the real "drift" of the action is revealed to the spectators. T o proceed from obvious to less obvious uses of "shape" in its theatrical sense, Hamlet's first speech in the play (after the one-line thrusts) calls attention to his "inky cloak" and "customary suits of solemn black" (1.2.77-78) as only "forms, moods, shapes of grief": "For they are actions that a man might play." But Hamlet has "that within which passes show;/ These but the trappings and the suits of woe" (82, 84-86). T h e passage is steeped in the language of the theater: "shapes," "actions," "play," "show," "trappings." Hamlet is using acting in the traditional way to represent appearances in contrast to true inner feelings. His costume, gesture, and facial expression are all "shapes of grief," the kinds of details with which an actor would concern himself in preparing his part

(the "actions that a man might

play"), but they are ultimately only outward "trappings," a "show." In Hamlet's nunnery scene with Ophelia, we find the word "shape" again in a theatrical context: "I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious, with more offenses at my beck than I have thoughts to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in" (3.1.124-28). T h e concurrence of "act" and "shape" suggests that Hamlet is thinking of his revenge — 145 —

IMAGERY as a part to be played, for which his "imagination" will provide the scenario. Among Hamlet's first passionate exchanges with the Ghost is this puzzling declaration: " T h o u com'st in such a questionable shape/ T h a t I will speak to thee" (1.4.43-44). "Questionable" may mean inviting question (or conversation), or arousing it by an odd or doubtful appearance. It seems likely that the Elizabethan ghost had traditional characteristics,4 so that the "shape" itself is not "questionable," only its otherworldly associations. Hamlet may also be thinking that the devil, as a master of theatrical disguises, "hath power/ T ' assume a pleasing shape" (2.2.611-12), especially for a temptation scene. There is an extensive use of "shape" to mean a false appearance or disguise, as in the Ghost's account of Gertrude, who lacks the virtue that "never will be moved,/ Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven" (1.5.53-54). T h e "shape of heaven" is only an actor's costume that cannot deceive steadfast virtue. "Act" is the most ambiguous of all dramatic words, but when the Clown says that "an act hath three branches" (5.1.11), it is difficult to ignore the intrusive theatrical meaning. It is not essential to verify whether the Clown's "act" occurs in the real world or in the world * See, for example, the interesting passage on the staging of ghosts by Angelo Ingegnieri Stuart

Masques

and

the

(1598), quoted in Allardyce Nicoll,

Renaissance

Stage

(New York, 1938),

pp. 204-5. See also R. A. Foakes's edition of Macbeth,

which

suggests (p. xviii) a "white-faced and perhaps white-robed ghost" in that play (The Bobbs-Merrill Shakespeare, Indianapolis, Ind., 1968).

— 146 —

ART,

ACTING,

AND

THE

THEATER

of the play. In other parts of Hamlet, "act" is defined by a context of theatrical words and images. Thus, before Hamlet dies, he addresses the spectators as an onstage audience: "You that look pale and tremble at this chance,/ T h a t are but mutes or audience to this act" (5.2.335-36). T h e "mutes" are nonspeaking supernumeraries, and we recall that the Poisoner in the dumb show enters "with some two or three Mutes" (3.2.140 s.d., Folio). In the closet scene, Gertrude demands to know "what act" it is that Hamlet speaks of, " T h a t roars so loud and thunders in the index" (3.4.52-53), as if her son were a ham actor like Bottom the Weaver, who "will roar that I will do any man's heart good to hear me" (A Midsummer Night's Dream 1.2.62-63). "Index" is a specific term for the prologue to a play, as in Iago's sexual metaphor: "Lechery, by this hand; an index and obscure prologue to the history of lust and foul thoughts" (Othello 2.1.252-54). Other common words with theatrical overtones are "plot," "show," and "part." "Plot" raises interesting analogies between the stage action and what it represents, so that Shakespeare's villains are usually good actors as well as skillful plotters—one could, in fact, take a completely histrionic approach to evil in the plays. Hamlet learns quite late in the action that " O u r indiscretion sometime serves us well/ W h e n our deep plots do pall" (5.2.8-9). These are "deep plots" such as Hamlet's decision to spare the praying Claudius in order to wait for a "more horrid hent" (3.3.88). A t the very end of the play, Horatio insists that all the actions he has specified — 147 —

IMAGERY . . . be presently performed, Even while men's minds are wild, lest more mischance On plots and errors happen. (5.2.394-96) "Plots and errors" suggest the complications of Plautine comedy, as they are happily developed in The Comedy of Errors, but Horatio has already indicated what he means: So shall you hear Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts, Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters, Of deaths put on by cunning and forced cause, And, in this upshot, purposes mistook Fall'n on th' inventors' heads. A l l this can I T r u l y deliver. (5.2.381-87) This is not only a summary of the action in Hamlet; it is also a compendium of tragic plots. T h e word "show" could be used for a play, especially one that stresses spectacle rather than language, as in the traditional image of the world as a theater in Sonnet X V : "this huge stage presenteth naught but shows/ Whereon the stars in secret influence comment." There is, of course, the dumb show or pantomime in Hamlet, on which the witty prince quibbles aggressively in his talk with Ophelia. When she asks if the Prologue will "tell us what this show meant" (3.2.148), as prologues were supposed to do, Hamlet taunts her: "Ay, or any show that you will show him. Be not you ashamed to show, he'll not shame to tell you what it means" (1495 1 ) . Hamlet later turns Ophelia's putative lovemaking into a puppet show, to which he will act as presenter or — 148 —

ART,

ACTING,

AND

THE

THEATER

chorus: " I could interpret between you and your love, if I could see the puppets dallying" (252-53). There is no doubt that this is a cruel attack on Ophelia, but Hamlet means to explode all false shows with his Mousetrap. "Part" is a theatrical word for role, but it has so many other meanings that it is often difficult to tell whether it is being used histrionically—for example, when Hamlet says: "for my own poor part,/ Look you, I'll go pray" (1.5.131-32). This is the sort of case that may be attracted into a theatrical meaning by its context. There is no ambiguity, however, when Hamlet says: "the humorous man shall end his part in peace" (2.2.331-32) , with a glance at Corporal Nym and the humors comedies with which Ben Jonson had so recently astounded English audiences. Another clear reference is found in Hamlet's outrageous puns on Polonius' acting career. He "played once i' th' university" and "was accounted a good actor" (3.2.101-3): Polonius.

I did enact Julius Caesar. I was killed i' th' Capitol; Brutus killed me.

Hamlet.

It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there.

(3.2.105-8)

T o continue the prophetic puns into the speech of the Player King, Polonius is one of those ill-fated actors whose "own enactures with themselves destroy" (203). Hamlet will enact the "brute part" for the old counselor in the closet scene, where, like the good curate Sir Nathaniel in the show of the Nine Worthies, he

— 149 —

IMAGERY proves to be "a little o'erparted" (Love's Labours 5.2.578).

Lost

Shakespeare's self-consciousness of his own theater is sometimes expressed in unexpected ways. When Hamlet vows to remember the Ghost, he speaks a line with an extraordinary allusion in it: Remember thee? Ay, thou poor ghost, whiles memory holds a seat In this distracted globe.

(1-5-95"97)

Hamlet makes a gesture to his head, which could familiarly be called a "globe," but this is also the name of the theater in which the play is being presented, and the word "seat" clinches the comparison. Memory, then, is personified as a member of the audience—one of those "wonder-wounded hearers" (5.1.259)—that closely attends the Ghost's recital, both in Hamlet's "globe" and in Shakespeare's Globe. 5 T h e phrase "holds a seat" suggests a place in the highest price category, that may have been held on subscription for influential patrons. For a more subtle example of Shakespeare's awareness of the illusion he is creating, we may turn to Hamlet's explanation of his melancholy to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern: "I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fret5

See Charles R. Forker, "Shakespeare's Theatrical Symbolism

and Its Function in Hamlet,"

SQ, X I V

— 150 —

(1963), 221.

ART,

ACTING,

AND

THE

THEATER

ted with golden fire: why, it appeareth nothing to me but a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors" (2.2. 303-11). During an afternoon performance in an unroofed theater, "this brave o'erhanging firmament" is plainly visible to all, and Hamlet's "look you" seems to invite the audience to verify the words of the play. Hamlet is making his demonstration in terms of visual realities just outside the theater, but "this most excellent canopy" and "this majestical roof fretted with golden fire" may also refer to the projecting canopy or "shadow" over the stage, with its zodiacal decorations.6 In Hamlet's cloud speech to Polonius, there is a similar reciprocation between the play world and the real world, and even the illusion that certain objects identifiable to the audience may be appropriated to theatrical use. Hamlet begins: " D o you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel?" (3.2.384-85). Polonius looks up, as the audience is encouraged to do, and politely agrees with this description of "yonder cloud." According to the meteorological conditions on the Bankside in Southwark on any particular day in the very early seventeenth century, "yonder cloud" might look like a camel, a weasel, or a whale—"Very like a whale" (390), as Polonius says obligingly—or like Antony's . . . cloud that's dragonish; A vapour sometime like a bear or lion, A tower'd citadel, a pendent rock, 8

See Nevill Coghill, Shakespeare's

Professional

Skills

(Cam-

bridge, Eng.: Cambridge University Press, 1964), Chap. 1: "Visual Meaning," esp. pp. 8-9. See also C. Walter Hodges, The Restored

(New York, 1954), p. 31.

— 151 —

Globe

IMAGERY A forked mountain, or blue promontory With trees upon't that nod unto the world And mock our eyes with air. (Antony and Cleopatra 4.14.2-7) These are excellent, if not fortuitous, examples of what Bethell calls the "popular dramatic tradition," that "multi-conscious" counterpoint between the desire to create a convincing illusion on stage and the contrary impulse to keep the audience aware that this is only a play, "a fiction" and "a dream of passion" (2.2.562) .7 This counterpoint may seem to violate modern assumptions about psychological verisimilitude, but it does allow the audience to share in the playwright's own selfconsciousness and to participate wholeheartedly in strong histrionic emotions. O n one side of this "multi-consciousness," we may see how Hamlet, from the Player's "passionate speech" (2.2.441-42), arrives at the central question of all mimetic art: "What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,/ T h a t he should weep for her?" (569-70). Through a series of self-accusations, this question leads to an understanding of how pity and fear—or, more practically, a guilty conscience—can be "caught" by a play: That Have Been They 7

I have heard guilty creatures sitting at a play by the very cunning of the scene struck so to the soul that presently have proclaimed their malefactions. (2.2.600-4)

See S. L. Bethell, Shakespeare

dition

and the Popular

(London, 1944).

— 152 —

Dramatic

Tra-

ART,

ACTING,

AND THE

THEATER

There were many "real life" anecdotes to support this confessional effect, including one in Der Bestrafte Brudermord (the German Hamlet), and three others in Heywood's Apology for Actors (1612), which defended the moral utility of the theater against Puritan attacks.8 "Cunning" means professional skill or art purposively applied, as in Hamlet's earlier remark that the Dido and Aeneas play was "set down with as much modesty as cunning" (2.2.450-51). " T h e very cunning of the scene" is the ability of the stage representation to work its emotional effects against the conscious will of the guilty spectator, who is caught unaware in the play's cathartic coils. But for every king who cries, "Give me some light. Away!" (3.2.275), and for every consciencestricken wife who suddenly exclaims, " O my husband!", revealing a well-hidden murder, there are all the other persons in the audience who refuse to be ensnared by "the very cunning of the scene." They agree with Hamlet's mocking deflation of illusion: "No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest; no offense i' th' world" (240-41). 8

See Kittredge, pp. 204-5, and Variorum,

— 153 —

I, 198.

PART TWO STAGING AND STRUCTURE

T W O U L D be a pleasant exercise to speculate on

I

that question Martin Holmes has proposed: "What sort of a play was Hamlet in the eyes of its original

spectators?"1 Or, if we accept Shakespeare as our contemporary, we may return with Jan Kott to that hypothetical moment when the members of Shakespeare's

company first meet to discuss Hamlet, the next presentation at the

Globe. 2

which is to be

T h e y will have the

"book" of the play in their hands, but decisions must still be made about the appearance of the characters, their costumes, the gestures they will use, and the sound effects and music needed in the stage action. A list of properties must be drawn up, and they must be cued into the text. T h e pattern of entrances and exits, stage groupings, doubling of minor roles, and use of traps must be made practicable for a performance. All permissive, authorial stage directions—for example, Quarto 2's entrance in the dumb show for "The some three or four"

poisoner,

with

(3.2.140 s.d.), which Folio reduces

to "some two or three Mutes"—must

be revised into a

precise form. Many of these indications are already in the text of the written play, and some effects are so much a matter of accepted practice that they can be noted in abbreviated form: for example, the trumpet fanfare or "flourish" to announce the entrance of royalty, or the clearing 1

Martin Holmes, The

2

Jan Kott, Shakespeare

Guns Our

of Elsinore

(London, 1964), p. 13.

Contemporary,

borski (London, 1964), Chap, 2: "Hamlet

tr. Boleslaw T a -

of the Mid-Century."

PART

TWO

of corpses from the stage before a new scene begins. In the dumb show, where all the directions are unusually explicit, we are told: "The dead body is carried away" (3.2.140 s.d.). Since there is no possibility of either a "blackout" or a lowered curtain in the Elizabethan theater, the dead must be disposed of in full view of the audience. There is a Hamlet of words that we all know almost by heart, and there is a Hamlet without words that may be unfamiliar, but these two Hamlets cannot be separated in the play we see in the theater. T h e poetic play is a puzzling genre, since so much in it is a matter of presentation rather than of words. What are we to make of the dumb show in Hamlet? T h e description in our text does not exist in performance. It is, literally, only a set of directions to actors, written instructions on how to execute the pantomime. W e regret losing that wonderful line that tells the Player Queen to make "passionate action" (3.2.140 s.d.) when she finds the Player King poisoned.The actor must be able to translate the stage directions into their proper nonverbal form. Whoever acted the part of Ophelia would be able to profit from Quarto i's vivid description of her entrance in the mad scene: "Enter Ophelia playing on a lute, and her hair down, singing" (at 4.5.20). This recalls the Folio directions in Troilus and Cressida: "Enter Cassandra with her hair about her ears" (2.2.100 s.d.), and in Richard III: "Enter QUEEN ELIZABETH, with her hair about her ears" (2.2.33 s-d.) — a conventional sign of grief-stricken, distracted ladies. One of the most graphic Shakespearean directions is — 158 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

for the entrance of Apemantus into the banqueting hall of Timon: " T h e n comes, dropping after all, APEMANTUS, discontentedly, like himself" (Timon of Athens 1.2 s.d.). This splendid line, which does not exist in the presented play, is meant to aid Apemantus in preparing his part and to help the poor reader "Piece out" his own "imperfections" (Henry V Prol. 23). W e are grateful, of course, for this verbal scaffolding, but we may still wonder what sort of Janus-faced genre is this that has one form when read and another when performed? Which is indeed the play that Shakespeare wrote? I do not propose to answer these teasing questions. Merely to formulate them suggests how difficult it is to speak about the style of a Shakespearean play. W e are forced to think simultaneously about the written text and its realization in performance. Sometimes a line in the written text is not complete without the gesture that accompanies it. I am thinking of Polonius* triumphant revelation of Hamlet's love melancholy to the king and queen: " T a k e this from this, if this be otherwise" (2.2.156). It is not a very impressive line, yet it is unintelligible without the stage direction supplied by Theobald: "Pointing to his head and shoulder." T h e gesture is implicit in Shakespeare's text, yet in what sense can a gesture be said to exist in a literary work? W e have also a problem in grammar, since the first two demonstrative pronouns refer not to other nouns, but to parts of the body of the actor playing Polonius. There is another example in the Quarto 2 stage direction for the second appearance of the Ghost: "It spreads — 159 —

PART

TWO

his arms"s (1.1.127 s.d.). T h e Ghost does not speak at all in this scene, but this gesture is intended as a reply to Horatio's bold line: "I'll cross it, though it blast me" (127). T h e Ghost answers by "crossing" Horatio—a dangerous procedure, according to all pneumatologists — a n d thus warning him that it will not be trifled with. How are we, in our accepted literary categories, to deal with a nonverbal reply? Since most studies of Shakespeare's style choose to ignore these uncategorizable details, I should like to go to the opposite extreme to see what can be said about the Hamlet without words. So much has already been written about the words of the play that it might be interesting, as an experiment, to confine our attention to the play as Shakespeare intended it to be produced at the Globe. I don't for a moment believe that we can literally recover Shakespeare's intentions, but the attempt might stimulate some fresh insight. In the first two chapters on staging, I shall be concerned with gesture and stage action, sound effects and music, costumes, and stage properties. I shall then briefly discuss structure in relation to dramatic scenes. 3

T h i s stage direction, omitted in Folio, is emended in the

Quarto of 1676 to "He spreads

his arms."

Most editors assume that

the gesture is made by Horatio rather than by the Ghost.

— 160 —

6. Gesture and Stage Action M O D E R N editions of Hamlet are filled with editorial indications of the movements to be made by the actors, such as Theobald's "Pointing to his head and shoulder," discussed above. In these stage directions, the editor records what he takes to be the implication of the lines, but often he is adapting Shakespeare to the theatrical practice of a later age. This is especially true of those eighteenth-century versions of Shakespeare on which so many modern editions are based. I believe that a careful reader of plays should be able to supply for himself the gestures and stage action demanded by the text, and, by so doing, avoid the distortions of editorial staging. In the present discussion, I shall ignore the inventions of imaginative actors, chronicled by theatrical history, in order to concentrate on those examples of gesture and stage action that are either mentioned or clearly implied in the text. There are certain demonstrative words that need a gesture to complete their meaning. T h e word "thus," for example, generates at least five gestures in Hamlet. Laertes, who is much given to broad gesturing to support his ranting style, tells the king how he will honor his father's memory: T o his good friends thus wide I'll ope my arms And like the kind life-rend'ring pelican 1 Repast them with my blood. 1

(4-5-145"47)

Folio has "politician" for Quarto 2's "pelican," an error so

wild and so difficult to account for textually that it seems as if

— 161 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

Laertes opens his arms in a gesture of friendship to illustrate his sanguinary words, a conventional movement that could serve as pantomime or dumb show without any accompanying words.2 There is another example of gesture illustrating text in Hamlet's warning to the players against obvious and excessive hand gestures: "Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus" (3.2.4-5). T h e added "thus" is for the demonstration, which follows the example of proper speaking, "as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue" (1-2). Right after the Ghost departs, Hamlet insists that his friends swear not to give away the secret of his "antic disposition" by such knowing movements as, "With arms encumb'red thus, or this headshake" (1.5.174). Hamlet is miming possible action, which he accompanies by brief phrases of "ambiguous giving out" (178). In Ophelia's report of Hamlet's frantic visit to her in her closet, she uses two gestures introduced by "thus": A n d with his other hand thus o'er his brow He falls to such perusal of my face As 'a would draw it. Long stayed he so. A t last, a little shaking of mine arm, A n d thrice his head thus waving up and down. . . . (2.1.89-93) the compositor is playing tricks with us (see Parrott and Craig, p. 197). T h e "kind life-rend'ring politician" makes a splendid image of Laertes overreaching his politic father. 2

See B. L. Joseph, Elizabethan

Acting

(2 edn.; London: O x -

ford University Press, 1964). First published, 1951. Joseph discusses, with illustrations, many of these conventional gestures.

— 162 —

GESTURE

AND

ACTION

Both examples of "thus" are unnecessary for Ophelia's narration; their only function is to call attention to the actor's gestures. " T h i s " and "that," and "these" and "those" are also words that frequently require an accompanying gesture. W h e n Polonius produces Hamlet's letter to Ophelia, he does it with a triumphant lawyer's emphasis: I have a daughter: have, while she is mine, W h o in her duty and obedience, mark, Hath given me this. Now gather, and surmise. (2.2.106-8) There is a pause at "this," during which Polonius might wave the letter significantly in the direction of the king and queen. In this example and in a great many others like it, the gesture calls attention to the stage property. T h e dialogue about Yorick's skull has a number of these demonstrative pronouns: Clown. This same skull, sir, was, sir, Yorick's skull, the King's jester. Hamlet. This? Clown. E'en that. (5.1.181-84) "This?" and "E'en that" need a referent to complete their meaning. "Here" and "there" are an analogous pair of direction words. They may indicate a property, as in Claudius' "we have here writ" (1.2.27), motioning to his letter to old Norway, but most often they serve to locate action on the stage. Like Launce in his patient representation of parting ( T h e Two Gentlemen of Verona 2.3), the — 163 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

Clown-gravedigger reenacts Ophelia's drowning: "Here lies the water—good. Here stands the man—good" (5.1.15-16). T h e imperative "look" or "look you," when it is not merely an interjection, implies the double action of pointing and observing. T h e word is of greatest importance in the closet scene, where Hamlet is urgently trying to make his mother see the Ghost: "Look you, how pale he glares!" (3.4.126). " D o you see nothing there?" (132), he asks unbelievingly, but Gertrude's blindness to the spiritual world is not to be broken by exhortation: "Nothing at all; yet all that is I see" (133). Hamlet makes one final attempt to show Gertrude the Ghost as it exits through the stage door: Why, look you there! Look how it steals away! My father, in his habit as he lived! Look where he goes even now out at the portal! (34-135-37)

Hamlet is describing what he observes, but Gertrude, although anxiously looking in the direction of her son's pointing finger, sees nothing, and confidently attributes the presence of the Ghost to madness. "Covering" lines also indicate stage actions, usually ones that are completed during the time the lines are being spoken. T h e y often "cover" quick costume changes or the donning of a disguise, or make it possible for a character to ascend or descend the upper stage by an inner staircase. T h e lines themselves may be extremely lyrical, but this does not alter their practical function. Similarly, there are many passages in Shakespeare that — 164 —

GESTURE

AND

ACTION

serve m a i n l y to locate the scene a n d to set the time, a n d w h i c h c o u l d b e r e p l a c e d o n the m o d e r n stage b y effects of l i g h t i n g a n d scenic illusion. T h e Ghost's e n t r a n c e a n d e x i t lines i n A c t I, f o r e x a m p l e , are c o n d i t i o n e d b y the slowly a s c e n d i n g a n d d e s c e n d i n g trap b y w h i c h it p r e s u m a b l y arrives a n d departs. A l t h o u g h there are n o directions r e g a r d i n g the t r a p — a n d it is clear that the stage doors are also u s e d (as i n the e x i t at 1.4.86 a n d the e n t r a n c e at the beg i n n i n g of 1 . 5 ) — t h i s was the c o n v e n t i o n a l m e a n s of producing and withdrawing an Elizabethan

dramatic

spook. T h e Ghost's e x i t l i n e i n A c t I, Scene v m a k e s f o r an e x c e l l e n t slow " f a d e - o u t " : " A d i e u , a d i e u , a d i e u . Remember me" "cellarage" stage"

( 9 1 ) . O n c e the G h o s t has r e a c h e d the

( 1 5 1 ) , w e n e x t h e a r it c r y i n g "under

the

(148 s.d.), w h i c h confirms o u r impression of a n

e x i t b y a trap. T h e first a p p e a r a n c e of the G h o s t is c h a r t e d b y m e a n s of a star, i n B a r n a r d o ' s n a r r a t i o n : L a s t n i g h t of all, W h e n y o n d same star that's w e s t w a r d f r o m the p o l e H a d m a d e his course t' i l l u m e that p a r t of h e a v e n W h e r e n o w it b u r n s , M a r c e l l u s a n d myself, T h e bell then beating o n e — Enter

Ghost.

(1.1.35-39 s -d-)

T h e precise astrological details l o c a t i n g the e v e n t

in

t i m e h e l p to d e v e l o p its portentousness, a n d they also serve to distract us, so t h a t the Ghost's e n t r a n c e can be

sudden

and

unobtrusive.

Shakespeare

will

work

changes o n this d r a m a t i c t e c h n i q u e for every a p p e a r a n c e — 165 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

of the G h o s t i n the play. E a c h has its o w n variety of distraction, o r w h a t I h a v e b e e n c a l l i n g its

"covering"

device. O n e o t h e r i m p o r t a n t source f o r u n d e r s t a n d i n g the stage a c t i o n is the description i n the t e x t of w h a t the characters l o o k l i k e a n d w h a t they do. T h e s e

clues

s h o u l d b e f o l l o w e d strictly b y a n y d i r e c t o r i n o r d e r to avoid

embarrassing o r

absurd

contradictions.

When

P o l o n i u s tells us of the First Player, f o r e x a m p l e : " L o o k , w h e ' r h e has n o t t u r n e d his color, a n d has tears in's eyes" (2.2.530-31), w e accept this as a n a c c o u n t of w h a t w e h a v e j u s t seen. H a m l e t ' s s o l i l o q u y c o n t i n u e s

the

description of the First Player's r e a c t i o n to his "passionate s p e e c h "

(441-42):

. . . all his visage w a n n e d , T e a r s i n his eyes, distraction i n his aspect, A b r o k e n voice, a n d his w h o l e f u n c t i o n s u i t i n g W i t h f o r m s to his conceit?

(2.2.564-67)

W e h a v e n o reason to d o u b t H a m l e t ' s w o r d , so that t h e actor p r e p a r i n g the r o l e of the First P l a y e r s h o u l d der i v e u s e f u l suggestions f r o m these t w o speeches. T h e r e are m a n y c o m p a r a b l e e x a m p l e s , some

very

b r i e f , scattered t h r o u g h o u t t h e play. T h e q u e e n tells us h o w H a m l e t k i l l e d P o l o n i u s : " B e h i n d the arras h e a r i n g s o m e t h i n g stir,/ W h i p s o u t his rapier, cries, ' A rat, a rat!' " (4.1.9-10). W e a l r e a d y k n o w most of this f r o m the closet scene, b u t " W h i p s o u t his r a p i e r " is a g r a p h i c detail that e x a c t l y describes H a m l e t ' s u n t h i n k i n g alacrity. A f t e r H o r a t i o has seen the G h o s t , B a r n a r d o comments:

" H o w now, Horatio? Y o u — 166 —

tremble and

look

GESTURE pale"

AND

ACTION

(1.1.53) • T h e breaking of Horatio's stoic calm

and skeptical banter must therefore be an immediate, physical reaction. W e have a few hints for Ophelia's part in the report of the anonymous gentleman, w h o says that she . . . hems, and beats her heart, Spurns enviously at straws, speaks things in doubt T h a t carry but half sense.

(4-5-5"7)

H e also tells us of "her winks and nods and gestures" ( 1 1 ) . A l l these details could profitably be put to use by an actor or serve to stimulate the histrionic imagination of a reader. In the closet scene, Gertrude gives us a full account of how her son looks as he speaks to the Ghost: Alas, how is't with you, T h a t you do bend your eye on vacancy, A n d with th' incorporal air do hold discourse? Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep, A n d as the sleeping soldiers in th' alarm Y o u r bedded hair like life in excrements Start u p and stand an end.

(3.4.117-23)

W e know that Gertrude believes her son to be suffering from "ecstasy" (139), so that all of her details fit the idea of uncontrollable emotion: the fixed stare, the wild eyes, the hair standing on end. If we follow through our assumptions about the relation of such passages to the stage action, we will want to know something more about Hamlet's "bedded hair" and how it can "Start u p and stand an end." T h e passage draws on Elizabethan — 167 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

n o t i o n s of h a i r as " e x c r e m e n t s " or o u t g r o w t h s , w h i c h , a l t h o u g h lifeless themselves, w e r e nevertheless c a p a b l e of e x t e n s i o n . I n a n earlier scene, the G h o s t anticipates the effect that a disclosure of its e x p e r i e n c e s i n purgatory w o u l d h a v e o n H a m l e t . S u c h a recital, it says, would make T h y k n o t t e d a n d c o m b i n e d locks to part A n d each p a r t i c u l a r h a i r to stand an e n d L i k e q u i l l s u p o n the f e a r f u l p o r p e n t i n e . (1.5.18-20) T h e r e is n o e q u i v o c a t i o n a b o u t the p r o p e r stage expression f o r H a m l e t ' s f r i g h t ; it is simply a q u e s t i o n of h o w it c o u l d h a v e b e e n realized i n p e r f o r m a n c e . F r o m w h a t w e k n o w of the E l i z a b e t h a n theater, there is n o indicat i o n that B u r b a g e or a n y o t h e r actor of that t i m e was a b l e to carry o u t these specific instructions i n the text. B u t the g r e a t G a r r i c k , so A r t h u r C o l b y S p r a g u e i n f o r m s us, was a b l e to a c c o m p l i s h the effect w i t h a m e c h a n i c a l wig, 3 the so-called " f r i g h t w i g " o p e r a t e d b y strings. H a m l e t ' s gestures m a y best b e s t u d i e d in the scene i m m e d i a t e l y a f t e r the d e p a r t u r e of the G h o s t .

The

y o u n g p r i n c e s u d d e n l y totters o n his f e e t — " A n d y o u , m y sinews, g r o w n o t instant old,/ B u t b e a r m e stiffly up"

( 1 . 5 . 9 4 - 9 5 ) — a n d clasps his h a n d s to his h e a r t —

" H o l d , h o l d , m y h e a r t " (93) — t o k e e p it f r o m c r a c k i n g its " f r a i l case"

( A n t o n y and

Cleopatra

4.14.41).

This

is a c o n v e n t i o n a l gesture for an o v e r m a s t e r i n g passion, just as G e r t r u d e ' s " w r i n g i n g " of h e r " h a n d s " 3

Arthur Colby Sprague, Shakespeare

and

the

Actors

(3.4.35) (Cam-

bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1945), p. 38a, note 43.

— 168 —

GESTURE

AND

ACTION

a f t e r the death of P o l o n i u s is a c o n v e n t i o n a l expression of grief. H a n d gestures are f r e q u e n t i n Hamlet,

especially the

s w e a r i n g of an oath, w h i c h is p r o b a b l y the m o s t rep e a t e d gesture i n Shakespeare. H a m l e t ' s m o s t m e m o r a b l e o a t h is his satirical protestation of l o v e to Rosencrantz, " b y these pickers a n d stealers"

(3.2.343). T h i s

p a r o d y of the A n g l i c a n catechism, " K e e p m y h a n d s f r o m p i c k i n g a n d stealing," 4 is p r o b a b l y e m p h a s i z e d b y the c o n t e m p t u o u s gesture of o p e n i n g the h a n d a n d spreadi n g the fingers. T h e most extensive use of h a n d gestures b e l o n g s to t h e G h o s t , w h o stands at o n e of the stage doors a n d "waves"

(1.4.61)

H a m l e t to f o l l o w :

"Ghost

beckons

Hamlet"

(57 s.d., F o l i o ) . L i k e the crossing of H o r a t i o

( 1 . 1 . 1 2 7 s.d.), the b e c k o n i n g is a r e p l y to a series of u r g e n t questions p u t to the G h o s t b y H a m l e t : "Say, w h y is this? W h e r e f o r e ? W h a t s h o u l d w e d o ? " (1.4.57) • T h e c o m m e n t s of the o t h e r characters r e m i n d us that the G h o s t c o n t i n u e s to gesture u n t i l H a m l e t

finally

exits

w i t h it. H o r a t i o says: It b e c k o n s y o u to g o away w i t h it, A s if it some i m p a r t m e n t d i d desire T o you alone.

(1.4.58-60)

M a r c e l l u s tells us that the G h o s t " w a v e s " H a m l e t " t o a more removed g r o u n d " with "courteous action"

(60-

6 1 ) , a h e l p f u l a n d u n e x p e c t e d detail f o r a G h o s t that has b e e n u n f l i n c h i n g l y m a r t i a l u p to n o w . I n H a m l e t ' s speech, " I t waves m e f o r t h a g a i n " 4

See Kittredge, p. 231.

— 169 —

(68) a n d " I t w a v e s

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

m e still" (78) a n d " S t i l l a m I c a l l e d " ( 8 4 ) , i n a m a n n e r n o t to b e d e n i e d . " M y fate cries o u t " ( 8 1 ) , says H a m l e t , a n d i n his last l i n e he m u s t fight off H o r a t i o a n d M a r cellus—"I

say,

away!"—before

G h o s t : " G o o n . I'll f o l l o w t h e e "

he

can

promise

the

(86).

T h e Ghost's u b i q u i t y raises a n i n t e r e s t i n g p r o b l e m a b o u t h o w to create the illusion of stage m o v e m e n t . 6 T h e G h o s t is a b o u t to speak w h e n "The

cock

crows"

( 1 . 1 . 1 3 8 s.d.) , at w h i c h signal the upstage trap o n w h i c h it p r e s u m a b l y has b e e n s t a n d i n g b e g i n s to descend. W e l e a r n later f r o m H o r a t i o h o w close the G h o s t is to speaki n g at this p o i n t a n d h o w strangely it seems to disappear: It l i f t e d u p it h e a d a n d d i d address Itself to m o t i o n l i k e as it w o u l d speak: B u t e v e n t h e n the m o r n i n g cock c r e w l o u d , A n d at the s o u n d it s h r u n k i n haste away A n d v a n i s h e d f r o m o u r sight.

(1.2.216-20)

N o t h i n g i n this speech is inconsistent w i t h the Ghost's e x i t b y a trap. H o r a t i o says i m m e d i a t e l y : " A n d then it started, l i k e a g u i l t y t h i n g / U p o n a f e a r f u l s u m m o n s " ( 1 . 1 . 1 4 8 ) , a n d M a r c e l l u s adds: " I t f a d e d o n the c r o w i n g of the c o c k " ( 1 5 7 ) . " S h r u n k in haste a w a y , " " v a n i s h e d , " " s t a r t e d , " " f a d e d " — a l l those w o r d s suggest s o m e t h i n g e x t r a o r d i n a r y a b o u t this exit, a n d " s h r u n k " a n d " f a d e d " h a v e some literal a p p l i c a t i o n to a descent. A s the G h o s t is disappearing, H o r a t i o shifts to a n e w set of i m p e r a t i v e s : "Stay a n d speak. S t o p it, M a r c e l l u s " 5

See William J. Lawrence's ingenious, but very literal essay,

" 'Hamlet' as Shakespeare Staged It," Pre-Restoration ies, pp. 107-8.

— 170 —

Stage

Stud-

GESTURE

AND

ACTION

( 1 . 1 . 1 3 9 ) . M a r c e l l u s , h o w e v e r , does n o t

immediately

p u r s u e the G h o s t , b u t asks H o r a t i o a q u e s t i o n : " S h a l l I strike at it w i t h m y partisan?"

( 1 4 0 ) . W e c o u l d con-

sider this a c o v e r i n g line, since it a l l o w s the

Ghost

sufficient t i m e to c o m p l e t e its exit. H o r a t i o agrees o n the use of w e a p o n s : " D o , if it w i l l n o t s t a n d "

(141),

b u t they can n o w n o l o n g e r locate the G h o s t : Barnardo.

' T i s here.

Horatio. Marcellus.

' T i s here. ' T i s gone.

(1.1.141-42)

I n a d a y l i g h t p e r f o r m a n c e the G h o s t c a n n o t lose itself i n stage obscurity either n a t u r a l or created b y effects of l i g h t i n g , n o r e v e n i n the p e r f u m e d mists that w e r e b e i n g p r o d u c e d at this t i m e i n masques. E v e r y t h i n g m u s t b e p l a i n l y visible, w h i c h m a k e s it clear that the G h o s t has m a d e its e x i t a n d t h a t these " v a i n b l o w s " are i n d e e d " m a l i c i o u s m o c k e r y " ( 1 4 6 ) . T h i s passage is also a g o o d o n e to illustrate the k i n d s of spatial effects possible o n a b r o a d , p r o j e c t i n g stage, since B a r n a r d o , H o r a t i o , a n d M a r c e l l u s successfully g i v e t h e i l l u s i o n of a c t i v e l y — a n d " m a l i c i o u s l y " — p u r s u i n g the G h o s t o v e r a w i d e area. T h e second d e m o n s t r a t i o n of the G h o s t ' s u b i q u i t y is m u c h s i m p l e r to stage, since the spirit's s u d d e n m o v e m e n t s i n the " c e l l a r a g e "

( 1 . 5 . 1 5 1 ) are mostly a m a t t e r

of s o u n d effects. T h e "Ghost

cries under

the stage"

(148

s . d . ) : " S w e a r " ( 1 4 9 ) , a n d a f e w lines f u r t h e r o n it cries again: " S w e a r "

( 1 5 5 ) , this t i m e f r o m a d i f f e r e n t p a r t

of t h e cellarage. H a m l e t a n d his f r i e n d s a t t e m p t i n v a i n to e l u d e the sepulchral voice: "Hie

et ubique?

Then

w e ' l l shift o u r g r o u n d " ( 1 5 6 ) . W h e n they h a v e m o v e d , — 171 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

h o w e v e r , the tricky, p u c k i s h G h o s t , o l d

"truepenny"

( 1 5 0 ) , is s u d d e n l y h e a r d b e n e a t h t h e m yet o n c e m o r e . H a m l e t ' s a m u s i n g lines r e c o r d a n o t h e r e x c u r s i o n across the stage: " W e l l said, o l d m o l e ! C a n s t w o r k i' th' e a r t h so fast?/ A w o r t h y p i o n e r ! O n c e m o r e r e m o v e , g o o d f r i e n d s " (162-63). T h e c o m p l i m e n t to the " o l d m o l e " o n its speed i n t u n n e l i n g suggests a c o m p a r a b l e swiftness o n the p a r t of the three swearers. A f t e r a l l these m e r r y pranks, H a m l e t ' s " R e s t , rest, p e r t u r b e d s p i r i t " (182) i m p l i e s that the G h o s t needs rest a f t e r its frantic activity u n d e r the stage. T h e o b v i o u s w a y of staging this scene is p r o b a b l y the correct o n e , w i t h the G h o s t t a k i n g u p three d i f f e r e n t stations i n the cellarage f o r its first three cries (no special m o v e m e n t is i n d i c a t e d f o r the f o u r t h ) . T h e r e are at least five c o v e r i n g lines b e t w e e n each cry, so that n o u n u s u a l d e m a n d s are m a d e e v e n o n a

supernatural

" p i o n e r . " O n the m o d e r n stage the effect c o u l d b e prod u c e d effortlessly b y

three separate loudspeakers.

It

seems to b e the accepted practice n o w to h a v e ghosts speak t h r o u g h m i c r o p h o n e s w i t h e x a g g e r a t e d bass amplification, a l t h o u g h e v e r y o n e i n the classical t r a d i t i o n t h o u g h t that shades " D i d squeak a n d g i b b e r "

(1.1.116).

E l i z a b e t h a n staging was n o t s y m b o l i c i n o u r sense of the t e r m ; i n fact, i n certain a r e a s — s u c h as the use of costumes, the r e p r e s e n t a t i o n of trades, a n d the s h o w i n g o f tortures a n d v i o l e n c e — i t was e x t r e m e l y literal. T h e c o m p l e x staging of the f e n c i n g m a t c h i n Hamlet,

for

e x a m p l e , is accurate e n o u g h to satisfy e v e n t h e " e l d e r masters of k n o w n h o n o r " (5.2.249). J o h n D o v e r W i l s o n observes: " I t was a f e n c e f o u g h t b y e x p e r t s w o r d s m e n — 172 —

GESTURE

AND

ACTION

b e f o r e a n u n d e r s t a n d i n g a u d i e n c e , m a n y of t h e m exp e r t swordsmen themselves a n d all of t h e m t r a i n e d f r o m b o y h o o d to use eye, h a n d , wrist a n d a r m i n self-defence. T h u s , every m o t i o n of the combatants, every t u r n of the fight, w a s f o l l o w e d w i t h c o n c e n t r a t e d a t t e n t i o n a n d the keenest a p p r e c i a t i o n . T o such watchers, the e x c h a n g e of swords m u s t h a v e seemed the m o s t t h r i l l i n g m o m e n t of the p l a y . " 6 O n e detail, " T h e y b l e e d o n b o t h sides" (5.2.305), c o u l d p r o b a b l y b e v e r i f i e d b y the spectators, as it seems to m e all such details s h o u l d be. Small concealed b l a d d e r s filled w i t h a n i m a l b l o o d c o u l d easily b e p r i c k e d to create a b l o o d y stain, a n effect that p r o m o t e s the i m m e d i a c y of the pity, terror, a n d w o n d e r e x p e c t e d f r o m the a u d i e n c e , a n d p r e v e n t s a n y unnecessary f a t i g u e to o u r c r e d u l i t y . T h e large topic of social c e r e m o n y offers a w a y of e x t e n d i n g the discussion of gesture a n d stage action. O n e difficulty h e r e is t h a t the c e r e m o n y is o f t e n of the trivial sort that H a m l e t satirizes i n Osric: " ' A d i d c o m p l y , sir, w i t h his d u g b e f o r e 'a s u c k e d i t "

(5.2.189-90). " C o m -

p l y " is an a m u s i n g w o r d f o r a courtier's c o m p l i m e n t s ; Osric's u n c o v e r i n g to H a m l e t w i t h his p l u m e d hat, f o r e x a m p l e , " c o m p l i e s " to a social superior. O c c a s i o n a l l y , h o w e v e r , the use of social c e r e m o n y or the d e n i a l of it is an i m p o r t a n t expression of a character's status at a p a r t i c u l a r p o i n t i n the d r a m a t i c action. T h e

fall of

R i c h a r d II, f o r e x a m p l e , is g r a p h i c a l l y r e p r e s e n t e d b y his f a i l u r e to receive f r o m N o r t h u m b e r l a n d the h o m a g e d u e to a k i n g : 6

Wilson, What

Happens

in Hamlet,

— 173 —

p. 287.

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

W e are a m a z ' d ; a n d thus l o n g h a v e w e stood T o w a t c h the f e a r f u l b e n d i n g of thy k n e e , Because w e t h o u g h t ourself thy l a w f u l k i n g ; A n d if w e be, h o w dare thy joints forget T o pay their a w f u l d u t y to o u r presence? (.Richard

II

3.3.72-76)

T h e d e f e a t e d C l e o p a t r a says to Caesar's messenger: W h a t , n o m o r e c e r e m o n y ? See, m y w o m e n ! A g a i n s t the b l o w n rose m a y they stop their nose T h a t k n e e l ' d u n t o the buds. (Antony

and

Cleopatra

T h i s is the " i d o l C e r e m o n y , " mony"

(Henry

3.13.38-40)

" t h r i c e g o r g e o u s cere-

V 4.1.236, 2 6 2 ) , w h o m

Henry V

so

d e f e r e n t i a l l y apostrophizes. I n Hamlet

c e r e m o n y is used ironically, as a f o r m of

disguise. B e n e a t h the absurdities of the Osric scene, f o r e x a m p l e , l u r k the poisonous realities of the k i n g ' s p l o t , a n d C l a u d i u s is n e v e r m o r e studiously gracious to his n e p h e w - s o n t h a n w h e n he is a b o u t to ship h i m to his d o o m i n E n g l a n d (cf. 4.3.40-46). R o s e n c r a n t z a n d G u i l d enstern a p p r o a c h H a m l e t w i t h all the effusiveness of practiced courtiers, b u t the p r i n c e soon has " a n e y e " (2.2.298)

of t h e m a n d their c r u d e s i g n a l i n g to each

other. H a m l e t ' s first spontaneous g r e e t i n g to t h e m is v e r y d i f f e r e n t f r o m his later f o r m a l w e l c o m e , a f t e r h e k n o w s that they are n o t m a k i n g a " f r e e

visitation"

( 2 8 1 ) . W e m a y set the t w o passages side b y side to show the contrast in social c e r e m o n y a n d style: — 174 —

GESTURE

AND

ACTION

M y e x c e l l e n t g o o d friends! H o w dost t h o u , G u i l d e n stern? A h , R o s e n c r a n t z ! G o o d lads, h o w d o y o u b o t h ? (2.2.227-29) G e n t l e m e n , y o u are w e l c o m e to Elsinore. Y o u r hands, c o m e then. T h ' a p p u r t e n a n c e of w e l c o m e is f a s h i o n a n d c e r e m o n y . L e t m e c o m p l y w i t h y o u i n this g a r b , lest m y e x t e n t to the players ( w h i c h I tell y o u m u s t s h o w fairly outwards)

s h o u l d m o r e a p p e a r l i k e en-

t e r t a i n m e n t than yours.

(2.2.378-83)

T h e r e is a f o r m a l i t y u n u s u a l f o r H a m l e t i n the second passage, a n d h e e v e n uses the affected w o r d " c o m p l y , " w i t h w h i c h h e w i l l later scoff at Osric. " Y o u r hands, c o m e t h e n " suggests that R o s e n c r a n t z a n d G u i l d e n s t e r n are h o l d i n g b a c k , perhaps o u t of shame at their discovery, a n d H a m l e t needs to spur t h e m o n to shake hands. C e r e m o n y is closely associated w i t h the c o u r t a n d the falsities of the c o u r t style, so that it is n o t t h r o u g h a n y anachronistically d e m o c r a t i c i m p u l s e that H a m l e t forswears c e r e m o n y i n the scene w i t h H o r a t i o a n d M a r cellus. W h e n they are a b o u t to e x i t , H a m l e t says: " L e t us g o i n t o g e t h e r " ( 1 . 5 . 1 8 6 ) , m e a n i n g n o t a c c o r d i n g to r a n k , b u t as equals. I n the v e r y last l i n e of the scene his c o m p a n i o n s are still hesitating, b u t H a m l e t insists that they s h o u l d n o t b e b o u n d b y d e c o r u m : " N a y , c o m e , let's g o t o g e t h e r " The

Comedy

( 1 9 0 ) . T h i s is l i k e the e n d i n g of

of Errors,

w h e r e the D r o m i o twins solve

the q u e s t i o n of p r e c e d e n c e b y a b o l i s h i n g it: —

775

—

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

W e c a m e i n t o the w o r l d l i k e b r o t h e r a n d b r o t h e r , A n d n o w let's g o h a n d i n h a n d , n o t o n e b e f o r e another.

(5.1.423-24)

Since there is so m u c h false a n d treacherous c e r e m o n y i n Hamlet,

w e feel s o m e t h i n g s a l u b r i o u s i n the prince's

c o l l o q u i a l d e n i a l of it: " N a y , c o m e . " I h a v e b e e n t r y i n g to describe a Hamlet

of p a n t o m i m e

a n d gesture that w o r k s b e n e a t h the surface of the play to shape its style. T h i s is, of course, to i n t e r p r e t style i n its w i d e s t sense, b u t it seems to m e that readers of Shakespeare s h o u l d participate

i n the effects

immediately

a v a i l a b l e to a n a u d i e n c e . If the t e c h n i q u e s of gesture a n d stage action seem at times simple a n d self-evident, it is also t r u e that in t h e d r a m a w h a t is most o b v i o u s is also most l i k e l y to be o v e r l o o k e d b y readers.

— 176 —

7. Sound Effects and Music, Costumes, and Stage Properties A N Y p e r f o r m a n c e of Hamlet f e r e n t f r o m the Hamlet

m u s t necessarily b e dif-

o n e reads. T h e v a l i d i t y of the

presented play, h o w e v e r , is n o t s o m e t h i n g i n d e p e n d e n t of l a n g u a g e , b u t r a t h e r a c o m b i n a t i o n of v e r b a l a n d n o n v e r b a l resources. S o u n d effects a n d music, costumes, a n d stage properties all f u n c t i o n as directly as gesture a n d stage action to express the m e a n i n g s of the play. W o r d s are o n l y o n e aspect of the style of Hamlet,

and

there is special n e e d to call a t t e n t i o n to a d i m e n s i o n of the p l a y that m a y n o t b e i m m e d i a t e l y a p p a r e n t i n the w r i t t e n text. S o u n d effects are n o t p r o p e r l y part of the t e x t at all, e x c e p t those that w e c a n surmise f r o m stage d i r e c t i o n s a n d f r o m v e r b a l clues, b u t o u r surmises d i f f e r i n k i n d f r o m w h a t w e a c t u a l l y hear i n the theater. I h a v e a l r e a d y s p o k e n a b o u t the w a y i n w h i c h the m i l i t a r y of Hamlet,

sounds

especially the f i r i n g of c a n n o n , s u p p o r t the

i m a g e r y of w a r , w e a p o n s , a n d explosives. I n this context, it is w o r t h n o t i n g the i m p o r t a n c e of s o u n d effects i n Laertes' u p r i s i n g of A c t I V , Scene v ; its discordant noises clash w i t h the m a r t i a l m u s i c for F o r t i n b r a s a n d his army. T h e first sounds of Laertes' " g i a n t l i k e " r e b e l l i o n are i n d i c a t e d as "A noise within"

(121)

(96 s.d.), at

w h i c h G e r t r u d e e x c l a i m s i n fear: " A l a c k , w h a t noise is this?"

(96). T h e unexpected disturbance

completes

C l a u d i u s ' simile of the " m u r d ' r i n g p i e c e , " w h i c h gives h i m " s u p e r f l u o u s d e a t h " (95-96). — 177 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

T h e m e n a c e of p o p u l a r i n s u r r e c t i o n c o u l d b e expressed b y a c o n f u s e d d i n of s h o u t i n g a n d c l a n g i n g of w e a p o n s offstage. S o m e of these s h o u t e d phrases are rep o r t e d b y a messenger: T h e y cry, " C h o o s e w e ! L a e r t e s shall b e k i n g ! " C a p s , hands, a n d t o n g u e s a p p l a u d it to the clouds, " L a e r t e s shall b e k i n g ! L a e r t e s k i n g ! "

(4.5.106-8)

W e h a v e r e t u r n e d to the t h r e a t e n i n g e x u b e r a n c e of the m o b i n Julius

Caesar just a f t e r the m u r d e r of Caesar.

T h e r e is a n o t h e r d i r e c t i o n for "A

noise

within"

(108

s . d . ) 1 — p r e s u m a b l y a m e d l e y of cries l i k e those r e p o r t e d b y the m e s s e n g e r — a n d G e r t r u d e answers this s o u n d w i t h q u e e n l y scorn: " H o w c h e e r f u l l y o n the false trail they cry!/ O , this is c o u n t e r , y o u false D a n i s h d o g s ! " (109-10). I i m a g i n e that G e r t r u d e speaks this l o u d l y e n o u g h so that it b e c o m e s a direct address to those offstage revolutionaries. R i g h t a f t e r w a r d , there is a s u d d e n crash as the massive doors are b r o k e n o p e n a n d Laertes a n d his r a b b l e c o m e r u s h i n g o n t o the stage. "A noise within"

(4.5.152 s.d.) also precedes the sec-

o n d a p p e a r a n c e of the m a d O p h e l i a . F o l i o adds "

'Let

her come in' " as an a d d i t i o n a l stage direction, 2 p r o b a b l y 1

T h i s stage direction comes after line

109 in Quarto 2 and

after line 110 in Folio. T h e queen's two lines (109-10) are clearly a response to the "noise

within."

The

difficulty of

placement

probably arises from the fact that the noise overlaps with some or all of the queen's lines. I do not think that it is a single burst of sound, as one might surmise from the written stage direction. 2

M y interpretation of " L e t her come in" differs from that of

Harold Jenkins, who believes that it should be part of the king's speech view,

( " T w o Readings in 'Hamlet,' " Modern

Language

Re-

L I V [1959], 391-95). Jenkins' argument depends upon the

— 178 —

STAGE

EFFECTS

shouted offstage b y Laertes' m e n , w h o are restive at bei n g e x c l u d e d f r o m the presence c h a m b e r a n d the promise of b l o o d y action. It is an u n u s u a l stage direction, yet n o t essentially different f r o m the previous noises in"

"with-

(96, 108). F r o m m y o w n l i m i t e d experience as a

supernumerary w i t h the M e t r o p o l i t a n O p e r a C o m p a n y , I can attest that the chorus always interprets a " c o n f u s e d m u r m u r " as actual words spoken at r a n d o m as the spirit moves. O f course, the p r o b l e m of h o w the audience is to distinguish these shouted phrases still remains, b u t w i t h only o n e short c o m m a n d like " L e t h e r come i n " there is n o real difficulty. T h e F o l i o text of Hamlet

seems to show a penchant

for offstage shouting. B e f o r e H a m l e t appears i n the closet scene, F o l i o adds his w i l d cry, " M o t h e r , M o t h e r , Mother!"

(3.4.6) to prepare us for his v e h e m e n t elo-

quence, a n d in the search for H a m l e t after the m u r d e r of Polonius, w e hear "Gentlemen

within"—Rosencrantz

and G u i l d e n s t e r n are certainly a m o n g

them—calling:

" H a m l e t ! L o r d H a m l e t ! " (4.2.2). T h i s is n o t w h a t w e ordinarily think of as an indispensable line, b u t H a m let's questions, "soft, w h a t noise? W h o calls o n H a m let?"

( 3 ) , seem to m a k e it necessary. In an

pursuit of H a m l e t , F o l i o also places "within"

earlier

the excla-

mations of H o r a t i o a n d Marcellus: " M y lord, m y l o r d ! " (1.5.113). Hamlet

begins, I believe, w i t h the sound of the b i g

assumptions of his important essay, "Playhouse Interpolations in the Folio T e x t of Hamlet,"

Studies

in Bibliography,

31-47— 179 —

XIII

(i960),

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

b e l l i n the theater t o w e r : 3 " ' T i s n o w struck t w e l v e , " says B a r n a r d o , " G e t thee to b e d , F r a n c i s c o "

(1.1.7).

T h i s is the b e l l o n w h i c h m i l i t a r y " a l a r u m s " w e r e r u n g , a n d its s o l e m n t o l l i n g h e r e helps to m a r k the spiritual a l a r m of the soldiers. S o m e lines f u r t h e r on, the b e l l tolls the h o u r of o n e a n d the G h o s t appears. A n o t h e r possible occasion for use of the t o w e r b e l l is the f u n e r a l of O p h e l i a . H e r " m a i m e d r i t e s " i n c l u d e " t h e b r i n g i n g home/ Of bell and burial"

(5.1.235-36), a n d the ring-

i n g of the d e a t h b e l l w o u l d p r o v i d e a f i t t i n g a c c o m p a n i m e n t f o r the e n t r a n c e of h e r f u n e r a l procession. 4 T h e r e is a n o t h e r s o u n d associated w i t h

Ophelia's

d e a t h that has n o t o f t e n b e e n noticed. W h i l e the k i n g is setting f o r t h his p l o t to Laertes, he is s u d d e n l y interr u p t e d : " B u t stay, w h a t noise?"

(4.7.162). T h i s line

occurs o n l y i n Q u a r t o 2; F o l i o has the colorless " H o w , sweet q u e e n , " w h i c h editors e m e n d to " H o w n o w , sweet q u e e n ! " B u t I t h i n k that the s o u n d the k i n g hears is some sort of h o w l or shriek o r l o u d w a i l , possibly m a d e b y G e r t r u d e herself, to m a r k the d e a t h of T h e staging i n Hamlet 3

anticipates that t e r r i f y i n g mo-

See W . J. Lawrence, "Bells in the Elizabethan Drama,"

Nut-Cracking 4

Ophelia.5

Elizabethans

See Shirley, Shakespeare's

Those

(London, 1935), pp. 84-96. Use

of

Off-Stage

Sounds,

pp.

162-

65. 5

A few lines further on, of course, Gertrude will describe the

death scene with all the lyrical detail of an eyewitness, but one is as little prompted to inquire why she made no efforts to save the drowning girl as one is to question the integrity of the chorus in Euripides' Medea,

who listen to the murder of the children

offstage with such tragic equanimity. T h e r e is a fault in logic here that the dramatist is skillful enough to gloss over.

— 180 —

STAGE m e n t i n Macbeth women"

EFFECTS

w h e n w e hear

"A

cry within

of

(5.5.7 s . d . ) , a n d w e l e a r n that L a d y M a c b e t h

is dead. T h e second c o m i n g of the G h o s t is f r a m e d b y H o r a tio's insistent expletives: " B u t soft, b e h o l d , l o w h e r e it comes a g a i n ! " ( 1 . 1 . 1 2 6 ) . T h i s time, " I t l i f t e d u p it h e a d a n d d i d address/ Itself to m o t i o n l i k e as it w o u l d s p e a k " ( 1 . 2 . 2 1 6 - 1 7 ) ; b u t then, a c c o r d i n g to Q u a r t o 2, cock crows"

"The

( 1 . 1 . 1 3 8 s . d . ) , a n d at the s o u n d " i t started,

like a guilty thing/ U p o n a fearful summons"

(148-49).

T h e c r o w i n g of the cock was p r o b a b l y i m i t a t e d offstage b y a n e x p e r i e n c e d m i m i c , a n d i n the earliest e x t a n t p r o m p t b o o k f o r Hamlet

( a b o u t 1 7 4 0 ) , there is a direc-

tion at this p o i n t f o r "One

to Crow."*

T h i s is a tricky

stage effect, w h i c h , if d o n e b a d l y , w i l l certainly g e t a l a u g h , a n d that is perhaps w h y the d i r e c t i o n is o m i t t e d i n F o l i o . H o r a t i o tells us that " t h e m o r n i n g cock c r e w loud"

( 1 . 2 . 2 1 8 ) , w h i c h doesn't a l l o w f o r a n y weakness

i n e x e c u t i o n . It seems a p p r o p r i a t e that i n a n open-air a f t e r n o o n p e r f o r m a n c e , the passage of t i m e s h o u l d b e m a r k e d b y s o u n d effects; the progress f r o m n i g h t to day i n the first scene of Hamlet

occurs swiftly, b e t w e e n the

t o l l i n g of the m i d n i g h t b e l l a n d the c r o w i n g of the cock. T h i s r e p r e s e n t a t i o n of the passing of t i m e b y m e a n s of s o u n d r a t h e r t h a n l i g h t (as o n o u r m o d e r n stage)

was

o n e of the r e c e i v e d traditions of E l i z a b e t h a n staging. T h e m u s i c of Hamlet 6

has b e e n f u l l y discussed b y lit-

James G. McManaway, " T h e T w o Earliest Prompt Books of

Hamlet,"

Papers

of the Bibliographical

Society

of America,

XLIII

(1949), 311. See also Lawrence, "Illusion of Sounds in the Elizabethan Theatre," Pre-Restoration

Stage

— 181 —

Studies,

pp. 199-220.

STAGING erary

musicologists, 7

AND

STRUCTURE

so that w e n e e d o n l y n o t i c e a f e w

special e x a m p l e s . T h e r e is a g o o d deal of c o n v e n t i o n a l t r u m p e t p l a y for the flourishes o r fanfares a n n o u n c i n g r o y a l entries, b u t there is also an u n e x p e c t e d for the Players"

(2.2.376 s.d.,

Folio8).

"Flourish

As Wilson informs

us, " T r u m p e t s w e r e used as a m e a n s of a d v e r t i s e m e n t b y E l i z a b e t h a n players b o t h i n the streets of L o n d o n a n d w h e n t r a v e l l i n g i n the c o u n t r y . " 9 I n the I n d u c t i o n of The

Taming

of the Shrew,

the e n t r a n c e of i t i n e r a n t

players is p r e c e d e d b y the d i r e c t i o n : "Sound

trumpets"

(Scene i, l i n e 7 1 , F o l i o ) . Q u a r t o 2 of Hamlet

calls f o r t r u m p e t play to an-

n o u n c e the d u m b s h o w : "The show follows"

trumpets

sounds.

Dumb

(3.2.140 s.d.). T h i s is r e p l a c e d i n F o l i o

b y a m o r e a p p r o p r i a t e l y soft m u s i c that can b o t h introd u c e a n d a c c o m p a n y the p a n t o m i m e : "Hoboyes

The dumb show enters." In Gorboduc

play.

(1562), for ex-

a m p l e , w h i c h is the sort of o l d play that The of Gonzago

Murder

imitates, w e h a v e the f o l l o w i n g d i r e c t i o n f o r

the d u m b show that precedes A c t I V : " F i r s t the m u s i c k of h o w b o i e s b e g a n to plaie, d u r i n g w h i c h there c a m e f r o m v n d e r the stage, as t h o u g h o u t of hell, three Furies. . . . A f t e r that the F u r i e s a n d these h a d passed a b o u t the stage thrise, they d e p a r t e d ; a n d t h a n the m u s i c k e 7

See F. W . Sternfeld, Music

in Shakespearean

Tragedy

(Lon-

don, 1963), esp. Chap. 10, which discusses the critical literature. See also Peter J. Seng, The speare

Vocal

Songs

in the

Plays

of

Shake-

(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967), pp.

131-62 and Bibliography. 8

Quarto 2 also has "A

9

Wilson, p. 179.

Flourish"

at this point.

— 182 —

STAGE

EFFECTS

ceased." 1 0 T h e r e is a g e n e r a l Renaissance association of o b o e s w i t h the s u p e r n a t u r a l a n d the p o r t e n t o u s , as i n Antony

and Cleopatra

(4.3) and Macbeth

(4.1), while

the t r u m p e t is considered a p i e r c i n g a n d startling ins t r u m e n t . In Richard

II w e h e a r of the "harsh-resound-

i n g trumpets' d r e a d f u l b r a y " John

( 1 . 3 . 1 3 5 ) , a n d in

B l a n c h speaks of " b r a y i n g t r u m p e t s "

cf. Hamlet

(3.1.303;

1.4.11).

A n o t h e r u n u s u a l musical effect i n Hamlet "Danish

King

March"

is

the

(3.2.91 s.d., F o l i o ) b y w h i c h the r o y a l

c o u p l e a n d their c o u r t e n t e r f o r the play. T h i s was possibly a d d e d a f t e r 1603 as a c o m p l i m e n t to Q u e e n A n n e of D e n m a r k , the w i f e of J a m e s I, a l t h o u g h Hamlet little e n o u g h i n it that is

flattering

has

to the Danes. T h e

k e t t l e d r u m s used f o r C l a u d i u s ' rouse a n d for o t h e r impressive occasions w e r e t h o u g h t to b e distinctively D a n ish instruments, 1 1 a n d the "Danish p l a y e d o n the "Trumpets

March"

was p r o b a b l y

and Kettledrums"

listed i n

Q u a r t o 2 at this p o i n t . T h e r e c o r d e r enters i m p o r t a n t l y i n t o the stage action i n A c t I I I , Scene ii, w h e n H a m l e t a t t e m p t s to catch t h e consciences of R o s e n c r a n t z a n d G u i l d e n s t e r n w i t h it. 10

Quoted from Joseph Quincy Adams, ed., Chief

spearean

Dramas

was at the height of its popularity at the time of Hamlet, Murder

of

Pre-Shake-

(Boston, 1924), p. 521. T h e dumb show itself

Gonzago

but

The

is intended to be in an old-fashioned, an-

tiquated style, and its dumb show looks back to a more formal and symbolic manner. See B. R. Pearn, "Dumb-Show in Elizabethan Drama," RES, The

Elizabethan

Hamlet; 11

first

Dumb

XI

(1935), 385-405. See also Dieter Mehl,

Show

(London, 1965), esp. pp. 110-20 on

published in German

See Variorum,

(Heidelberg, 1964).

I, 79, and Travers, p. 42.

— 183 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

H a m l e t h a d c a l l e d f o r m u s i c soon a f t e r the " C o m e , the r e c o r d e r s ! "

play—

( 2 9 7 - 9 8 ) — a consort of instru-

m e n t s of d i f f e r e n t range. W h e n the players b r i n g t h e m o n (350 s.d., Q u a r t o 2 1 2 ) , H a m l e t takes one f o r his obj e c t lesson o n the d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n m e n a n d things a n d demonstrates h o w to play it: " G o v e r n these ventages w i t h y o u r fingers a n d t h u m b , give it b r e a t h w i t h y o u r m o u t h , a n d it w i l l discourse m o s t e l o q u e n t music. L o o k y o u , these are the stops" (365-68) . T h e most s t r i k i n g m u s i c a l d i r e c t i o n i n Hamlet

is

that f o r the Q u a r t o 1 staging of O p h e l i a ' s m a d scene:

"Enter Ophelia, playing on a lute, and her hair down, singing"

(at 4.5.20). If Q u a r t o 1 is a r e p o r t e d t e x t a n d

represents w h a t was actually seen o n stage, this d i r e c t i o n is v e r y a p t f o r a m a i d e n o v e r w h e l m e d b y grief. I d o n ' t t h i n k w e n e e d to insist o n a r e f e r e n c e to l u t e lessons f o r O p h e l i a to b e l i e v e that she c o u l d h o l d the i n s t r u m e n t p r o p e r l y a n d s t r u m a f e w distracted chords, e v e n t h o u g h " a l u t e c o u l d o n l y b e p l a y e d c l u m s i l y , if at all, b y a s t a n d i n g p l a y e r . " 1 3 H e r madness w o u l d excuse a n y deficiencies

in technique.

T h e r e are n o f o r m a l songs i n Hamlet

that are c a l l e d

f o r a n d s u n g as set pieces, so that, as m u c h as w e r e g r e t it, P o l o n i u s has n o aria to m a t c h the s p l e n d i d f o r m a n c e of P a n d a r u s i n A c t I I I , Scene i of and Cressida. 12

Troilus

B u t there is a great deal of i n f o r m a l sing-

Everything in the text of this scene indicates that we must

follow the Quarto a direction: "Enter

the Players

with

rather than the economizing direction in Folio: "Enter a

per-

recorders," one

with

recorder." 13

Peter J. Seng, "Ophelia's Songs in Hamlet,"

versity

Journal,

X X V , N. S.

(1964), 78, note 4.

— 184 —

Durham

Uni-

STAGE

EFFECTS

i n g i n the play, especially of snatches f r o m o l d ballads, n o t o n l y b y the m a d O p h e l i a , b u t also b y the C l o w n g r a v e d i g g e r a n d b y H a m l e t himself. I t h i n k that all of H a m l e t ' s little p o e m s or f r a g m e n t s of p o e m s are int e n d e d to b e sung, w h i c h w o u l d a d d a n o t h e r d i m e n s i o n to his already w i d e g a m u t of possible styles. B y Elizab e t h a n standards, it w o u l d seem o d d to h e a r h i m recite as p o e m s w h a t seem to b e o b v i o u s b a l l a d stanzas, w h i l e O p h e l i a a n d the C l o w n sing theirs. A f t e r i n t o n i n g to P o l o n i u s a f e w scattered b u t p o i n t e d lines f r o m the o l d J e p t h a ballad, H a m l e t b r e a k s off at the arrival of the players: " T h e first r o w of the p i o u s chanson w i l l show you more, for look where m y abridgment comes"

(2.2.

428-29). Since " c h a n s o n " was a self-conscious F r e n c h w o r d n o t c u r r e n t i n E l i z a b e t h a n E n g l i s h , there is n o reason for H a m l e t to use it if h e has just r e c i t e d these lines. Q u a r t o I'S " g o d l y B a l l e t "

(or ballad)

confirms

the musical i n t e r p r e t a t i o n of " p i o u s c h a n s o n . "

From

Laertes' w a r n i n g to his sister a b o u t H a m l e t , w e l e a r n of the dangers to h e r v i r g i n i t y " I f w i t h too c r e d e n t ear y o u list his songs" (1.3.30). T h i s i m p l i e s that H a m l e t ' s D o n n e - l i k e p o e m , " ' D o u b t t h o u the stars are fire. . .' " ( 2 . 2 . 1 1 6 ) , 1 4 is o n e of these p e r i l o u s serenades. I n H a m l e t ' s e x h i l a r a t i o n o v e r the success of his trap,

he sings e x t e m p o r e

the ballad,

Mouse-

" W h y , let

the

s t r u c k e n deer g o w e e p " (3.2.277), w h i c h presents a n im14

Is it possible that John Donne remembered Hamlet's little

poem to Ophelia in " A n Anatomy of the World," written 1611? T h e best-known lines of Donne's poem read: " A n d

in

new

Philosophy cals all in doubt, / T h e Element of fire is quite p u t out . . ." (11. 205-6, ed. Frank Manley [Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1963]). See Levin, The

Question

— 185 —

of Hamlet,

p. 54.

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

age v e r y l i k e Jaques' g r o t e s q u e l y " s o b b i n g d e e r " i n As You

Like

It

( 2 . 1 . 6 6 ) . H a m l e t also p r e s u m a b l y

sings,

" F o r t h o u dost k n o w , O D a m o n d e a r "

(3.2.287), a n d

adds a c o u p l e t flourish that parodies The

Spanish

edy

Trag-

(1587): F o r if the K i n g l i k e n o t the c o m e d y , W h y then, b e l i k e he likes it n o t , perdy. (3.2.299-300)

T h e r e is n o w a y to p r o v e that all of these e x a m p l e s w e r e sung, e x c e p t to say that songs w o u l d c o n t r i b u t e to the t r i u m p h a n t e x c i t e m e n t of the c o n t e x t . T h e distinction b e t w e e n speech a n d song is an artificial o n e , a n d s i n g i n g can b e used q u i t e n a t u r a l l y to e x t e n d the possibilities of expression for the h u m a n voice. WE MAY also a p p r o a c h

the Hamlet

without

words

t h r o u g h a study of costumes, w h i c h offer a n o t h e r m e a n s of characterization. " T h e a p p a r e l o f t p r o c l a i m s the m a n " (1.3.72) i n m o r e ways than P o l o n i u s intends. E v e n m o d ern-dress p r o d u c t i o n s a c k n o w l e d g e the i m p o r t a n c e

of

c o s t u m e b y a b a n d o n i n g o v e r w o r k e d c o n v e n t i o n s of historical p e r i o d i n favor of a direct a n d easily compreh e n d e d symbolism. G e r t r u d e ' s m i n k hearsal-dress Hamlet

coat in the re-

d i r e c t e d b y G i e l g u d (1964) is a n

a l m o s t p e r f e c t expression of h e r c o m p l a i s a n t v u l g a r i t y , a l t h o u g h C l a u d i u s ' b l u e blazer in the same p r o d u c t i o n f a i l e d to c o n v e y a n y n o t i o n of a k i n g . C o s t u m e s m a y reflect i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s of the play that h a v e l o n g since b e e n discredited, f o r e x a m p l e the late-nineteenth-century interest, b o t h visual a n d a n t i q u a r i a n , in

Hamlet

as a S c a n d i n a v i a n saga. T h u s t h e r e a d e r of a play has a — 186 —

STAGE

EFFECTS

m u c h w i d e r r a n g e of possibilities for i n t e r p r e t i n g character than the spectator, w h o sees the d r a m a t i s personae fully clothed and fully conceived. C o s t u m e is u s e d to m a r k significant changes i n the r o l e of H a m l e t . H e first appears i n A c t I, Scene ii i n m o u r n i n g f o r his father. H i s " n i g h t e d c o l o r " (68), " i n k y c l o a k " ( 7 7 ) , a n d " c u s t o m a r y suits of s o l e m n b l a c k " (78) contrast strongly w i t h the b r i l l i a n t a p p a r e l of C l a u d i u s ' c o u r t . T h e staging of the scene is d e s i g n e d to isolate this peevish m a l c o n t e n t . In Q u a r t o 2 he enters a f t e r all the others, r a t h e r t h a n a c c o r d i n g to social p r e c e d e n c e (as in F o l i o ) , a n d he does n o t speak u n t i l the b i t t e r aside of l i n e 65: " A l i t t l e m o r e than kin, a n d less than k i n d ! " H i s first substantial speech calls a t t e n t i o n to his app e a r a n c e as o n l y a n o u t w a r d " s h o w "

(85) that c a n n o t

t r u l y " d e n o t e " (83) his i n n e r " w o e " (86). T h e c o u p l e t e n d o w s his sentiments w i t h a special emphasis a n d finality; w e k n o w that h e c a n n o t be r e c o n c i l e d to this shall o w court. H a m l e t ' s n e x t c h a n g e of c o s t u m e is f o r his " a n t i c disp o s i t i o n " ( 1 . 5 . 1 7 2 ) , b u t I t h i n k w e s h o u l d n o t take t o o literally the figure O p h e l i a describes: M y lord, as I was s e w i n g i n m y closet, L o r d H a m l e t , w i t h his d o u b l e t all u n b r a c e d , N o h a t u p o n his head, his stockings f o u l e d , U n g a r t e r e d , a n d down-gyv£d to his a n k l e , P a l e as his shirt, his k n e e s k n o c k i n g each other, A n d w i t h a l o o k so p i t e o u s in p u r p o r t , A s if he h a d b e e n loosed o u t of h e l l T o speak of h o r r o r s — h e comes b e f o r e m e . (2.1.77-84) — 187 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

It is w e l l to k e e p in m i n d that O p h e l i a is n a r r a t i n g a scene that takes place offstage. W e never actually see H a m l e t costumed i n this way, a n d it w o u l d seem to m e risky for a director to show such a slovenly figure to the audience, a l t h o u g h there m u s t obviously be some disorder in H a m l e t ' s dress to correspond w i t h his f e i g n e d madness. T h e k i n g speaks of . . . H a m l e t ' s transformation: so call it, Sith n o r th' exterior n o r the i n w a r d m a n Resembles that it was.

(2.2.5-7)

M o r e i m p o r t a n t for o u r purposes, A n t h o n y Scoloker, a m i n o r poet w h o saw Hamlet tells us in his Daiphantus, (1604)

a n d was influenced b y it, or The

Passions

of

Love

that his m a d hero " P u t s off his cloathes; his

shirt he onely weares,/ M u c h like mad-Hamlet; thus as Passion teares." 1 5 T o say, however, as J. Q . A d a m s does, that " H a m l e t ' s 'madness,' as it impressed the audience of the G l o b e , was conspicuously a madness 'in clothes,' " i e seems to m e to exaggerate the dramatic point. Everyone i n the play thinks of H a m l e t ' s madness as chiefly a matter of words and wit. A little loosening a n d untrussing of his original costume or sagging of his stockings should serve w e l l e n o u g h to represent his " a n t i c disposition." O r w e m i g h t choose to f o l l o w Scoloker and show H a m l e t in his shirt, 15

A n t h o n y Scoloker, Daiphantus,

printed by the Roxburghe C l u b 16

or The

Passions

of Love,

Joseph Quincy Adams, ed., Hamlet

(Boston, 1929), p. 224;

the whole argument is on pp. 221-24. See also Wilson, What pens Inset

in Hamlet,

re-

(London, 1818), E4T.

pp. 96-98, and Francis Berry, The

(London, 1965), pp. 8-9.

— 188 —

Hap-

Shakespeare

STAGE

EFFECTS

w h i c h , w h i l e n o t q u i t e the e q u i v a l e n t of o u r u n d e r s h i r t , was still a n o t a b l e offense against d e c o r u m . W h e n H a m l e t r e t u r n s f r o m his v o y a g e to E n g l a n d , there is a n i m p o r t a n t d i f f e r e n c e i n his costume, w h i c h reflects a d e v e l o p m e n t o r r e g e n e r a t i o n 1 7 i n his character. I agree w i t h W i l l i a m P o e l a n d

Granville-Barker

that H a m l e t s h o u l d a p p e a r i n the g r a v e y a r d w i t h his "sea g o w n scarfed a b o u t " h i m

(5.2.13). 1 8 T h e r e is a

n e w resoluteness a n d i n f o r m a l i t y a b o u t this c o s t u m e that m a k e s a visual l i n k w i t h the dress of the pirate sailors i n A c t I V , Scene vi. C o t g r a v e defines a "sea g o w n " as " a course, high-collered, a n d short-sleeued

gowne,

r e a c h i n g d o w n e to the m i d leg, a n d vsed m o s t b y sea-men, a n d Saylors." 1 9 It is a r o u g h sort of cloak a p p r o p r i a t e f o r the o u t d o o r scene that b e g i n s A c t V , b u t i n a p p r o p r i a t e f o r the i n t e r i o r scene that follows. Since there is n o t i m e f o r a c h a n g e of c o s t u m e b e t w e e n these t w o scenes, I ass u m e that H a m l e t is w e a r i n g the standard m a l e attire of d o u b l e t a n d hose b e n e a t h his sea g o w n . H e s h o u l d h a v e l o n g since a b a n d o n e d the b l a c k m o u r n i n g suit of the earlier p a r t of the play, since a c o n s i d e r a b l e i n t e r v a l o f t i m e has elapsed. 17

See S. F. Johnson, " T h e Regeneration of Hamlet," SQ, I I I

(1952),

187-207;

Maker,"

Journal

Peter of

G.

Phialas,

English

and

"Hamlet Germanic

(1964), 226-34; Irving Ribner, Patterns

and

the

Philology,

in Shakespearian

(London, i960), pp. 80-82; and Prosser, Hamlet

and

GraveLXIII Tragedy Revenge,

Chap. 9. 18

See Poel, Shakespeare

Granville-Barker, Prefaces

in the Theatre, to Shakespeare

University Press, 1947), I, 233. Hamlet

pp. 173-74, and Harley (Princeton: Princeton is in the third series of

Prefaces (London, 1937). 19

Variorum,

I, 415. T h e French word in Cotgrave is

— 189 —

Esclavine.

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

T h e c o s t u m e of Osric is very d i f f e r e n t n o t o n l y f r o m H a m l e t ' s , b u t also f r o m t h a t of Laertes, as this is set f o r t h i n P o l o n i u s ' advice: " C o s t l y thy h a b i t as thy purse c a n b u y , / B u t n o t expressed i n fancy; r i c h , n o t g a u d y " ( 1 . 3 . 7 0 - 7 1 ) . Osric's " h a b i t " is costly a n d f a n c i f u l , r i c h a n d g a u d y , a n d his a p p a r e l " o f t p r o c l a i m s the m a n " (72) w i t h an exclusiveness a p p r o p r i a t e t o a m i n o r f o p . H a m l e t calls h i m " t h i s w a t e r f l y "

(5.2.83), w h i c h m a y

h a v e some visual r e l a t i o n to the short, w i n g l i k e c l o a k t h e n i n vogue 2 0 or to some o t h e r i t e m of fantastic dress. W e k n o w f r o m J o h n W e b s t e r ' s I n d u c t i o n to M a r s t o n ' s The

Malcontent

(1604), where W i l l

Sly

burlesques

some of Osric's lines, that O s r i c has a foolish h a t w i t h a l o n g p l u m e . W h e n asked to b e covered, he replies: " N o , i n g o o d faith, for m i n e ease. L o o k y o u , m y hat's the h a n d l e to this f a n " 2 1 — a v e r i t a b l e " f o r e s t of f e a t h e r s " (3.2.281), w h i c h h e stuffs i n t o his p o c k e t r i g h t afterwards. I t m u s t b e a n a b s u r d hat, a conversation piece, to d r a w so m u c h a t t e n t i o n to itself, a n d he exits w i t h it o n c e a g a i n t r i u m p h a n t l y o n his head. THE MOST e l e m e n t a r y q u e s t i o n of all still r e m a i n s to b e answered: W h a t stage properties are n e e d e d to p r o d u c e Hamlet?

Since most of these properties h a v e a l r e a d y

b e e n c o n s i d e r e d i n P a r t O n e , w e m a y n o w t u r n to special aspects of t h e topic. T h e properties are p a r t of t h e i m a g e r y of the p l a y i n a direct, presentational sense. A d 20

See Travers, p. 234, and Percy Macquoid, "Costume,"

speare's 21

England,

Shake-

II, 105.

John Marston, The

Malcontent,

ed. M . L . Wine,

Regents

Renaissance Drama series (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1964), p. 9

(Induction).

— 190 —

STAGE

EFFECTS

m i t t e d l y , properties are m o r e literal a n d less c o m p l e x i n their r e f e r e n c e than l a n g u a g e , b u t they still interact w i t h l a n g u a g e a n d g i v e it i m p o r t a n t support. T o u n d e r stand the i c o n o g r a p h y of Hamlet,

w e m u s t consider a l l

the means, v e r b a l a n d n o n v e r b a l , f o r e x p r e s s i n g symb o l i c theme. A s w e m i g h t expect, there are m a n y w r i t i n g s o r literary properties i n the p l a y , b e g i n n i n g w i t h H a m l e t ' s p o c k e t n o t e b o o k or " t a b l e s " ( 1 . 5 . 1 0 7 ) , i n w h i c h he can r e c o r d o n e fixed t r u t h i n a w h i r l i n g w o r l d . W e h a v e a n i c e s y m m e t r y b e t w e e n H a m l e t "reading

on a

book"

(2.2.167 s.d., Folio) a n d O p h e l i a o r d e r e d b y h e r father to " R e a d o n this b o o k " ( 3 . 1 . 4 4 ) . T h e r e are q u i t e a f e w letters i n the play: C l a u d i u s ' letter to o l d N o r w a y

(1.2)

a n d the r e p l y (2.2) to it, H a m l e t ' s l o v e letter to O p h e l i a ( 2 . 2 ) , H a m l e t ' s letter to H o r a t i o , d e l i v e r e d b y the pirate sailors (4.6), his m e n a c i n g letters to the k i n g a n d q u e e n ( 4 . 7 ) , a n d P o l o n i u s ' notes f o r L a e r t e s i n Paris

(2.1).

V o l t e m a n d a n d C o r n e l i u s g i v e the k i n g a w r i t t e n r e p o r t of their mission to N o r w a y ( 2 . 2 ) , a n d C l a u d i u s sends a " g r a n d c o m m i s s i o n " to h a v e H a m l e t k i l l e d i n E n g l a n d , w h i c h H a m l e t steals a n d replaces w i t h his o w n f o r g e d invention

(5.2).

Interestingly

enough,

h e gives

the

k i n g ' s d o c u m e n t to H o r a t i o to r e a d " a t m o r e l e i s u r e " (5.2.26), w h i c h seems to p r o v e that H a m l e t has a scholar's c o n c e r n for the preservation of h o l o g r a p h

manu-

scripts. The

portraits o n w h i c h H a m l e t discourses i n

the

closet scene are the most p u z z l i n g properties i n the play. T h a t there are t w o visible portraits o n stage seems clear f r o m H a m l e t ' s d e m o n s t r a t i v e words: " L o o k h e r e u p o n — 191 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

this p i c t u r e , a n d o n this" (3 4 . 5 4 ) . T h e m o s t practicable staging of this scene is that f a v o r e d b y theatrical tradition: the use of p a i n t e d m i n i a t u r e s , the pictures " i n litt l e " of w h i c h H a m l e t has already s p o k e n

(2.2.374).

M i n i a t u r e portraits were, a f t e r all, the m o s t distinctive E l i z a b e t h a n c o n t r i b u t i o n to the fine arts, especially i n the w o r k of N i c h o l a s H i l l i a r d

(ca. 1 5 4 7 - 1 6 1 9 ) . A c c o r d -

i n g to this staging, H a m l e t w o u l d m o s t p r o b a b l y take f r o m his pocket, or f r o m a c h a i n a b o u t his neck, a miniat u r e of his father, p r o p e r l y set in a f r a m e of g o l d a n d p r e c i o u s stones, b u t he w o u l d seize the m i n i a t u r e of the detested C l a u d i u s f r o m the l o c k e t his m o t h e r is w e a r i n g , as Fechter, Rossi, a n d E d w i n B o o t h did, w i t h their o w n idiosyncratic variations. 2 2 T h e most impressive properties in Hamlet 22

See Variorum,

are those

I, 390. It would be temptingly simple to stage

this scene according to the illustration in Rowe's edition

(1709):

two large, framed, half-length portraits hang on the wall at the back of the stage—with curtains

that

Hamlet

the added Elizabethan

can

thrust

open

touch of

(see W .

J.

" 'Hamlet' as Shakespeare Staged It," Pre-Restoration

dust

Lawrence, Stage

Stud-

ies, pp. 111-16). T h e r e have been strong objections to this staging, especially on the questions of where the portraits would be placed in the Elizabethan public theater and when they would be brought on (see Hazelton Spencer, " H o w Shakespeare Staged his Plays . . . ," The

Johns

Hopkins

205-21, and Fairchild, Shakespeare

Alumni and

Magazine, the

Arts

X X [1932],

of Design,

pp.

122-24). O n e teasing but highly speculative way out of these difficulties is to follow Davies' conjecture of 1784 ( V a r i o r u m , I, 290), recently supported by Martin Holmes

( T h e Guns

of

pp. 46-47, 131): that the two full-length portraits were into

Elsinore, woven

(or perhaps painted on) the arras itself. T h e r e is good war-

rant for this conjecture in the series of tapestry kings in Kronborg castle, some of which may be seen in the National Museum at Copenhagen.

— 192 —

STAGE

EFFECTS

u s e d f o r r e g a l scenes, w h i c h a l l o w a k i n d of staging that Shakespeare f u l l y e x p l o i t e d i n his E n g l i s h history plays. I n Henry

V, f o r e x a m p l e , the k i n g catalogues f o r us,

n e g a t i v e l y , all the c u s t o m a r y aspects of royal p o m p : . . .

I know

' T i s n o t the b a l m , the sceptre, a n d the ball, T h e sword, the m a c e , the c r o w n i m p e r i a l , T h e intertissued r o b e of g o l d a n d pearl, T h e farced title r u n n i n g fore the k i n g , T h e t h r o n e h e sits o n , n o r the tide of p o m p T h a t beats u p o n the h i g h shore of this w o r l d — N o , n o t a l l these, thrice g o r g e o u s c e r e m o n y , N o t all these, l a i d i n b e d majestical, C a n sleep so s o u n d l y as the w r e t c h e d slave. . . . (4.1.255-64) B y c o m b i n i n g so m a n y possible elements, this passage evokes a n i m a g e of k i n g s h i p that satisfies H e n r y r o m a n t i c i m a g i n a t i o n . I n Hamlet,

V's

h o w e v e r , w e are m a d e

a c u t e l y conscious that the splendors of royalty are a n e m p t y show that conceals u g l y realities. I n the large c o u r t scenes, p l a c e d so s y m m e t r i c a l l y a t the b e g i n n i n g

(1.2), middle

(3.2), a n d e n d

(5.2)

of

t h e play, the k i n g a n d q u e e n sit o n the chair of state o r t h r o n e , w h i c h was set o n a dais w i t h a f e w steps leadi n g u p to it. A d o u b l e t h r o n e was p r o b a b l y u s e d to acc o m m o d a t e t h e m b o t h , as i n Macbeth.

I n these f o r m a l

c o u r t scenes, w e m u s t i m a g i n e that C l a u d i u s a n d G e r t r u d e i n v o k e all the r i t u a l a n d p a g e a n t r y at their comm a n d to display their d i v i n e sanction:

crown,

royal

robes, scepter a n d g o l d e n b a l l , a n d the c e r e m o n i o u s at— 193 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

tendance of courtiers and servants, who rush to execute the most minor of royal velleities. If we may follow u p a hint in Act IV, Scene v, it is likely that the king and queen are guarded by "Switzers" (97), those impressive mercenaries still active in the Vatican. A l l this regal show has a special ironic application to A cutpurse of the empire and the rule, T h a t from a shelf the precious diadem stole A n d put it in his pocket. . . .

(3.4.100-2)

T h e royal accoutrements of The Murder of Gonzago and its dumb show are meant to parody those of the Danish court and also to suggest an exchange of identity between actors and spectators. W h o is the Player K i n g and who is the real king? W e think of U g o Betti's The Queen ry IV

and the Rebels

(1949) and Pirandello's

Hen-

(1922). If Claudius' claim to the throne rests on

murder and adulterous marriage, then he too only "plays the king"

(2.2.328). It is noteworthy that the

Ghost never appears in royal robes and crown; these properties have been tainted by Claudius and Gertrude. W h e n the poisoner woos the Player Queen "with

gifts"

(3.2.140 s.d.), we are reminded of Claudius' winning of Gertrude, W i t h witchcraft of his wits, with traitorous g i f t s — O wicked wit and gifts, that have the power So to seduce!

(1-5-43"45)

As Gascoigne tells us so pithily, "Lyberall gyfts are the glewe of everduring love" (Tilley, W 7 0 4 ) , and in Two Gentlemen

The

of Verona, Valentine counsels the duke — 194 —

STAGE

EFFECTS

h o w to succeed as a w o o e r : " D u m b j e w e l s o f t e n i n their silent k i n d / M o r e than q u i c k w o r d s d o m o v e a w o m a n ' s mind"

(3.1.90-91).

I n this c h a p t e r a n d the p r e v i o u s o n e , I h a v e p u r s u i n g a n elusive Hamlet

been

w i t h o u t words, a fiction

d e s i g n e d to startle those w h o c a n see the p l a y o n l y as w o r d s o n a p r i n t e d page. I d o n o t wish, h o w e v e r , to g o to the o t h e r e x t r e m e a n d d e f e n d the p r o m p t b o o k as the o n l y a u t h e n t i c d o c u m e n t , or c h a m p i o n the rights of the a u d i e n c e as sole arbiters of the play. I h a v e tried, b y d e l i b e r a t e l y n a r r o w i n g the scope of i n q u i r y to "when

new,"23

Hamlet

to reconstruct a p r o d u c t i o n of the p l a y

possible i n the early seventeenth c e n t u r y . F o r this purpose, I h a v e a t t e m p t e d to l i m i t myself to the indications of staging i n Q u a r t o 2 a n d F o l i o , w i t h occasional glances at the m u c h m a l i g n e d Q u a r t o 1. I a c k n o w l e d g e that I h a v e strayed b e y o n d the strict b o u n d s of the s u b j e c t at almost every p o i n t , since the v e r y act of criticism violates the " w i t h o u t w o r d s " stipulation. M y a i m has b e e n to i m a g i n e a n ideal Hamlet

p e r f o r m e d in the

Globe

theater of the m i n d b e f o r e p a r t i c u l a r l y alert a n d e x i g e n t spectators, w h o m a y i n d e e d already k n o w the p l a y f r o m their r e a d i n g . T o this end, I h a v e freely i n v o k e d that p o w e r of

"histrionic

sensibility" 2 4

by which

readers

a n d spectators can m e e t o n c o m m o n g r o u n d . 23

T h i s is William Empson's title phrase for two articles in the

Sewanee 24

Review,

LXI

See Fergusson, The

(1953), 15-42, 185-205. Idea

of a Theater,

— 195 —

pp. 250-55.

8. "The Very Cunning of the Scene" SCAENA is the Latin word for stage, but in Elizabethan usage "scene" could mean either the stage itself or the place where the dramatic action is imagined to occur. T h e latter is the most frequent Shakespearean sense, although there is a natural confusion between the physical stage and what is happening on it. "In Troy, there lies the scene," begins the Prologue to Troilus and Cressida, which I take to mean both that the stage is to be imagined as located in Troy, and that the dramatic representation one is about to see is set in Troy. These are not quite the same thing, although very close. There is a similar ambiguity in the prologues to Henry V: "Unto Southampton do we shift our scene" (Prol. II, 1. 42), Romeo and Juliet: "In fair Verona, where we lay our scene" (Prol. I, 1. 2), and Pericles: Now to Marina bend your mind, W h o m our fast-growing scene must find A t Tharsus. . . . (Prol. IV, 11. 5-7) In the staging of the Elizabethan public theater, Troy, Southampton, Verona, and Tharsus are the fxctive places of their respective plays, rather than actual "scenes" painted on canvas. T h e introduction of changeable scenery after the Restoration altered radically the earlier definitions of "scene." Since the Elizabethan public theater did not try to represent specific locality, 1 it is difficult to insist on 1

On

the representation

of

place

in

Elizabethan

drama

see

Harley Granville-Barker, " A N o t e u p o n Chapters X X . a n d X X I .

— 196 —

"THE

VERY

CUNNING

OF THE

SCENE"

a c h a n g e i n place f o r every c h a n g e of scene. T h e r e are a great m a n y unlocalized, placeless scenes i n the plays of Shakespeare a n d the o t h e r dramatists, w h i c h editors u s u a l l y tag as " a n o t h e r r o o m i n the castle" o r " a n o t h e r p a r t of the forest," as if there actually w e r e a castle o r a forest to b e g i n w i t h . T h e art of the m o v i e has m a d e it especially h a r d f o r us to c o n c e i v e of scenes that are set n o w h e r e m o r e specific than o n the stage itself.

The

d r a m a t i c sense of place is, of course, a m a t t e r of the degree of i l l u s i o n the p l a y w r i g h t wishes to create. T h e r e is always some sense of place i m p l i e d i n the w o r d s of the d i a l o g u e o r e v e n i n the costumes. W h e r e the sense of place is w e a k , h o w e v e r , w e m a y n e e d to define " s c e n e " in terms of persons a n d the significant e n c o u n t e r s of those persons r a t h e r than i n terms of setting. N e w persons i n d i f f e r e n t k i n d s of e n c o u n t e r s w o u l d m a k e a n e w scene w i t h o u t a n y c h a n g e i n locale. T h e b e g i n n i n g of Hamlet,

f o r e x a m p l e , is usually

visualized o n the b a t t l e m e n t s of the castle of Elsinore. T h i s is a c o n v e n i e n t a n d p e r h a p s inescapable assumpt i o n a b o u t the scene's l o c a t i o n f o r m o d e r n readers a n d spectators, b u t it is o n l y a fiction. I n Shakespeare's play, w e b e g i n w i t h the c h a n g i n g of the g u a r d at m i d n i g h t ; it is v e r y c o l d a n d the soldiers are e x t r e m e l y a n x i o u s a b o u t the state of the n a t i o n . A l l this is p e r f o r m e d o n a

of The

Elizabethan

Stage,"

RES,

I

(1925), 60-71; Arthur Sewell,

"Place and T i m e in Shakespeare's Plays," Studies XLII the

(1945), 205-24; Richard Southern,

Modern

Theatre

esp. pp. 94-121; and Globe

1599-1609

in Research Bernard

and

The

Practice

Beckerman,

Philology, Stage

(London,

Shakespeare

(New York, 1962), pp. 64-69, 220.

— 197 —

in

Open

and 1953),

at

the

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

b a r e stage i n the a f t e r n o o n , w i t h o u t e v e n the r e m o t e s t scenic i l l u s i o n of K r o n b o r g castle i n Elsinore.

Time,

place, a n d m o o d m u s t all b e created b y the w o r d s themselves a n d their expressive sounds a n d r h y t h m s .

We

k n o w that w e are e n d i n g o n e scene a n d b e g i n n i n g ano t h e r w h e n H o r a t i o , B a r n a r d o , a n d M a r c e l l u s leave the stage at o n e d o o r , a n d C l a u d i u s a n d his c o u r t appear, w i t h H a m l e t t r a i l i n g b e h i n d , at the other. T h e r o y a l "Flourish"

to w h i c h this procession enters i m m e d i a t e l y

b l o w s away the anxieties of the p r e v i o u s scene.

The

costumes are e n t i r e l y d i f f e r e n t f r o m the m i l i t a r y dress of the first scene, a n d there is a t h r o n e

( p r o b a b l y thrust

o u t f r o m backstage) as w e l l as o t h e r a p p u r t e n a n c e s of royalty. W e feel that w e are i n a d i f f e r e n t place because of the c h a n g e i n persons, costumes, a n d style r a t h e r than b e c a u s e of a n y c h a n g e i n setting. O n the m o d e r n realistic stage the o r d e r is reversed, a n d the visual p i c t u r e , e m p h a t i c a l l y l i g h t e d , takes precedence. A s a test case f o r u n d e r s t a n d i n g the r e l a t i o n of s e t t i n g to scene, let us l o o k at the theatrical distinction b e t w e e n i n t e r i o r a n d e x t e r i o r scenes. I n a theater of scenic illusion a n d i n the m o v i e s ( w h i c h are d e r i v e d f r o m i t ) , indoors a n d o u t d o o r s are p o l a r terms, a n d c o m p l e t e l y diff e r e n t staging, l i g h t i n g , a n d visual r e p r e s e n t a t i o n are a p p r o p r i a t e to each. B u t i n Hamlet

the separation is

b l u r r e d , a n d w e can r e c o g n i z e e x t e r i o r scenes o n l y f r o m the s u b j e c t m a t t e r . A s s u m i n g , as is customary, that Hamlet contains t w e n t y scenes, w e h a v e five that d o n o t take place w i t h i n the castle: the scenes w i t h the G h o s t 1.4, 1 . 5 ) , H a m l e t ' s d e p a r t u r e for E n g l a n d the g r a v e y a r d scene

(1.1,

(4.4), a n d

( 5 . 1 ) . A s i d e f r o m the k n o w l e d g e — 198 —

"THE

VERY

CUNNING

that it is " b i t t e r c o l d "

OF THE

SCENE"

(1.1.8) w h i l e the soldiers a w a i t

the G h o s t , n o t h i n g m u c h is d o n e to g i v e a sense of the out-of-doors, a n d e v e n in the scenes w i t h the G h o s t the a t m o s p h e r i c detail is m e a n t to create a certain m o o d a n d set of e x p e c t a t i o n s r a t h e r than a n y f e e l i n g of particular place. A c t I V , Scene i v is u s u a l l y l o c a t e d o n "A Denmark,"

plain

in

f o l l o w i n g C a p e l l , a l t h o u g h R o w e puts it

in "A camp" and Theobald in "A camp, on the Frontiers of Denmark."2

B u t there is n o t h i n g i n this scene

that has a n y t h i n g e v e n r e m o t e l y to d o w i t h either a p l a i n o r a c a m p or e v e n a n e x t e r i o r place. T h e scene exists as a raison d'etre

f o r H a m l e t ' s l o n g s o l i l o q u y , " H o w all

occasions d o i n f o r m against m e "

(32ff.), w h i c h

fur-

nishes just a b o u t half the lines. F o r a l l practical purposes the scene is u n l o c a t e d , e v e n t h o u g h w e k n o w that H a m l e t is a b o u t to e m b a r k f o r E n g l a n d , a n d the dist i n c t i o n , therefore, b e t w e e n e x t e r i o r a n d i n t e r i o r scenes breaks down. If w e agree to suspend o u r i n t r u s i v e m o d e r n d e m a n d that a scene b e a place that c a n b e visualized, w e m a y try o u t o u r d e f i n i t i o n of " s c e n e " as a significant e n c o u n ter

(or series of r e l a t e d e n c o u n t e r s ) . A c t I, Scene iii

takes place i n the h o u s e h o l d of P o l o n i u s , a n d its domestic t o n e n o t a b l y lowers the tension created b y the first t w o scenes of t h e play. T h e

p o r t e n t o u s concerns

of

h e a v e n a n d earth are scaled d o w n h e r e to the p r i v a t e matters of the P o l o n i u s f a m i l y , especially H a m l e t ' s wooi n g of O p h e l i a . She is at the center of this scene, e v e n t h o u g h she speaks so f e w lines, a n d h e r e n c o u n t e r s w i t h 2

Variorum,

I, 322.

— 199 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

her brother and her father define her role. Polonius' advice to Laertes acts as a bridge between these analogous encounters; it allows us to grasp the Polonian morality in full detail. T h e next scene (1.4) reinvokes the mood and even some of the language of the first scene of the play, as we once more prepare for the appearance of the Ghost. T h e fifth scene continues the fourth in what seems to be a single sequence, so that we do not return to the household of Polonius until Act II, Scene i, a scene from which Laertes is absent. T h e domestic setting, like that in Act I, Scene iii, also serves to distract our attention from more weighty and vehement concerns, but Polonius is an analogue for Claudius, and Reynaldo an anticipation of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. In ordinary terminology, a scene is a subdivision of an act, but in the Elizabethan public theater the acts are much less clearly defined than the scenes. Hamlet even seems to use the two words interchangeably in his plotting with Horatio: There is a play tonight before the King. One scene of it comes near the circumstance Which I have told thee, of my father's death. I prithee, when thou seest that act afoot, Even with the very comment of thy soul Observe my uncle. (3.2.77-82) Hamlet may, of course, be using "act" for "action," but the equation with "scene" seems to fit better with the logic of his speech. It is possible that Shakespeare's much-heralded five-act structure may be a piece of wish— 200 —

"THE

VERY

CUNNING

OF THE

SCENE"

ful thinking on the part of critics, who want to make Shakespeare a more "regular" dramatist and improve his literary standing by claiming for him the sanction of classical models. T h e five-act structure is a reality in the Italian court theater and in English plays such as Gorboduc (1562) that are influenced by classical precedent; the entr'actes in such plays are clearly marked either by dumb shows or by spectacular intermezzi. But in Shakespeare one must look hard for the act divisions, about which there is no general agreement. T h e dramatic action in his plays certainly has welldefined movements; I would only question whether these movements form pentagonal structures. T h e act divisions of Hamlet are essentially the product of the "Players' Quarto" of 1676, followed by Rowe in his influential edition of 1709 and perpetuated by all later editors. Thus, Shakespeare's five-act structure is the result of the adaptation of an Elizabethan dramatist to the stage practice of the Restoration, with its pictureframe theater and its exploitation of scenic illusion. 3 A few act and scene divisions in Hamlet are marked in the Folio text (1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 2.1, 2.2), but they are casual and incomplete and have no particular authority. Of the act divisions followed by most modern editors, the worst is the one between Acts III and IV. As Samuel Johnson says in his note to Act IV, Scene i: "This play is printed in the old editions without any separation of the acts. T h e division is modern and arbitrary; and is here not very happy, for the pause is made at a time 3

See Granville-Barker, Prefaces,

I, 32-38: " T h e Five Acts of

the Editors."

— 201 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

when there is more continuity of action than in almost any other of the scenes."4 Hamlet has just concluded the closet scene, and he exits "tugging in Polonius" (3.4.218 s.d.). T h e Folio, which has no exit for Gertrude at this point, has the king enter immediately after Hamlet leaves, to comment on her "sighs" and "profound heaves" (4.1.1). In other words, not only is Act IV, Scene i not the beginning of a new act, but it is not even a separate scene. If we follow the Folio staging, Act IV, Scene i represents the logical conclusion of Act III, Scene iv and a necessary part of it. Quarto 2 has an "Exit," presumably for Hamlet, at the end of Act III, Scene iv, but the next direction is: "Enter King, and Queen, with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern." Perhaps this is the sign of an intermission in the Quarto 2 text, since it is pointless to have Gertrude exit and reenter so quickly and not plausible that she is able, nevertheless, to produce enough "sighs" and "profound heaves" for Claudius to take notice of in his first line of Act IV. Separate acts imply prominent pauses, and although no other act division in Hamlet

is so flagrant as this

one, they all seem to violate the swift and continuous movement that is a feature of Elizabethan staging. W e may make an exception for the break between Act II and Act III, where Hamlet's exit couplet makes a strong cadence: " T h e play's the thing/ Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King" (2.2.616-17). This may indicate an intermission, a use to which it has frequently been * Johnson's

Notes

to Shakespeare,

ed. Arthur Sherbo, p. 172.

— 202 —

"THE

VERY

CUNNING

OF THE

SCENE"

put since Shakespeare's time. T h e next scene (3.1) begins in a low-keyed, businesslike way, with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern reporting back to Claudius. Between Acts I and II and also between Acts IV and V there are logical links that obviate any feeling of act division. T h e Polonius-Reynaldo scene (2.1) is almost a parody of the scene with Hamlet and the Ghost that has just preceded it (1.5). In both, fathers have messages to impart to sons, about whose conduct they are doubtful. By the familiar device of undercutting and abrupt scenic contrast, the portentous concerns of Act I, Scene v — " O all you host of heaven! O earth! What else?/ A n d shall I couple hell?" (92-93) — a r e reduced in scale to the comfortable domestic atmosphere of Act II, Scene i, in which Polonius can lose his way in a manner unthinkable for the Ghost: "What was I about to say? By the mass, I was about to say something!" (50-51). There is an even bolder contrast between Scene vii of Act IV and the first scene of Act V, in the shift from the court to a graveyard, where two clowns we have never seen before and will not see again are engaged in witty logicchopping in the style of Shakespeare's early comedies. But the scenes are closely related in subject matter; the report of Ophelia's death in Act IV, Scene vii leads naturally to the graveyard in which she will be buried. Although the five acts of Hamlet are not strongly demarcated as units, the scenes generally are, especially through the use of scene-ending couplets. In blank verse, the shift into couplets creates a special emphasis. T h e couplet is usually exclamatory, epigrammatic, or sen— 203 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

tentious, and it conveys a sense of finality. Hamlet is customarily divided into twenty scenes, of which only six do not end with a couplet. W e may rule out Scene iv of Act I, which is continuous with Scene v, and we may also consider as special cases the two shortest scenes in the play: Scene ii (31 lines) and Scene vi (34 lines) of the fourth act, where speed of movement to the next scene is important. T h e absence of a couplet in Act IV, Scene vii is difficult to explain, although Shakespeare may have wanted a quick transition to the clowns of Act V, Scene i. Scenes i and iii of Act I, the other units without cadence couplets, both end with a sense of suspended action that will need to be completed. Significantly, the couplet is not usually the very last line of the scene. Shakespeare seems eager to avoid a tooformal close by adding a few extra-metrical words. Hamlet concludes Act I, Scene v, for example, with an energetic exclamation: T h e time is out of joint. O cursed spite, T h a t ever I was born to set it right! (1.5.188-89) But he adds immediately his forswearing of precedence, in order to tone down the rhetorical quality of his couplet: "Nay, come, let's go together" (190). T h e last line is deliberately anticlimactic and antiheroic. Claudius uses an almost identical form at the end of Act IV, Scene v: "So you shall;/ A n d where th' offense is, let the great ax fall" (215-16). He then tells Laertes: " I pray you go with me" (217), which is commonplace enough to neutralize the effect of the "great ax." Po— 204 —

"THE

VERY

CUNNING

OF THE

SCENE"

lonius, too, has a couplet of this sort, the most complex in the play: This must be known, which, being kept close, might move More grief to hide than hate to utter love. (2.1.118-19) T h e effect of the couplet is undercut by the addition of a colorless and unnecessary imperative, "Come" (120). In the same way, Fortinbras also makes a dignified close with a couplet: T a k e up the bodies. Such a sight as this Becomes the field, but here shows much amiss. (5.2.402-3) But the play actually ends with a prosaic military order: "Go, bid the soldiers shoot" (404). Shakespeare wants to frustrate our expectations of noble diction for the very last words. In the closet scene, Hamlet seems to be making a well-turned, epigrammatic close: Indeed, this counselor Is now most still, most secret, and most grave, W h o was in life a foolish prating knave. (3.4.214-16) T o this, however, he appends a rhetorically excrescent line and a half: "Come, sir, to draw toward an end with you./ Good night, Mother" (217-18). A l l of this could have been placed before, but in its position after the couplet it has a deflating quality. Another idiosyncratic aspect of the couplets in Hamlet is the strong caesura in the first line. Actually, the

— 205 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

most frequent logical and syntactical form of the couplet is only one and a half lines long (seven or eight accented feet). I count eight and a half of these "broken couplets" 6 out of fourteen (the half based on the double couplet close of Act III, Scene iii). If we put some of Hamlet's line-and-a-half couplets together, we may note a remarkable similarity in rhythm among them: Foul deeds will rise, Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes. (1.2.257-58) O cursed spite, T h a t ever I was born to set it right!

(1.5.188-89)

T h e play's the thing Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King. (2.2.616-17) O, from this time forth, My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth! (4.4.65-66) These are all exclamations in a rhetorical and hortatory style; the couplet form does not lend itself to colloquial informality.® 5

Levin, The

8

There are other couplets in the play, most notably in

Murder

of

Question

Gonzago,

of Hamlet,

p. 86. The

which imitates the end-stopped, singsong

style of an old-fashioned, moralistic tragedy. Gertrude's sententious

couplets

(1.2.72-73,

4.5.17-20)

and

Ophelia's

(3.1.100-1)

have some relation to this antiquated manner, even Ophelia's haunting couplet of lamentation for Hamlet's "ecstasy": "O, woe is me / T ' have seen what I have seen, see what I seel" (3.1.16364). There is an extraordinary felicity in the patterned sound and antithesis—Ophelia in her brief role is as artful a stylist as her father—although we would not be surprised to hear her couplet spoken by the Player Queen. W e may also note in

— 206 —

Ham-

"THE

VERY

CUNNING

OF THE

SCENE"

A stage that does not use changeable scenery to create the illusion of setting can have one scene moving swiftly into another, so that whatever is lost in visual stimulus may be more than regained by the intensity and concentration with which the play seems to progress. There are no blackouts or curtain drops during which the clattering flats and cumbersome interior decorations are moved into position, while the audience is expected willingly and cheerfully to think only that "this play is playing" (3.2.90). T h e "two hours' traffic of our stage" that the Prologue to Romeo and Juliet speaks of is not so unbelievable when the staging is uninterrupted. It is not likely that the full text of Hamlet could have been presented in two hours, but modern directors would be well advised to follow the Elizabethan example and abbreviate the visual representation rather than the text. T i m e is an illusion, but in plays time is a calculated illusion used to produce certain effects. Even writers following a strict unity of time, such as Jonson in The Alchemist (1610), need to practice some deception in order to be convincing. Shakespeare's Hamlet, however, is not bound by the unity of time; in all senses of Polonius' phrase, it is a "poem unlimited" (2.2.4089). One temporal trick that Shakespeare uses is to divide what seems to be a single scene into two parts, separated by a short bridge. T h i s breaking of the scene in two gives the impression of a much longer duration than would be possible if it were a single unit, and it allows for important economies in exposition. let a good many speech-ending couplets, which are analogous in function to the scene-ending ones.

— 207 —

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

I am thinking of the sequence of scenes showing Laertes' rebellion and its consequences: Scenes v, vi, and vii of Act IV. Scenes v and vii are essentially the same scene, but if one looks at the end of Scene v and the beginning of Scene vii, one is struck by how much intervening material has been omitted. A t the close of the earlier scene, Claudius promises that he will give Laertes a satisfying account of his father's death. By the time the later scene opens, this account has already been rendered, and Claudius is now ready to make Laertes a tool in his plot against the unexpectedly returned Hamlet. T i m e has been foreshortened here by the use of a brief intervening scene (4.6) setting forth Hamlet's escape from the fateful voyage arranged by the king. W e may also study the illusion of elapsed time in the Ghost scenes of Act I. T h e first appearance of the Ghost in the first scene is suspended (rather than broken, as in the sequence of Scenes v, vi, and vii in Act IV), while two extremely different kinds of scenes intervene (Act I, Scenes ii and iii). T h e Ghost then reappears in Scenes iv and v for an extended interval. T h e stylistic intention in Scene iv seems to be to recapitulate the mood of Scene i, as we may see by setting two passages side by side: Barnardo. 'Tis now struck twelve. Get thee to bed, Francisco. Francisco. For this relief much thanks. 'Tis bitter cold, And I am sick at heart. Barnardo. Have you had quiet guard? — 208 —

"THE

VERY

CUNNING

OF THE

SCENE"

Not a mouse stirring. Francisco. Barnardo. Well, good night. If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus, T h e rivals of my watch, bid them make (1.1.7-13) haste. Hamlet. Horatio. Hamlet. Horatio. Marcellus. Horatio.

T h e air bites shrewdly; it is very cold. It is a nipping and an eager air. What hour now? I think it lacks of twelve. No, it is struck. Indeed? I heard it not. It then draws near the season Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk. (1.4.1-6)

These passages are so similar because Shakespeare wants to give the impression of beginning again, but much has happened since those tentative part-lines of the opening scene. Scene iv has the two previous scenes as its context, while Scene i must create its own context as it goes along. By separating the Ghost scenes, Shakespeare generates a momentum that reaches its climax in the Ghost's narration of its murder (1.5). T h e revelation of the hidden truth is certainly crucial in Act I, but even more important is the idea of the Ghost as it develops in Hamlet's consciousness. This idea is built up slowly and discretely, and one has the feeling that a substantial period of time has elapsed between Scene i and Scene iv. T h e ambiguity of the Ghost, established by the structure of these early scenes, persists even after —

209—

STAGING

AND

STRUCTURE

Hamlet confirms the truth of the Ghost's narration and is certain that it is not a devil. One other deceptive illusion of time is created by Hamlet's absence during his English voyage. He is away for all of Scenes v, vi, and vii of Act IV, although Scene vi is devoted to Hamlet's letter to Horatio about his adventurous escape. There is nothing in these three scenes that would factually suggest a long interval, yet when Hamlet returns, Shakespeare takes pains to tell us that he is now thirty years old and no longer the young man of the earlier part of the play. I have already discussed the pseudo-rational question of Hamlet's age, but I should like to insist that the matter can only be resolved by the logic of scenes and not by the logic of overt and covert allusions to time in the text. From the spectator's point of view, Hamlet has so overwhelmingly dominated the action until his departure in Act IV, Scene iv that the duration of his absence from the stage tends to be exaggerated. W e could say that there is a Hamlet time and a nonHamlet time in the play, as there would be a separate time sense for each character. This is not to argue that Hamlet was ten years at sea on his voyage to England or even five. Hamlet is obviously no Odysseus, but in both characters there is an equally strong notion that time is fictive and chronology is a matter of dramatic and rhetorical emphasis. Hamlet makes an unanticipated appearance in the graveyard, entering with Horatio from "afar off" (5.1.56 s.d.)—and the authorial direction of Folio makes an unexpected theatrical pun on "afar": as a stage term ( = f r o m far upstage) and as an — 210 —

"THE

VERY

CUNNING

OF THE

SCENE"

indication of distance ( = f r o m a faraway place). Hamlet's return via the graveyard suggests an orphic delivery from " T h e undiscovered country, from whose bourn/ N o traveler returns" (3.1.79-80). He is the mythic adventurer, who, by triumphing over death, has also triumphed over time.7 7

See J. Gold, "Hamlet's Sea-change," English,

55-

— 211 —

XV

(1964), 53-

PART THREE DRAMATIC CHARACTER

H A R A C T E R analysis is in disfavor in Shakespearean criticism as well as in the criticism of the novel, where it would be more naturally at home. T h e excesses of this approach to Shakespeare were so grievous that, like those mathematical studies of collaboration, the method itself was discredited by its own practitioners. L. C. Knights's essay, " H o w Many Children Had Lady Macbeth?" (1933), dealt a deathblow to the kinds of concerns posed in the title. Knights is parodying the questions so earnestly debated in Note EE of A. C. Bradley's Shakespearean Tragedy (1904): "Duration of the Action in Macbeth. Macbeth's Age. 'He Has No Children.' " W e may well add Bradley's Note B: "Where Was Hamlet at the T i m e of His Father's Death?" and Note DD: "Did Lady Macbeth Really Faint?"

C

Everyone who has read Bradley closely and profited from his resilient and logical mind knows that these are the quirks of his criticism rather than its substance. But even if they are quirks, they do reflect the kinds of interests that fill the pages of the New Shakespere Society Transactions, the Variorum editions of Horace Howard Furness and his son, and the nineteenth-century issues of Notes and Queries. T h e whole approach is brilliantly typified by Hartley Coleridge in his Blackwood's Magazine article of 1828: "Let us, for a moment, put Shakespeare out of the question, and consider Hamlet as a real person, a recently deceased acquaintance." 1 1

Quoted in L. C. Knights, Explorations

p. 30.

(New York,

1947),

PART

THREE

T o consider Hamlet as "a recently deceased acquaintance," we must indeed "put Shakespeare out of the question," and this is precisely where character analysis, with its juicy human concerns, parts company with literature. In his essay, Knights tries to reestablish Shakespeare's status as a dramatic poet rather than a creator of unforgettable imaginative persons. But in his zeal to replace character by poetry, Knights completely ignores the nature of dramatic illusion. He speaks only of the play as read and never as acted ("We start with so many lines of verse on a printed page which we read as we should read any other poem"), and he is constantly using that limiting phrase, "the words on the page." 2 If we think of the play as presented by actors in a theater, then the notion of character does not seem so farfetched as Knights would have us believe. There is no essential conflict between the idea that "our actors" "were all spirits, and/ Are melted into air, into thin air" ( T h e Tempest 4.1.149-50) and the fact that the "poet's pen" turns " T h e forms of things unknown" into "shapes, and gives to airy nothing/ A local habitation and a name" (A Midsummer Night's Dream 5.1.15-17). Duke Theseus presents a justification for dramatic character a few lines further on in this same speech: Such tricks hath strong imagination That, if it would but apprehend some joy, It comprehends some bringer of that joy. . . . (5.1.18-20) 2

Knights, Explorations,

pp. 31

and 20. Compare

the more

eclectic approach in Knights's essay, " T h e Question of Character in Shakespeare," Further

Explorations

204.

—

216—

(London, 1965), pp. 186-

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

In other words, emotions are embodied in persons, and we can only "apprehend some joy" through the medium of "some bringer of that joy." Or in Hamlet, if the Player could "in a fiction, in a dream of passion" (2.2.562) produce such a powerful reaction in himself, what would he do if he had the "motive and the cue for passion" (571) that Hamlet has? There is a world of difference between the fictive Hecuba and the real Gertrude, or at least we are made to acknowledge a distinction between characters described in the poetry and those actually present on stage. There is a brief but illuminating example of Shakespearean characterization in the pirate sailors of Act IV, Scene vi, who come to Horatio with a letter from Hamlet. These colorful figures have been equally neglected by poetic analysis and by stage production. According to Quarto 2: "Enter Sailors" (6 s.d.), but Folio, in its consistent search for economies, reduces this to "Enter Sailor," since there is only one speaking part. T h e Sailor begins inoffensively enough, with a greeting to Horatio: "God bless you, sir" (7); but Horatio, who is always keen on incongruity, gives his salutation a personal turn: "Let Him bless thee too" (8), as if the pirate's formidable appearance marked him out for one in need of worldly and otherworldly aid. T h e pirate is, of course, a proscribed outlaw who could be seized and put to death at once by the authorities. T h e Sailor is not very flattered by Horatio's concern for his salvation, and he answers with masterful aplomb: " 'A shall, sir, an't please H i m " (9), with stress on " H i m " to separate God's will from Horatio's. He continues his message with calculated and amused imperti— 217 —

PART

THREE

nence: "There's a letter for you, sir—it came from th' ambassador that was bound for England—if your name be Horatio, as I am let to know it is" (9-12). How cool and unyielding is that "let to know!" T h e pirate's costume would, of course, give an additional emphasis to his words, and the presence of a second or third pirate— all "thieves of mercy" (21-22)—would strengthen the illusion of a distinctive role. In these five lines of the Sailor's part, we have a delightful characterization that has nothing to do with poetic imagery, but which nevertheless shows an important aspect of Shakespeare's art. For all the complexity of Hamlet, the psychological processes in the play are deliberately simplified and stylized to suit the demands of the brief, swift, and unequivocal communication demanded in the theater. Claudius' brilliant device against Hamlet, for example, suggests itself to him with the sudden inspiration of comic strips: Soft, let me see. We'll make a solemn wager on your cunnings— I ha't! (4.7.154-56) Hamlet hits on the idea of a play to "catch the conscience of the King" (2.2.617) with an equally unsubtle flash: 8 I have heard About, my brains. H u m T h a t guilty creatures sitting at a play. . . .

(2.2.599-601) 8

I follow the lineation of Quarto 2 rather than the adaptation

of Folio that appears in Hubler. There is no warrant for the dra-

— 218 —

DRAMATIC "I ha't!" and " H u m

CHARACTER " indicate certain limits in the

psychological range of Shakespearean tragedy. T h e y are not the sort of expressions that would give comfort to Bradley and his followers. W e may attempt to resuscitate character analysis by approaching it through style4 rather than through physical and psychological attributes. W e may ask some of the following questions: How is the character identified and individualized as a dramatic speaker? What are some of his special modes of expression? What is his own attitude to language, as this might be seen in relation to other attitudes? For example, is language for him a form of revelation or a means of deception, or some combination of these at different times? Does the character use a single dominant style, or a series of different and inconsistent styles, including parody? I shall try to apply some of these questions to Claudius, Polonius, and Hamlet. By putting the emphasis on style, I hope to avoid the pitfalls of a psychological approach to dramatic character. Although the actors who play the parts are real people, the persons in a play are, after all, only impersonations. This creates a knotty paradox about the nature of drama as a literary form—a paradox that ceases to be so troubling in films, where we see the actors matic flourish of giving "Hum

," a word that does not occur

in Folio, a line to itself. 4

See Mikhail M. Morozov, " T h e Individualization of Shake-

speare's Characters Through esp. pp. 93-106 on Hamlet.

Imagery," SS,

II

(1949),

83-106,

Imagery, of course, provides only one

means of stylistic characterization.

— 219 —

PART

THREE

through the fixed medium of the photograph. Once we assume the presence of live actors, it is difficult not to believe in the active force of characterization: the actors will naturally endow the playwright's fictions with the illusion of human purpose and consistency. In this sense, the actors themselves are exercising the same willing (or professional) suspension of disbelief that is demanded from the spectators.

— 220 —

9. Claudius: "Break not your sleeps for that" C L A U D I U S is not a self-conscious stylist like Hamlet and Polonius, who are acutely aware of words in their multiple significations and who at times even seem to be amusing themselves with verbal extravagance. Although he is subtle and calculating in his speech, Claudius' stylistic intentions are never difficult to discern. He uses little wordplay, his imagery inclines to illustrative similes, and both his language and his acts are the expression of a resolute sense of purpose. Claudius alternates between two styles: an embellished, rhetorical style—his "most painted word" (3.1. 53) — f o r formal occasions, and a simple, direct, even colloquial style to express his determinations. I do not think that these are public and private styles, as Miss Ellis-Fermor claims, 1 because there is not very large scope in the play for revealing the private aspect of the king. In addition, Claudius shifts abruptly from one style to another, sometimes in the same speech, to show something strong and menacing behind the pleasant embellishments of his court manner. Whenever the king uses complex syntax and polysyllabic diction, there is an immediate suspicion of hypocrisy, which is dispelled when he speaks simply. If the king seems harsh and coercive in this simple style, it is at least free of verbal deception. Since the main lines of Claudius' style are so 1

See Una Ellis-Fermor, The

Frontiers

of Drama

don, 1964), pp. 88-89. First published, 1945.

— 221 —

(2 edn.; Lon-

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

apparent, I shall discuss it in terms of three scenes: Act I, Scene ii, and Act IV, Scenes v and vii, with some attention to his soliloquies and his aside. Claudius begins his part with a formal oration very much in the manner of Polonius. It has farfetched conceits, such as "an auspicious and a dropping eye" (1.2. 11) and "our whole kingdom/ T o be contracted in one brow of woe" (3-4); strained paradoxes: "With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage" (12); and a division of imagery and syntax into attractive antitheses: "In equal scale weighing delight and dole" (13). It is, presumably, the first public address of the new king to his court, so that its ceremoniousness is part of the state occasion. He moves from platitudes of mourning for the late king to business of state, especially young Fortinbras' presumption . . . to pester us with message, Importing the surrender of those lands Lost by his father, with all bands of law, T o our most valiant brother. (1.2.22-25) There is already a hint of something disdainful in that less than formal word "pester." Fortinbras is disposed of in four strong and unexpected monosyllables: "So much for him" (25). This phrase exactly matches the conclusion of Claudius' gratitude to the court: "For all, our thanks" (16), which may pass for bluff sincerity, but the dismissal of Fortinbras is curt and threatening. It seems to say: "Enough words about such a trivial matter; now that we are aware of what Fortinbras is u p to, we will soon crush him." From — 222 —

CLA UDIUS the thirty-nine lines of Claudius' first speech, we learn that he can not only use the imperial style, but that he can also transact the business of state with energy, firmness, and unambiguous command. Despite his ornamental rhetoric dressed up for the occasion, we know that he bears no resemblance at all to Richard II. After the formalities of Claudius' first speech, there is something offensively familiar in his tone with Laertes. He repeats the name unctuously, caressingly,2 as if he could not offer too much flattery: " A n d now, Laertes, what's the news with you?/ You told us of some suit. What is't, Laertes?" (1.2.42-43), he asks, and "What wouldst thou beg, Laertes. . . ?" (45), and yet again, "What wouldst thou have, Laertes?" (50). As Hamlet says in a different context, "Something too much of this" (3.2.76). Claudius knows how to ingratiate himself with the son of his chief counselor; indeed, the king speaks to Laertes a period so characteristically Polonian that it sounds like parody: T h e head is not more native to the heart, T h e hand more instrumental to the mouth, T h a n is the throne of Denmark to thy father. (1.2.47-49)

T h e nine lines of Claudius' speech to Laertes (42-50) provide a very good example of how unpredictably the king can alternate between his simple and his embellished style. As we have seen, the first five lines are emphatically colloquial, if not studiedly so. T h e three 2

See Granville-Barker, Prefaces,

I, 50; 124; 125, note 8; 185,

note 13; 186.

— 223 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

lines that follow are the elaborate triple figure quoted above, while the last line reverts to the colloquial: "What wouldst thou have, Laertes?" T h e king puts off to the end his difficult interview with Hamlet, who is not only a grieving son, but also a dispossessed prince. Claudius' oration on comfort continues the formal high style of his first speech. Since it is a collection of pious (or perhaps impious) platitudes about mourning, it must be given gravity and magnitude by rhetorical means. In other words, the style is deliberately heightened, especially by Latinate polysyllables, as in the following: But to persever In obstinate condolement is a course Of impious stubbornness. (1.2.92-94) These words are almost purely oratorical, without much relation to ordinary speech. Another device of elevation is witty syntax, in which Claudius anticipates his lord chamberlain's "foolish figure" (2.2.98): "But you must know your father lost a father,/ T h a t father lost, lost his" (1.2.89-90). Claudius also gains strong emphasis by repetition and by long speech periods that produce breathless climaxes: Fie, 'tis a fault to heaven, A fault against the dead, a fault to nature, T o reason most absurd, whose common theme Is death of fathers, and who still hath cried, From the first corse till he that died today, " T h i s must be so." — 224 —

(1.2.101-6)

CLA UDIUS T h e king rises to the height of his exhortatory persuasion, and we can imagine the admiration of the whole court for his brilliant performance. A l l except Hamlet, of course, who persevers in stony silence as well as "obstinate condolement" (93). When he tells his mother, "I shall in all my best obey you, madam" (120), the king seizes on this grudging fragment and magnifies it into "a loving and a fair reply" (121). T h e resourceful Claudius wants to mitigate Hamlet's cruel anticlimax and to maintain his own image as a "smiling public man." Claudius' great moment in the play is his triumph over Laertes in Act IV, Scene v, at a time when the headstrong youth has the king and queen completely in his power, so that Claudius can only defend himself with words. This scene is a remarkable example of the efficacy of his rhetoric. Most commentators exaggerate Claudius' physical courage here, as if Laertes were afraid that the king might at any moment pinion him in his bearlike grip. Claudius never once in the play even vaguely hints at anything so chivalric as single combat; although he is obviously no coward, his persuasion of Laertes is more a matter of cunning and bluff than of any heroic qualities. There is much more spontaneous courage in Gertrude, who tries to restrain Laertes by force, only to be rebuked by the husband she is attempting to protect: "Let him go, Gertrude. Do not fear our person" (4.5.122), and again four lines further on: "Let him go, Gertrude" (126). T h e queen's direct approach threatens to spoil Claudius' very different plan of attack. As Claudius tried to imprison Hamlet, so with — 225 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

Laertes he exercises an even more powerful restraint by allowing him a useless and deceptive liberty. It is the masterstroke of an expert in fast and loose. If interrogation is one of the ruling devices of the play, as Levin tells us,3 then Claudius* questions in this scene match those of Hamlet in significance. Laertes is prepared to fight for what he imagines to be his right, but he is not ready to answer the king's paralyzing questions: "What is the cause, Laertes,/ T h a t thy rebellion looks so giantlike?" (4.5.120-21). Laertes has no written manifesto that he can read from, and Claudius has deflated his pretensions by that diminutive "giantlike." W h e n Laertes asserts with characteristic bravado: " L e t come what comes, only I'll be revenged/ Most throughly for my father" (135-36), Claudius disarms him by assent: " W h o shall stay you?" (136). Obviously, Laertes cannot manage this kind of psychological warfare, which weakens the very foundations of his assault. How can you fight with an enemy who agrees with you? Claudius then proceeds with his pacifying interrogatives: Good Laertes, If you desire to know the certainty Of your dear father, is't writ in your revenge T h a t swoopstake you will draw both friend and foe, Winner and loser? (4.5.139-43) There is only one possible answer to this question, which Laertes makes: "None but his enemies" (144). T h e king then moves to the final stage of his diversionary 3

Levin, The

Question

of Hamlet,

Part I: "Interrogation."

— 226 —

CLA UDIUS tactics: " W i l l y o u k n o w t h e m t h e n ? " ( 1 4 4 ) . N o w that h e is c o m p l e t e l y e x o n e r a t e d , h e can p r e p a r e the onslaught against H a m l e t . C l a u d i u s n o t o n l y asks a series of questions himself, b u t h e also e n c o u r a g e s L a e r t e s to " d e m a n d his

fill"

( 1 2 9 ) , so that b y the e n d of the scene o n e has the impression that a l l of L a e r t e s ' u n t h i n k i n g h e r o i c energies h a v e b e e n d r a i n e d b y q u e s t i o n s a n d answers. L a e r t e s b e g i n s b y asking:

"Where

is m y f a t h e r ? "

(128),

to

w h i c h t h e k i n g replies at o n c e w i t h m a s t e r f u l s i m p l i c i t y : " D e a d " ( 1 2 8 ) . T h i s is the m a r k of C l a u d i u s ' r h e t o r i c a l skill, to k n o w w h e n to b e evasive a n d w h e n

to b e

b r u t a l l y direct. H i s u n e x p e c t e d frankness h e r e

takes

L a e r t e s b y surprise a n d e n c o u r a g e s the i l l u s i o n of b l u f f honesty. G e r t r u d e ' s " B u t n o t b y h i m "

(128)

is, o f

course, s u p e r f l u o u s — " T h e l a d y d o t h protest too m u c h , m e t h i n k s " (3.2.236). " L e t h i m d e m a n d his fill" (4.5.129), says C l a u d i u s ,

to e m p h a s i z e

that there is a b s o l u t e l y

n o t h i n g to h i d e . Laertes' " H o w c a m e h e d e a d ? "

(130)

is n e v e r a n s w e r e d , a n d his n e x t questions relate to his sister's madness. T o Laertes' " D o y o u see this, O G o d ? " ( 1 9 9 ) , the k i n g says o n l y : " L a e r t e s , I m u s t c o m m u n e w i t h y o u r grief,/ O r y o u d e n y m e r i g h t "

(200-1). I n

a practical sense, C l a u d i u s has such a n u n s w e r v i n g sense of purpose that h e is a b l e to e x c l u d e e v e r y t h i n g t h a t does n o t f u r t h e r his o w n ends. O n e ideological t e c h n i q u e that C l a u d i u s uses to overa w e Laertes is the assertion of d i v i n e sanction. Since h e k n o w s h o w useless it is to reason w i t h an a n g r y m a n , h e appeals to Laertes' instinctive p r e j u d i c e s : —

227

—

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

L e t h i m go, G e r t r u d e . D o n o t fear o u r person. T h e r e ' s such d i v i n i t y d o t h h e d g e a k i n g T h a t treason can b u t p e e p to w h a t it w o u l d , A c t s little of his w i l l .

(4.5.122-25)

L a e r t e s is r e d u c e d to the i g n o m i n i o u s status of a Peepi n g T o m b e f o r e the d i v i n e h e d g e of royalty, a n d the w o r d " t r e a s o n " m u s t g i v e h i m pause. H e is soon, h o w ever, s p e a k i n g the direst sort of treason a n d b l a s p h e m y : T o h e l l allegiance, v o w s to the blackest devil, C o n s c i e n c e a n d grace to the p r o f o u n d e s t pit! I dare d a m n a t i o n .

(4-5- 1 3 1 -33)

B u t the k i n g m a k e s n o a t t e m p t to i n t e r r u p t h i m a n d m a y , i n fact, b e secretly d e l i g h t e d that L a e r t e s is l e t t i n g off steam w i t h this s w a g g e r i n g talk. C l a u d i u s w i l l k n o w h o w to d i v e r t this b r a v a d o o n t o H a m l e t . N o t o n l y does C l a u d i u s e n c o u r a g e Laertes to speak his m i n d , b u t he also p a m p e r s h i m , v e r b a l l y , i n the same shameless m a n n e r as i n A c t I, Scene ii. H e offers a n excessive, e v e n p u e r i l e , a p p r o v a l of his d e v o t i o n to his father's cause: " W h y , n o w y o u speak/ L i k e a g o o d child and a true gentleman"

(4.5.147-48) . T h e k i n g is

a b l e to m o l l i f y Laertes' strong passions, a n d h e m a k e s his justification f o r P o l o n i u s ' death i n a

simplified,

illustrative simile: T h a t I a m guiltless of y o u r father's death, A n d a m m o s t sensibly i n grief f o r it, It shall as level to y o u r j u d g m e n t 'pear A s day does to y o u r eye.

(4.5.149-52)

T h e i m a g e is v a g u e e n o u g h n o t to arouse a n y possible — 228 —

CLA UDIUS dissent. A t the e n d of the scene, C l a u d i u s appeals to L a ertes' legalistic a n d c e r e m o n i a l sense of h o n o r , o f f e r i n g to a b i d e b y the a r b i t r a t i o n of w h a t e v e r specialists Laertes m a y wish to consult: M a k e choice of w h o m y o u r wisest friends y o u w i l l , A n d they shall h e a r a n d j u d g e ' t w i x t y o u a n d m e . (4.5.202-3) If the k i n g is f o u n d to b e " t o u c h e d , " . . . w e w i l l o u r k i n g d o m give, O u r c r o w n , o u r life, a n d all that w e call ours, T o y o u i n satisfaction. . . .

(4.5.205-7)

L a e r t e s is m e a n t to b e dazzled b y strong t e m p t a t i o n . If h e is i n d e e d " A v e r y n o b l e y o u t h " ( 5 . 1 . 2 2 6 ) , as H a m let says, t h e n h e s h o u l d n o t b e c o r r u p t e d w i t h o u t suita b l e p r o v o c a t i o n , w h i c h is p r o v i d e d b y the k i n g ' s irresistible flattery. B y the t i m e A c t I V , Scene v i i opens, i n the m i d s t of a conversation, L a e r t e s is C l a u d i u s ' ally, b u t the k i n g n e v e r seems sure of h i m , e v e n i n the f e n c i n g m a t c h . P e r s u a d i n g h i m , therefore, b e c o m e s a c o n t i n u o u s effort, w i t h the k i n g constantly a d d i n g n e w reasons a n d n e w safeguards. T h e c h a n g e i n L a e r t e s is m o r e r e m a r k a b l e than H a m l e t ' s " t r a n s f o r m a t i o n "

(2.2.5)» because

L a e r t e s passes f r o m heroics to v i l l a i n y almost w i t h o u t conscious i n t e n t i o n . I n A c t I V , Scene vii, w e feel v e r y strongly that he is b e i n g c a u g h t i n a w e b of r h e t o r i c a l tricks; C l a u d i u s is n o w h e r e m o r e a r t f u l , various, a n d elusive. A t the b e g i n n i n g of the scene, w e see h i m t a k i n g Laertes i n t o his c o n f i d e n c e a n d p a t i e n t l y e x p l a i n i n g to h i m — 229 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

t h e t w o reasons that he has n o t p r o c e e d e d

publicly

against H a m l e t . T h e s e reasons are s u p p o r t e d b y characteristic illustrative i m a g e r y . T h e first concerns the tria n g u l a r l o v e b e t w e e n himself a n d G e r t r u d e , a n d G e r trude and Hamlet: She is so c o n j u n c t i v e to m y l i f e a n d soul, T h a t , as the star m o v e s n o t b u t i n his sphere, I c o u l d n o t b u t b y her.

(4.7.14-16)

T h i s k i n d of simile is C l a u d i u s ' favorite trope:

com-

m o n p l a c e , v a g u e , u n e x c e p t i o n a b l e , w i t h the v e h i c l e exactly a p p l i e d to the tenor. I n e x p l a i n i n g his n e x t reason, h o w e v e r , he seems to g e t lost i n the t u r g i d p r o l i f e r a t i o n of his

figures:4

T h e other motive W h y to a p u b l i c c o u n t I m i g h t n o t g o Is the great l o v e the g e n e r a l g e n d e r b e a r h i m , W h o , d i p p i n g all his faults i n their affection, W o u l d , l i k e the s p r i n g that t u r n e t h w o o d to stone, C o n v e r t his gyves to graces; so that m y arrows, T o o slightly t i m b e r e d f o r so l o u d a w i n d , W o u l d h a v e r e v e r t e d to m y b o w again, A n d n o t w h e r e I h a d a i m e d them.

(4.7.16-24)

W e k n o w i m m e d i a t e l y that tropes are a sign of d u p l i c i t y i n C l a u d i u s , a n a t t e m p t to disguise the literal

truth.

T h e first simile is i n t e n d e d to illustrate the p o w e r of " a f f e c t i o n " to transform " f a u l t s , " to " C o n v e r t . . . g y v e s to graces," as v a r i o u s p e t r i f y i n g springs i n E n g l a n d are 4

See Johnson's

Notes

to Shakespeare,

175, and Ellis-Fermor, The

Frontiers

88-89.

— 230 —

ed. Arthur Sherbo, p. of Drama,

note 3 on pp.

CLA UDIUS a b l e to t u r n " w o o d to stone." C l a u d i u s w a n t s to restrict the i m a g e to the p o w e r s of m e t a m o r p h o s i s alone, b u t o t h e r qualities i n t r u d e , as they also d o i n the m e t a p h o r that

follows.

In

Claudius'

representation,

the

loud

" w i n d " is the p u b l i c c l a m o r i n f a v o r of H a m l e t , w h i c h w o u l d b l o w the l i g h t l y shafted arrows that the k i n g a i m s at H a m l e t b a c k to the b o w f r o m w h i c h they w e r e shot. T h e i n t e n t of the f i g u r e to d e p i c t useless e f f o r t is clear, b u t the visual action it suggests is i n e p t a n d grotesque. I n C l a u d i u s ' desire to b e w e i g h t y , his i m a g e r y is escaping his c o n t r o l ; it seems o n l y strained, factitious, a n d therefore dishonest. T h e w h o l e speech p r o v i d e s a g o o d e x a m p l e of h o w figures of speech m a y b e used negatively as a device of characterization. C l a u d i u s ' shifts f r o m e m b e l l i s h e d r h e t o r i c to stark simplicity are o n e of the m o s t n o t a b l e features of his style. A f t e r the figures w e h a v e just considered, his n e x t speech is the simplest i n the play. L a e r t e s has just said: " B u t m y r e v e n g e w i l l c o m e " ( 2 9 ) , w h i c h C l a u d i u s confirms w i t h an understated, c o l l o q u i a l m e n a c e : B r e a k n o t y o u r sleeps for that. Y o u m u s t n o t t h i n k T h a t w e are m a d e of stuff so flat a n d d u l l T h a t w e c a n let o u r b e a r d b e shook w i t h danger, A n d t h i n k it pastime. Y o u shortly shall h e a r m o r e . I l o v e d y o u r father, a n d w e l o v e ourself, A n d that, I h o p e , w i l l teach y o u to i m a g i n e — (4-7-3°"35)

C l a u d i u s shows a r e m a r k a b l e c o n t r o l o v e r those twenty-nine

monosyllables

leading

up

to

"danger,"

and

his o v e r p o w e r i n g egotism is displayed f r a n k l y a n d w i t h — 231 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

o u t self-indulgence: " I l o v e d y o u r father, a n d w e l o v e o u r s e l f . " T h i s is an antagonist w h o s e stature m a k e s h i m w o r t h y to b e p i t t e d against H a m l e t , a n d w h o , i n fact, m a k e s us fear for H a m l e t w i t h a n intensity p r o p e r to tragedy. T h e r e is a trace of sarcasm i n the k i n g ' s tone, as if he n e e d e d to correct the false i m a g e Laertes m i g h t h a v e of h i m as a m a g n a n i m o u s C h r i s t i a n prince. H e is, of course, g e t t i n g Laertes r e a d y f o r the i m m i n e n t n e w s of H a m l e t ' s e x e c u t i o n , b u t then, i n the m i d s t of C l a u dius' dark hints, comes the coup de theatre

of H a m l e t ' s

letter. W i t h a w o n d e r f u l resourcefulness, the k i n g proceeds to a n e w stage of persuasion i n w h i c h Laertes w i l l bec o m e the i n s t r u m e n t of H a m l e t ' s death. It is n o t a b l e i n Shakespearean tragedy h o w m u c h the v i l l a i n w o r k s b y f o r t u i t o u s circumstances o n w h i c h h e m u s t i m p r o v i s e , r a t h e r than b y a p r e m e d i t a t e d r a t i o n a l plan. C l a u d i u s shares this creative q u a l i t y most o b v i o u s l y w i t h

Iago,

a n d there is m u c h in the c o r r u p t i o n of Laertes that resembles the m o r e protracted fall of

Othello. A l l

of

Shakespeare's v i l l a i n s are masters of rhetoric, especially the simple, i n s i n u a t i n g style w h o s e efficacy can b e imm e d i a t e l y measured. O n a m o m e n t ' s notice, C l a u d i u s has a f u l l y f o r m e d p l a n to t r a p Laertes b y p r a i s i n g his skill w i t h the r a p i e r and, i n t e r t w i n e d w i t h this, a d o u b l e p l o t against H a m l e t t h a t w i l l seem to b e a n " a c c i d e n t , " " U n d e r the w h i c h he shall n o t choose b u t f a l l "

(4.7.

68, 6 5 ) . C l a u d i u s seems to b e m a k i n g e v e r y t h i n g u p as he goes a l o n g , a n d this i m p r o v i s a t i o n a l f e e l i n g e n d o w s the d i a l o g u e w i t h a g o o d deal of d r a m a t i c e x c i t e m e n t . T h e k i n g n o w m o v e s i n t o a d e l i b e r a t e l y b r o k e n dis— 232 —

CLA UDJUS course, f u l l of i n s i n u a t i n g hints. A f t e r L a m o r d ' s fulsome r e p o r t of L a e r t e s ' f e n c i n g — a n d C l a u d i u s expatiates h e r e w i t h a leisure f o u n d n o w h e r e else in the p l a y — there is a s u d d e n b r e a k that is all the m o r e e m p h a t i c i n its chatty a n d s m o o t h l y a r t i c u l a t e d c o n t e x t : Sir, this r e p o r t of his D i d H a m l e t so e n v e n o m w i t h his e n v y T h a t he could nothing do b u t wish and beg Y o u r s u d d e n c o m i n g o'er to p l a y w i t h y o u . N o w , o u t of t h i s —

(4.7.102-6)

T h e u n e x p e c t e d pause i n the k i n g ' s speech rouses L a ertes to ask the a p p r o p r i a t e q u e s t i o n : " W h a t o u t of this, m y l o r d ? " ( 1 0 6 ) . A s i n A c t I V , Scene v, the k i n g refuses to answer, b u t shifts instead i n t o teasing i n t e r r o g a t i o n : Laertes, was y o u r father dear to you? O r are y o u l i k e the p a i n t i n g of a sorrow, A face w i t h o u t a heart?

(4.7.107-9)

T h e k i n g ' s s u s p e n d e d sentence, " N o w , o u t of

this—"

( 1 0 6 ) , r e m a i n s s u s p e n d e d i n an a t m o s p h e r e of d o u b t s a n d p e r t u r b a t i o n s n e v e r to b e satisfied. Instead, C l a u dius delivers his m o s t c o n t e m p l a t i v e speech i n the play, o n the t h e m e of love, time, a n d purpose, w h o s e u p s h o t is: " T h a t w e w o u l d d o / W e s h o u l d d o w h e n w e w o u l d " ( 1 1 8 - 1 9 ) . It is an e l o q u e n t persuasion to action. T h a t C l a u d i u s s h o u l d speak t w o soliloquies (3.3.36-72, 97-98, a n d 4.3.58-68) 5 a n d an aside (3.1.49-54)® m i g h t 5

It seems unlikely that Claudius' eleven lines at the beginning

of A c t IV, Scene iii are a soliloquy. Quarto 2 has: "Enter and

two or three,"

King,

whereas in Folio the king enters alone. T h i s

may be another of Folio's economies in the number of super-

—

233—

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

seem o u t of character to us, b u t Shakespeare w a n t s to e n l a r g e the scope of his r o l e b y m a k i n g h i m conscious of his o w n " s h u f f l i n g " ( 3 . 3 . 6 1 ) . T h e f o r m s of s o l i l o q u y a n d aside a l l o w C l a u d i u s to e x a m i n e passionately his s p i r i t u a l state. T h e r e h a v e b e e n strong o b j e c t i o n s to the k i n g ' s aside, because it is too brief a n d too u n p r e p a r e d to b e c o n v i n c i n g . G r a n v i l l e - B a r k e r says that it " h a s all the l o o k of a s u b s e q u e n t l y a p p l i e d patch," 7 since

it

comes o u t of n o w h e r e a n d leads n o w h e r e . It is t r i g g e r e d b y P o l o n i u s ' o b s e r v a t i o n that " w e d o sugar o ' e r / devil himself"

The

(3.1.48-49). W e s u d d e n l y discover that

the k i n g is a v i l l a i n w i t h m o r a l sensitivity: O , 'tis t o o true. H o w smart a lash that speech d o t h g i v e m y conscience! T h e harlot's cheek, b e a u t i e d w i t h plast'ring art, Is n o t m o r e u g l y to the t h i n g that h e l p s it T h a n is m y d e e d to m y m o s t p a i n t e d w o r d . O heavy burden!

(3.1.49-54)

I n a f e w m o m e n t s w e w i l l hear H a m l e t s p e a k i n g his " T o be, o r n o t to b e " s o l i l o q u y (3.1.56ft.), i n w h i c h he w i l l e x a m i n e " c o n s c i e n c e " i n its m u l t i p l e

meanings.

numeraries, since it is more reasonable for the king to discuss affairs of state with a few of his trusted advisers than with himself. 6

1 omit the king's speech to Laertes at the end of A c t V, Scene

i, which is technically a "conversational" rather than a "solo" aside

(see Beckerman, Shakespeare

at the

Globe,

p. 186). Since

this kind of aside is spoken apart to another character, it is really dialogue, whereas the solo aside is close to the soliloquy in form — i n both the character speaks to himself and is overheard by the audience. 7 Granville-Barker, Prefaces,

I, a 18.

— 234 —

CLA

UDIUS

A g a i n s t this speech, C l a u d i u s ' aside seems p a t a n d m o r alistic. B y the m a c h i n a t i o n s of d r a m a t i c irony, w e n o w k n o w that H a m l e t can " t a k e the ghost's w o r d f o r a t h o u s a n d p o u n d " (3.2.292-93) a n d that there is n o n e e d to use The Mousetrap

as a test. B u t this i n f o r m a t i o n is

p r i m a r i l y for the a u d i e n c e ' s benefit, so that w e m a y still c o m p l a i n that C l a u d i u s ' aside has n o t b e e n

properly

i n t e g r a t e d i n t o its c o n t e x t . W e m a y m a k e the same comp l a i n t a b o u t the asides of G e r t r u d e a n d Laertes, w h i c h are also revelations of conscience. T h e i d e a of r e p e n t ance o r c o n t r i t i o n was so firmly established as a m o r a l c o n v e n t i o n i n E l i z a b e t h a n d r a m a that n o f u l l e x p l a n a tion was r e q u i r e d f o r it, b u t the p e n i t e n t asides of C l a u dius, G e r t r u d e , a n d Laertes seem a b r u p t e v e n b y Elizab e t h a n standards. Since a l l of these asides are so closely r e l a t e d f u n c t i o n a l l y , it m a y b e u s e f u l to l o o k a t t h e m as a g r o u p . G e r t r u d e ' s r e m o r s e f u l aside occurs i n A c t I V , Scene v, i n the c o n t e x t of h e r refusal to speak w i t h the " i m p o r tunate, i n d e e d distract" (2) O p h e l i a . She is persuaded, p e r h a p s b y the political a r g u m e n t of H o r a t i o , to " L e t her come i n "

( 1 6 ) . G e r t r u d e ' s didactic a n d e p i g r a m -

m a t i c aside, d e l i v e r e d i n t w o couplets, m a y w e l l b e a s o l i l o q u y , a l t h o u g h the d i s t i n c t i o n is a technical o n e . She has a s u d d e n access of conscience 8 that carries o v e r f r o m the closet scene: 8

O p h e l i a ' s first line in this scene seems to confirm Gertrude's

fears: " W h e r e is the beauteous majesty of D e n m a r k ? "

(4.5.21).

T h i s is a splendid e x a m p l e not only of the dark discourse of m a d folk, b u t also of the ambiguity of the English language. A s "prologue to some great amiss"

(18), O p h e l i a is u n a b l e to recognize

the once "beauteous majesty of D e n m a r k " because of the changes

— 235 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

T o m y sick soul (as sin's true n a t u r e is) E a c h toy seems p r o l o g u e to some great amiss; So f u l l of artless j e a l o u s y is g u i l t I t spills itself i n f e a r i n g to b e spilt. (4.5.17-20) The

moral

"guilt"—are

terms—"sick

soul,"

"sin's

true

similar to those i n C l a u d i u s '

nature," aside,

t h o u g h the a r t f u l p a t t e r n i n g of s o u n d a n d

al-

polished

antitheses also r e m i n d us of the P l a y e r Q u e e n . Laertes' aside comes u n e x p e c t e d l y , d u r i n g the f e n c i n g m a t c h . H e has lost the first t w o bouts, a n d w h e n h e tells the k i n g , " M y l o r d , I'll h i t h i m n o w "

(5.2.296),

C l a u d i u s discourages h i m : " I d o n o t t h i n k ' t "

(296).

T h e r e is n o t h i n g u n u s u a l here. A l t h o u g h the k i n g is p l o t t i n g w i t h Laertes, he has p l a c e d a h e a v y w a g e r o n H a m l e t , a n d w e m i g h t e x p e c t h i m to b e p u b l i c l y cheeri n g o n his favorite a n d d i s c o n c e r t i n g his

opponent.

L a e r t e s has p r i v a t e m i s g i v i n g s a b o u t his resolve to " h i t h i m n o w " : " A n d yet it is almost against m y c o n s c i e n c e " ( 2 9 7 ) . T h i s is s p o k e n aside a n d has n o r e l a t i o n to w h a t precedes o r follows, since L a e r t e s is shortly to p r i c k H a m l e t b y w h a t seems to b e f o u l play. B u t the smart " l a s h " that L a e r t e s gives his " c o n s c i e n c e "

(3.1.50)

is

i m p o r t a n t structurally, to p r e p a r e us f o r his reconciliation w i t h H a m l e t . H e m u s t once m o r e , just b e f o r e he

Gertrude's "sick soul" has wrought. "Where, indeed, in this haggard, fearful woman, is the 'beauteous majesty' that has been the cause of all this ill?"

(Granville-Barker, Prefaces,

I,

120).

Ophelia may also be speaking distractedly of herself; under different circumstances, majesty of

she

might

have

Denmark."

— 236 —

become

"the

beauteous

CLA

UDIUS

dies, b e c o m e " A v e r y n o b l e y o u t h "

(5.1.226), and we

m u s t b e w i l l i n g to accept the s i m p l i f i e d m o r a l i t y of " T h e K i n g , the K i n g ' s to b l a m e "

(5.2.321).

I n all three asides, Shakespeare w a n t s us to feel that C l a u d i u s , G e r t r u d e , a n d L a e r t e s are t r o u b l e d b y g u i l t a n d conscience, " t h e a g e n b i t e of i n w i t , " b u t h e doesn't w i s h to carry this p o i n t too far. T h e f o r m of the aside as a p r i v a t e d e c l a r a t i o n offers a c o n v e n i e n t one-line o r half-dozen-line statement, a l t h o u g h all of the e x a m p l e s suffer f r o m their b r e v i t y a n d their strong d e p e n d e n c e o n m o r a l c o n v e n t i o n s . Since they have n o vital r e l a t i o n to their contexts, these three asides seem sententious and mechanical. C l a u d i u s ' aside does, h o w e v e r , h e l p to p r e p a r e us f o r his l o n g s o l i l o q u y in A c t I I I , Scene iii, w h i c h develops the earlier sense of g u i l t a n d gives us, as it w e r e , his private response to The Murder

of Gonzago.

H e r e , too,

C l a u d i u s m o v e s i n t o his s o l i l o q u y a b r u p t l y ,

without

e v e n a p e r f u n c t o r y " N o w I a m a l o n e " (2.2.559). T h e r e is n o transition at all f r o m " T h a n k s , d e a r m y (3.3.35) to " O , m y offense is r a n k "

lord"

( 3 6 ) . T h e style of

the s o l i l o q u y is simple a n d passionate, v e r y l i k e

the

expression of p e n t - u p e m o t i o n that w e find i n H a m l e t ' s soliloquies. T h e r e

is a w h o l e series of

monosyllabic

declarations: " P r a y can I n o t " (38), " T h e n I'll l o o k u p . / M y f a u l t is past" (50-51), " A l l m a y b e w e l l " ( 7 2 ) , " M y w o r d s fly u p "

( 9 7 ) . If there is n o " s h u f f l i n g " " a b o v e "

(61, 6 0 ) , then e v e n " I n the c o r r u p t e d currents of this world"

(57)

a man must

"most painted w o r d "

occasionally

forswear

his

(3.1.53).

C l a u d i u s raises a g a i n the m o r a l q u e s t i o n of style al— 237 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

r e a d y present i n his first aside. H e is searching f o r t h e p r o p e r f o r m of p r a y e r that " C a n serve" his " t u r n "

(3.

3 . 5 2 ) . " ' F o r g i v e m e m y f o u l m u r d e r ' " (52) is his first tentative f o r m u l a t i o n , b u t h e discovers that the w o r d s d o n o t c o r r e s p o n d to a n y reality, "since I a m still possessed/ O f those effects f o r w h i c h I d i d the m u r d e r " (53-54). H e is f o r c e d to the b i t t e r c o n c l u s i o n that prayer, o r a n y f o r m of words, is useless w h e n it does n o t represent a n y spiritual t r u t h : " M y w o r d s fly u p , m y t h o u g h t s r e m a i n b e l o w . / W o r d s w i t h o u t thoughts n e v e r to h e a v e n g o "

(97-98). " W o r d s w i t h o u t t h o u g h t s " are

the e q u i v a l e n t of " m y m o s t p a i n t e d w o r d , " a n d b o t h phrases h e l p to define C l a u d i u s ' e m b e l l i s h e d style. T h e s e are the " c o l o r s " of w h a t B e r o w n e " p a i n t e d r h e t o r i c " (Love's

Labour's

disdainfully Lost

calls

4.3.235).

T h e k i n g ' s s o l i l o q u y is presented i n the f o r m of a debate, i n w h i c h m a n ' s

" o f f e n s e " is set against

" m e r c y , " as i n C l a u d i u s '

question:

"Whereto

God's serves

m e r c y / B u t to c o n f r o n t the visage of offense?" (3.3.46-47). E v e r y t h i n g i n the s o l i l o q u y has its c o r r e s p o n d i n g opposite, so that a l t h o u g h C l a u d i u s has f o r s w o r n the arts of rhetoric, antithesis still d o m i n a t e s his t h i n k i n g . In his o n l y simile here, he says that h e is " l i k e a m a n to d o u b l e business b o u n d "

( 4 1 ) , a n d o n e feels the effect of this

d o u b l e n e s s t h r o u g h o u t the speech. " O l i m e d soul, that s t r u g g l i n g to b e f r e e / A r t m o r e e n g a g e d ! "

(68-69) is a

p a r a d o x that illustrates h o w t r a p p e d C l a u d i u s is b y his o w n dualistic logic. T h e soul, c a u g h t i n the b i r d l i m e of its o w n black deeds, is t r y i n g to set itself at l i b e r t y , b u t it also w a n t s to b e " f r e e " i n the sense of guiltless, innocent, a n d blameless.

"My

stronger g u i l t defeats

— 238 —

my

CLA UDIUS s t r o n g i n t e n t " (40), says C l a u d i u s , t r y i n g to b a l a n c e o n e force against another. " T h i s cursed h a n d / . . . t h i c k e r than itself w i t h b r o t h e r ' s b l o o d " (43-44) c a n n o t b e m a d e " w h i t e as s n o w " ( 4 6 ) , n o r " h e a r t w i t h strings of steel,/ B e soft as sinews of the n e w b o r n b a b e " ( 7 0 - 7 1 ) . T h e r e is a n a d m i r a b l e toughness i n C l a u d i u s that refuses to i n d u l g e itself i n p i p e d r e a m s of an impossible salvation. H e k n o w s " h o w his a u d i t stands" ( 8 2 ) , so that h e n e e d n e v e r again t r o u b l e himself w i t h spiritual questionings, n o t e v e n just b e f o r e his i g n o m i n i o u s d e a t h i n the fenci n g scene. O n e of the m o s t m e m o r a b l e gestures i n Hamlet

is

C l a u d i u s ' h o l d i n g u p the h a n d that " h a t h t h e p r i m a l eldest curse u p o n ' t "

(37):

W h a t if this cursed h a n d W e r e t h i c k e r than itself w i t h b r o t h e r ' s b l o o d , Is there n o t r a i n e n o u g h i n the sweet heavens T o wash it w h i t e as snow?

(3.3.43-46)

T h e s e lines are e c h o e d i n M a c b e t h ' s m o r e lyric soliloquy: W i l l all great N e p t u n e ' s ocean wash this b l o o d C l e a n f r o m m y hand? N o ; this m y h a n d w i l l r a t h e r T h e m u l t i t u d i n o u s seas i n c a r n a d i n e , M a k i n g the g r e e n o n e r e d .

( M a c b e t h 2.2 60-63)

It is w o r t h n o t i n g h o w close C l a u d i u s a n d M a c b e t h are i n spirit as w e l l as i n words. B o t h are r e d e e m e d

by

their o w n u n m i t i g a t e d self-awareness, a l t h o u g h M a c b e t h shows Shakespeare's b e t t e r u n d e r s t a n d i n g of h o w — 239 —

to

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

m a k e a v i l l a i n sympathetic, mysterious, a n d tragic b y m a k i n g h i m so e l o q u e n t . Claudius'

soliloquy

is i n t e r t w i n e d

with

Hamlet's,

w h i c h is actually a s o l i l o q u y w i t h i n a s o l i l o q u y .

Al-

t h o u g h H a m l e t m a y be s t a n d i n g close e n o u g h to stab C l a u d i u s i n the back, the k i n g is n o t a b l e to o v e r h e a r H a m l e t ' s h o m i c i d a l hesitations n o r feel " t h e w h i f f a n d w i n d of his fell s w o r d "

(2.2.484). It is a m i s t a k e to

d e n y d r a m a t i c c o n v e n t i o n a n d to p u t C l a u d i u s so far upstage as to be, for all practical purposes, o u t of earshot of

H a m l e t ' s speech.

Elizabethan

staging

would

p r o b a b l y d o just the opposite, a n d place C l a u d i u s far d o w n s t a g e a n d a little to o n e side, b u t w i t h i n easy reach of H a m l e t ' s w o r d s a n d sword. H a v i n g t w o such d i f f e r e n t soliloquies set back to back is a b o l d stylistic e x p e r i m e n t , especially because C l a u dius seems to b e s p e a k i n g i n the passionate, reflective style of H a m l e t ' s o t h e r soliloquies, a n d H a m l e t i n the b r u s q u e a n d m e n a c i n g style of his antagonist. W e are also e x p e c t e d to b e sympathetic w i t h the v i l l a i n a n d d e e p l y d i s t u r b e d b y the protagonist's sentiments. C l a u dius' c o u p l e t c o n c l u s i o n a f t e r H a m l e t ' s e x i t seems to c o m m e n t o n b o t h soliloquies at o n c e ; H a m l e t ' s w o r d s also "fly u p " a n d " n e v e r to h e a v e n g o "

(3.3.97-98).

T h e k i n g ' s second s o l i l o q u y at the e n d of A c t

IV,

Scene iii is a brief b u t characteristic expression b o t h i n s u b j e c t m a t t e r a n d style. C l a u d i u s f o l l o w s the Elizab e t h a n c o n v e n t i o n of s o l i l o q u y as the villain's direct self-explanation to the a u d i e n c e , a m e a n s of p r o v i d i n g a s w i f t a n d effective exposition. T h e speech b e g i n s w i t h a n earnest a p p e a l to the k i n g of E n g l a n d : — 240 —

CLA UDIUS A n d , E n g l a n d , if m y l o v e t h o u hold'st at a u g h t — A s m y great p o w e r thereof m a y g i v e thee sense, Since yet thy cicatrice looks r a w a n d r e d A f t e r the D a n i s h sword, a n d thy free a w e Pays h o m a g e to u s — t h o u mayst n o t c o l d l y set O u r sovereign process, w h i c h i m p o r t s at f u l l B y letters c o n g r u i n g to that effect T h e p r e s e n t d e a t h of H a m l e t .

(4-3-58-65)

T h e r e is a c a l c u l a t e d p a r a d o x o n " f r e e a w e "

paying

" h o m a g e , " a n d the " l o v e " i n this passage, w i t h its "cicatrice . . . r a w a n d r e d , " is m o r e of the M a r q u i s de Sade than the S e r m o n o n the M o u n t . T h e w e i g h t y r e d u n d a n c y of the legal "process, w h i c h i m p o r t s at f u l l / B y letters c o n g r u i n g to that e f f e c t " disappears w i t h the m e n t i o n of " T h e present death

of

H a m l e t . " A t this p o i n t , C l a u d i u s shifts to the intense simplicities of a m a n of a c t i o n : D o it, E n g l a n d , F o r l i k e the hectic i n m y b l o o d h e rages, A n d t h o u m u s t c u r e m e . T i l l I k n o w 'tis done, H o w e ' e r m y haps, m y joys w e r e n e ' e r b e g u n . (4.3.65-68) T h e s e e m p h a t i c m o n o s y l l a b l e s a n d aggressive verbs are r a d i c a l l y d i f f e r e n t f r o m the earlier p a r t of the s o l i l o q u y , a n d they a l l o w C l a u d i u s to express the sort of c o n t r o l l e d frenzy, l i k e that of M a c b e t h , that w o u l d b e i n a p p r o p r i ate i n o r d i n a r y discourse. In its f o r c e f u l , passionate, percussive, a n d e v e n musical assertion, this passage represents C l a u d i u s ' style at its best. — 241 —

10. Polonius: " 'Beautified' is a vile phrase"— " 'Mobled queen' is good" P O L O N I U S ' p a r t ends a b r u p t l y b e h i n d a n arras i n A c t I I I , Scene iv, a c c o r d i n g to his o w n p r e d i c t i o n : " I ' l l silence m e even here"

( 4 ) . B u t u p u n t i l this p o i n t , h e

has b e e n , stylistically, second i n interest o n l y to H a m let. T h e y are b o t h self-conscious rhetoricians, w h o eng a g e i n w o r d p l a y , conceit, a n d o t h e r w i t t y t u r n s w i t h skill a n d pleasure. T h e c o m p a r i s o n does n o t e x t e n d to t h e s u b j e c t m a t t e r of their discourse, since P o l o n i u s represents e v e r y t h i n g that H a m l e t is m o s t i n c l i n e d to satirize a n d p a r o d y , y e t b o t h t h i n k of style as an art. A s a literary critic, P o l o n i u s ' taste is radically diff e r e n t f r o m H a m l e t ' s . I n t h e letter to O p h e l i a that h e reads a l o u d w i t h so m u c h d e m o n s t r a t i v e satisfaction, h e o b j e c t s to H a m l e t ' s a f f e c t e d d i c t i o n :

"That's an

phrase, a v i l e phrase; ' b e a u t i f i e d ' is a v i l e p h r a s e "

ill

(2.2.

1 1 1 - 1 2 ) . P o l o n i u s is t h i n k i n g of the w o r d i n its m o d e r n c o n n o t a t i o n of b e a u t y created b y the cosmetic art, b u t i n E l i z a b e t h a n usage this p e j o r a t i v e m e a n i n g is n o t v e r y strong. A l l the o t h e r Shakespearean e x a m p l e s are l a u d a t o r y . V a l e n t i n e is " b e a u t i f i e d / W i t h g o o d l y s h a p e " (The

Two Gentlemen

of Verona 4 . 1 . 5 5 - 5 6 ) , a n d J u l i e t ' s

m o t h e r represents Paris as a " f a i r v o l u m e " : " T h i s prec i o u s b o o k of l o v e , this u n b o u n d lover,/ T o b e a u t i f y h i m , o n l y lacks a c o v e r " (Romeo

and Juliet

1.3.88-89).

W e s h o u l d u n d e r s t a n d that P o l o n i u s is twisting " b e a u t i fied"

to a special p u n n i n g sense i n o r d e r to p r o v e his —•242 —

POLONIUS o w n r e f i n e d sensibility i n words, a q u a l i t y h e shares w i t h Osric. W e c a n also i m a g i n e Osric's pleasure at that o d d w o r d " m o b l e d , " m e a n i n g muffled, i n the First Player's speech: " ' B u t w h o (ah woe!) h a d seen the m o b l e d q u e e n — ' " ( 2 . 2 . 5 1 3 ) . H a m l e t is puzzled: " ' T h e m o b l e d q u e e n ' ? " ( 5 1 4 ) . E i t h e r h e doesn't u n d e r s t a n d it, o r h e t h i n k s it strange, b u t P o l o n i u s asserts his u n h e s i t a t i n g a p p r o v a l : " T h a t ' s g o o d . ' M o b l e d q u e e n ' is g o o d " ( 5 1 5 ) . T h e r e is n o t m u c h else i n this play that h e likes, b u t " ' M o b l e d q u e e n ' is g o o d , " p r e s u m a b l y because it is o n e of H o l o fernes' " o d o r i f e r o u s flowers of fancy, the j e r k s of invention"

(Love's

Labour's

Lost

4.2.118-19).

"Beautified"

a n d " m o b l e d " m a k e a n a p t pair of e x a m p l e s i n w h i c h P o l o n i u s a n d H a m l e t c o m e to opposite c o n c l u s i o n s o n specific p o i n t s of style. So far as w e c a n tell, P o l o n i u s inclines to neoclassical criteria, as i n his n o t a b l e c a t a l o g u e of genres: " T h e best actors i n the w o r l d , either f o r tragedy, c o m e d y , history, pastoral,

pastoral-comical,

historical-pastoral,

historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral"

tragical(2.2.405-

8 ) . T h e F o l i o a d d i t i o n of "tragical-historical, tragicalcomical-historical-pastoral" c o n t i n u e s t h e f u n , since t h e w h o l e speech is a p a r o d y of Renaissance rhetoric, w i t h every s u b d i v i s i o n mercilessly s u b d i v i d e d . P o l o n i u s ' a n n o u n c e m e n t of t h e players is a c o m p e n d i u m of post-Aristotelian d r a m a t i c criticism, as it m i g h t h a v e c o m e to Shakespeare t h r o u g h E n g l i s h a d a p t a t i o n s of Italian Renaissance c o m m e n t a t o r s . Besides every conc e i v a b l e genre, the " b e s t actors i n the w o r l d " can also p l a y "scene i n d i v i d a b l e , o r p o e m u n l i m i t e d . Seneca can— 243 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

n o t b e too h e a v y , n o r P l a u t u s too light. F o r the l a w of w r i t a n d the liberty, these are the o n l y m e n "

(2.2.408-

1 1 ) . T h e p u n c t u a t i o n of the last t w o lines d e p e n d s o n a suggestion of T h e o b a l d that has b e e n c h a l l e n g e d , 1 b u t the u n i t y of place i m p l i e d i n "scene i n d i v i d a b l e " seems to b e part of the " l a w of w r i t , " w h o s e strict r u l e s w e r e m e a n t to a c c o m m o d a t e plays to the single-perspective setting of c o m e d y , tragedy, or pastoral. " P o e m u n l i m i t e d " is a n e x a m p l e of " l i b e r t y , " o r f r e e d o m f r o m the u n i t i e s of place, time, a n d a c t i o n d e r i v e d f r o m A r i s t o t l e . " L i b e r t y " w o u l d a p p l y to the E n g l i s h p o p u l a r theater, w h e r e a s the E n g l i s h a c a d e m i c a n d c o u r t theaters w o u l d , l i k e the Italian theaters, b e closer to the " l a w of w r i t . " Seneca a n d P l a u t u s are, of course, the most w i d e l y imitated e x e m p l a r s of tragedy a n d c o m e d y . I r e c o g n i z e that I a m p u r s u i n g a thankless task i n e x p l i c a t i n g the comm o n p l a c e s of P o l o n i u s , b u t the l e c t u r e o n d r a m a t i c f o r m that h e gives H a m l e t , R o s e n c r a n t z , a n d

Guildenstern

p e r f e c t l y e x e m p l i f i e s the p e d a n t i c q u a l i t y of his interest i n style. P o l o n i u s is also a critic of acting. H e has spontaneously h i g h praise f o r H a m l e t ' s r e n d i t i o n of the

Aeneas

speech: " F o r e G o d , m y l o r d , w e l l spoken, w i t h g o o d accent a n d g o o d d i s c r e t i o n "

(2.2.477-78). T h i s

judg-

m e n t is e c h o e d i n H a m l e t ' s advice to the players: " l e t y o u r o w n discretion be y o u r t u t o r "

(3.2.17-18),

but

H a m l e t m a k e s " y o u r o w n d i s c r e t i o n " a m o r e personal g u i d e than the l o r d c h a m b e r l a i n ' s " g o o d

discretion."

P o l o n i u s has some advice of his o w n f o r the First Play1See

New

Wilson, pp. 181-82; Parrott and Craig, p. 128; and Sisson,

Readings

in Shakespeare,

II, 217.

— 244 —

POLONIUS er, as h e rises to the h e i g h t of his i n v o c a t i o n against "strumpet

Fortune"

(2.2.504) :

"This

is

too

long"

( 5 0 9 ) . It is i r o n i c to hear the chief representative of " T h e s e tedious o l d f o o l s " (221) c o m p l a i n a b o u t prolixity, b u t his taste is n o t d i f f e r e n t f r o m that of " t h e m i l l i o n , " w h o m this play " p l e a s e d n o t "

(446).

H a m l e t twits the o l d m a n o n his i n a b i l i t y to appreciate s o m e t h i n g fine; if it is too l o n g , " I t shall to the barber's, w i t h y o u r b e a r d . — P r i t h e e say o n . H e ' s f o r a j i g or a tale of b a w d r y , o r he sleeps" ( 5 1 0 - 1 2 ) . I n o n e sentence, H a m l e t has p u t his finger o n the musicalc o m e d y , b e d r o o m - f a r c e f o r m u l a of the c o m m e r c i a l theater, for w h i c h P o l o n i u s w o u l d h a v e m a d e the ideal tired businessman w i t h e x p e n s e a c c o u n t u n l i m i t e d .

Hamlet

h a d earlier w a r n e d us that i n this p l a y " t h e r e w e r e n o sallets i n the lines to m a k e the m a t t e r s a v o r y "

(451-52),

o r spicy. If there is n o " b a w d r y , " o r " c o u n t r y m a t t e r s " ( 3 . 2 . 1 1 9 ) , there is also n o " j i g , " o r farcical b a l l a d s u n g a n d d a n c e d b y the c l o w n s a f t e r the play, w h i c h is i n the same scale of literary v a l u e s as the " i n e x p l i c a b l e d u m b shows a n d n o i s e " ( 1 2 - 1 3 ) . T a k e n together, these are the o n l y d r a m a t i c effects that a p p e a l e q u a l l y to the " g r o u n d l i n g s " a n d to P o l o n i u s . A s a stage m a n a g e r , P o l o n i u s rehearses his d a u g h t e r f o r the decoy scene w i t h H a m l e t : " O p h e l i a , w a l k y o u here"

( 3 . 1 . 4 3 ) , a n d he insists o n the r i g h t properties

f o r his t a b l e a u : R e a d o n this b o o k , T h a t show of such a n exercise m a y c o l o r Y o u r loneliness.

(3.1.44-46) — 245 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

H i s theatrical specialty, h o w e v e r , is concealments,

of

w h i c h h e arranges o n e w i t h the k i n g , a n d a n o t h e r b y himself i n the closet scene, w h e r e G e r t r u d e w i l l e n t r e a t h e r son " a l l a l o n e " ( 3 . 1 . 1 8 5 ) , as P o l o n i u s so d i p l o m a t i cally p u t s it. T h i s piece of staging comes to g r i e f , a n d " t h e e n g i n e r " is " H o i s t w i t h his o w n p e t a r "

(3.4.207-

8 ) . B y some p r o p h e t i c fatality of his u n i v e r s i t y days, Polonius "was accounted a good actor" and " d i d enact J u l i u s Caesar. I was k i l l e d i' th' C a p i t o l ; B r u t u s k i l l e d me"

(3.2.102-3,

Hamlet,2

105-6). If B r u t u s is a p r o t o t y p e

of

t h e n the s t a b b i n g scene i n the C a p i t o l a n d

t h e k i l l i n g of "so capital a c a l f " (107-8) has a final ree n a c t m e n t i n A c t I I I , Scene iv. P o l o n i u s is a self-conscious r h e t o r i c i a n , w h o speaks b y art r a t h e r t h a n b y n a t u r e . H i s m o s t a m b i t i o u s e f f o r t is his o r a t i o n o n the cause of H a m l e t ' s madness, w h i c h h e delivers as " t h e f r u i t to that great feast" (2.2.52) — a grandiose o v e r s t a t e m e n t — o f V o l t e m a n d a n d C o r n e l i us' r e p o r t f r o m N o r w a y . P o l o n i u s has p r e p a r e d a f o r m a l discourse so f u l l of w i t t y e l a b o r a t i o n a n d e p i g r a m m a t i c a m p l i f i c a t i o n that o n e w o n d e r s if the w i l y o l d statist is n o t a w a r e of w h a t h e is d o i n g . T h e q u e e n calls f o r " M o r e m a t t e r , w i t h less a r t " (95), b u t P o l o n i u s protests: " M a d a m , I swear I use n o a r t at a l l "

( 9 6 ) . " A r t " has

a n u n f a v o r a b l e c o n n o t a t i o n of p o l i c y a n d c u n n i n g as 2

S. F. Johnson suggests a possible in-joke here for those of the

audience at the Globe who had recently seen Julius

Caesar.

It is

likely that the same actor played both Julius Caesar and Polonius, as Burbage undoubtedly played Brutus and Hamlet. I n general, Shakespeare's allusions to his contemporary theater are probably more pointedly topical than we can now hope to recover.

— 246 —

POLONIUS w e l l as artificiality. T h e i d e a l of the g o o d stylist is to a c h i e v e the art that conceals art a n d c o n v i n c i n g l y imitates n a t u r e . R i g h t a f t e r this protest, h o w e v e r , P o l o n i u s m o v e s almost b y r e f l e x i n t o a n o t h e r set of p o i n t e d inversions: T h a t he's m a d , 'tis t r u e : 'tis t r u e 'tis pity, A n d p i t y 'tis 'tis t r u e — a foolish figure. B u t f a r e w e l l it, f o r I w i l l use n o art. (2.2.97-99) P o l o n i u s ' f a r e w e l l to foolish

figures

is short-lived.

In

the n e x t lines h e plays o n the e t y m o l o g i c a l sense of "eff e c t " a n d " d e f e c t , " w i t h a n e x a g g e r a t e d shuffling of a f e w w o r d s to p r o d u c e u n e x p e c t e d a n d o u t l a n d i s h antitheses. P o l o n i u s n e v e r falters i n his l i n g u i s t i c display, a n d h e m a n a g e s to use an astonishing v a r i e t y of devices inc l u d i n g " b r e v i t y " as " t h e soul of w i t " brief"

(90). " I w i l l b e

( 9 2 ) , h e asserts, a n d h e is b r i e f , e v e n c u r t a n d

m o n o s y l l a b i c , b u t his b r e v i t y is lost i n endless proliferations, identities, c i r c u l a r definitions,

circumlocutions,

inversions, e x a c t stipulations, paradoxes, s u p e r f l u o u s orn a m e n t s , a n d pointless emphases. P o l o n i u s m a y b e selfconsciously p a r o d y i n g the art of rhetoric, since h e does call o n e of his little turns " a foolish

figure"

(98), and

to his d e f i n i t i o n of m a d n e s s — " t o define t r u e madness,/ W h a t is't b u t to b e n o t h i n g else b u t m a d ? " h e adds: " B u t let that g o "

(93-94) —

( 9 5 ) . T h i s is p a r o d y i n a

d i f f e r e n t sense f r o m H a m l e t ' s , y e t there is some pensee

arriere-

i n the o l d counselor's stylistic foolishness, w h i c h

m a y b e w h a t S a m u e l J o h n s o n m e a n t w h e n h e said: — 247 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

" T h i s idea of dotage encroaching upon wisdom, will solve all the phaenomena of the character of Polonius." 3 His precepts to Laertes make another oration, but everything in the immediate context of this speech emphasizes its inappropriateness. It is apparent from Laertes' first words to his father that the ceremony of leavetaking has already been successfully concluded: A double blessing is a double grace; Occasion smiles upon a second leave. (i-3-53-54) Polonius begins by chiding his son for tarrying: Yet here, Laertes? Aboard, aboard, for shame! T h e wind sits in the shoulder of your sail, A n d you are stayed for. (1-3-55"57) There is a pleasant colloquial air about this, which shows that Polonius is not such a stuffy orator after all. T h e father gives his son his blessing again, with some parting words of advice: " A n d these few precepts in thy memory/ Look thou character" (58-59). But "these few precepts" grow to twenty-two solid lines of moral commonplaces, delivered seriatim and without any diversions. T h e speech is unexpected in its present proportions, and one has the impression that Polonius himself could not have anticipated its length. T h i s endless discourse seems to be the mark of senility, since the rational control over expression has begun to slip and the free expatiation is becoming ever freer and more and more independent of the will. Ped8

Johnson's

Notes

to Shakespeare, —

248

ed. Arthur Sherbo, p. 163. —

POLONIUS antry a n d garrulousness (as w e l l as l o v e of

flattery)

are

all vices of o l d m e n , so that there is some psychological basis for P o l o n i u s ' style i n the character type of the senex.

T h i s is also true of N e s t o r i n Troilus

and

Cres-

sida, w h o is the classical e x e m p l a r of the o l d m a n , a n d of Justice S h a l l o w i n 2 Henry

IV.

P o l o n i u s ' style is at its m o s t characteristic i n A c t II, Scene i, w h e r e h e is g i v i n g his servant R e y n a l d o m o n e y a n d notes f o r L a e r t e s i n Paris, w i t h an elaborate set of instructions o n h o w to spy o u t the secrets of his son's life abroad. Polonius' insinuating method, " W i t h windlasses a n d w i t h assays of bias,/ B y i n d i r e c t i o n s f i n d directions o u t "

(65-66), m a y also describe the w i n d i n g s

of his o w n discourse, w h i c h reach their apotheosis i n total i n c o h e r e n c e : A n d then, sir, does 'a t h i s — ' a d o e s — W h a t was I a b o u t to say? B y the mass, I was a b o u t to say s o m e t h i n g ! W h e r e d i d I leave?

(2.1.49-51)

R e y n a l d o then, w i t h an a t t e m p t at p a r o d y , leads h i m b a c k to the m e a n d e r i n g trail of his speech: " A t 'closes i n the consequence,' at ' f r i e n d o r so,' a n d ' g e n t l e m a n ' " (52-53). T h i s is the most e x p l i c i t t o u c h of senility i n all of Shakespeare. It is n o t surprising that the senex

s h o u l d b e o n e of

the stock figures of c o m e d y , w h e r e his foolishness, because it is buttressed w i t h w e a l t h , m a y the m o r e easily b e s h o w n u p in the desiccated w o o i n g of a y o u n g w e n c h . B u t there is n o a m o r o u s p u r s u i t for P o l o n i u s , a l t h o u g h he does confess that " t r u l y i n m y y o u t h I suffered m u c h e x t r e m i t y for l o v e " (2.2.191-92). A l t h o u g h P o l o n i u s ex— 249 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

hibits some features of the senex,

the comic e l e m e n t in

his character has been m u c h exaggerated b y a l o n g tradition of imperceptive acting. H i s status as C l a u d i u s ' chief minister w o u l d immediately e x c l u d e any direct buffoonery, a n d there are times w h e n he is as m e n a c i n g as the king. In general, however, w e think of h i m as a misplaced purist, w h o has come to love the techniques a n d rhetoric of " p o l i c y " m o r e than its a v o w e d aims. In A c t II, Scene i particularly, P o l o n i u s uses Machiavellian methods that are grotesquely o u t of p r o p o r t i o n w i t h their objectives. T h e most striking quality of this scene is its overfullness a n d overcompleteness of detail, as if n o t h i n g w e r e too trivial to b e omitted. Just b e f o r e P o l o n i u s loses the thread of his speech completely, he wanders off into the vagueness of excessive specification. T h e hypothetical i n f o r m a n t w h o m R e y n a l d o is p u m p ing . . . closes w i t h y o u in this consequence: " G o o d sir," or so, or " f r i e n d , " o r " g e n t l e m a n " — A c c o r d i n g to the phrase or the addition Of man and c o u n t r y —

(2.1.45-48)

W h e n Polonius takes u p his b r o k e n discourse, he is still f o u n d e r i n g in meaningless formulas: A t "closes in the c o n s e q u e n c e " — A y ,

marry!

H e closes thus: " I k n o w the g e n t l e m a n ; I saw h i m yesterday, or t'other day, O r then, or then, w i t h such or such. . . ." (2- 1 -54-57) — 250 —

POLONIUS T o the i m a g i n a r y b u t c o o p e r a t i v e i n f o r m a n t , L a e r t e s w i l l b e g u i l t y of the " p r e n o m i n a t e , " o r a f o r e m e n t i o n e d , " c r i m e s " ( 4 3 ) , a m o n g w h i c h w i l l be: " I saw h i m e n t e r such a h o u s e of sale," V i d e l i c e t , a b r o t h e l , o r so f o r t h .

(2.1.60-61)

W e c a n n o t b e l i e v e that R e y n a l d o needs to h a v e exp l a i n e d to h i m w h a t a " h o u s e of sale" is, b u t i n P o l o n i u s ' a m p l i f i e d r h e t o r i c n o t h i n g is taken f o r g r a n t e d . L i k e H a m l e t , P o l o n i u s is m u c h g i v e n to w o r d p l a y of all sorts, especially puns, a l t h o u g h h e seems to h a v e n o interest i n e x p l o r i n g the possibilities of l a n g u a g e f o r their o w n sake. H i s q u i b b l e s are g e n e r a l l y m o r e f o r m a l t h a n H a m l e t ' s , a n d h a v e a certain sarcasm in t h e m , o r at least that sense of s u p e r i o r sophistication that h e shows t o w a r d O p h e l i a . W h e n she tells h i m directly that H a m l e t " h a t h , m y lord, of late m a d e m a n y tenders/ O f his affection to m e "

(1.3.99-100), P o l o n i u s m o c k s his

daughter's innocence: A f f e c t i o n p o o h ! Y o u speak l i k e a g r e e n girl, U n s i f t e d i n such p e r i l o u s circumstance. D o y o u b e l i e v e his tenders, as y o u call them? (1.3.101-3) " A f f e c t i o n p o o h ! " is an a b r u p t deflation of a

young

girl's i l l u s i o n s — a n d w e s h o u l d n o t f o r g e t that O p h e l i a is a b o u t the same n u b i l e age as J u l i e t , a l t h o u g h she is w i t h o u t any of J u l i e t ' s resourcefulness or wit. P o l o n i u s d w e l l s o n O p h e l i a ' s w o r d " t e n d e r s " o r offers "as y o u call t h e m , " just as H a m l e t gives a n i r o n i c em— 251 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

phasis to Osric's w o r d : " W h y is this all i m p a w n e d , as y o u call it?" (5.2.164-65). H e m e a n s to g i v e his daughter a little lesson i n the ways of the w o r l d , a n d " t e n d e r s " p r o v i d e s a s p l e n d i d o p p o r t u n i t y to i m p r o v i s e : M a r r y , I w i l l teach y o u . T h i n k yourself a b a b y T h a t y o u h a v e ta'en these tenders f o r true p a y W h i c h are n o t sterling. T e n d e r yourself m o r e dearly, O r (not to crack the w i n d of the p o o r phrase) T e n d ' r i n g 4 it thus y o u ' l l t e n d e r m e a fool. (1.3.105-9) A s a " g r e e n girl,/ U n s i f t e d i n such p e r i l o u s stance"

( 1 0 1 - 2 ) , O p h e l i a is l i k e l y to accept

circumHamlet's

" t e n d e r s " of affection, w h i c h are o n l y legal offers of m o n e y r a t h e r than the " t r u e p a y " itself in " s t e r l i n g . " " T e n d e r yourself m o r e d e a r l y "

palpable

( 1 0 7 ) , says

P o l o n i u s , as if O p h e l i a w e r e a v a l u a b l e c o m m o d i t y that s h o u l d n o t b e e i t h e r sold f o r less t h a n it is w o r t h o r d e l i v e r e d w i t h o u t cash p a y m e n t . T h e w o r d

"dearly"

has a strong c o n n o t a t i o n of " e x p e n s i v e l y " ; it is the same " h i g h e r r a t e " at w h i c h O p h e l i a is to set h e r "entreatm e n t s " ( 1 2 2 ) . O p h e l i a m u s t t h e r e f o r e " t e n d e r " herself ( w i t h some a u d i t o r y suggestion of " a t t e n d t o " or "care f o r " ) at a h i g h e r price if she doesn't w a n t to e n d b y m a k i n g h e r father a f o o l a n d p r e s e n t i n g h i m w i t h a bastard. P o l o n i u s is e n o u g h of a stylist to k n o w that h e * Hubler follows the Quarto ( A f e w Readings

in

Shakespeare,

1 reading advocated by

Sisson

II, 210), which, with a slight

shift in the second parenthesis, makes at least as good sense as Collier's emendation " R u n n i n g , " adopted by most modern editors. " T e n d ' r i n g " is a characteristically tedious extension of wit by Polonius.

— 252 —

POLONIUS is c r a c k i n g " t h e w i n d of the p o o r p h r a s e " as if it w e r e a nag ridden too hard, but "foolish figure"

once embarked

on

his

(2.2.98), h e c a n n o t stop u n t i l he has

c o m p l e t e d it. P o l o n i u s ' i m a g e r y is o r n a m e n t a l a n d illustrative, w i t h the v e h i c l e exactly a p p l i e d to the tenor. I n o t h e r words, the i m a g e is l i m i t e d to its single w i t t y p o i n t w i t h o u t a n y i m a g i n a t i v e resonance, as i n the f o l l o w i n g : " S e e y o u n o w — / Y o u r b a i t of f a l s e h o o d take this c a r p of t r u t h " (2.1.62-63). T h e i m a g e is pictorial a n d it offers the sort of m o r a l a l l e g o r y o n e sees i n e m b l e m books. P o l o n i u s ' lesson to O p h e l i a is constructed f r o m a w h o l e series of these k i n d s of images. H a m l e t ' s v o w s of l o v e are "springes to catch w o o d c o c k s " ( 1 . 3 . 1 1 5 ) , w h i c h w e r e simple birds, p r o v e r b i a l l y easy to snare, just as O p h e l i a has b e e n easily snared b y H a m l e t . E v e r y i m a g e has its

exact

r e f e r e n t , so that it is m e r e l y a q u e s t i o n of translating the

figurative

term i n t o its n o n f i g u r a t i v e

equivalent.

H a m l e t ' s " b l o o d " or sexual desire is a flame that " b u r n s " ( 1 1 6 ) , b u t P o l o n i u s w a r n s his d a u g h t e r n o t to take " T h e s e blazes," " G i v i n g m o r e l i g h t than h e a t "

(117-

1 8 ) , for true fire, since a b r i g h t blaze w i l l soon b e b u r n t out. I a m c o m p l e t i n g the i m a g e f o r P o l o n i u s m e r e l y to i n d i c a t e the c o m m o n p l a c e f r o m w h i c h it derives. Most

of

Polonius'

imagery

f o l l o w s this

symmetrical

pattern, w h i c h is sometimes h e l p e d a l o n g b y a n ' t w e r e " to m a k e sure that w e shift i n t o the

"as

figurative

mode. P o l o n i u s also uses a direct a n d s i m p l e style that is usually f o r g o t t e n i n the gross c a r i c a t u r i n g of his r o l e . F o r o n e thing, h e w a n t s to c o n f i r m w h e t h e r his n o t v e r y — 253 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

difficult r h e t o r i c has b e e n u n d e r s t o o d . " Y o u h a v e m e , have you not?"

( 2 . 1 . 6 8 ) , h e asks R e y n a l d o at the e n d

of his endless e x p l a n a t i o n s . W i t h O p h e l i a , h e a p p e n d s the b a l d l y stated message that his figures w e r e i n t e n d e d to illustrate: T h i s is f o r all: I w o u l d n o t , i n p l a i n terms, f r o m this t i m e f o r t h H a v e y o u so slander a n y m o m e n t leisure A s to g i v e w o r d s o r talk w i t h the L o r d H a m l e t . L o o k to't, I c h a r g e y o u . C o m e y o u r ways. (i-s^si-ss)

T h e " p l a i n t e r m s " are v e r y p l a i n i n d e e d , w i t h m a n y m o n o s y l l a b l e s , especially i n that last m e n a c i n g

line,

s p o k e n i n the i m p e r a t i v e m a n n e r of C l a u d i u s . " T h i s is f o r a l l " f o r d a u g h t e r m a t c h e s " T h i s a b o v e a l l " (78) f o r son, b o t h phrases b e i n g c o n c l u d i n g s u m m a r i e s as w e l l as final a d m o n i t i o n s . If P o l o n i u s is a master of " i n d i r e c t i o n s "

(2.1.66),

h e also k n o w s h o w to ask d i r e c t questions at the p r o p e r t i m e : " W h a t is't, O p h e l i a , h e h a t h said to y o u ? " (1.3.88) a n d the m o r e p e r e m p t o r y : " W h a t is b e t w e e n you? G i v e m e u p the t r u t h "

( 9 8 ) . T h i s is v i g o r o u s a n d threaten-

i n g , w i t h o u t the slightest t o u c h of senility. P o l o n i u s also k n o w s h o w to g i v e c o m m a n d s i n a m a n n e r that w i l l n o t brook

opposition:

"From

this

time/

scanter of y o u r m a i d e n p r e s e n c e "

Be

something

(120-21), and

"In

f e w , O p h e l i a , / D o n o t b e l i e v e his v o w s " ( 1 2 6 - 2 7 ) . H o w effective that " I n f e w " is f o r a g a r r u l o u s m a n ! P o l o n i u s c a n speak l u c i d l y w h e n the occasion dem a n d s , so that there is n o d o u b t at all of his capacity — 254 —

POLONIUS f o r h i g h p u b l i c office. H i s talk w i t h C l a u d i u s a f t e r their e a v e s d r o p p i n g o n H a m l e t is a b s o l u t e l y s t r a i g h t f o r w a r d a n d u n a d o r n e d . O p h e l i a is q u i c k l y disposed of as m e r e l y a tool i n affairs of state: H o w now, Ophelia? Y o u n e e d n o t tell us w h a t L o r d H a m l e t said; W e h e a r d it all.

(3.1.181-83)

T h i s is, of course, a p o i n t of w h i c h O p h e l i a is a l r e a d y p a i n f u l l y aware. P o l o n i u s ' final w o r d s to the k i n g b e f o r e the closet scene are also simple a n d businesslike: Fare y o u w e l l , m y liege. I'll call u p o n y o u ere y o u g o to b e d A n d tell y o u w h a t I k n o w .

(3-3-33-35) T h i s is terse a n d almost e n t i r e l y m o n o s y l l a b i c , a style i n k e e p i n g w i t h its e x p o s i t o r y p u r p o s e . I t s h o u l d seem clear b y n o w that P o l o n i u s ' figurative a d o r n m e n t is a self-conscious style r a t h e r

t h a n his n o r m a l

speaking

voice. L i k e a w e l l - t r a i n e d statesman, h e can e m b e l l i s h his speech w h e n the n e e d arises. I n his domestic setting, P o l o n i u s uses a g o o d d e a l o f c o l l o q u i a l p h r a s i n g a n d s y n t a x t h a t w o u l d h a v e a certain c h a r m w e r e it n o t so o v e r b e a r i n g . W e h a v e a l r e a d y n o t i c e d h i s ' ' A f f e c t i o n p o o h I" (1.3.101) to O p h e l i a , w h o answers a l l of his assaults w i t h the literalness of a dutif u l d a u g h t e r . " M y lord, h e h a t h i m p o r t u n e d m e w i t h l o v e / I n h o n o r a b l e f a s h i o n " ( 1 1 0 - 1 1 ) , she says, to w h i c h her father replies with scornful mockery: " A y , fashion y o u m a y call it. G o to, g o t o " ( 1 1 2 ) . T h i s is a w o n d e r —

255

—

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

f u l l y n a t u r a l l i n e , w h o s e speech emphases are

likely

to b e o v e r l o o k e d b y a reader. I n paraphrase, " G o to, go to" means something like: " A r e you kidding me with your

high-mindedness?"

shocked

Polonius

that the d a u g h t e r of

seems

the l o r d

genuinely chamberlain

s h o u l d b e so unsophisticated. H i s l o n g aside i n the f i s h m o n g e r scene w i t h H a m l e t is also attractively c o l l o q u i a l : " H o w say y o u b y that? Still h a r p i n g o n m y d a u g h t e r . Y e t h e k n e w m e n o t at first. ' A said I was a

fishmonger.

' A is f a r g o n e , far g o n e .

A n d truly i n m y y o u t h I suffered m u c h e x t r e m i t y f o r love, v e r y n e a r this. I'll speak to h i m a g a i n "

(2.2.188-

9 2 ) . O n e c o u l d n e v e r e x t r a p o l a t e P o l o n i u s ' decorative style f r o m these f r a g m e n t s of speech, w h i c h are i n the a b b r e v i a t e d s y n t a x of o r d i n a r y conversation. " ' A " is the f a m i l i a r c o n t r a c t i o n for " h e . " P o l o n i u s ' confession of his a m o r o u s y o u t h e n d o w s h i m w i t h a pleasant a v u n c u l a r q u a l i t y n o t u n l i k e that of Justice S h a l l o w a n d his m e m orable exploits with Jane Nightwork

(2 Henry

IV

3.2.193ft.). " T h a t he is o l d — t h e m o r e the p i t y — h i s w h i t e hairs d o witness i t " (/ Henry

IV 2.4.452-53), Falstaff says i n

his o w n b e h a l f , b u t P o l o n i u s ' m o r e a d v a n c e d age is attested to b y a n i n e x h a u s t i b l e a p p e t i t e f o r

flattery

and

self-magnification. A t a h i n t of coldness i n the q u e e n , h e asks archly: H a t h there b e e n such a time, I w o u l d fain k n o w that, T h a t I h a v e positively said " ' T i s so," W h e n it p r o v e d otherwise? — 256 —

(2.2.153-55)

POLONIUS T h i s is a t e x t b o o k e x a m p l e of a r h e t o r i c a l q u e s t i o n , to w h i c h the k i n g answers distantly, " N o t that I k n o w " ( 1 5 5 ) , w h e n n o t h i n g less than an encomiastic p a n e g y r i c w o u l d suffice. T h e r e is an e v e n m o r e u n c t u o u s r h e t o r i c a l q u e s t i o n earlier i n this scene, w h e n P o l o n i u s a n n o u n c e s the j o y f u l r e t u r n of the ambassadors f r o m N o r w a y : King.

T h o u still hast b e e n the father of g o o d news.

Polonius.

H a v e I, m y lord?

(2.2.42-43)

M u c h d e p e n d s o n the p r o p e r i n t o n a t i o n of this question, since P o l o n i u s is p r e e n i n g himself o n the " g o o d n e w s " that h e is so coyly w i t h h o l d i n g :

"that I have

f o u n d / T h e very cause of H a m l e t ' s l u n a c y "

(48-49).

P o l o n i u s also loves c e r e m o n i a l usages of all sorts, a trait i n h e r i t e d , w i t h fatal consequences, b y his son. P o l o n i u s is n e i t h e r a c o m i c n o r a tragic figure i n Hamlet,

b u t he is c a u g h t u p i n the tragic circumstances

of the play a n d b e c o m e s their first casualty; his death precipitates all the deaths to f o l l o w . A s the k i n g ' s chief counselor, he is i n some sense a v i c t i m of the tragic plot, so that f o r all of his r h e t o r i c a l b r i l l i a n c e g r a v i t y of m a n n e r , h e is f a t e d to b e o n e of

and

"These

tedious o l d f o o l s " ( 2 . 2 . 2 2 1 ) , a b e a r e r of stale n e w s a n d a teller of twice-told tales. W h e n w e consider all the possibilities f o r P o l o n i u s i n a n o t h e r sort of play, it seems a t e r r i b l e waste that he s h o u l d die " a foolish p r a t i n g k n a v e " (3.4.216) m i s t a k e n f o r his " b e t t e r "

— 257 —

(33).

11. Hamlet: "How pregnant sometimes his replies are" U N L I K E Laertes, H a m l e t has n o single, i d e n t i f i a b l e style, n o r does he, l i k e C l a u d i u s , h a v e a p a i r of styles, o r n a t e a n d simple, r e a d y f o r all occasions. W e m a y dist i n g u i s h at least f o u r d i f f e r e n t styles f o r H a m l e t : 1. a self-conscious style expressed chiefly i n p a r o d y ; 2. a w i t t y style associated w i t h his madness; 3. a passionate style used p r i m a r i l y i n the soliloquies; a n d 4. a simple style f o r n a r r a t i o n a n d special effects. T h e s e are only f o u r possibilities a m o n g m a n y , b u t they s h o u l d h e l p to m a k e the p o i n t that H a m l e t ' s m o d e of expression varies w i d e l y i n d i f f e r e n t contexts. L a e r t e s f o l l o w s w i t h a m u r d e r o u s simplicity his father's advice, " t o t h i n e o w n self true"

be

( 1 . 3 . 7 8 ) , a n d if the d e f e a t of R o s e n c r a n t z a n d

G u i l d e n s t e r n " D o e s b y their o w n i n s i n u a t i o n

grow"

(5.2.59), they are i n s i n u a t i n g f r o m their first appearance i n the p l a y to their l a s t — t h e o n l y variations are i n intensity. B u t H a m l e t ' s strong awareness of his o w n " W o r d s , words, w o r d s "

(2.2.194) does n o t p e r m i t this

k i n d of consistency. T h e r a n g e a n d versatility of his d r a m a t i c r o l e is reflected i n a c o r r e s p o n d i n g i n v e n t i v e ness a n d variety of style. 1

Hamlet as Artist and Critic T h e w a r r a n t f o r c o n s i d e r i n g H a m l e t as artist a n d critic m a y b e d r a w n f r o m his o w n active c o n c e r n w i t h 1

ton

See Madeleine Doran, " T h e Language of Hamlet," Library

Quarterly,

XXVII

vack, " H a m l e t and Imagery: Sprachen,

V

Hunting-

(1964), 259-78, and Marvin SpeThe

Mind's Eye," Die

(1966), 203-12.

— 258 —

Neueren

HAMLET style t h r o u g h o u t the play. H e is artist a n d critic i n a literal sense that is t r u e of n o o t h e r S h a k e s p e a r e a n character. A s an a m a t e u r dramatist, he w i l l w r i t e " a speech of some d o z e n o r sixteen l i n e s " that he w i l l "set d o w n a n d i n s e r t " (2.2.551-52) i n the n e x t n i g h t ' s p e r f o r m a n c e of The

Murder

of Gonzago.

N o o n e has yet b e e n a b l e

precisely to i d e n t i f y H a m l e t ' s speech, a l t h o u g h Shakespeare c o u l d c e r t a i n l y h a v e tagged it for us h a d

he

w a n t e d us to k n o w . I n a n y case, the difficulty i n dist i n g u i s h i n g H a m l e t ' s topical insertion shows that it is c o m p l e t e l y i n k e e p i n g w i t h the rest of the play. T h e v e r y fact that H a m l e t chooses a play to test C l a u d i u s ' g u i l t is itself a sign of the l i t e r a r y b e n t of his m i n d . W e l e a r n f r o m his advice to the players that h e has b e e n c o a c h i n g t h e m f o r their e v e n i n g p e r f o r m a n c e :

"Speak

the speech, I p r a y y o u , as I p r o n o u n c e d it to y o u , tripp i n g l y o n the t o n g u e " (3.2.1-2). Since the conversation w i t h the players b e g i n s in medias

res, w e can assume

that H a m l e t has already g i v e n t h e m o t h e r bits of practical advice, such as: " d o n o t saw the air too

much

w i t h y o u r h a n d , t h u s " (4-5) — t h e final gesture is grossly propaedeutic. W e already k n o w that H a m l e t is a c o m p e t e n t actor f r o m the " t a s t e " of his " q u a l i t y " (2.2.441) i n the A e n e a s speech ( p o p u l a r l y c a l l e d the " P l a y e r ' s speech," a l t h o u g h H a m l e t speaks almost one-third as m a n y lines as the First P l a y e r ) . W e h a v e P o l o n i u s ' enthusiastic testimony to H a m l e t ' s skill: " F o r e G o d , m y lord, w e l l spoken, w i t h g o o d accent a n d g o o d d i s c r e t i o n " u n a n t i c i p a t e d success of The

(477-78). A f t e r the

Mousetrap,

H a m l e t amus-

i n g l y considers b e c o m i n g a professional actor: " W o u l d n o t this, sir, a n d a forest of f e a t h e r s — i f the rest of m y

— 259 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

f o r t u n e s t u r n T u r k w i t h m e — w i t h t w o P r o v i n c i a l roses o n m y razed shoes, g e t m e a f e l l o w s h i p i n a cry of players?"

(3.2.281-84).

The

skeptical

and

bantering

H o r a t i o w i l l a l l o w his p r i n c e l y f r i e n d o n l y " H a l f

a

s h a r e " ( 2 8 5 ) , b u t H a m l e t w i l l b e satisfied w i t h n o t h i n g less t h a n " A w h o l e o n e , I " (286). H e is n o j o u r n e y m a n o r a p p r e n t i c e , b u t e x p e r i e n c e d i n the " m y s t e r y . "

In

Hamlet's

Q.

question,

"this"

is a m b i g u o u s ,

and

J.

A d a m s b e l i e v e s that h e m a y b e g e s t i c u l a t i n g w i t h the m a n u s c r i p t of the scene. 2 H e certainly thinks of himself as its p r o d u c e r , a n d p e r h a p s as its director, too. It is H a m l e t ' s show, a n d the a u d i e n c e are his i n v i t e d guests. W e r e m e m b e r that the players h a v e " o r d e r / T h i s n i g h t to p l a y b e f o r e h i m "

(3.1.20-21), a n d that

Polonius,

officially c h a r g e d as l o r d c h a m b e r l a i n w i t h royal entertainments, entreats " y o u r M a j e s t i e s , " at H a m l e t ' s request, " T o h e a r a n d see the m a t t e r "

(22-23) •

Besides those " d o z e n or sixteen l i n e s " The Mousetrap,

(2.2.551)

of

w e also h a v e some samples of H a m l e t ' s

n o n d r a m a t i c w r i t i n g . T h e r e is his pleasantly c o n c e i t e d P e t r a r c h a n p o e m i n his l o v e letter to O p h e l i a .

The

a f f e c t e d style of this p o e m a n d letter are r e d o l e n t of H a m l e t as he o n c e was, " T h e glass of fashion, a n d the m o l d of f o r m " ( 3 . 1 . 1 5 6 ) , r a t h e r than someone w h o has n o w "lost all m y m i r t h "

(2.2.304). T h e close of the

letter, " T h i n e e v e r m o r e , m o s t dear lady, w h i l s t m a c h i n e is to h i m "

(123-24), is distinctively i n

this the

m a n n e r of Osric, especially that o d d w o r d " m a c h i n e , " w h i c h is i n d e e d " v e r y dear to f a n c y " ( 5 . 2 . 1 5 2 ) . W e also k n o w that H a m l e t w r o t e a n e w " g r a n d 2

Adams' edition of Hamlet,

p. a68.

— 260 —

commission"

HAMLET (5.2.18)

o r d e r i n g that R o s e n c r a n t z a n d

Guildenstern

b e p u t to death in E n g l a n d . N o o n e ever suspects it to be a forgery, so w e l l is it p r e p a r e d a n d so a u t h e n t i c a n e x a m p l e is it of the scrivener's art. A n o t h e r professional s k i l l — " t o write fair"

(34)—does

Hamlet

"yeoman's

service" (36) i n this e m e r g e n c y . H a m l e t carries w i t h h i m a p o c k e t n o t e b o o k , o r table b o o k , of the sort i n w h i c h every t h o u g h t f u l , o r m e r e l y polished,

gentleman

recorded

m o d e r n instances" (As You Like

the

"wise

saws

and

It 2.7.156) of r e a d i n g

a n d daily life. I n a n e x t e n d e d passionate i m a g e , H a m let's b r a i n b e c o m e s the table b o o k i n w h i c h h e w i l l inscribe his v o w to r e m e m b e r the G h o s t : Y e a , f r o m the table of m y m e m o r y I'll w i p e a w a y a l l trivial f o n d records, A l l saws of books, all forms, all pressures past T h a t y o u t h a n d o b s e r v a t i o n c o p i e d there, A n d thy c o m m a n d m e n t all a l o n e shall l i v e W i t h i n the b o o k a n d v o l u m e of m y b r a i n , U n m i x e d w i t h baser matter. Yes, b y h e a v e n ! (1.5.98-104) B y t e l l i n g us w h a t h e w i l l e x p u n g e , H a m l e t gives us a v i v i d social portrait of the " b a s e r m a t t e r " of a y o u n g E l i z a b e t h a n g e n t l e m a n ' s m e m o r a n d a . I n the sort of l i n k o n l y possible i n a play, the i m a g e leads to the stage property, 3 as " t h e table of m y m e m o r y " b e c o m e s " M y tables"

( 1 0 7 ) , the little n o t e b o o k

has i n his hands: 8

that H a m l e t

" m e e t it is I set it d o w n /

See J. L. Styan, Shakespeare's

Stagecraft

Cambridge University Press, 1967), pp. 59-60.

— 261 —

(Cambridge,

now That Eng.:

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

o n e m a y smile, a n d smile, a n d b e a v i l l a i n "

(107-8).

H e proceeds to e n t e r this observation, t r u e a t least f o r D e n m a r k , i n his " t a b l e s , " a n d the physical act of w r i t i n g is c o m p l e t e d w i t h the c o v e r i n g l i n e , "So, u n c l e , there you are"

(110).

A characteristic stage d i r e c t i o n m a r k s H a m l e t ' s entrance "reading

on a book"

(2.2.167 s.d., Folio), as Po-

l o n i u s prepares to accost h i m " i n the l o b b y " (161). O n the basis of the r e m a r k s of the "satirical r o g u e " (198), keen-sighted

commentators

have

identified

b o o k as J u v e n a l ' s T e n t h Satire.* In Troilus

Hamlet's

and

Cressida,

the w i l y Ulysses is also characterized as b o o k i s h , a n d A c h i l l e s is m a d e to i n t e r r u p t his r e a d i n g . T h e passage that f o l l o w s — " A strange f e l l o w h e r e / W r i t e s m e that m a n " (3.3.95-96) — h a s m a n y v e r b a l similarities to H a m let's talk w i t h P o l o n i u s . H a m l e t is n o t o n l y a p r a c t i t i o n e r of the arts, b u t also a k e e n critic. T h i s is the v e r y w o r d that O p h e l i a u s e s — " Y o u are k e e n , m y lord, y o u are k e e n "

(3.2.254) —

a l t h o u g h H a m l e t chooses to i n t e r p r e t his " e d g e "

(256)

i m m o d e s t l y . A f t e r the i n t r o d u c t o r y b a d i n a g e w i t h the players, H a m l e t calls f o r " a passionate s p e e c h "

(2.2.441-

42) f r o m a D i d o a n d A e n e a s play that was an a l m o s t instantaneous flop: " i t was n e v e r acted, o r if it was, n o t a b o v e o n c e , f o r the p l a y , I r e m e m b e r , pleased n o t the m i l l i o n ; 'twas caviary to the g e n e r a l "

(444-47).

T h e r e m a y w e l l b e an a l l u s i o n h e r e to a n actual Eliz4

See Variorum,

Huntington

Library

I, 151, and Hardin Craig, "Hamlet's Book," Bulletin,

Number 6 (1934), 17-37.

— 262 —

HAMLET a b e t h a n play. 5 B u t if it " p l e a s e d n o t the m i l l i o n , " to H a m l e t a n d his literary f r i e n d s it was " a n

excellent

play, w e l l digested i n the scenes, set d o w n w i t h as m u c h modesty as c u n n i n g " (449-51). H a m l e t is d i s t i n g u i s h i n g b e t w e e n a debased p o p u l a r taste a n d the e x p e r t j u d g m e n t of a c u l t i v a t e d elite, a distinction

that is also

the basis for his advice to the players a b o u t

acting:

" N o w , this o v e r d o n e , o r c o m e tardy off, t h o u g h it m a k e s the u n s k i l l f u l l a u g h , c a n n o t b u t m a k e the j u d i c i o u s grieve, the censure of the w h i c h o n e m u s t in y o u r allowa n c e o ' e r w e i g h a w h o l e theater of o t h e r s "

(3.2.26-30).

" T h e j u d i c i o u s " versus " t h e u n s k i l l f u l " is a n unmist a k a b l y aristocratic

pairing.

T o r e t u r n to the D i d o a n d A e n e a s play,

Hamlet

praises it for b e i n g " w e l l digested i n the scenes," w h i c h indicates a c o h e r e n t , l o g i c a l structure r a t h e r than a n episodic, spectacular one. T h e a u t h o r avoids all "affect i o n " (2.2.454, Q u a r t o 2 ) , or " a f f e c t a t i o n " ( F o l i o ) . T h e p l a y was "set d o w n " w i t h " m o d e s t y , " o r m o d e r a t i o n , a v i r t u e stressed i n the a d v i c e to the players. T h e central c r i t e r i o n there is " t h a t y o u o'erstep n o t the modesty of n a t u r e " (3.2.19-20), w h i c h is a n o t h e r w a y of expressi n g the theory of mimesis: " t o h o l d , as 'twere, the m i r r o r u p to n a t u r e " (22-23) • " T e m p e r a n c e " a n d " d i s c r e t i o n " are s y n o n y m s f o r this ideal of " m o d e s t y . " I n sum, the 5

T h e allusion is probably not to Marlowe and Nashe's

Queen

of Carthage

Dido,

(1587), since the verbal parallels are not at

all close. T h e r e is also an anonymous Dido

and

Aeneas

recorded

as acted by the Admiral's Men on January 8, 1598. See A l f r e d Harbage, Annals

of English

Drama

975-1700

London, 1964), p. 68.

— 263 —

(rev. S. Schoenbaum;

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

p l a y uses " a n honest m e t h o d , as w h o l e s o m e as sweet, a n d b y very m u c h m o r e h a n d s o m e than

fine"

(2.2.454-

5 6 ) . " F i n e " suggests " a f f e c t i o n , " s o m e t h i n g o v e r l y delicate a n d m a n n e r e d , as Osric's style is " f i n e " r a t h e r than " h a n d s o m e , " a n d as the l a w y e r i n the g r a v e y a r d has " h i s fine pate f u l l of fine d i r t "

(5.1.108-9).

some,"

"handsome"

"sweet,"

"honest,"

and

"Wholeare

all

h o m e l y w o r d s m e a n t to describe solid a n d u n i m p e a c h a b l e stylistic virtues. W i t h i n its o w n m o d e of e m o t i o n a l d e c l a m a t i o n , the tale of P r i a m ' s slaughter is s p l e n d i d l y successful, a n d if critics find it o v e r w r o u g h t , it is w o r t h

remembering

that E l i z a b e t h a n writers d i d n o t p u t such a h i g h v a l u e o n the simple style as w e do. W i t h classical i n d i g n a t i o n , D r y d e n considers the speech a n e x a m p l e of " t h e b l o w n p u f f y style," in w h i c h " t h e f u r y " of Shakespeare's " f a n c y o f t e n transported h i m b e y o n d the b o u n d s of j u d g m e n t . . . ." 6 C o l e r i d g e also thinks it " t o o poetical, the l a n g u a g e of lyric v e h e m e n c e a n d epic p o m p , n o t of the d r a m a . " 7 F o r b e t t e r o r for worse, these c o m m e n t s attest that this is i n d e e d the "passionate speech" (2.2.441-42) that H a m let requested. H a m l e t ' s easy a n d personal m a n n e r w i t h the players suggests a tiring-house f a m i l i a r i t y , such as w e

might

e x p e c t f r o m a f r e q u e n t e r of rehearsals (cf. 2.2.444-45) • H e is the connoisseur of plays, the g i f t e d a m a t e u r coun8

John Dryden, " T h e Grounds of Criticism in T r a g e d y "

Preface to Troilus Other

Critical

and

Essays,

Cressida,

1679), in Of Dramatic

ed. George Watson

(London,

(The

Poesy 1962),

and p.

2577

Samuel T a y l o r Coleridge, Shakespearean

as Middleton Raysor

Criticism,

(2 edn.; London, i960), I, 37.

— 264 —

ed. T h o m -

HAMLET seling l i m i t e d professionals a n d a t t e m p t i n g to raise their standards b y a n a p p e a l to f u n d a m e n t a l principles. H a m l e t insists o n a r a t i o n a l m e a n b e t w e e n t e a r i n g " a passion to tatters, to v e r y rags" (3.2.10) a n d b e i n g " t o o t a m e " ( 1 7 ) . Speeches are to b e " p r o n o u n c e d . . . t r i p p i n g l y o n the t o n g u e " ( 1 - 2 ) , n o t m o u t h e d as if b y the " t o w n crier"

(3-4) t h u n d e r i n g his p r o c l a m a t i o n s i n the mar-

k e t p l a c e . G e s t u r e is to b e u s e d " g e n t l y "

(5), a word

w h i c h carries a b u i l t - i n p u n o n its social sense, " l i k e a g e n t l e m a n . " D e c o r u m a n d naturalness are the p r i n c i p a l criteria: o n e s h o u l d " S u i t the action to the w o r d , the w o r d to the a c t i o n " ( 1 8 - 1 9 ) , since the p u r p o s e of a c t i n g is i m i t a t i o n , mimesis. B a d actors are monsters f a s h i o n e d b y " s o m e of N a t u r e ' s j o u r n e y m e n " (35) r a t h e r t h a n b y G o d , because " t h e y i m i t a t e d h u m a n i t y so a b o m i n a b l y " (36-37). " T h e y " is d e l i b e r a t e l y v a g u e , so that it can r e f e r e i t h e r to the players themselves b o t c h i n g

their

i m i t a t i o n of " h u m a n i t y " o n stage, or to the j o u r n e y m e n , w h o s e p r o d u c t is a n a b o m i n a b l e i m i t a t i o n of a n a u t h e n tic h u m a n being. 8 P a r t of the w i t i n the passage comes f r o m the E l i z a b e t h a n p u n o n " a b o m i n a b l y " i n its p o p u lar

(and false) e t y m o l o g y :

ab-\-homine.

H a m l e t adds a special caveat against the a d - l i b b i n g of clowns, w h o s e " o n e suit/ O f jests" are c o n v e n i e n t l y rec o r d e d f o r us at this p o i n t i n Q u a r t o 1, i n c l u d i n g the mysterious

barb:

"Cannot

you

stay

till

I

eat

my

p o r r i d g e ? " T o H a m l e t , t h e "necessary q u e s t i o n of t h e p l a y " m u s t always take p r e c e d e n c e o v e r the

clown's

b a r r e n i m p r o v i s a t i o n . T h i s advice to the players pro8

See T i l l e y , M i 6 2 : " H e is (is not) a M a n of God's m a k i n g . "

— 265 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

vides a touchstone for H a m l e t ' s o w n r h e t o r i c a n d acting style, since he is occasionally g u i l t y of the excesses h e i n v e i g h s against. T h e w h o l e passage, a l o n g w i t h

the

discussion i n theatrical affairs i n A c t I I , Scene ii, also has i n t e r e s t i n g m o r a l overtones. H o r a t i o , for e x a m p l e , seems to h a v e j u s t those q u a l i t i e s of " t e m p e r a n c e "

(3.2.

7-8) that characterize the g o o d actor, a n d , structurally, the advice to the players leads directly i n t o H a m l e t ' s praise of H o r a t i o . W e see H a m l e t at w o r k as a d r a m a critic d u r i n g Murder

of Gonzago.

The

H i s e x p l i c a t i o n s a n d stylistic ob-

servations are, as O p h e l i a says, "as g o o d as a c h o r u s " ( 3 . 2 . 2 5 1 ) . H e insists that it is o n l y a foolish a n d c r u d e o l d play; t h e r e f o r e , honi

soit qui mal y pense.

A s pro-

d u c e r of the e n t e r t a i n m e n t , H a m l e t takes the l i b e r t y of d o i n g a little hasty p r o m p t i n g of L u c i a n u s :

"Begin,

m u r d e r e r . L e a v e thy d a m n a b l e faces a n d b e g i n "

(258-

5 9 ) . H e is a p p a r e n t l y " m u g g i n g " his p a r t b e y o n d the l i m i t s of H a m l e t ' s e n d u r a n c e , so that " d a m n a b l e " serves f o r b o t h the r o l e a n d the actor. I t is w o r t h n o t i n g that H a m l e t ' s o w n a n t i c i p a t i o n s of the p l o t d o n o t a l l o w us to place too m u c h w e i g h t o n his c o m m e n t : " T h e players c a n n o t k e e p counsel; they'll tell a l l " ( 1 4 6 - 4 7 ) ; H a m l e t himself has b e e n t e l l i n g us m u c h m o r e than the players. T h e p o i n t of The Mousetrap

is n o t to create a sense of

r e a l i t y , b u t r a t h e r o n e of artifice. T h e trap is to b e s p r u n g unawares. W h i l e L u c i a n u s is p o u r i n g poison i n t o the ears of the P l a y e r K i n g , H a m l e t is b u s i l y s u m m a r i z i n g w h a t r e m a i n s of t h e plot, as if h e w e r e the official presenter called

upon

to e x p l a i n

"inexplicable

— 266 —

dumb

shows"

HAMLET (3.2.12-13): " ' A poisons h i m i' th' g a r d e n f o r his estate. H i s n a m e ' s G o n z a g o . T h e story is e x t a n t , a n d w r i t t e n i n very choice Italian. Y o u shall see a n o n h o w the m u r d e r e r gets the l o v e of G o n z a g o ' s w i f e " (267-70). I t is a t this p o i n t , precisely, that the k i n g rises a n d breaks u p the play. The

Murder

of Gonzago

proves to b e a k i n d

of history play, " t h e i m a g e of a m u r d e r d o n e i n V i e n n a " ( 2 4 4 ) , e v e n t h e n associated w i t h i n t e r n a t i o n a l i n t r i g u e a n d d a r k deeds. H a m l e t seems to b e ironically suggesti n g that C l a u d i u s m a y w i s h to p u r s u e this play to its " e x t a n t " sources, w h i c h are " w r i t t e n i n v e r y

choice

I t a l i a n . " H o w characteristic is H a m l e t ' s insistence o n " c h o i c e " style at this m o m e n t , as if C l a u d i u s w e r e int e r r u p t i n g the p l a y o n l y to r u s h to t h e r o y a l l i b r a r y to r e a d m o r e a b o u t this " k n a v i s h piece of w o r k "

The Self-Conscious

(246).

Style

H a m l e t seems always to b e conscious of himself as a user of words, a n d w e o f t e n h a v e the impression that h e is t r y i n g o u t d i f f e r e n t styles to see w h a t their effect o n himself w i l l be. T h i s is p a r t i c u l a r l y t r u e of his exp e r i m e n t s w i t h the role of stage r e v e n g e r , a p a r t f o r which

Laertes is m u c h

b e t t e r suited. A f t e r

Hamlet

has b e e n r e m i n d e d of P y r r h u s ' b l o o d y deeds, h e feels the i m p u l s e , i n a l o n g s o l i l o q u y , to m a k e his

own

t h o u g h t s p r o p e r l y b l o o d y . H e b e g i n s this s e q u e n c e w i t h a series of i r r i t a t i n g short questions: A m I a coward? W h o calls m e villain? B r e a k s m y pate across? P l u c k s off m y b e a r d a n d b l o w s i t i n m y face? — 267 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

T w e a k s m e b y the nose? G i v e s m e the lie i' th' throat A s d e e p as to the lungs? W h o does m e this? (2.2.582-86) T h e s e are a l l f o r m a l insults, d e l i b e r a t e p r o v o c a t i o n s to a duel. B u t H a m l e t fears h e m a y b e a c o w a r d , a n d this fear leads h i m to use a s w a g g e r i n g style to reassure himself of his manliness: H a , 'swounds, I s h o u l d take it, for it c a n n o t b e B u t I a m p i g e o n - l i v e r e d a n d lack g a l l T o m a k e oppression bitter, or ere this I s h o u l d ha' fatted all the r e g i o n kites W i t h this slave's offal.

(2.2.587-91)

H a m l e t is c h e e r i n g himself u p , the s t r o n g w o r d s asserti n g a c o r r e s p o n d i n g strength i n their user. O n c e started, h e c o n t i n u e s w i t h b o l d e r e x c l a m a t i o n s to a breathless, polysyllabic c l i m a x : Bloody, bawdy villain! Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless v i l l a i n ! O , vengeance!

(2.2.591-93)

T h i s is expressive rhetoric, since the m e a n i n g of the passage is c o n v e y e d as m u c h b y its s o u n d as b y d e n o t a t i o n s of the words. In the theater, o n e

the

could

p r o b a b l y u n d e r s t a n d its i n t e n t w i t h o u t k n o w i n g a w o r d of English. So far H a m l e t has n o t d i s t i n g u i s h e d himself i n this soliloquy from many another Elizabethan revenger, b u t — 268 —

HAMLET o n c e h e has v e n t e d his passion, he s u d d e n l y b e c o m e s critical a n d self-conscious: W h y , w h a t a n ass a m I! T h i s is most b r a v e , T h a t I, the son of a d e a r f a t h e r m u r d e r e d , P r o m p t e d to m y r e v e n g e b y h e a v e n a n d hell, M u s t , like a w h o r e , u n p a c k m y h e a r t w i t h w o r d s A n d fall a-cursing l i k e a v e r y d r a b , A scullion! 9 F i e u p o n ' t , f o h !

(2.2.594-99)

H a m l e t confirms o u r f e e l i n g that the earlier p a r t of the s o l i l o q u y was all self-indulgent rant, the m e r e t r i c i o u s billingsgate of whores, drabs, scullions, a n d o t h e r base, m e n i a l creatures. If the d e a t h of P o l o n i u s w i l l later set Hamlet "packing"

(3.4.212), the t h o u g h t s of his re-

v e n g e h a v e h e r e set h i m to u n p a c k i n g , as if his h e a r t w e r e l o a d e d w i t h d e c e p t i v e words, the protestations of l o v e that a w h o r e reserves f o r h e r clients. T h e w o r d s are false wares a n d , l i k e C l a u d i u s , H a m l e t is conscious of a g a p b e t w e e n his d e e d a n d his " m o s t p a i n t e d w o r d " (3-!-53)-

T h e r e is a q u i b b l e o n " b r a v e " i n its positive sense of v a l i a n t a n d i n its stronger n e g a t i v e sense of

the

b r a v a d o of m e r e words. H a m l e t ' s o w n self-disgust is c o n c l u d e d w i t h those strong interjections, " F i e u p o n ' t , f o h ! " " F o h " is u n c o m m o n i n Shakespeare, a n d all of 9

Wilson's attempt to justify the Quarto 2 reading, "stallion,"

in the sense of courtesan or male whore, seems farfetched; see p. 188 of his edition and The let,

Manuscript

of Shakespeare's

Ham-

I, 71. See also Parrott and Craig, p. 137. Hubler reads "stal-

lion." U n t i l we can believe that "stallion" was a word in common usage in this sense at the time of Hamlet, Folio's more workaday "scullion."

— 269 —

we must follow

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

the e x a m p l e s indicate c o n t e m p t o r a b h o r r e n c e , as i n Iago's false accusation of D e s d e m o n a : " F o h ! o n e m a y smell i n such a w i l l most r a n k " ( O t h e l l o 3.3.236). T h e s o l i l o q u y f o r m c o n v e n t i o n a l l y p r o v i d e s f o r a n honest self-expression n o t possible i n one's p u b l i c utterances, b u t i n this scene H a m l e t uses s o l i l o q u y b o t h f o r v e r b a l pretense a n d f o r the deflation of that pretense.

This

d o u b l e n e s s is w h a t I m e a n b y a self-conscious style. W e can see the same effect at w o r k i n H a m l e t ' s praise of H o r a t i o , w h i c h is p e r h a p s his most l a u d a t o r y speech i n the play. H o r a t i o is the p a r a g o n of the just a n d nonh e r o i c m a n , w h o has o v e r c o m e those "slings a n d a r r o w s of o u t r a g e o u s f o r t u n e " (3.1.58) that t r o u b l e H a m l e t : D o s t t h o u hear? Since m y dear soul was mistress of h e r choice A n d c o u l d of m e n distinguish h e r election, S' h a t h sealed thee f o r herself, f o r t h o u hast b e e n A s o n e , i n s u f f ' r i n g all, that suffers n o t h i n g , A m a n that F o r t u n e ' s b u f f e t s a n d r e w a r d s H a s t ta'en w i t h e q u a l thanks. . . . Hamlet's

uncomfortably

colloquial

(3.2.64-70) question—"Dost

t h o u h e a r ? " — p r e p a r e s us f o r the u n u s u a l frankness of w h a t is to f o l l o w . T h e w h o l e speech comes d a n g e r o u s l y close to b e i n g a personal confession of the strength of H a m l e t ' s feelings for H o r a t i o : G i v e m e that m a n T h a t is n o t passion's slave, a n d I w i l l w e a r h i m I n m y heart's core, ay, i n m y h e a r t of heart, A s I d o thee.

(3-2.73-76) — 270 —

HAMLET H a m l e t is t h i n k i n g of his o w n p o t e n t i a l self outside the toils of tragedy, a n d i n t h e t r i p l e r e p e t i t i o n of " h e a r t " (with a f o u r t h use i m p l i e d i n " c o r e " — L a t i n cor),

there

is a n a t t e m p t to establish the intensity of his a t t a c h m e n t to his f r i e n d . B u t s u d d e n l y there occurs o n e of those a b r u p t shifts that w e h a v e just n o t i c e d i n the " r o g u e a n d peasant s l a v e " s o l i l o q u y .

Hamlet

breaks off

his

p a n e g y r i c , w h i c h is b e g i n n i n g to s o u n d f u l s o m e a n d r h e t o r i c a l : " S o m e t h i n g too m u c h of t h i s — "

( 7 6 ) . I t is

as if l a n g u a g e is a false a n d i n a d e q u a t e m e d i u m f o r conv e y i n g true e m o t i o n . H e seems to feel that a n y comm e n d a t i o n p u t i n t o w o r d s is b o u n d to a p p e a r o v e r d o n e a n d h o l l o w , a n d this is the last w e h e a r of

Horatio's

sterling qualities. H a m l e t ' s self-conscious style achieves its most b r i l l i a n t a n d m o s t characteristic effects i n p a r o d y , w h i c h , as the art of i r o n i c i m i t a t i o n , shows at o n c e a subtle mastery of style a n d a total a b a n d o n m e n t of a n y i n d i v i d u a l style. B y m i m i c k i n g the r h e t o r i c a l absurdities of others, H a m let, l i k e B e n Jonson, is e n d e a v o r i n g to p u t t h e m o u t of their h u m o r s — a n d it is r e m a r k a b l e h o w strongly H a m let's aristocratic canons a n d r e f o r m e r ' s gusto seal h i m as o n e of the t r i b e of B e n . B u t the objects of the p a r o d y are usually b e y o n d r e c o v e r y , so that, l i k e Osric, they a p p l a u d their o w n excesses w h e n d e l i v e r e d b y a n o t h e r : " Y o u r l o r d s h i p speaks most i n f a l l i b l y of h i m " ( 5 . 2 . 1 2 2 ) . T h i s absence of effect turns H a m l e t ' s parodies i n t o d e m onstrations of satirical insight, w h o s e chief target is the m a l e v o l e n t c i r c u m l o c u t i o n of the c o u r t style. B y h o l d i n g this style u p to scorn, H a m l e t a t t e m p t s to strip away t h e false appearances b y w h i c h D e n m a r k a n d the w o r l d are —

271

—

DRAMATIC "Rankly abused"

CHARACTER

( 1 . 5 . 3 8 ) . M u c h m o r e than i n

any

o t h e r p l a y of Shakespeare, the pretensions a n d deceits of style i n Hamlet

are u s e d to express the h i d d e n evil,

the " S o m e t h i n g " that "is r o t t e n i n the state of D e n mark"

(1.4.90).

H a m l e t ' s scene w i t h Osric is the most extensive p a r o d y i n the play. It is also the m o s t e x u b e r a n t , since Osric is so i n v i n c i b l y i m p e r v i o u s to r i d i c u l e . H i s l o v e of refinem e n t i n diction, as i n dress a n d m a n n e r s , is expressed i n a series of n e w - m i n t e d , i n k h o r n terms, " n e v e r clapp e r c l a w e d w i t h the palms of the v u l g a r , " as " A N e v e r W r i t e r , to an E v e r R e a d e r " puts it i n his preface to Troilus

and Cressida.10

O s r i c consistently replaces vul-

g a r m o n o s y l l a b l e s b y n o b l e r polysyllables, e u p h e m i z e s all l o w a n d base words, s u b j u n c t i v a t e s a n d conditionalizes the i n d i c a t i v e m o o d , a n d turns direct phrases i n t o p o l i t e a n d meaningless c i r c u m l o c u t i o n s . T o s u m u p i n the pleasant phraseology of Sister M i r i a m Joseph, " C a c o zelia is Osric's characteristic v i c e . " 1 1 Osric is i n d e e d , to dally w i t h M i l t o n ' s phrase, " F a n c y ' s c h i l d . " " T h e r e was g o o d sport at his m a k i n g " Lear

1.1.22-23), i

nto

(King

which went a generous measure

of D o n A r m a d o , w h o has b e e n " a t a great feast of lang u a g e s a n d stol'n the scraps," a n d of H o l o f e r n e s , too, w h o admires O v i d i u s N a s o " f o r s m e l l i n g o u t the odorQuoted from the Signet edition of

10

ed. Daniel Seltzer

Troilus

and

Cressida,

(New York, 1963), p. xli. T h e passage is not

in Alexander. 11

Sister Miriam Joseph, Shakespeare's

guage

Use

of the Arts

of

Lan-

(New York: Columbia University Press, 1947), p. 73. " A f -

fected diction, especially the coining of fine words out of Latin, is a form of the vice cacozelia. T h r o u g h it Shakespeare satirizes inkhornism"

(p. 72). —

272

—

HAMLET i f e r o u s flowers of fancy, the j e r k s of i n v e n t i o n " Labour's

(Love's

Lost 5.1.33-34; 4.2.118-19). O s r i c is also l i k e the

" p o p i n j a y " lord, " F r e s h as a b r i d e g r o o m , " w h o comes to d e m a n d H o t s p u r ' s prisoners, " W i t h m a n y a n d l a d y terms"

(/ Henry

IV

holiday

1.3.34, 4 6 ) . I n

Hamlet,

there is a p r e l i m i n a r y sketch of Osric i n the i m a g i n e d c o u r t i e r of the g r a v e y a r d scene, w h o c o u l d say, " ' G o o d m o r r o w , sweet lord! H o w dost t h o u , sweet lord?' T h i s m i g h t b e m y L o r d Such-a-one, that praised m y

Lord

Such-a-one's horse w h e n 'a m e a n t 1 2 to b e g it, m i g h t it not?"

(5.x.83-87).

It is n o t difficult for H a m l e t to p a r o d y Osric's style, a n d o n c e he gets the feel of it, he is q u i c k l y out-Osricki n g his m o d e l . H e answers Osric's h i g h - f l o w n praise of L a e r t e s i n an e q u a l l y elevated style: " I k n o w , to d i v i d e h i m i n v e n t o r i a l l y w o u l d dozy th' a r i t h m e t i c of m e m o r y " ( 5 . 2 . 1 1 4 - 1 5 ) . T h e i m a g e is based o n the i n v e n t o r y of goods

in

Laertes'

huge

warehouse

a m o u n t that w o u l d " d o z y "

of

qualities,

an

(an o l d f o r m of " d i z z y " ) , 13

o r stagger, any systematic a t t e m p t to recollect them. O n e 12

" M e a n t " is the Folio reading, which most modern

editors

prefer; Hubler reads "went," as in Quarto 2. 13

A l l three extant copies of the 1604 printing of Quarto 2

read "dosie," a variant spelling of "dozy," which is a rare but correct form of the verb "to dizzy." T h e press corrector, however, did not seem to know this, and changed "dosie" to "dazzie," a nonsense word, in the printing of Quarto 2 dated 1605 (of which there are also three extant copies). See Parrott and Craig, p. 231. T h e Osric scene is one place where we might literally follow the textual principle of durior

lectio,

since Hamlet and Osric are

v y i n g with each other to produce a more esoteric and rechercM style. T h e textual problem is complicated by the fact that Folio omits about thirty-eight lines from what must have seemed very "literary" and dispensable passage

"here is" in line 107 through "unfellowed" in line 144).

— 273 —

a

(the cut extends from

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

can h a r d l y use w o r d s for Laertes at all, since he is " a soul of great article, a n d his i n f u s i o n of such dearth a n d rareness as, to m a k e t r u e d i c t i o n of h i m , his s e m b l a b l e is his m i r r o r "

(1x7-20). A n " a r t i c l e " is a n i t e m i n a n

i n v e n t o r y , o r a n y s t i p u l a t i o n or clause i n a legal docum e n t , such as the " c a r r i a g e of the article (1.1.94)

i n t h e "sealed c o m p a c t "

(86)

designed"

between

old

H a m l e t a n d o l d Fortinbras. Laertes' " d e a r t h " o r dearness i n price, l i k e that of o t h e r c o m m o d i t i e s in the market, is d e t e r m i n e d b y his "rareness." W h e n O s r i c sudd e n l y slips i n t o direct a n d v u l g a r speech, " O f Laertes?" (5.2.130), H o r a t i o t h i n k s it a sign of v e r b a l insolvency: " H i s purse is e m p t y already. A l l ' s g o l d e n w o r d s are s p e n t " ( 1 3 1 - 3 2 ) . Osric's aureate d i c t i o n m a y b e a p u r s e w i t h g o l d coins, b u t it is n o t o v e r f u l l . I n a n n o u n c i n g the k i n g ' s w a g e r against Laertes', Osr i c d w e l l s l o v i n g l y o n the o r n a m e n t a l details:

"The

K i n g , sir, h a t h w a g e r e d w i t h h i m six B a r b a r y horses, against the w h i c h he has i m p a w n e d , as I take it, six F r e n c h rapiers a n d poniards, w i t h their assigns, as g i r d l e , hangers, a n d so. T h r e e of the carriages, i n faith, are v e r y dear to fancy, v e r y responsive to the hilts, m o s t delicate carriages, a n d of v e r y l i b e r a l c o n c e i t "

(148-54).

T h e s e are terms n o r m a l l y used f o r poetry, b u t

"car-

r i a g e s " are the farthest e x t e n t of Osric's aesthetic capabilities. H a m l e t is ruffled b y that affected w o r d

"car-

r i a g e s , " as he was earlier b y the Player's " m o b l e d q u e e n " ( 2 . 2 . 5 1 4 ) , a n d he d e m a n d s a stricter l e x i c o g r a p h y f r o m Osric: " T h e phrase w o u l d b e m o r e g e r m a n e to the matter if w e c o u l d carry a c a n n o n b y o u r sides. I w o u l d it m i g h t b e hangers till t h e n "

(5.2.159-61).

— 274 —

HAMLET B u t H a m l e t soon abandons his v e r b a l p u r i s m for a m o r e g r a t i f y i n g self-indulgence i n Osric's o w n element: " B u t onl Six Barbary horses against six French swords, their assigns, a n d three liberal-conceited

carriages—

that's the French b e t against the Danish. W h y is this all i m p a w n e d , as y o u call it?" (161-65). T h e r e is Osric's precious w o r d " i m p a w n e d " for honest English

"bet,"

a n d H a m l e t means to call attention to i t — " a s y o u call i t " — t o match Osric's o w n emphasis in "as I take i t " (149-50). In this direct b o r r o w i n g b y H a m l e t of Osric's words, w e have parody according to its textbook criterion: the imitation of another's speech w i t h intent to burlesque. Osric is the " C o u r t i e r " of Q u a r t o 2, the "Braggart G e n t l e m a n " of Q u a r t o 1, a n d Phantasmo of Bestrafte

Brudermord—a

Der

m a n " t h e drossy age dotes o n "

( 5 . 2 . 1 9 1 ) . H e has " m u c h land, and fertile" a n d is a " l o r d of beasts" (86-87), b u t w h e n b l o w n to his " t r i a l " ( 1 9 6 ) , poor Osric proves to b e only a "yeasty" (193)

bubble.

H a m l e t ' s parody of Laertes in the graveyard scene is also m e a n t to e x p l o d e , b y ridicule, the inflated style of its object, b u t this parody is m u c h m o r e aggressive a n d lacerating than that of Osric. O n e has the impression that H a m l e t is attacking C l a u d i u s t h r o u g h his minions, a n d even t h o u g h H a m l e t cannot k n o w that the k i n g a n d Laertes have sealed their triple plot against his life, he seems already to have that f a t e f u l feeling of " h o w ill all's here a b o u t m y h e a r t "

(5.2.213-14).

H a m l e t and H o r a t i o observe the f u n e r a l of O p h e l i a " a p a r t , " or concealed

(conventionally)

at o n e side of

the stage, because it is n o t yet safe for the recently escaped H a m l e t to reveal himself. H e maintains his con— 275 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

c e a l m e n t e v e n a f t e r he learns that they are b u r y i n g " t h e fair O p h e l i a " ( 5 . 1 . 2 4 4 ) , b u t w h e n L a e r t e s l a u n c h e s i n t o his h y p e r b o l i c a l e x c l a m a t i o n s , H a m l e t c a n n o

longer

c o n t a i n himself. H i s first speech is e n t i r e l y d e v o t e d to his o u t r a g e d sense of style r a t h e r than to any l a m e n t a tions for his lost l o v e d o n e : W h a t is h e w h o s e grief Bears such an emphasis, w h o s e phrase of sorrow C o n j u r e s the w a n d ' r i n g stars, a n d m a k e s t h e m stand L i k e w o n d e r - w o u n d e d hearers? T h i s is I, H a m l e t the D a n e .

(5.1.256-60)

T h e terms are a l l specifically r h e t o r i c a l a n d theatrical: " e m p h a s i s , " " p h r a s e of s o r r o w , " " w o n d e r - w o u n d e d hearers." Laertes is g u i l t y of the same excesses that H a m l e t c o m p l a i n s of i n his advice

to the players, a n d

the

" w a n d ' r i n g stars," or planets, seem to react l i k e those ear-split " g r o u n d l i n g s , w h o f o r the most part are c a p a b l e of n o t h i n g b u t i n e x p l i c a b l e d u m b shows a n d

noise"

(3.2.11-13). T h e r e is a n o t h e r l i n k w i t h the advice to the players i n H a m l e t ' s s c o r n f u l c o m m e n t to Laertes: t h o u l ' t m o u t h , / I'll r a n t as w e l l as t h o u "

"Nay,

an

(5.1.285-86),

w h i c h recalls: " B u t if y o u m o u t h it, as m a n y of o u r players do, I h a d as lief the t o w n crier spoke m y l i n e s " (3.2.2-4). T h e same criteria a p p l y i n b o t h cases, a n d L a e r t e s is m a d e to illustrate the type of the b a d actor. R a n t i n g is the q u a l i t y of " o ' e r d o i n g T e r m a g a n t . It outh e r o d s H e r o d " (14-15), j u s t as Laertes is n o w a t t e m p t i n g to " o u t f a c e " (5.1.280) H a m l e t at O p h e l i a ' s grave. T h i s is, b y the w a y , the o n l y o c c u r r e n c e of the w o r d " r a n t " — 276 —

HAMLET i n Shakespeare Merry

Wives

(although we have "ranting" in

of Windsor

The

2 . 1 . 1 7 0 ) . A n o t h e r w o r d ex-

pressing c o n t e m p t f o r Laertes' style is " p r a t e " : " A n d if t h o u prate of m o u n t a i n s , l e t t h e m t h r o w / M i l l i o n s of acres o n u s " (5.1.282-83). T h e w o r d m e a n s to prattle, to chatter, to talk i d l y ; w e r e m e m b e r that the d e a d Pol o n i u s was " a foolish p r a t i n g k n a v e "

(3.4.216). Signifi-

cantly, Laertes a n d P o l o n i u s are the o n l y " p r a t e r s " i n the play. L a t e r H a m l e t is to regret " T h a t to L a e r t e s I forgot myself"

(5.2.76), b u t he pleads strong provoca-

tion: "sure the b r a v e r y of his grief d i d p u t m e / I n t o a t o w ' r i n g passion" (79-80). " B r a v e r y " a n d " t o w ' r i n g pass i o n " b o t h indicate f l a m b o y a n t a n d o v e r w r o u g h t emotional effects that l e n d themselves to r i d i c u l e . H a m l e t ' s p a r o d y of Laertes is set in the c o n t e x t of a strong self-consciousness of style. T o grandiloquence,

answer

Laertes'

H a m l e t proposes a series of

absurd,

mock-heroic l o v e trials: 'Swounds, show m e w h a t t h o u ' t do. W o o ' t weep? W o o ' t fight? W o o ' t fast? W o o ' t tear thyself? W o o ' t d r i n k u p eisel? E a t a crocodile? I'll do't.

(5.1.276-79)

T h e a b r u p t c o l l o q u i a l questions a n d staccato r h y t h m s are i n themselves grotesque, apart f r o m the c o n t e n t of the images. T h e b u r l e s q u e crocodile seems to c o n n e c t w i t h " W o o ' t w e e p ? " , since it was best k n o w n for its trick of hypocritical o r m a l i c i o u s tears, l i k e G e r t r u d e ' s "salt of m o s t u n r i g h t e o u s tears" (1.2.154) a n d Laertes' o w n "tears seven times salt"

(4.5.154)—another

— 277 —

rhetorical

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

a b s u r d i t y i n the spirit of the crocodile passage. H a m l e t will match Laertes hyperbole for hyperbole and give h i m odds, too: D o s t t h o u c o m e h e r e to w h i n e ? T o o u t f a c e m e w i t h l e a p i n g i n h e r grave? B e b u r i e d q u i c k w i t h h e r , a n d so w i l l I. A n d if t h o u prate of m o u n t a i n s , let t h e m t h r o w M i l l i o n s of acres o n us, till o u r g r o u n d , S i n g e i n g his pate against the b u r n i n g zone, M a k e Ossa l i k e a w a r t ! N a y , a n t h o u ' l t m o u t h , I'll r a n t as w e l l as t h o u .

(5.1.279-86)

T h e r e is an e x a g g e r a t e d oratorical d e l i v e r y of that l o n g p e r i o d c a l l i n g f o r " M i l l i o n s of acres," b u t at " N a y " a n a b r u p t shift i n tone m a r k s H a m l e t ' s r e t u r n to his norm a l style. H e tells us directly that h e has b e e n r a n t i n g , b u t h e w i l l " o u t f a c e " L a e r t e s i n all respects. If w e t h i n k of " w h i n e " as a c o m m e n t o n

Laertes'

style, it s h o u l d b e p l a c e d w i t h H a m l e t ' s o t h e r

vocal

terms: " L e t H e r c u l e s himself d o w h a t h e m a y , / T h e cat w i l l m e w , a n d d o g w i l l h a v e his d a y "

(293-94). A l l of

these i m a g e s seem to m e to r e f e r to Laertes: l e t this b o m b a s t i c H e r c u l e s g o t h r o u g h his miles gloriosus

rou-

tines; w e m u s t a l l o w cats a n d dogs to express their serioc o m i c , bellicose natures. H e r c u l e s is A n t o n y ' s t u t e l a r y deity, and, to the a c c o m p a n i m e n t of "hautboys the stage,"

" N o w leaves h i m "

( A n t o n y and

...

under

Cleopatra

4.3.12 s.d., 1 7 ) . B u t H a m l e t has f o r c e f u l l y r e j e c t e d a n y r e s e m b l a n c e to H e r c u l e s : C l a u d i u s is his father's brother, " b u t n o m o r e l i k e m y f a t h e r / T h a n I to H e r c u l e s " ( 1 . 2 . 1 5 2 - 5 3 ) . I t h i n k the p o i n t of the a l l u s i o n is that — 278 —

HAMLET "Ercles' v e i n " is " a tyrant's v e i n , " as B o t t o m i n f o r m s us, a n d h e defines the r o l e i n a w a y that c o u l d a p p l y to the r a n t i n g Laertes i n the g r a v e y a r d (and to H a m l e t ' s p a r o d y of h i m ) : " I c o u l d play Ercles rarely, o r a p a r t to tear a cat in, to m a k e all s p l i t " (A Midsummer Dream

Night's

1.2.33-34, 23-24).

H a m l e t ' s desire to " o u t f a c e " his r i v a l w o u l d also inc l u d e , it seems to m e , his l e a p i n g i n t o O p h e l i a ' s g r a v e a f t e r Laertes. T h e p a r o d y is e x t e n d e d follow-the-leader f a s h i o n f r o m w o r d s to stage action. If Q u a r t o 1 is a mem o r i a l r e c o n s t r u c t i o n of w h a t was actually seen a n d h e a r d d u r i n g a p e r f o r m a n c e , t h e n its directions h a v e a special v a l u e . R i g h t a f t e r "Laertes

leaps into the

(at 5 . 1 . 2 5 3 ) , Q u a r t o 1 notes i n the m a r g i n : leaps in after Laertes"

(at a b o u t 5 . 1 . 2 5 5 ) . W e

grave" "Hamlet would

l i k e to disavow this e x p l i c i t direction, b u t it is clear f r o m " A F u n e r a l l E l e g y e o n y e D e a t h of the f a m o u s A c t o r Richard Burbedg"

(1618)

that this was o n e of his re-

m e m b e r e d histrionic exploits: O f t h a u e I seene h i m , l e a p i n t o the G r a u e S u i t i n g the person, w h i c h h e s e e m ' d to h a u e O f a sadd L o u e r , w i t h soe true a n E y e T h a t theer I w o u l d h a u e sworne, h e m e a n t to dye. . . T h e stage a c t i o n of j u m p i n g i n t o the grave a n d scuffling there supports the v e r b a l aggression of H a m l e t ' s p a r o d y ; it is also a p r e p a r a t i o n f o r the l e t h a l f e n c i n g m a t c h of 14

Quoted from Edwin Nungezer, A Dictionary

of Actors

(Itha-

ca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1929), p. 74. See GranvilleBarker's objection to this staging in his Prefaces,

— 279 —

I, 139, note 19.

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

the n e x t scene. I n the E l i z a b e t h a n staging of this

un-

s e e m l y b r a w l , O p h e l i a ' s coffin w o u l d b e q u i c k l y r e m o v e d f r o m the stage-trap grave to m a k e it r e a d y for and

Laertes

Hamlet.

P a r o d y is p a r t o f H a m l e t ' s c o u n t e r a t t a c k o n C l a u d i u s a n d h i s m i n i o n s . T h e r e is l i t t l e d i r e c t b u r l e s q u e o f t h e king, a d a n g e r o u s t o p i c o n t h e E l i z a b e t h a n stage,

but

t h e r e a r e a t l e a s t t w o p l a c e s w h e r e C l a u d i u s is t h e o b ject of H a m l e t ' s verbal

assault. First,

Hamlet's

pected letter to the king mocks the polite

unex-

circumlocu-

tions o f t h e c o u r t style. S i n c e t h e w r i t e r o f t h e l e t t e r h a s just escaped the death plot of the addressee, the portent o u s l y r e s p e c t f u l t o n e is m e a n t t o b e t a u n t i n g :

" 'High

a n d m i g h t y , y o u shall k n o w I a m set n a k e d o n

your

k i n g d o m . T o m o r r o w shall I b e g l e a v e to see y o u r k i n g l y eyes; w h e n I shall recount return' "

(first a s k i n g y o u r p a r d o n

thereunto)

the occasion of m y sudden a n d m o r e (4-743-47) • T h e

begging

of leave

strange and

the

" f i r s t a s k i n g y o u r p a r d o n t h e r e u n t o " a r e fine s t r o k e s o f ironic subservience. " T h e r e u n t o " alone should identify this l e t t e r as a p a r o d y — w e m i g h t , i n fact, s e p a r a t e o f t h e c h a r a c t e r s i n Hamlet users of the w o r d

all

into potential users o r n o n -

"thereunto."

T h e o t h e r p a r o d y o f C l a u d i u s is i n H a m l e t ' s s p i r i t e d a c c o u n t to H o r a t i o of the w o r d i n g of his forged " g r a n d commission": A n earnest conjuration from the

King,

As E n g l a n d was his faithful tributary, A s l o v e b e t w e e n t h e m like t h e p a l m m i g h t flourish, A s p e a c e s h o u l d still h e r w h e a t e n g a r l a n d w e a r

— 280 —

HAMLET A n d stand a c o m m a ' t w e e n their amities, A n d m a n y s u c h l i k e as's of great charge, T h a t o n the v i e w a n d k n o w i n g of these contents, W i t h o u t d e b a t e m e n t f u r t h e r , m o r e o r less, H e s h o u l d those bearers p u t to s u d d e n death, N o t shriving time allowed.

(5.2.38-47)

T h e i m a g e r y is of the o r n a m e n t a l sort o n e m i g h t e x p e c t i n a p u b l i c p r o c l a m a t i o n , a n d each of the c o n d i t i o n a l particles m a r k s a n o t h e r meaningless stipulation. p h r a s i n g t h r o u g h o u t is mock-legal, a series of

The

empty

f o r m u l a s distilled f r o m official d o c u m e n t s . W i t h

the

r e p e t i t i o n of " a s , " H a m l e t is at o n c e p a r o d y i n g a recogn i z a b l e f e a t u r e of the k i n g ' s style 1 5 a n d g i v i n g his f o r g e d c o m m i s s i o n a n air of a u t h e n t i c i t y . T h e t w o " b e a r e r s " of this " c o n j u r a t i o n " " o f

great

c h a r g e " are, of course, those serviceable "asses" Rosencrantz a n d G u i l d e n s t e r n , a n d H a m l e t takes special del i g h t i n h a v i n g o v e r r e a c h e d their shallow wits. T h e y are m u c h m o r e w o r k a d a y courtiers than the fantastic Osric, w h o s e c o u r t r h e t o r i c they echo, b u t s t r i p p e d of all its ent e r t a i n i n g flourishes. H a m l e t n e v e r tires of t w i t t i n g this i g n o b l e pair of witlings. H e is n o t just p a r o d y i n g their style; he is also m y s t i f y i n g t h e m , since it is a p p a r e n t that they h a v e n o c o m p r e h e n s i o n either of w o r d p l a y o r m e t a p h o r . " A k n a v i s h speech sleeps i n a foolish e a r " 15

I n A c t I V , Scene vii, for example, C l a u d i u s uses "as" eight

times: "as the star moves not b u t in his sphere" should it b e so?" (58), " A s checking at his v o y a g e " that o n e " As" end"

(75), " A s h a d he been incorpsed"

(120-21), a n d

(15), " A s h o w (6a), " A s d i d

(87), "as m a n y

" A s make your bouts more violent

(158).

— 281 —

to

/

that

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

(4.2.23-24), a n d " t o b e d e m a n d e d of a sponge, w h a t r e p l i c a t i o n s h o u l d b e m a d e b y the son of a k i n g ? "

(12-

1 3 ) . " R e p l i c a t i o n " is a n e x c e p t i o n of the second d e g r e e m a d e b y the plaintiff u p o n the answer of the d e f e n d a n t , b e i n g the t h i r d step i n c o m m o n pleadings. 1 8 T h i s impressive legal w o r d is m u c h m o r e l i k e l y to g a i n respect f o r " t h e son of a k i n g " than the h o m e l y " r e p l y " that it replaces. I t is difficult to m a k e a c o m p l e t e survey of H a m l e t ' s parodies, since h e slips i n a n d o u t of p a r o d y so q u i c k l y a n d so n a t u r a l l y . I n the closet scene, f o r e x a m p l e , w h e n G e r t r u d e b e g i n s to " l a y h o m e " to h e r son a n d " b e r o u n d w i t h h i m " (3.4.1, 5 ) , h e d e f e n d s himself a n d b e g i n s his attack o n h e r b y m i m i c k i n g h e r lines. T h e effect is o n e of stilted, stichomythic e c h o i n g : Queen.

H a m l e t , t h o u hast thy father m u c h o f f e n d e d .

Hamlet.

M o t h e r , y o u h a v e m y father m u c h o f f e n d e d .

Queen.

C o m e , come, y o u answer w i t h a n idle t o n g u e .

Hamlet.

G o , go, y o u q u e s t i o n w i t h a w i c k e d t o n g u e . (3.4.10-13)

" C o m e , c o m e " a n d " G o , g o " are exactly parallel, b u t H a m l e t answers his m o t h e r ' s f a m i l i a r " t h o u " w i t h the more formal "you." I n the s w e a r i n g c e r e m o n y a f t e r the scene w i t h the G h o s t , H a m l e t projects the response of his friends to his " a n t i c d i s p o s i t i o n " : T h a t y o u , at such times seeing m e , n e v e r shall W i t h arms e n c u m b ' r e d thus, o r this headshake, O r b y p r o n o u n c i n g of some d o u b t f u l phrase, 18

See Variorum,

I, 315.

— 282 —

HAMLET A s " W e l l , w e l l , w e k n o w , " or " W e c o u l d , a n if w e w o u l d , " O r " I f w e list to speak," o r " T h e r e be, an if they might," O r such a m b i g u o u s g i v i n g o u t , to n o t e T h a t y o u k n o w a u g h t of m e . . . .

(1.5.173-79)

T h e p a r o d y proceeds b o t h b y gesture ( " W i t h arms enc u m b ' r e d thus, o r this h e a d s h a k e " ) a n d b y words, a n d those cryptic, o r a c u l a r phrases, p r o n o u n c e d w i t h suitable i n n u e n d o , show that H a m l e t is also a master of the coll o q u i a l style. 1 7 T h e a f t e r m a t h of the G h o s t scene i n Hamlet

is m u c h m o r e s o l e m n l y f u n n y t h a n is u s u a l l y

thought, particularly "old m o l e " cellarage"

(162) c r y i n g " i n the

(151). Hamlet's "wild and whirling words"

(133) are n e i t h e r so w i l d n o r so w h i r l i n g as w e w o u l d l i k e to believe. H e is o u t r a g e d , hysterical, stirred to the d e p t h s of his b e i n g b y w h a t the G h o s t has said, b u t his a b i l i t y to p a r o d y it all is surely a sign of c o n t r o l r a t h e r t h a n of madness. T h e r e is p r o b a b l y m u c h m o r e p a r o d y of o t h e r works, especially of o t h e r plays, i n Hamlet

a n d i n a l l of Shake-

speare t h a n critics recognize. A l o n g w i t h the p r o p o n e n t s 17

The

collection

of

speech

fragments—"hard

fractions"—in

this passage seems to be brilliantly echoed in Flavius' report of the senators in Timon

of

Athens:

T h e y answer, in a joint and corporate voice, T h a t now they are at fall, want treasure, cannot D o what they would, are sorry—you are h o n o u r a b l e — B u t yet they could have wish'd—they know n o t — Something hath been amiss—a noble nature M a y catch a wrench—would all were well!—'tis p i t y — (2.2.204-9)

— 283 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

of d r a m a t i c c o l l a b o r a t i o n , the topical allusionists h a v e so discredited their field of investigation b y their o w n excesses that w e n o l o n g e r t h i n k of these as respectable topics. Y e t w e k n o w that Hamlet

contains a g o o d deal

of local discussion of theatrical affairs at the t u r n of the c e n t u r y , a n d the G r a v e d i g g e r ' s r e f e r e n c e to Y a u g h a n ' s tavern

(5.1.61, F o l i o ) is almost certainly to a f a m i l i a r

place o n the B a n k s i d e n e a r the G l o b e theater. archaic style a n d m a n n e r of The

Murder

of

The

Gonzago

i m i t a t e o l d plays, so that it is j u s t a n o t h e r step to i d e n t i f y these plays, as some c o m m e n t a t o r s h a v e done. 1 8 I n the larger sense of the term, the p l a y w i t h i n the play is entirely a p a r o d y , as is also A e n e a s ' speech to D i d o . T h e r e are at least t w o e x a m p l e s of literary p a r o d y i n H a m l e t ' s part. H i s l i t t l e song-poem a f t e r the play is a takeoff o n The

Spanish

Tragedy

( 1 5 8 7 ) , w h i c h was

o n e of the most p a r o d i e d w o r k s of its time: F o r if the K i n g l i k e n o t the c o m e d y , W h y then, b e l i k e he likes it n o t , perdy. (3-2-299"3°°)

A n d if the w o r l d l i k e n o t this tragedy, H a r d is the h a p of o l d H i e r o n i m o . (The

Spanish

Tragedy

4.1.197-98)19

H a m l e t is a m u s i n g himself b y c a l l i n g The

Mousetrap

a c o m e d y a n d b y creating a nonsense l i n e to fill o u t a r h y m e d c o u p l e t . H i e r o n i m o ' s speech comes at the e n d 18

See, for example, Kittredge, p. 224.

19

T h o m a s Kyd,

T h e Revels Plays

The

Spanish

Tragedy,

(London, 1959), p. 108.

— 284 —

ed. Philip

Edwards,

HAMLET of a scene, i n a place w h e r e w e m i g h t e x p e c t a c o u p l e t . Since H a m l e t r e f u s e d to r h y m e i n his p r e c e d i n g p o e m (3.2.290), h e c a n n o w g r a t u i t o u s l y m a k e his c o u p l e t c o n t r i b u t i o n to K y d ' s play. T h e r e is a n o t h e r e x a m p l e of p a r o d y also p r o v o k e d b y The

Mousetrap.

While

Lucianus

is

conscientiously

" m u g g i n g " his part, H a m l e t pricks h i m o n to his p r o p e r duties: " B e g i n , m u r d e r e r . L e a v e thy d a m n a b l e

faces

a n d b e g i n . C o m e , the c r o a k i n g r a v e n d o t h b e l l o w f o r revenge"

(3.2.258-60).

The

last l i n e

sounds l i k e

a

p r o m p t e r ' s cue, w h i c h R . S i m p s o n has i d e n t i f i e d as a "satirical c o n d e n s a t i o n " of t w o lines f r o m The Tragedy

of Richard

III

True

( 1 5 9 1 ) : " T h e screeking R a u e n

sits c r o k i n g f o r r e u e n g e . / W h o l e heards of beasts comes b e l l o w i n g f o r r e u e n g e . " 2 0 W e r e m e m b e r that H a m l e t w i l l n o t f o r g i v e the b a d actor w h o " s t r u t t e d a n d bellowed"

(3.2.34), l i k e M a c b e t h ' s " p o o r player,/

That

struts a n d frets his h o u r u p o n the stage" ( M a c b e t h 5.5. 24-25), o r l i k e H a m l e t ' s o w n " o u t s t r e t c h e d h e r o e s "

(2.

2.268). W e seem to discern echoes of the mysterious Ur-Hamlet

that

preceded

Shakespeare's

play,

whose

G h o s t , a c c o r d i n g to T h o m a s L o d g e , " c r i e d so m i s e r a b l y at y e T h e a t o r , l i k e an oister w i f e , H a m l e t , r e v e n g e . " 2 1 I n Hamlet

p r o p e r the G h o s t does n o t b e l l o w at all, b u t

o n l y urges, w i t h w h a t m i g h t b e taken as p o l i t e circumlocution, " R e m e m b e r m e " 20

pens 21

(1.5.91).

Quoted from Wilson, p. 204; see also p. 205, and What in Hamlet,

Hap-

pp. 161-62. T h e original text reads "heads."

Quoted from Chambers, William

Shakespeare,

— 285 —

I, 411.

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

The Witty Style L i k e p a r o d y , H a m l e t ' s w i t t y style is also e x u b e r a n t a n d i n v e n t i v e , a n d its f u n c t i o n is o n l y p a r t l y p r a g m a t i c . O u r assumptions a b o u t the r a t i o n a l q u a l i t y of a p l a y t e n d to e x a g g e r a t e the purposiveness of d r a m a t i c speech. T r u e , H a m l e t puts " a n antic disposition o n "

(1.5.172),

as o n e m i g h t p u t o n the fool's c o s t u m e i n o r d e r to c l a i m t h e license a n d i m m u n i t i e s of the role, b u t h e is n o t always at w o r k p u r s u i n g his ends. T h e H a m l e t of the source story seems a n a l t o g e t h e r m o r e e n t e r p r i s i n g a n d businesslike y o u n g m a n t h a n Shakespeare's prince, w h o sometimes engages i n f r e e association, b r o k e n v e i l e d i n n u e n d o , d o u b l e - e n t e n d r e , lyric

syntax,

extravagance,

a n d n o n s t o p w o r d p l a y f o r their o w n sake, as exercises of w i t a n d recreations of the spirit. I t n e e d h a r d l y b e said that, r h e t o r i c a l l y , H a m l e t is n o t always a c t i n g i n his o w n best interest. P u n n i n g is the m o s t direct expression of witty

style; 2 2

Hamlet's

it assumes that l a n g u a g e is f u l l of "springes

to catch w o o d c o c k s "

(1.3.115)

and

s p e e c h " m a y sleep " i n a foolish e a r "

that " a

knavish

(4.2.23-24). P a r t

of H a m l e t ' s w o r d p l a y is p l a y f u l self-expression, b u t the m o r e significant p a r t is b i t i n g a n d satirical.

Among

m a n y possible e x a m p l e s , w e m a y consider the e x t e n s i v e q u i b b l i n g o n " c o m m o n " i n A c t I, Scene ii, w h i c h s h o u l d also h e l p us to distinguish H a m l e t ' s sense of w o r d s f r o m that of the k i n g a n d q u e e n . W h e n G e r t r u d e p r o v i d e s " a b a c k or s e c o n d " 22

See Mahood, Shakespeare's

Wordplay,

whose perceptive com-

ments are not limited to the discussion of puns.

— 286 —

(4.7.

HAMLET to the cold comfort of Claudius,

153)

mourning

son a well-meaning

she offers

couplet

her

platitude:

T h o u k n o w ' s t 'tis c o m m o n ; all t h a t lives m u s t die, Passing t h r o u g h n a t u r e to eternity. Surprisingly, H a m l e t seems to assent: is c o m m o n "

(1.2.72-73) "Ay, madam,

it

(74) — a t least G e r t r u d e ' s answer shows n o

a w a r e n e s s o f w o r d p l a y : " I f i t b e , / W h y s e e m s i t so p a r ticular with thee?"

( 7 4 - 7 5 ) . W e n o w have three distinct

senses of " c o m m o n " :

1. d e a t h is t h e " c o m m o n f a t e , " t h e

e x p e c t e d e n d o f a l l m e n , i n w h i c h 2. t h e y s h a r e j o i n t l y a s in a c o m m o n

stock corporation,

but

to H a m l e t

r e l i g i o u s c o m m o n p l a c e s a r e 3. l o w , b a s e , m e a n , ordinary, a n d therefore disgusting. " C o m m o n "

these

vulgar, becomes

a k e y w o r d i n A c t I , S c e n e i i . C l a u d i u s is u n a w a r e o f , o r refuses to acknowledge, his stepson's p u n , b u t h e seems m a g n e t i c a l l y a t t r a c t e d to " c o m m o n " in his n e x t speech: F o r w h a t w e k n o w m u s t b e a n d is as c o m m o n A s a n y t h e m o s t v u l g a r t h i n g t o sense, W h y should w e in o u r peevish opposition T a k e it t o h e a r t ?

(1.2.98-101)

C l a u d i u s is c o n v e n i e n t l y m a k i n g t h e l i n k f o r u s b e t w e e n "common"

and

"vulgar,"

and

he

goes

on

Gertrude's truisms about mortality: nature's t h e m e / Is d e a t h o f f a t h e r s "

to

repeat

"common

( 1 0 3 - 4 ) . T h e k i n g is n o t a

m a n to be o v e r w h e l m e d by the death of those n e a r a n d dear to him. I n t h e c o n t e x t o f A c t I , S c e n e ii, H a m l e t w o u l d p r o b a b l y i n t e r p r e t t h e k i n g ' s first w o r d s t o h i m i n a p u n n i n g sense:

" B u t now, m y cousin

Hamlet,

— 287 —

and my

son—"

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

(64). " C o u s i n " and "cozen" are

homophones, 2 3

(to cheat, to conycatch)

and we remember how

H a m l e t is b y his uncle's " c o z ' n a g e "

disgusted

(5.2.67). I n

Rich-

ard III, Q u e e n E l i z a b e t h q u i b b l e s b i t t e r l y o n R i c h a r d ' s m u r d e r of h e r c h i l d r e n : King

Richard.

Y o u speak as if that I h a d slain m y

Elizabeth.

Cousins, i n d e e d ; a n d b y their u n c l e

cousins. Queen

cozen'd Of comfort, kingdom, kindred, f r e e d o m , life. (4.4.221-23) U n l i k e " c o u s i n " i n its m o d e r n usage, the E l i z a b e t h a n w o r d is a g e n e r a l t e r m f o r a f a m i l y r e l a t i o n s h i p m o r e distant than b r o t h e r or sister. If the " c o u s i n - c o z e n " p u n i n Hamlet

seems f a r f e t c h e d to us, w e o u g h t to k e e p i n

m i n d that E l i z a b e t h a n playgoers w e r e m o r e sensitive to w o r d p l a y t h a n w e are a n d p l a c e d a m u c h h i g h e r v a l u e o n it as an expression of w i t . T h e h i g h l y sophisticated spectator m i g h t test his v e r b a l skill o n H a m l e t ' s "Seems, m a d a m ? N a y , it is. I k n o w n o t 'seems.' " ( 1 . 2 . 7 6 ) . H a m l e t can distinguish b e t w e e n a p p e a r a n c e a n d reality, t h e " s e a m y side"

( O t h e l l o 4.2.147)

f r o m the fair o u t w a r d

g a r m e n t ; a n d " s e a m " also m e a n s hog's lard, as i n the " r a n k sweat of a n e n s e a m e d b e d " (3.4.93). I w o u l d n o t w a n t to a r g u e Shakespeare's i n t e n t i o n i n these t w o ex28

the

See Walter W . Skeat, A Concise English

Robert

Language

Nares, A

Etymological

Dictionary

(New York, 1963), first published,

Glossary,

rev. J.

O.

Halliwell

and

W r i g h t (London, 1905); and Eric Partridge, A Dictionary Underworld

(New York, 1950), under "cousin."

— 288 —

of 1882;

Thomas of

the

HAMLET amples, b u t p u n n i n g is a reflex, a n d o n c e the possibility of p u n s is a c k n o w l e d g e d , the E n g l i s h l a n g u a g e has so m a n y m u l t i p l e m e a n i n g s that it is difficult to a v o i d wordplay. "The mirth,"24

p r e t e n d e d madness of

Hamlet

causes

much

o b s e r v e d S a m u e l J o h n s o n , w h o was always o n

the l o o k o u t f o r a m u s e m e n t i n Shakespeare.

Hamlet's

w i t t y style is chiefly, b u t n o t e x c l u s i v e l y , c o n n e c t e d w i t h his " m a d " scenes. T h e o b t u s e objects of his satirical w i t are sometimes d i m l y a w a r e that they are b e i n g ridic u l e d . I n the f i s h m o n g e r d i a l o g u e , for e x a m p l e , Polonius k n o w s that " T h o u g h this b e madness, yet there is m e t h o d i n ' t " (2.2.207-8) , a n d w e are assured f r o m o t h e r scenes that the l o r d c h a m b e r l a i n is a g o o d j u d g e of " m e t h o d . " H e sums u p H a m l e t ' s w i t t y style in a n adm i r i n g aside: " H o w p r e g n a n t sometimes his replies are! A happiness that o f t e n madness hits on, w h i c h reason a n d sanity c o u l d n o t so prosperously b e d e l i v e r e d o f " ( 2 1 0 - 1 3 ) . H a m l e t ' s repliques

are " p r e g n a n t " w i t h sig-

nificances b e y o n d those of s i m p l e d e n o t a t i o n ,

which

h e is " d e l i v e r e d o f " — t o c o m p l e t e the i m a g e — " p r o s p e r o u s l y " a n d w i t h a n i n t u i t i v e Tightness or " h a p p i n e s s . " P o l o n i u s seems to b e confessing that madness has some stylistic advantages o v e r reason a n d sanity. T h e r e is a m p l e justification f o r P o l o n i u s ' f e e l i n g of i n a d e q u a c y i n the

fishmonger

scene, w h e r e he b e c o m e s

the "straight m a n " f o r H a m l e t ' s wit, the o n e w h o feeds h i m the p r o p e r n a i v e a n d literal lines. E v e n so n e u t r a l a v e r b a l f o r m u l a as " M y l o r d , I w i l l take m y leave of you"

(215-16) stimulates o n e of H a m l e t ' s m o s t u n f o r -

2* Johnson's

Notes

to Shakespeare,

— 289 —

ed. Arthur Sherbo, p. 181.

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

g e t t a b l e r e j o i n d e r s : " Y o u c a n n o t take f r o m m e a n y t h i n g that I w i l l m o r e w i l l i n g l y p a r t w i t h a l " ( 2 1 7 - 1 8 ) . H a m let's chief trick w i t h P o l o n i u s is " l i k e F r e n c h f a l c o n e r s " to "fly at a n y t h i n g w e see" (439-40), a n d his p u n n i n g is relentless a n d u n r e m i t t i n g . " C o n c e p t i o n is a blessing, b u t as y o u r d a u g h t e r m a y conceive, f r i e n d , l o o k t o ' t " (185-87). T h e father is a " f i s h m o n g e r "

(174)

for " a

g o o d kissing c a r r i o n " (182) as w e l l as a fisher i n H a m let's o w n t r o u b l e d waters. H a m l e t ' s " m a t t e r " (195) m a y b e e i t h e r a l e g a l dispute or " W o r d s , words, w o r d s " (194) that r e v e a l the physical d e c r e p i t u d e of o l d m e n , w h o cannot "like a crab . . . go backward"

(205-6).

Besides H a m l e t ' s o w n w o r d f o r it, there is g o o d evid e n c e i n the p l a y that his " a n t i c d i s p o s i t i o n " is deliberately " p u t o n " (1.5.172). A t a n u m b e r of points, H a m l e t changes s u d d e n l y f r o m his n o r m a l to his " m a d " style. L i k e M a l e v o l e i n The Malcontent his speech"

(1.4.43

s -d.)

, 25

( 1 6 0 4 ) , he

"shifteth

a q u i c k m o v e m e n t f r o m verse

to prose b y w h i c h M a r s t o n m a r k s the r e t u r n to the malcontent's role. T h e verse-prose distinction is n o t so consistently m a i n t a i n e d i n Hamlet,

b u t the shifts f r o m m a d

to r e a s o n a b l e style are q u i t e clear a n d w e r e p r o b a b l y ind i c a t e d o n stage b y a c h a n g e of voice. A t the e n t r a n c e of P o l o n i u s , f o r e x a m p l e , H a m l e t adopts a d i f f e r e n t t o n e f r o m the o n e h e has b e e n u s i n g w i t h R o s e n c r a n t z a n d G u i l d e n s t e r n , a n d h e e v e n takes the t r o u b l e to e x p l a i n to t h e m w h a t h e is d o i n g : " I w i l l p r o p h e s y h e c o m e s to tell m e of the players. M a r k i t . — Y o u say r i g h t , sir; a Monday

morning,

26 Marston, The The

Question

'twas

Malcontent,

of Hamlet,

then

indeed"

(2.2.395-97) •

ed. M. L. Wine, p. 36. See Levin,

pp. 117-18.

— 290 —

HAMLET " P r o p h e s y " is an a m u s i n g l y p o r t e n t o u s w o r d that seems to carry H a m l e t r i g h t i n t o his m a n t i c v a t i c i n a t i o n a b o u t Monday morning. I n the play scene h e w a r n s H o r a t i o of a n i m m i n e n t c h a n g e i n his discourse: " T h e y are c o m i n g to the play: I must be idle;/ Get you a place"

(3.2.92-93). " I d l e "

m e a n s foolish, v a i n , frivolous, thoughtless, a n d absurd, q u a l i t i e s b r e d b y i n a c t i v i t y a n d lack of

employment.

L i k e T o u c h s t o n e a n d o t h e r professional fools, H a m l e t "uses his f o l l y l i k e a stalking-horse, a n d u n d e r the prese n t a t i o n of that he shoots his w i t " (As You Like

It 5.4.

100-1). F r o m his p r e t e n d e d madness h e gains the satirical license of the a l l o w e d f o o l , so that h e can g o a d the k i n g a n d q u e e n freely w i t h his barbs. H a m l e t ' s f r a n t i c g a i e t y b e f o r e a n d d u r i n g the p l a y is a k i n d of e n t e r t a i n m e n t i n its o w n r i g h t , a c a l c u l a t e d e x a c e r b a t i o n . H e is " m e r r y " ( 3 . 2 . 1 2 5 ) , as O p h e l i a says, since h e m u s t c o u n t e r a c t the p o m p o u s f o r m a l i t i e s of the tragedy n o w p l a y i n g . H a m l e t has a m o r e difficult r o l e t h a n a n y of the professional actors, b u t h e carries it off w i t h w o n d e r f u l a p l o m b . I n Francis Fergusson's description, H a m l e t acts "as s h o w m a n , as master of ceremonies, as c l o w n , as n i g h t - c l u b e n t e r t a i n e r w h o l e w d l y

jokes

w i t h the embarrassed patrons." 2 6 T h e i m p r o v i s a t i o n bel o n g s to a p r e p a r e d part, b u t it is n e v e r m o r e i n v i n c i b l y r i g h t t h a n i n this scene. H e is also, of course, a m u s i n g himself a n d H o r a t i o w i t h his stylistic virtuosity, as i n his alliterative l i n e that anticipates the style of the o l d play: " M a r r y , this is m i c h i n g m a l l e c h o ; it m e a n s misc h i e f " (142-43). I n this c o n t e x t , H a m l e t ' s auditors w e r e 26 Fergusson, The

Idea

of a Theater,

— 291 —

p. 134.

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

as l i k e l y to b e mystified b y the f o r e i g n w o r d " m a l l e c h o " as w e are. H a m l e t ' s w i t t y style r u n s t h r o u g h o u t the play, a n d it is associated n o t o n l y w i t h his supposed madness, b u t also w i t h scenes of h e i g h t e n e d e m o t i o n , as in his " w i l d and whirling words"

(1.5.133)

a f t e r the revelations of

t h e G h o s t , a n d i n his l y r i c e x c l a m a t o r y speeches a n d songs a f t e r the success of The Mousetrap.

T h e most neg-

lected w i t t y s e q u e n c e is Scenes ii a n d iii of A c t

IV,

w h e r e there is an i r o n i c contrast b e t w e e n H a m l e t ' s prese n t s t a t u s — " W i t h o u t , m y l o r d ; g u a r d e d , to k n o w y o u r p l e a s u r e " ( 4 . 3 . 1 4 ) , as R o s e n c r a n t z puts i t — a n d his absolute self-assurance. W i t h c o l l o q u i a l m o c k e r y , h e taunts the k i n g a n d his court, w h o s e o n l y defense is to p r e t e n d n o t to u n d e r s t a n d . In H a m l e t ' s talk w i t h R o s e n c r a n t z a n d G u i l d e n s t e r n , he steadfastly refuses to answer t h e i r questions w i t h a n y t h i n g e x c e p t " p r e g n a n t "

nonsense.

R o s e n c r a n t z begins: " W h a t h a v e y o u done, m y lord, w i t h the d e a d b o d y ? " (4.2.5), to w h i c h H a m l e t r e p l i e s as the pharmacist-preacher: " C o m p o u n d e d it w i t h dust, w h e r e t o 'tis k i n " ( 6 ) . It is, i n fact, " A little m o r e than k i n " to dust, b e i n g dead, " a n d less than k i n d " n o l o n g e r b e i n g i n the n a t u r a l state of

(1.2.65),

the

living.

H a m l e t seems to b e energetically d e v o t i n g himself i n these scenes to m a k i n g " t h e g a l l e d j a d e w i n c h " 2 4 8 ) , w h i l e b r a z e n l y asserting h o w " u n w r u n g "

(3.2. (249)

his o w n w i t h e r s are. H e taunts R o s e n c r a n t z w i t h a dogg e r e l r i d d l e : " T h e b o d y is w i t h the K i n g , b u t the K i n g is n o t w i t h the b o d y . T h e K i n g is a t h i n g — " (4.2.27-28) . D o e s H a m l e t m e a n that P o l o n i u s ' b o d y is w i t h

the

K i n g of K i n g s r a t h e r than w i t h the k i n g of D e n m a r k ? O r — 292 —

HAMLET that the k i n g of D e n m a r k is n o t yet w i t h the b o d y of P o l o n i u s , b u t w i l l shortly be? If the " K i n g is a t h i n g , " h e c a n n o t also b e a person, a n d t h e r e f o r e is already k i n to dusty matter. T h e s e p o r t e n t o u s little truisms m a y h a v e w h a t e v e r m e a n i n g w e m a y choose to g i v e t h e m ; H a m l e t m e r e l y w a n t s to t w i t R o s e n c r a n t z a n d G u i l d e n stern for their s t u p i d questions. G u i l d e n s t e r n ' s o n l y cont r i b u t i o n to this scene is his shock at H a m l e t ' s treasonous words: " A thing, m y l o r d ? " ( 2 9 ) , w h i c h H a m l e t u n d e r cuts w i t h a n o t h e r p a r a d o x : " O f n o t h i n g . B r i n g m e to him"

(30). A s L a e r t e s says of his m a d sister's songs:

" T h i s n o t h i n g ' s m o r e than m a t t e r "

(4.5.173) ,27

W i t h C l a u d i u s , H a m l e t is so m u c h at his ease that he can e n j o y the p e r t u r b a t i o n i n t o w h i c h h e has t h r o w n the c o u r t b y k i l l i n g P o l o n i u s . T o u n d e r m i n e the official interrogation,

Hamlet

m a k e s jokes at C l a u d i u s '

ex-

pense. A t the k i n g ' s second d e m a n d , " W h e r e is Polon i u s ? " (4.3.32), H a m l e t seems to b e d e l i v e r i n g a factual answer: " I n h e a v e n . Send t h i t h e r to see. If y o u r messenger find h i m n o t there, seek h i m i' th' o t h e r place yourself"

(33-35). T h e r e is an i m p l i c a t i o n that

the

k i n g ' s messenger service is as extensive as his spy system. T o cap it off, H a m l e t m o c k s the k i n g ' s officious haste i n d i s p a t c h i n g his attendants: " ' A w i l l stay till you come" 27

See

( 3 9 ) . H a m l e t has presented the k i n g w i t h

Rosalie

L.

Colie,

Paradoxia

Epidemica

(Princeton:

Princeton University Press, 1966), esp. Chap. 7: " 'Nothing is b u t what is not': Solutions to the Problem of Nothing." Miss Colie explores the sexual implications of "thing," "nothing," and "something." T h e r e is possible wordplay on "nothing-noting," were homophones speare's

Pronunciation,

in Shakespeare's

time;

see Kokeritz,

pp. 132, 233, and 320.

— 293 —

which Shake-

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

his o w n little g r a v e y a r d scene, w i t h some m e n a c i n g h i n t s a b o u t his i m m i n e n t arrival there. I n a final thrust, H a m l e t b i d s f a r e w e l l to h i m as " d e a r M o t h e r "

( 4 g ) , since

" m a n a n d w i f e is o n e flesh" ( 5 2 ) , a n o t h e r satirical rem i n d e r of C l a u d i u s ' m e t h o d of u s u r p a t i o n . It w o u l d b e w r o n g to call H a m l e t b i t t e r i n this scene. H e is clownish, antic, grotesque, i n h i g h spirits, a n d very u n c o n strained, e v e n t h o u g h h e is n o w u n d e r g u a r d a n d a b o u t to b e s h i p p e d to his death i n E n g l a n d . I t is this self-possession of H a m l e t ' s w i t t y style that m a k e s C l a u d i u s so p o w e r f u l l y uneasy, e v e n i n a m o m e n t of s e e m i n g victory: " T i l l I k n o w 'tis done,/ H o w e ' e r m y haps, m y joys were ne'er b e g u n "

(67-68).

H a m l e t ' s w i t t y style is p u t directly to the test o n l y once, i n the scene w i t h the C l o w n - g r a v e d i g g e r , a n d w e h a v e the impression that the p r i n c e c a n n o t stand u p to the C l o w n ' s i n t r a n s i g e n t p u n n i n g a n d logic-chopping, so r e m i n i s c e n t of Shakespeare's earliest comedies. T h e C l o w n m u s t always h a v e the final w o r d i n each of his q u i d p r o quos, b u t he is slow a n d p l o d d i n g a b o u t it a n d does n o t m e a n to rush the t r i u m p h of his m o t h e r w i t o v e r a g e n t l e m a n . W i t h a m u s e d exasperation,

Hamlet

a c k n o w l e d g e s his d e f e a t : " H o w a b s o l u t e the k n a v e is! W e m u s t speak b y the card, or e q u i v o c a t i o n w i l l u n d o us"

(5.1.139-40). H a m l e t ' s w o r d s h a v e strong

moral

connotations, especially " e q u i v o c a t i o n , " so i m p o r t a n t a t e r m f o r the " j u g g l i n g f i e n d s " of Macbeth

(5.8.19). T h e

" c a r d " is the compass card, b y w h o s e thirty-two points sailors steer, b u t H a m l e t has n e v e r b e e n o n e to speak so m a t h e m a t i c a l l y . T h e C l o w n , h o w e v e r , has b e e n p u t t i n g h i m o n his — 294 —

HAMLET m e t t l e , c o m p l e t i n g the prince's e d u c a t i o n as a wit. T h e representative h e r o of this scene is Y o r i c k , o l d H a m l e t ' s fool, " a f e l l o w of infinite jest, of m o s t e x c e l l e n t f a n c y , " w h o was " w o n t to set the table o n a r o a r "

(5.1.186-87,

192-93). I t is Y o r i c k ' s s k u l l that H a m l e t h o l d s i n his h a n d a n d contemplates, as if to a b s o r b some part of that " i n f i n i t e j e s t " i n o r d e r t o p r e p a r e himself f o r the

final

e n c o u n t e r w i t h his enemies.

The Passionate Style " P a s s i o n " a n d " p a s s i o n a t e " are c o m p l e x w o r d s E l i z a b e t h a n E n g l i s h , a n d Hamlet

in

m a k e s m o r e significant

use of t h e m than does a n y o t h e r p l a y of Shakespeare. W h e n H a m l e t asks the First P l a y e r f o r a "taste of y o u r q u a l i t y , " h e specifies " a passionate speech"

(2.2.441-42).

H e r e passion is the strong e m o t i o n aroused b y P y r r h u s ' relentless r e v e n g e , P r i a m ' s p i t i f u l slaughter, a n d H e c u ba's w i t h e r i n g grief. I n the Player's speech, the death of o l d P r i a m " W o u l d h a v e m a d e m i l c h the b u r n i n g eyes of h e a v e n / A n d passion i n the g o d s "

(528-29).

"The

b u r n i n g eyes of h e a v e n " are p r e s u m a b l y the stars, n o w w e e p i n g tears i n a c o n c e i t e d a n a l o g y w i t h the M i l k y W a y , b u t the n o r m a l l y c a l m a n d dispassionate

gods

w o u l d themselves b e m o v e d to compassion as the First P l a y e r is, w i t h "tears in's eyes" ( 5 3 1 ) , f o r w h a t H a m l e t calls m e r e l y " a fiction" a n d " a d r e a m of passion"

(562).

" P a s s i o n " i n its g e n e r a l sense is a n y v e h e m e n t , comm a n d i n g , or o v e r p o w e r i n g e m o t i o n ; i n its m o r e

re-

stricted sense it m e a n s v i o l e n t sorrow. T h u s , the P l a y e r Q u e e n "makes King

dead"

passionate

action"

(3.2.140 s.d.). — 295 —

w h e n she "finds

the

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

A c c o r d i n g to Renaissance psychology, the

passions

are a basic h u m a n faculty, s u b o r d i n a t e b u t necessary to the reason, w h i c h p r o v i d e s the m o t i v e force for hum a n actions. 2 8 T h i s d o c t r i n e is n e a t l y s u m m a r i z e d

in

the P l a y e r K i n g ' s c o u p l e t : W h a t to ourselves i n passion w e propose, T h e passion e n d i n g , d o t h the purpose

lose.

(3.2.200-1) H a m l e t ' s a p o l o g y to the G h o s t f o r b e i n g " l a p s e d

in

t i m e a n d passion" (3.4.108) is based o n the same n o t i o n , because r e v e n g e is n o t possible w i t h o u t a m o t i v a t i n g " p a s s i o n . " T h i s is the vital h u m a n q u a l i t y that

the

Stoics w e r e m i s t a k e n l y t r y i n g to dispense w i t h , since the efficient cause for all acts of the w i l l , e v e n v i r t u o u s ones, is the p r i o r p e r t u r b a t i o n of the passions. W e m a y c o n c l u d e that passion is an a m b i v a l e n t q u a l i t y that, dep e n d i n g u p o n the d e g r e e of r a t i o n a l control, m a y prod u c e either e m o t i o n a l l y p o w e r f u l expression o r selfi n d u l g e n t a n d histrionic rant. H a m l e t ' s passionate style is chiefly associated

with

his soliloquies, w h i c h are the m o s t m i s u n d e r s t o o d stylistic f e a t u r e of the play. A c c o r d i n g to the t r a d i t i o n a l v i e w , as stated b y D o w d e n , they are " t h e u t t e r a n c e of t h o u g h t i n solitude," 2 9 b u t it seems to m e that n e i t h e r t h o u g h t n o r s o l i t u d e — w i t h all their c o n n o t a t i o n s of R o m a n t i c 28

See Lily B. Campbell, Shakespeare's

of Passion

Tragic

Heroes:

Slaves

(New York, 1959), esp. Chap. 6. First published by

Cambridge University Press, 1930. 29

and

Edward Dowden, Shakspere: Art

A

Critical

Study

of His

Mind

(New York, 1881), p. 111. See also the passage from

L a m b on page x x i of the Introduction.

— 296 —

HAMLET lyric p o e t r y — a r e p r o p e r l y r e l e v a n t to the d r a m a t i c soliloquy. 3 0 It is a d m i t t e d l y a p r i v a t e as o p p o s e d to a p u b lic expression, a n d it is s p o k e n b y a character o n stage, as if to himself, b u t w e m u s t r e m e m b e r that it is int e n d e d to b e o v e r h e a r d b y the a u d i e n c e a n d is a f o r m of direct address to that a u d i e n c e . T h i s is h a r d l y "solit u d e . " R a t h e r t h a n expressing " t h o u g h t " i n o u r m o d e r n sense of discursive reasoning, the s o l i l o q u y in

Hamlet

is u s e d p r i m a r i l y to g i v e free v e n t to e m o t i o n s that m u s t o t h e r w i s e b e suppressed. It is this passionate, e m o t i o n a l q u a l i t y that m a k e s the s o l i l o q u y so d i f f e r e n t i n k i n d f r o m o t h e r speeches. Stylistically, s o l i l o q u y represents a radical d e p a r t u r e f r o m the n o r m of d r a m a t i c d i a l o g u e , so that there is special n e e d to m a k e a s m o o t h transition f r o m o n e to the other. Shakespeare u s u a l l y takes pains to create a c r e d i b l e situation f o r the s o l i l o q u y , especially i n A c t I, Scene ii, w h e r e the c o n t e x t is c a r e f u l l y d e v e l o p e d i n r e l a t i o n to the speech that w i l l f o l l o w . A l t h o u g h this is H a m l e t ' s first a p p e a r a n c e i n the play, he speaks o n l y fifteen lines b e f o r e his s o l i l o q u y . H e m u s t listen w i t h ill-concealed disgust to the n e w k i n g ' s p l a t i t u d e s a b o u t m o u r n i n g , w h i l e the gay court, i n c l u d i n g his m o t h e r , takes u p its business a g a i n as if the e l d e r H a m l e t h a d n e v e r existed. F o u r of H a m l e t ' s speeches i n this scene are " o n e - l i n e r s " : " A little m o r e than k i n , a n d less than k i n d ! " ( 6 5 ) , s p o k e n aside; " N o t so, m y lord. I a m too 30

See the perceptive comments on the Romantic interpretation

of soliloquy

in Robert Langbaum,

The

Poetry

of

Experience

(New York, 1963), Chap. 5: "Character versus Action in Shakespeare." First published,

1957.

— 297 —

DRAMATIC m u c h i n the s u n "

CHARACTER

(67) ; " A y , m a d a m , it is c o m m o n "

( 7 4 ) ; a n d " I shall in all m y best obey you, m a d a m " ( 1 2 0 ) . H a m l e t also speaks eleven lines o n the theme of appearance and reality: "Seems, madam? N a y , it is . . ." (76-86), w h i c h

Claudius

tactfully

ignores.

Hamlet's

b r o o d i n g passivity i n this scene provides the context for his first soliloquy. 3 1 L i k e C o r d e l i a , he understands h o w to b e an outcast f r o m fashionable pieties: " L o v e , a n d be silent" ( K i n g Lear

1 . 1 . 6 1 ) . B y the time the k i n g a n d

q u e e n and their followers exit w i t h a flourish at l i n e 128, H a m l e t is ready to burst i n t o a torrent of passionate words. H a m l e t ' s soliloquy is entirely different f r o m the artf u l oration of C l a u d i u s at the b e g i n n i n g of this scene, w i t h its c o m p l e x syntax, e p i g r a m m a t i c wit, a n d calculated antitheses. H a m l e t is n o t artless, b u t his speech avoids any effects of the polished style. T h e r e is a g o o d deal of variety in the r h y t h m s and irregularity i n the meter, and H a m l e t tries to give the impression of a natural, e m o t i o n a l utterance that follows the w i n d i n g turns of thought. T h e r e is a passionate insistence on the brief interval of time, " A little m o n t h "

(1.2.147), between

the death of H a m l e t ' s father and the remarriage of his mother. T h i s is the leitmotif of the soliloquy, the gross reality that dominates H a m l e t ' s disgust a n d also dominates the syntax b y a series of parenthetical reminders: 31

Ophelia

is in a similarly

constrained

situation

in A c t

I,

Scene iii, as she listens to the homilies of her brother and father. O f the 136 lines in the scene, she speaks only 13 f u l l lines and 8 part-lines; u p to line 45 she says only, " D o y o u d o u b t that?" a n d " N o more b u t so?"

(10). U n l i k e

Hamlet

in the

scene, she has no soliloquy to release her pent-up emotions.

— 298 —

(4)

previous

HAMLET W h y , she w o u l d h a n g o n h i m A s if increase of a p p e t i t e h a d g r o w n B y w h a t it f e d o n ; a n d yet w i t h i n a m o n t h — L e t m e n o t t h i n k o n ' t ; frailty, thy n a m e is w o m a n — A little m o n t h , or ere those shoes w e r e o l d W i t h w h i c h she f o l l o w e d m y p o o r father's b o d y L i k e N i o b e , all tears, w h y she, e v e n s h e — O G o d , a beast that w a n t s discourse of reason W o u l d have m o u r n e d l o n g e r — m a r r i e d with my uncle, M y father's b r o t h e r , b u t n o m o r e l i k e m y father T h a n I to H e r c u l e s . W i t h i n a m o n t h , E r e yet the salt of m o s t u n r i g h t e o u s tears H a d l e f t the f l u s h i n g i n h e r g a l l e d eyes, She m a r r i e d .

(1.2.143-56)

T h e m o d e r n dashes indicate breaks i n the syntax that w o u l d b e expressed b y the actor's changes of voice, tone, a n d tempo. H a m l e t ' s passion d e v e l o p s i n this s o l i l o q u y t h r o u g h these repetitions, e m p h a s i z e d b y the

abrupt

shifts i n the r h y t h m . I t is i n t e r e s t i n g to n o t e that i n the " v e r y

torrent,

tempest, a n d . . . w h i r l w i n d " (3.2.6) of H a m l e t ' s soliloq u y , his disgust turns fetishistically to his m o t h e r ' s shoes — " A little m o n t h , o r ere those shoes w e r e o l d "

(1.2.

1 4 7 ) . W e c a n i m a g i n e h i m b r o o d i n g o n those shoes d u r i n g his l o n g silence i n this scene, as his " v a i l e d l i d s " seek f o r his " n o b l e father i n the d u s t "

(70-71).

H a m l e t ' s trick of d o u b l i n g a n d t r i p l i n g his words, 3 2 a 32

Hamlet's repetition of words is probably not so distinctive

a feature of his style as Bradley thought (Shakespearean pp. 148-49). See also Levin, The Wilson, The

Manuscript

Question

of Shakespeare's

— 299 —

of Hamlet, Hamlet,

Tragedy, p. 49, and

I, 79-82. Many

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

r h e t o r i c a l device that e n c o u r a g e s the f e e l i n g of insistent stress, is e v i d e n t i n this soliloquy. H e b e g i n s w i t h a wish f o r his " t o o t o o solid flesh" t o " m e l t , / T h a w , a n d resolve itself i n t o a d e w "

(1.2.129-30), as if he l a c k e d

w o r d s to express his l o n g i n g f o r nothingness, l i k e D r . Faustus' a r d e n t desire for his soul to " b e c h a n g ' d i n t o little w a t e r drops,/ A n d fall i n t o the ocean, n e ' e r b e found."33 H a m l e t exclaims " O God, G o d "

(132)

and

" F i e on't, ah, fie" (135) to d o u b l e the effect of his disgust. " T h a t it s h o u l d c o m e to this" (137) is p a r a l l e l e d i n f o r m b y the b r i e f e r " t h a t was to this" ( 1 3 9 ) . T h e r e is n a g g i n g c o l l o q u i a l

e n e r g y i n the l i n e :

m o n t h s dead, nay, n o t so m u c h , n o t t w o "

"But

two

( 1 3 8 ) , that

turns o n its n e g a t i v e axis. A similarly n e r v o u s a n d rhythm i c a l l y harsh l i n e is: " L i k e N i o b e , all tears, w h y she, e v e n s h e — " ( 1 4 9 ) . T h i s uses the f a m i l i a r figure of inc r e d u l o u s r e p e t i t i o n , b u t H a m l e t m a n a g e s to m a k e it c o n v i n c i n g b y the e m o t i o n a l pressure b e h i n d it. T h e s o l i l o q u y p r o p e r ends at that decisive l i n e : " I t is of Hamlet's most familiar doublets and triplets occur only in the Folio text and are quite possibly playhouse interpolations.

See

Harold Jenkins, "Playhouse Interpolations in the Folio T e x t of Hamlet,"

Studies

in

Bibliography,

XIII

(i960),

31-47.

There

seems to be a consistent pattern in Folio of the expansion

of

words and the economizing of actors. T h e difficult question of "how

additions and deviations of the players came to be incor-

porated" in the Folio text still remains to be answered, as Jenkins acknowledges (p. 47). As an addendum to this topic, it is worth noting that the Ghost has a striking number of triplets in its speech in A c t I, Scene v, as this speech appears in the Quarto 2 text. 33

Christopher Marlowe, Doctor

Faustus,

ed. John D.

T h e Revels Plays (London, 1962), Scene xix, 185-86.

— 300 —

Jump,

HAMLET n o t , n o r it c a n n o t c o m e to g o o d "

( 1 5 8 ) . B y the n e x t

l i n e , " B u t b r e a k m y heart, f o r I m u s t h o l d m y t o n g u e " ( 1 5 9 ) , H a m l e t a l r e a d y sees H o r a t i o , M a r c e l l u s ,

and

B a r n a r d o a p p r o a c h i n g . It is a w a r n i n g to himself

to

p u t o n the mask of silence o r falsely c e r e m o n i a l speech; h e needs to g u a r d himself lest he u t t e r the passionate truths of his first s o l i l o q u y , a n d it is this constraint that h e fears w i l l cause his h e a r t to " b r e a k . " W e m a y also see H a m l e t ' s passionate style at w o r k i n w h a t is a c k n o w l e d g e d to b e his most m e d i t a t i v e speech i n the play: " T o be, or n o t to b e " (3.1.56(1.) . 3 i O n e of the difficulties i n d i a g r a m m i n g the a r g u m e n t of

this

s o l i l o q u y arises f r o m its sinuous, e m o t i o n a l logic, w h i c h proceeds b y v e r b a l association rather t h a n b y a f o r m a l , p r e c o n c e i v e d p l a n . I n the first ten lines, f o r e x a m p l e , the infinitives p e r p e t u a t e themselves i n an o r d e r l y seq u e n c e : " T o be, o r n o t to b e "

(56); "to suffer"

(57)

" O r to take a r m s " ( 5 9 ) ; " T o die, to s l e e p — " (60) a n d " t o say w e e n d " (61) ; " D e v o u t l y to b e wished. 3 5 T o die, to s l e e p — " (64) ; " T o s l e e p — p e r c h a n c e to d r e a m " (65). A f t e r these d o z e n infinitives, there is o n l y o n e m o r e ( " T o g r u n t a n d sweat") 34

ards,

i n the n e x t twenty-five lines.

See the full commentary on this soliloquy in Irving T . Rich"The

M e a n i n g of

Hamlet's Soliloquy," PMLA,

XLVIII

(1933), 741-66. See also C . C. Clarke, " A N o t e on ' T o be or not to b e , ' " Essays

in Criticism,

X

(i960), 18-23,

anfl

A l e x Newell,

" T h e Dramatic Context and Meaning of Hamlet's ' T o be or not to be' Soliloquy," PMLA, 35

LXXX

(1965), 38-50.

T h e r e is much to be said for the lighter punctuation

of

Quarto 2 that Wilson follows here and elsewhere in this speech. Quarto 2 runs together "wished" and " T o die" without any punctuation at all, which does better justice than Folio to the soliloquy's improvisational quality.

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

T h e f o r m is discarded f o r o t h e r m e t h o d s of organization. O n e of t h e effects of all the infinitives is to suspend b o t h the syntax a n d r h y t h m i n a w a y n o t possible i n the indicative m o o d . T h i s is w h a t gives the b e g i n n i n g of the s o l i l o q u y its u n f o r g e t t a b l y slow a n d l i n g e r i n g q u a l i t y . T w o l o n g questions of exactly six a n d a half l i n e s each m a k e u p the central section. T h e s e are q u e s t i o n s w i t h a set of v i v i d e x a m p l e s to illustrate w h a t it m e a n s to " b e a r the w h i p s a n d scorns of t i m e "

(70),

a v e n g i n g lashes of H i e r o n i m o ' s speech i n The

those Spanish

Tragedy: W e l l , h e a v e n is h e a v e n still, A n d there is N e m e s i s a n d Furies, A n d things call'd w h i p s . . . .

(3.11.40-42) 3 6

B u t i n H a m l e t ' s speech the " f a r d e l s " o n e m u s t " b e a r " (3.1.76) are all u n j u s t l y l a i d o n ; they are " t h e spurns/ T h a t p a t i e n t m e r i t of th' u n w o r t h y takes"

(73-74),

T h ' oppressor's w r o n g , the p r o u d m a n ' s c o n t u m e l y , T h e p a n g s of despised love, the law's delay, T h e insolence of office. . . .

(S-1-?1^)

T h e e x a m p l e s d r a w their e l o q u e n c e f r o m the realities of the play. H a m l e t is setting the k n o w n evils of this l i f e against the u n k n o w n " d r e a d of s o m e t h i n g a f t e r d e a t h "

(78),

just as O p h e l i a says mysteriously: " L o r d , w e k n o w w h a t w e are, b u t k n o w n o t w h a t w e m a y b e " (4.5.43-44), a n d the P l a y e r K i n g traces a process i n w h i c h 36

Kyd, The

Spanish

Tragedy,

ed. Philip Edwards, p. 126

T h i r d Addition).

— 302 —

(The

HAMLET O u r wills a n d fates d o so c o n t r a r y r u n T h a t o u r devices still are o v e r t h r o w n ; O u r t h o u g h t s are ours, their ends n o n e of o u r o w n . (3.2.217-19) H a m l e t is h e r e " t h i n k i n g too precisely o n th' e v e n t " ( 4 . 4 . 4 1 ) , or, as H o r a t i o tells h i m : " ' T w e r e to consider too curiously, to consider so" (5.1.207-8) . H e is t r y i n g to u n d e r s t a n d w h y h e w i l l n o t m a k e " h i s q u i e t u s . . ./ W i t h a bare b o d k i n "

(3.1.75-76). I n a practical sense

the s o l i l o q u y is a b o u t suicide, o r the r e j e c t i o n of suicide, a l t h o u g h this is o n l y part of a l a r g e r discourse. T h e consideration of " s o m e t h i n g a f t e r d e a t h " " p u z zles the w i l l " ( 3 . 1 . 7 8 , 8 0 ) , so that one's passionate argum e n t s c a n n o t l e a d to any clear-cut decision. " P u z z l e s " was a m u c h stronger a n d rarer w o r d i n Shakespeare's t i m e than it is today. I t m e a n t p e r p l e x e s , c o n f o u n d s , bewilders, puts i n a maze, as E n o b a r b u s tells C l e o p a t r a that h e r presence i n battle " n e e d s m u s t puzzle A n t o n y " (Antony

and

Cleopatra

3.7.10)

and thereby

destroy

h i m , a n d as Feste the c l o w n mystifies the supposedly m a d M a l v o l i o b y i n f o r m i n g h i m that " t h e r e is n o darkness b u t i g n o r a n c e ; i n w h i c h t h o u art m o r e p u z z l e d than the E g y p t i a n s i n their f o g " (Twelfth

Night

4.2.41-43).

T h e e n d of H a m l e t ' s s o l i l o q u y is d e l i b e r a t e l y anticlimactic a n d unsatisfactory: T h u s conscience does m a k e cowards of us all, A n d thus the n a t i v e h u e of r e s o l u t i o n Is sicklied o'er w i t h the p a l e cast of t h o u g h t , A n d enterprises of great p i t c h a n d m o m e n t , W i t h this r e g a r d their currents t u r n awry, A n d lose the n a m e of action. — 303 —

(3.1.83-88)

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

" T h u s , " " A n d thus," a n d " W i t h this r e g a r d " are all terms of a logical c o n c l u s i o n i n w h i c h n o t h i n g c a n b e c o n c l u d e d . T h e r e s o l u t i o n of this s o l i l o q u y does n o t o c c u r u n t i l the last scene of the play, i n w h i c h H a m l e t has c o m e to u n d e r s t a n d the w i s d o m of "rashness"

(5.

2.7) : " O u r i n d i s c r e t i o n s o m e t i m e serves us w e l l / W h e n o u r d e e p plots d o p a l l " (8-9). O n c e he has a r r i v e d at this p o i n t , he n o l o n g e r needs to soliloquize. T h e c r u c i a l fact of the s o l i l o q u y is that the d r a m a t i c character is a l o n e o n stage, or believes himself to be, so that he c a n take stock of his situation, appraise his o w n motives, release his p e n t - u p feelings, o r e v e n — d e s p i t e the a s s u m p t i o n that a l l soliloquies are s i n c e r e — i n d u l g e i n w i s h - f u l f i l l m e n t roles. H a m l e t does all of these things i n d i f f e r e n t soliloquies, a n d W o l f g a n g C l e m e n has rec e n t l y c a l l e d o u r a t t e n t i o n to the " n e w k i n d of dram a t i c s p e e c h " e v i d e n t i n t h e m , " w h i c h b y its r a p i d transitions, its dissolution of syntax, its e x t r a o r d i n a r y e c o n o m y a n d its f u s i o n of several e m o t i o n s a n d ideas can f o l l o w the q u i c k l y c h a n g i n g reactions of a sensitive m i n d b e t t e r t h a n speech i n d i a l o g u e ever c o u l d . " 3 7 If there is t h o u g h t i n the sense of reflection, especially the w e i g h i n g of a l t e r n a t i v e courses of action, it is the sort of passionate t h o u g h t that a t t e m p t s to f o l l o w the psychol o g i c a l turns of an a r g u m e n t as it presents itself i n the m i n d , w i t h all of its i n c o n s e q u e n t i a l i t y , r e p e t i t i o n , intrusive irrelevance, lack of sequence, hesitation,

and

b r o k e n syntax. I n o t h e r words, H a m l e t ' s soliloquies are 37

W o l f g a n g Clemen,

"Shakespeare's

Soliloquies,"

The

Presi-

dential Address of the M o d e r n Humanities Research Association (Cambridge, Eng.: C a m b r i d g e University Press, 1964), p. 22.

— 304 —

HAMLET d r a m a t i c a l l y conceived. T h e y are b y n o m e a n s the d i r e c t expression of Shakespeare's o w n views, a n d their imp o r t a n c e as the soul of the play has b e e n grossly exaggerated.

The Simple Style Hamlet's

simple

style

is n o t

very

extensive,

and

Shakespeare is f o l l o w i n g g o o d p r e c e d e n t i n u s i n g simplicity n o t as a g e n e r a l style, b u t for certain special effects. A l u c i d a n d u n a d o r n e d style was n o t , i n the R e n aissance, t h o u g h t to h a v e the virtues it has since acq u i r e d , especially because i t c o n f l i c t e d w i t h the w i t a n d e l o q u e n c e e x p e c t e d f r o m persons t r a i n e d i n classical rhetoric. S o m e of t h e characteristics of this style are a strongly m o n o s y l l a b i c d i c t i o n w i t h o u t w o r d p l a y , a natu r a l syntax of the subject-verb-object k i n d that avoids s u b o r d i n a t i o n , a n d a literal, n o n f i g u r a t i v e

discourse.

N o t all of these qualities are always present, b u t the p u r p o s e of the style is to speak perspicuously a n d to m a k e all clear. It lends itself especially to h e r o i c assertion, as i n H a m let's r e s o l u t i o n to a c c o m p a n y the G h o s t that " b e c k o n s " (1.4.58) to h i m : " I t w i l l n o t speak. T h e n I w i l l f o l l o w i t " ( 6 3 ) . T h e G h o s t c o n t i n u e s its b e c k o n i n g , a n d H a m let repeats his i n t e n t i o n : " I t w a v e s m e f o r t h again. I'll follow it"

(68). A t the n e x t r e p e t i t i o n , H a m l e t

ad-

dresses the G h o s t directly: " I t w a v e s m e still./ G o o n ; I'll f o l l o w t h e e " (78-79), a n d j u s t b e f o r e h e exits, a f t e r b r e a k i n g away f r o m his friends, he asserts y e t

once

m o r e : " I say, away! G o o n . I'll f o l l o w t h e e " (86). T h e style is u n u s u a l f o r H a m l e t because it is so straightfor— 305 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

w a r d a n d literal, b u t Shakespeare wants to impress us i n a v e r y early scene w i t h his hero's i n c o n t r o v e r t i b l e will. A n o t h e r effect of the simple style i n these early scenes is to create a n a t m o s p h e r e of u n c e r t a i n t y a n d a n x i o u s a n t i c i p a t i o n . T h i s is m o s t b r i l l i a n t l y a c c o m p l i s h e d at the o p e n i n g of the play. T h e a b r u p t part-lines set the m o o d f o r the first a p p e a r a n c e of the G h o s t , w h o s e stylistic effect i n A c t I is to m a k e e v e r y o n e speak w i t h exceptional b r e v i t y , if n o t curtness. W e m a y see this t r u n c a t e d style at its best w h e n H a m l e t questions H o r a t i o

(and

M a r c e l l u s a n d B a r n a r d o ) a b o u t the G h o s t . H i s series of short questions, m i x e d w i t h a f e w e q u a l l y b r i e f assertions, conveys a n u n c a n n y sense of f o r e b o d i n g :

"Saw?

W h o ? " (1.2.190); " T h e K i n g m y father?" ( 1 9 1 ) ; " F o r G o d ' s l o v e l e t m e h e a r ! " ( 1 9 5 ) ; " B u t w h e r e was this?" ( 2 1 2 ) ; " D i d y o u n o t speak to it?"

(214); " ' T i s

very

s t r a n g e " (220). I a m g i v i n g all of H a m l e t ' s w o r d s i n ord e r n o t to falsify the impression his speech makes, w h i c h is radically d i f f e r e n t f r o m that of his usual stylistic invention. H a m l e t continues:

"Indeed,

i n d e e d , sirs, b u t

t r o u b l e s m e . / H o l d y o u the w a t c h t o n i g h t ? " " A r m e d , say y o u ? "

this

(224-25);

( 2 2 6 ) ; " F r o m t o p to toe?"

(228);

" T h e n saw y o u n o t his f a c e " ( 2 2 9 ) ; " W h a t , l o o k e d h e f r o w n i n g l y ? " ( 2 3 1 ) ; " P a l e or r e d ? " ( 2 3 3 ) ; " A n d f i x e d his eyes u p o n y o u ? " ( 2 3 4 ) ; " I w o u l d I h a d b e e n t h e r e " ( 2 3 5 ) ; " V e r y l i k e , v e r y l i k e . Stayed it l o n g ? "

(237);

" H i s b e a r d was grizzled, n o ? " ( 2 4 0 ) ; " I w i l l w a t c h tonight./ Perchance 'twill walk again"

(242-43).

This

k i n d of d i a l o g u e has n o intrinsic e l o q u e n c e , b u t devel— 306 —

HAMLET ops its persuasiveness f r o m the d r a m a t i c c o n t e x t .

The

c o l l o q u i a l skill of these part-lines is also w o r t h r e m a r k ing, especially i n l i n e 240: " H i s b e a r d w a s grizzled, n o ? " T h e r o l e of n a r r a t i o n i n Shakespearean tragedy has n e v e r b e e n f u l l y studied, a l t h o u g h F r a n c i s B e r r y has r e c e n t l y presented some o r i g i n a l speculations a b o u t narr a t i v e "insets." 3 8 T h e simple style lends itself a d m i r a b l y to n a r r a t i o n . I t c a n c o n v e y a l a r g e b o d y of factual material q u i c k l y a n d l u c i d l y , a n d it can also create the impression of actual speech a n d thus e n c o u r a g e a sense of c r e d i b i l i t y i n w h a t is b e i n g said. T h e s e effects are v e r y d i f f e r e n t f r o m those of the r h e t o r i c a l l y h e i g h t e n e d style of Senecan tragedy, i n w h i c h the f o r m a l i t y of the presentation w o r k s against a n y f e e l i n g of v e r i s i m i l i t u d e . T h e use of n a r r a t i o n m a y , i n fact, o f f e r a m e a n i n g f u l comparison b e t w e e n Shakespeare a n d Seneca, since the tragedies of Seneca r e l y so significantly o n reports of action, usually v i o l e n t , that has a l r e a d y taken place offstage. E l i z a b e t h a n audiences, h o w e v e r , l i k e d to savor

their

v i o l e n c e directly, so that there is n o t the same n e e d i n Shakespeare as t h e r e is in Seneca f o r h i g h l y colored, emotional narratives. T h e Player's speech a b o u t the death of P r i a m is, of course, a n e x c e p t i o n , b u t Shakespeare is successfully i m i t a t i n g Seneca's trick of c o m b i n i n g f r a n t i c sensationalism i n the s u b j e c t m a t t e r w i t h the almost excessive c o n t r o l of a h i g h l y w r o u g h t style. O n e of the most effective n a r r a t i o n s i n Hamlet

is the

hero's a c c o u n t of the e x c i t i n g events of his sea v o y a g e to E n g l a n d . I n the s w i f t prose of H a m l e t ' s letter to 38

See Francis Berry, The

Shakespeare

Hamlet.

— 307 —

Inset,

esp. Chap. 8 on

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

H o r a t i o , h e tells his f r i e n d e n o u g h b o t h to satisfy his i m m e d i a t e curiosity a n d to w h e t his a p p e t i t e f o r m o r e details: " E r e w e w e r e t w o days o l d at sea, a pirate of v e r y w a r l i k e a p p o i n t m e n t gave us chase. F i n d i n g ourselves too slow of sail, w e p u t o n a c o m p e l l e d valor, a n d i n the g r a p p l e I b o a r d e d them. O n the instant they g o t clear of o u r ship; so I a l o n e b e c a m e their

prisoner"

(4.6.15-21). T h i s is free of w o r d p l a y , e x c e p t possibly i n the first clause, a n d it has the breezy a n d businesslike pace of prose narratives i n the v o y a g e literature. W e see H a m l e t i n a n e n t i r e l y n e w light, as a r o m a n t i c adventurer at sea, w h o appeals to us, l i k e O t h e l l o , to l o v e h i m " f o r the d a n g e r s " he " h a d pass'd"

(Othello

1.3.167).

T h e u r g e n c y of H a m l e t ' s r e t u r n does n o t a l l o w for leisurely e x p a t i a t i o n ; H o r a t i o is to " r e p a i r " to h i m i n his h i d i n g place " w i t h as m u c h speed as t h o u w o u l d e s t fly death"

(4.6.24-25). T h e letter ends w i t h a n o t h e r tri-

u m p h a n t piece of i n f o r m a t i o n : " R o s e n c r a n t z a n d G u i l denstern h o l d their course for E n g l a n d . O f t h e m I h a v e m u c h to tell thee. F a r e w e l l " (28-30). A s w e can see i n the phrase " h o l d their course," the simple style also offers possibilities for i r o n i c u n d e r s t a t e m e n t : the k i n g ' s agents p u r s u e their d o o m w i t h tenacity a n d u n s h a k a b l e determination! H a m l e t ' s e x u b e r a n c e has f u l l e r scope for its expression i n the scene w i t h H o r a t i o , w h i c h , l i k e A c t I V , Scene vii, b e g i n s v i g o r o u s l y i n the m i d s t of a conversation: m u c h for this, sir; n o w shall y o u see the o t h e r "

"So

(5.2.1).

B y the laws of d r a m a t i c g r a m m a r , " t h i s " has a nonexistent, offstage r e f e r e n t . T h e r e is a fine sense of actual speech: — 308 —

HAMLET Hamlet. Horatio.

Y o u d o r e m e m b e r all the circumstance? R e m e m b e r it, m y l o r d !

(5.2.2-3)

H o r a t i o ' s answer is the e q u i v a l e n t either of " H o w c o u l d I f o r g e t it?" o r " H o w c o u l d y o u ask m e such a question?". H a m l e t ' s n a r r a t i o n i n this scene is m o r e

self-con-

sciously i r o n i c t h a n that of his letter, b u t it is still primarily i n the simple style. L i k e m a n y a n o t h e r a d v e n t u r e story, it b e g i n s w i t h the i n a b i l i t y to sleep: "Sir, i n m y h e a r t there was a k i n d of f i g h t i n g / T h a t w o u l d n o t let m e sleep"

(4-5). T h e steps i n H a m l e t ' s

counter-con-

spiracy are m a r k e d b y active verbs: U p from m y cabin, M y sea g o w n scarfed a b o u t m e , i n the dark G r o p e d I to find o u t t h e m , h a d m y desire, F i n g e r e d their packet, a n d i n fine w i t h d r e w T o m i n e o w n r o o m again, m a k i n g so b o l d , M y fears f o r g e t t i n g m a n n e r s , to unseal T h e i r g r a n d commission. . . .

(5.2.12-18)

T h i s is all o n e breathless sentence that b e g i n s at l i n e 12 a n d c o n t i n u e s t h r o u g h l i n e 25, for w h i c h w e n e e d to recreate the actor's suspension of the parts i n t e l l i n g the story. A l t h o u g h the w o r d s themselves c o n v e y a tactile i m p r e s s i o n — " G r o p e d , " " F i n g e r e d " — t h e r e are n o rhetorical e m b e l l i s h m e n t s to slow d o w n t h e pace of the narrative. H a m l e t takes a g o o d deal of satisfaction i n his o w n r e s o u r c e f u l cleverness, w h i c h is proof to h i m that he can act decisively as w e l l as c u n n i n g l y . I n his enthusiasm — 309 —

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

to g i v e H o r a t i o all the d e t a i l s — a n d to preserve the illusion of d r a m a t i c d i a l o g u e in the m i d s t of n a r r a t i o n — h e asks his f r i e n d t w o v e r y teasing questions: " B u t

wilt

t h o u hear n o w h o w I d i d p r o c e e d ? " (27) a n d " W i l t t h o u k n o w / T h ' effect of w h a t I w r o t e ? "

(36-37). H o r a t i o ,

of course, says w h a t is e x p e c t e d of h i m : " I beseech y o u " (28) a n d " A y , g o o d m y l o r d "

( 3 7 ) , b u t at the n e x t

n a t u r a l pause, it is h e w h o p r o v i d e s the " H o w was this sealed?"

continuity:

(47).

O n e of the effects of the simple style i n this scene is to create a sense of c o l l o q u i a l v e r i s i m i l i t u d e , as i n H a m let's statement: " I sat m e d o w n , / D e v i s e d a n e w commission, w r o t e it f a i r " (31-32). T h e a b b r e v i a t e d speech syntax can dispense w i t h g r a m m a t i c a l connectives.

In

fact, some of H a m l e t ' s periods in this scene are anacolutha, w h i c h d o n ' t m a k e sense g r a m m a t i c a l l y , b u t w h i c h raise n o difficulties at all i n their spoken f o r m . T h e sentence b e g i n n i n g " R a s h l y "

(6) is n e v e r c o m p l e t e d , b u t

seems to b e c o n t i n u e d i n the v e r b s of H a m l e t ' s n e x t speech. L a t e r o n , H a m l e t b e g i n s a q u e s t i o n w h i c h is sudd e n l y b r o k e n a n d t h e n b e g u n again: D o e s it n o t , t h i n k thee, stand m e n o w u p o n — H e that h a t h k i l l e d m y k i n g , a n d w h o r e d m y m o t h e r , P o p p e d i n b e t w e e n th' election a n d m y hopes, T h r o w n o u t his a n g l e f o r m y p r o p e r life, A n d w i t h such c o z ' n a g e — i s ' t n o t p e r f e c t conscience T o q u i t h i m w i t h this arm?

(5.2.63-68)

T h i s passage also uses a series of strong m o n o s y l l a b i c v e r b s — " k i l l e d , " " w h o r e d , " " P o p p e d " — t o emphasize direct action, a n d the b r e a k s i n syntax g i v e the impression — 310 —

HAMLET that certain things m u s t b e said that o v e r r i d e the req u i r e m e n t s of f o r m a l g r a m m a r . T h e most significant use of the simple style i n

Ham-

let, a n d i n all of Shakespeare's tragedies, is to create a sense of tragic calm, a k i n d of t r a n q u i l self-assurance, a t climactic m o m e n t s i n the action. W h e r e a n o t h e r dramatist m i g h t b e i n c l i n e d to h e i g h t e n the crises of his p l a y , Shakespeare d e l i b e r a t e l y frustrates o u r n a t u r a l expectations of g r a n d e u r . H e seems to b e w o r k i n g t o w a r d a f e e l i n g of q u i e t that w i l l transcend m e r e pity f o r the i n e v i t a b l e tragic d o o m . I f i n d this effect m o s t p o w e r f u l l y a c h i e v e d i n King

Lear, i n a series of m o n o s y l l a b i c

lines t o w a r d the e n d of the p l a y : " Y o u d o m e w r o n g to take m e o u t o' th' g r a v e " ( 4 . 7 . 4 5 ) ; " B e y o u r tears wet? Yes, faith. I p r a y w e e p n o t "

(4.7.71); " W h y should a

dog, a horse, a r a t h a v e life,/ A n d t h o u n o b r e a t h at all? T h o u ' l t c o m e n o m o r e " (5-3-3o6-7). T h e r e is a n extraord i n a r y defiance of the art of r h e t o r i c i n these monosyllables, as if Shakespeare c o u l d n o l o n g e r r e l y o n the t r u t h f u l n e s s of a n y t h i n g e x c e p t the simplest expressions. " P r a y y o u u n d o this b u t t o n "

(5.3.309)

is o n e of t h e

m o s t m o v i n g lines i n the play, j u s t because Shakespeare is so d e l i b e r a t e l y s c o r n i n g e l o q u e n c e i n L e a r ' s death speech. T h e gesture that a c c o m p a n i e s the l i n e helps to insure its p o i g n a n c y . T h e r e are n o simple effects i n Hamlet tensity as those i n Lear,

of the same in-

y e t t h e r e is o n e passage t h a t

comes v e r y close. I t occurs j u s t b e f o r e the catastrophe of the play a n d r i g h t a f t e r the stylistic e x t r a v a g a n z a w i t h Osric. H a m l e t has n o w a g r e e d to the f e n c i n g m a t c h w i t h Laertes, b u t h e has a sense of f a t e f u l " g a i n g i v i n g " — 311 —

(5.

DRAMATIC

CHARACTER

2.217) that H o r a t i o confirms: " Y o u w i l l lose this w a g e r , my lord"

( 2 1 0 ) . T h e r a t i o n a l H o r a t i o offers to m a k e

excuses f o r h i m , b u t if H a m l e t wishes to " d e f y a u g u r y " (220), he m u s t r e f u s e H o r a t i o ' s sensible i n t e r v e n t i o n a n d , like Caesar, " g o f o r t h "

( J u l i u s Caesar

2.2.28).

H a m l e t answers H o r a t i o w i t h an a m u s i n g j i n g l e , " N o t a whit"

(5.2.220), that c o m p l e t e s " y o u are n o t fit," b u t

h i s prose a p o l o g i a is a b s o l u t e l y s t r a i g h t f o r w a r d

and

simple: " T h e r e is special p r o v i d e n c e i n the fall of a sparrow. If it b e n o w , 'tis n o t to c o m e ; if it b e n o t to c o m e , it w i l l be n o w ; if it b e n o t n o w , yet it w i l l come. T h e readiness is all. Since n o m a n of a u g h t he leaves k n o w s , w h a t is't to l e a v e betimes? L e t b e "

(220-25).

" T h e readiness is a l l " matches Edgar's " R i p e n e s s is a l l " i n King Lear

(5.2.11) i n b o t h s o u n d a n d sense, as m a n y

c o m m e n t a t o r s h a v e p o i n t e d out, b u t H a m l e t ' s series of twenty-seven m o n o s y l l a b l e s is u n i q u e . T h e e l o q u e n c e of these vatic phrases g r o w s o u t of a n e w sense of tranq u i l l i t y i n H a m l e t . E v e r since his "rashness" (5.2.7) o n the sea v o y a g e p r o v e d to h i m that h e a v e n is " o r d i n a n t " ( 4 8 ) , he has ceased to struggle against his fate. If " T h e readiness is a l l , " then t i m e present a n d time " t o c o m e " — " n o w or whensoever"

(204) — a r e b o t h e q u a l l y sig-

nificant, a n d the o n l y w i s d o m is, as F l o r i o

translates

M o n t a i g n e , " t o learne h o w to d i e . " T h e final t w o m o n o syllables, " L e t b e , " are a m o n g H a m l e t ' s most m e m o r a b l e words. T h e y are m e a n t to tell H o r a t i o that all persuasion is vain, a n d they are also a f a r e w e l l to H a m l e t ' s t u m u l t u o u s past. T h e n e x t l i n e i n the p l a y is the king's: " C o m e , H a m l e t , c o m e , a n d take this h a n d f r o m m e " — 312 —

(226), w h i l e h e

HAMLET t r e a c h e r o u s l y r e c o n c i l e s t h e s w o r d s m a n w i t h his v i c t i m . " L e t b e " e c h o e s i n H a m l e t ' s s p e e c h a f t e r h e has b e e n m o r t a l l y w o u n d e d . H a d h e b u t t i m e n o w a n d c o u l d forestall " t h i s f e l l s e r g e a n t , D e a t h "

( 3 3 7 ) , h e c o u l d a tale

u n f o l d — " B u t l e t it b e " ( 3 3 9 ) . T h a t , too, c a n n o l o n g e r b e a p a r t of a n y m o r t a l c o n c e r n . H a m l e t ' s s i m p l e style h a s a c l a i r v o y a n c e i n it i n this final scene. H e is m o v i n g a w a y f r o m c o m p l e x i t i e s a n d p e r t u r b a t i o n s of

thought

as w e l l as of l a n g u a g e , so t h a t h i s v e r y last w o r d s — i f w e e x c l u d e t h e " O , o, o, o " of F o l i o 3 9 — h a v e a n i r o n i c app r o p r i a t e n e s s f o r a discussion of style: " t h e rest is silence" 39

(359).

Editors agree unanimously in rejecting these quadruple " O "

groans as a playhouse interpolation, although they are generally skeptical about most of the other items on Jenkins' list (see note 32, above). In the Pied Bull Quarto (1608) of King

Lear,

the next

to the last speech of Lear concludes: " O thou wilt come no more, never, never, never, pray you undo this button, thank you sir, O , o, o, o" (Shakespeare Quarto Facsimiles, N u m b e r 1, ed. W . W . Greg [London: O x f o r d University Press, 1939]). T h e dying O's seem to be a characteristic flourish of Richard Burbage that somehow found its way into the copy used by the printer. See Wilson, The

Manuscript

of Shakespeare's

— 313

Hamlet,

—

I, 77-82.

Conclusion S O M E A P O L O G Y is d u e to the r e a d e r for p r e s e n t i n g w h a t m i g h t a p p e a r to b e a f r a g m e n t e d , analytic a p p r o a c h to Hamlet.

I a m conscious of the fact that I seem to b e

t a k i n g the p l a y apart, u n d e r v a r i o u s pretexts, a n d n e v e r p u t t i n g it t o g e t h e r again. I a m n o t t r y i n g to d e m o n strate a n e w n o m i n a l i s t a p p r o a c h to Shakespeare, b u t o n l y a t t e m p t i n g to w o r k o u t rigorously a n d i n d e t a i l the style of

Hamlet.

T h e vast p y r a m i d of l i t e r a t u r e o n the play is d i r e c t e d to " w h a t h a p p e n s i n Hamlet"

a n d w h a t the characters

are like. I t is essentially c o n c e r n e d w i t h w h a t I w o u l d call s u b j e c t matter. H a m l e t ' s delay i n t a k i n g r e v e n g e , f o r e x a m p l e , is a favorite topic, and, i n g o o d

exegetical

fashion, passages are q u o t e d f r o m the p l a y either to supp o r t o r to d e n y the v a l i d i t y of this i n t e r p r e t a t i o n . I f , h o w e v e r , w e l o o k at Hamlet

stylistically (that is, n o t i n

terms of its s u b j e c t matter, b u t i n the w a y that s u b j e c t m a t t e r is r e p r e s e n t e d o r s y m b o l i z e d ) , t h e n delay does n o t seem to b e a significant topic. E v e n w i t h g o o d w i l l , o n e c a n n o t find a m e a n i n g f u l expression of delay emb o d i e d e i t h e r in the i m a g e r y o r i n a n y o t h e r recognizab l e i m a g i n a t i v e f o r m . 1 T h u s , m y c o m m i t m e n t to the style of Hamlet

is a consciously restricted p o i n t of v i e w ,

w h i c h m a y o f f e r some justification f o r e x c l u d i n g a n y talk a b o u t g e n e r a l "issues" of the play. 1

But

see

Robert

Hapgood,

Dramaturgy of Delay," Tulane

"Hamlet Drama

Nearly

Review,

IX

Absurd:

The

(1965), 132-45.

It seems to me that Hapgood's speculations do not have a distinctive application to

Hamlet.

— 314 —

CONCLUSION I a m c o n v i n c e d that there is n o w a pressing n e e d to restore Hamlet

criticism to the play Hamlet,

a n d to dis-

p e l the f e e l i n g a m o n g c u l t i v a t e d persons that it is a conv e n i e n t exercise b o o k f o r i n t e l l e c t u a l divagations. in "Hamlet"

Style

insists n o t o n l y that w e r e a d the play close-

ly, b u t also t h a t w e try to place it i n its theatrical context. I n this sense, the section o n staging a n d structure m a k e s the strongest d e m a n d s o n the r e a d e r to t h i n k of the play as a p e r f o r m a n c e b o t h i n Shakespeare's G l o b e a n d i n the m o d e r n theater. S o m e readers are l i k e l y to b e a l a r m e d b y this strenuous insistence that Hamlet

is a

play, w h i c h w o u l d i m m e d i a t e l y p r e c l u d e certain k i n d s of psychological a n d l y r i c criticism. A l l genres impose l i m i tations w i t h i n w h i c h an a u t h o r m u s t w o r k , b u t these l i m i t a t i o n s m a y also offer characteristic e x c e l l e n c e s — i t is the o l d p a r a d o x of difficulty o v e r c o m e . O n e of the f u n c t i o n s of a critic of Shakespeare, it seems to m e , is to p u r s u e the distinctively d r a m a t i c m e a n s of expression i n his plays. T h i s is the s u b j e c t of P a r t T w o , i n w h i c h I a t t e m p t to relate gesture a n d stage action, s o u n d effects a n d music, costumes, stage properties, a n d the techn i q u e of scenic c o n s t r u c t i o n to the style of

Hamlet.

A l t h o u g h I h a v e n o t tried to d r a w conclusions a b o u t Hamlet,

m y o w n p o i n t of v i e w is strongly i m p l i e d b y

the emphasis o n certain topics r a t h e r t h a n others. I n the section o n i m a g e r y , for e x a m p l e , I h a v e chosen to beg i n w i t h war, w e a p o n s , a n d explosives because I b e l i e v e that Hamlet

is a m u c h m o r e active a n d e n e r g e t i c p l a y

t h a n d o those critics w h o stress disease. I d o n o t r e c o i l f r o m the n o t i o n that Hamlet

m a y be, i n part at least,

u n p l e a s a n t a n d d i s t u r b i n g , f u l l of secrecy, poison, ex— 315 —

CONCLUSION p l o d i n g w e a p o n s , a n d l a c e r a t i n g aggression. If there is a strong sense of disease, as is g e n e r a l l y a c k n o w l e d g e d , it is a h i d d e n disease, craftily concealed, that

"inward

breaks, a n d shows n o cause w i t h o u t / W h y the m a n d i e s " (4.4.28-29). W h e n restored to its c o n t e x t , the R o m a n t i c c o r r u p t i o n that has b e e n a t t r i b u t e d to Hamlet

is f o u n d

to b e m u c h m o r e a part of the traditional w a r f a r e bet w e e n g o o d a n d e v i l than a special p r o p e r t y of the protagonist. W e s h o u l d r e m e m b e r that " S o m e t h i n g is rotten i n the state of D e n m a r k " (1.4.90), n o t just i n H a m let, w h o , a f t e r all, has n o t k i l l e d his father himself, despite the m a l i c i o u s p r o m p t i n g s of F r e u d i a n critics. It is difficult to preserve a " s w e e t P r i n c e "

(5.2.360) i n a

r o t t e n w o r l d , a n d the Ghost's i n j u n c t i o n to his son, " T a i n t n o t thy m i n d "

( 1 . 5 . 8 5 ) , is an impossible re-

straint. I n terms of m y emphasis, t h e n — a s emphasis implies c o n c l u s i o n s — i t s h o u l d b e clear that, l i k e

Kitto,

I a m actively c o n v i n c e d of the presence of evil i n

Ham-

let, a n d that I feel n o weakness, as E l i o t did, i n the "objective correlative." T o p u r s u e this line of i n q u i r y , I w o u l d l i k e to evaluate briefly some of the i m p l i c a t i o n s of Style in

"Hamlet"

f o r a n i n t e r p r e t a t i o n of the play. M y r e a d i n g of the i m a g e r y insists o n a m u c h m o r e significant r o l e f o r C l a u dius than has usually b e e n a c c o r d e d h i m , so that the structure of the play is seen as a conflict b e t w e e n " m i g h t y opposites"

(5.2.62), antagonist set against protagonist.

W e s h o u l d n o t f o r g e t the a d v e n t u r e story o n Hamlet

is based, i n w h i c h w e see h o w

which

overwhelming

are the forces against w h i c h H a m l e t m u s t struggle i n o r d e r to a c h i e v e his r e v e n g e . — 316 —

CONCLUSION T h e i m a g e r y of animals, food, a n d gardens, l i k e the i m a g e r y of disease, reveals s o m e t h i n g i m p o r t a n t a b o u t the w o r l d of the play, w h i c h is as m u c h C l a u d i u s ' w o r l d as H a m l e t ' s . T h i s i m a g e r y conveys a sense of a m o r e g r a c i o u s existence b e f o r e the play b e g a n : H a m l e t was " T h ' e x p e c t a n c y a n d rose of the fair state"

(3.1.155),

H a m l e t ' s father h a d " A station l i k e the h e r a l d M e r c u r y / N e w l i g h t e d o n a heaven-kissing h i l l "

(3.4.59-60),

a n d he was "so l o v i n g " to G e r t r u d e " T h a t he m i g h t n o t b e t e e m the w i n d s of h e a v e n / V i s i t h e r face too r o u g h l y " (1.2.140-42). T h e s e are possibilities that are irretrieva b l y l o s t — c e r t a i n l y n e v e r to b e r e v i v e d b y the r e g i m e of F o r t i n b r a s a n t i c i p a t e d at the e n d of the play. T h e i m a g e r y of l i m i t s h e l p s to define this sense of restriction b y c l a i m i n g that m a n is l i k e a g o d o n l y " i n a p p r e h e n s i o n " ( 2 . 2 . 3 1 5 ) ; i n actuality, m a n is a " q u i n t e s s e n c e of d u s t " ( 3 1 7 ) , h o r r i d l y shaken w i t h " t h o u g h t s b e y o n d the reaches of o u r souls"

(1.4.56).

T h e r e l a t i o n of style to d r a m a t i c character

draws

m o r e directly o n traditional n o t i o n s of style as a n indiv i d u a l f o r m of expression. Style is the m a n , a n d i n a p l a y the w r i t e r m u s t conscientiously p r o v i d e the details that w i l l d i f f e r e n t i a t e o n e character f r o m another. T h i s is easiest to d o a c c o r d i n g to the " h u m o r s " p r i n c i p l e of B e n Jonson, i n w h i c h caricature of a f e w l e a d i n g traits a n d m a n n e r i s m s replaces any extensive characterization. H a m l e t is at an opposite p o l e f r o m M o r o s e i n Jonson's Epicene

( 1 6 0 9 ) , w h o s e insane aversion to noise pro-

vides the s p r i n g f o r his character. T h e r e is n o

such

easy p r i n c i p l e b y w h i c h to grasp H a m l e t ; i n fact, h e has n o single distinctive style, b u t is self-conscious, witty, — 317 —

CONCLUSION passionate, a n d simple as the occasion demands. H e uses these v a r i o u s styles to attack, e x p l o r e , evaluate, a n d e v e n p l a y w i t h the r e a l i t y a r o u n d h i m , a n d o n e of the conclusions w e m a y d r a w f r o m H a m l e t ' s stylistic virtuosity is t h a t he t h i n k s of e x p e r i e n c e as a w o r k of art t h a t c a n o n l y b e mastered b y aesthetic means. T h i s i n t e r p r e t a t i o n w o r k s against a n y p u r e l y e t h i c a l u n d e r s t a n d i n g of w h a t H a m l e t is d o i n g i n the play. H e refuses to k i l l C l a u d i u s i n the act of p r a y i n g , f o r e x a m p l e , i n o r d e r to w a i t f o r a "more horrid hent"

(3.3.88), a n d i n t h e g r a v e y a r d

scene h e comes o u t of h i d i n g o n l y to protest against Laertes' i n s u f f e r a b l e r a n t : " W h a t is h e w h o s e g r i e f / Bears such a n e m p h a s i s " (5.1.256-57). T h e r e is a n overp o w e r i n g aesthetic r e v u l s i o n i n that question. I d o n ' t m e a n to c l a i m H a m l e t as a n aesthete, b u t the c u s t o m a r y m o r a l analysis of his character fails to take acc o u n t of his c o m m i t m e n t

to e x c e l l e n c e of style.

He

praises a n o l d D i d o a n d A e n e a s play t h a t was " c a v i a r y to the g e n e r a l " (2.2.447), a n d h e is constantly registeri n g his disgust w i t h the n e w tone a n d a t m o s p h e r e of C l a u d i u s ' D e n m a r k . B u t there is a t h i n l i n e that separates style f r o m m o r a l i t y , a n d there are ethical implications i n all of H a m l e t ' s aesthetic j u d g m e n t s . T h e observation he sets d o w n i n his tables, " T h a t o n e m a y smile, a n d smile, a n d b e a v i l l a i n "

(1.5.108), applies

e q u a l l y w e l l to C l a u d i u s ' r a d i a n t p l a t i t u d e s as to his u n c t u o u s g e n i a l i t y . T h e contrast i n C l a u d i u s a n d i n P o l o n i u s b e t w e e n their fair o u t w a r d show a n d their inn e r ruthlessness is m a d e b y i d e n t i f i a b l e aspects of style. O n e moral-aesthetic p o s t u l a t e i n this play, as i n m o s t of Shakespeare, is that t h e arts of r h e t o r i c are associated — 318 —

CONCLUSION w i t h hypocrisy a n d d i s g u i s e — C l a u d i u s ' " m o s t p a i n t e d word"

( 3 . 1 . 5 3 ) — w h e r e a s simplicity of expression m a y

be strong a n d w i l l f u l , b u t it is also, c o n v e n t i o n a l l y , honest a n d sincere. T h e p o l i s h e d antitheses of the k i n g ' s first speech i n the play, o f f e r i n g a specious consolation to the g r i e v i n g H a m l e t — " W i t h a n auspicious a n d a d r o p p i n g eye,/ W i t h m i r t h i n f u n e r a l , a n d w i t h d i r g e in marriage"

(1.2.11-12)—immediately

identifies

his

shallow m o r a l i t y . H a m l e t certainly uses " a r t , " too, b u t his m o s t e l o q u e n t speech i n the play is the almost m o n o syllabic d e c l a r a t i o n just b e f o r e the catastrophe: " I f it be n o w , 'tis n o t to c o m e ; if it be n o t to c o m e , it w i l l b e n o w ; if it b e n o t n o w , yet it w i l l c o m e . T h e readiness is a l l "

(5.2.221-24). T h e r e is a consistent f e e l i n g i n

Shakespeare that this sort of b a r e a n d l u c i d style is most suitable to m o m e n t s of the highest tragic intensity, as if any h i n t of e m b e l l i s h m e n t w o u l d create a false tone i n w h a t the characters are saying. Shakespeare places a special emphasis o n the n o t i o n that a character m a y use d i f f e r e n t styles for d i f f e r e n t purposes. T h i s i n v o l v e s m o r e than the classical d o c t r i n e of d e c o r u m , since the changes i n style seem to d e r i v e n o t f r o m the p l a y w r i g h t , b u t f r o m the characters' o w n awareness of themselves as dramatis personae. T h i s is p a r t i c u l a r l y true of H a m l e t himself, a l t h o u g h b o t h C l a u dius a n d P o l o n i u s seem to b e a b l e to switch q u i c k l y f r o m a figurative a n d " w i t t y " style to a d i r e c t a n d businesslike one. T h e self-conscious style of the play m a y b e seen m o s t literally i n the allusions to art, acting, a n d the t h e a t e r — w h a t w e m a y call Shakespeare's "profess i o n a l " imagery. W e are n o t a l l o w e d to f o r g e t that the — 319 —

CONCLUSION p l a y itself is o n l y " a

fiction"

a n d " a d r e a m of passion"

(2.2.562), j u s t as T h i s w i d e a n d universal theatre Presents m o r e w o e f u l pageants than the scene W h e r e i n w e play in. (As You Like

It 2.7.137-39)

U l t i m a t e l y , a s t r o n g sense of style w o r k s against a n y c o n v i n c i n g sense of illusion. A s a u d i e n c e , w e are n e v e r f o r c e d to s u r r e n d e r o u r o w n insistent awareness of the p l a y as a w o r k of art. T h e self-consciousness of style that pervades Hamlet

serves b o t h to suggest a n d to jus-

t i f y a critic's o w n self-conscious discussion of that style.

— 320 —

Index Campbell, Lily B., 2g6n

actors and acting, 68, 137-50, 158, 159, 161, 166-68, 182,

Capell, Edward, 22n, i g g

216-20, 244-46, 250, 259-60,

Chambers, E. K., i7n, 25n, 285n

263, 264-66, 276, 283, 285,

characterization, xx, 13, 215-20, 317-18; nonpsychological, 40,

286, 290-91, 299, 309 Adams, Joseph Quincy, 183n,

135, 152, 2i8-ig, 236-37; by costume, 186-87; character

188, 260

analysis, 215-16, 219; by fig-

Aeneas speech, see Player's

ures of speech, 231; by solilo-

speech Alexander, Peter, xi, 92n, 272n

quy, 304-5

Altick, Richard D., 54, 57n

Charney, Maurice, xix, gon

Antony

Christian doctrine, 44, 88, 102,

and Cleopatra,

61, 79,

83, 89-90, 104n, 123, 128, 132,

108, n o n , 119, 120, 287, 2g2,

151-52, 168, 174, 183, 278, 303

302-3; Doomsday, ion, 83;

Arden

of Feversham,

O l d Testament, 28, 57, 102,

9

Aristotle, 243, 244

105, 118, 131, 132, 185; sin,

Armstrong, Edward A., 57n

34, 54, 102, 104-5, !23> !29"

As You Like

It, 56, i04n, 132,

30, 238-39; heaven as "ordinant," 43, 50, 52, 84, 113, 122,

186, 261, 291, 320

189, 217, 312-13; man's place

aside, 233-37

in nature, 53, 54, 64, 74, 89, Babcock, Weston, 73n

112-13; devil, 83, 146; N e w

Bacon, Francis, 45

Testament, 84, 241; atheism

Barnardo, 117, 165, 166-67, 180

and blasphemy, 103, 228;

Bartlett, John, xi, 133n

"churlish priest," 110; infinite-finite, 114-15; Anglican

Beckerman, Bernard, 197n,

catechism, 169

234n

Clarke, C. C., 3 0 m

Beckett, Samuel, 80

Claudio (in Hamlet),

Belleforest, F. de, 51 Bestrafte

Brudermord,

186, 193-94, 200, 267, 316-17;

Der,

sound effects, x x , 17-19; and

153, 275

Hamlet, 6, 11-12, 15, 16, 22-

Bethell, S. L „ 152

2 3 . 3 1 ' 33- 3 7 - 3 8 , 42-43, 47,

Betti, Ugo, 194

51-52, 64, 65, 67, 77-78, 87,

Booth, Edwin, 192

101, 115-17, 174, 218, 224,

Bowers, Fredson, 6on Bradley, A . C., 27n, 73n, 215, 219, 2ggn

40, 52

Claudius, 10, 29, 121-23, 153,

Berry, Francis, i88n, 307

225, 228, 230-31, 232, 236, 287, 312-13; and Laertes,

Brecht, Bertolt, 137

12-13, 42-43, 44, 48, 72, 74,

Burbage, Richard, 87, 168, 246n, 279, 3 i 3 n Burton, Robert, 82

223-24, 225-33, 234n, 236-37;

119, 131, 144-45, !8O, 208, and Iago, 13, 50, 58, 144, 232;

— 321 —

INDEX drinking, 17-18, 99-102; con-

Clutton-Brock, A.,

cern for appearances, 21-22,

Coghill, Nevill, 1 5 m

56, 116-17, 193-94; poisoner,

Coleridge, Hartley, 215

23' 3 1 ' 34-37- 42-44; and

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, xv,

brother, 24, 40, 82, 120; and Henry IV, 33; and Mousetrap,

The

ion

264 Colie, Rosalie L., 293n

39-42; and Mac-

beth, 41, 43, 58, 102, 239-40, 241; plotter, 46, 47-48, 48n, 50-52, 144-45, 218; subtle and

Collier, John Payne, 252n Comedy

of Errors,

The,

148,

175-76 Comito, Terry Allen, io2n

tough villain, 66, 69, 84-85,

Coriolanus,

120, 225, 239; physical de-

costume, 139, 157, 164, 172,

21, 139

scription, 73-74, 91, 100, 115,

186-90, 193, 194, 197, 198;

225; emphasis on action, 86,

military uniform, 20; armor,

122-23, 221-23, 227, 233; and

24-27; "nightgown," 26; "sea

Ophelia, 119-20; and Ger-

gown," 52, 189; "stockings

trude, 120, 194, 202, 230 style:

fouled," 58; imagery, 143-46;

221-41, 254, 258, 286-

87; embellished, 33, 221, 223, 224, 230-31, 238, 241, 298,

"inky cloak," 145, 187; Osric's hat, 173, 190; pirate sailor, 218; shoes, 299

319; monosyllables, 42, 222,

Cotgrave, Randle, 37, i2on, 189

231, 237, 241; soliloquies, 49-

couplets, 44, 134, 186, 187, 202,

5°- 57-58' 84-85, 118, 129-30,

203-6, 2o6-7n, 235, 240, 284-

233-34. 237-41, 294; lyric

85, 287, 292, 296, 312

expatiation,

73, 233; an-

titheses, 86, 99, 222, 238-39, 319; images on parts of

Craig, Hardin, 262n. See

also

Parrott, T h o m a s Marc Crashaw, Richard, 97

the body, 115, 120; similes, 177, 221, 228-29, 230-31,

Danby, John F., 1 i2n

238; colloquial, 221, 223-24,

Davies, T o m , ig2n

231; simple, 221, 223, 227,

De Witt, Johannes, 121

231-32, 237, 241; orations,

Dekker, Thomas, xvii

222, 224; in style of Polonius,

delay as theme, xv-xvi, 314

222-24; questions, 226-27,

Delius, Nicolaus, 94

233; broken discourse, 232-

Dido and Aeneas play, see

33; aside, 233-35, 237-38; in style of Hamlet, 240 Clemen, W . H., 4-6, 35-36,

Doran, Madeleine, 258n Dorius, R . J., 88n

i02n, 304 Clown-gravedigger, 62-63, 78, 95' >27- 135-36, 146-47' 164. 185, 284, 294-95

Player's speech Donne, John, 185

Dowden, Edward, 296 drama as a genre, xx-xxi, 143, 159-60, 176, 177,

— 322 —

i8on, 243-

INDEX 44, 261, 308; transfer of roles,

Frame, D o n a l d M., i2on

33; calculation of characters'

Francisco, 84

ages, 136; villain as actor,

Franklin, Benjamin, gg

144-45, L47> 232; cartharsis,

Freiligrath, Ferdinand, x v

152-53; moral utility, 153;

Frye, R o l a n d Mushat, 11 on

poetic drama, 158; narration,

Furness, Horace Howard, 215.

163, 188, 307-10; relation to

See also Variorum

Hamlet

film art, 219; purposiveness, 286; departures from dia-

Garrick, David, 61, 168

logue form, 297, 304-5

Gascoigne, George, ig4

Dryden, John, 264

Gellert, Bridget J., 82n

dumb show or pantomime, 39-

Gertrude, 10, 47, 168-69,

41, 1 1 1 , 147, 148, 157, 158,

1

1T

78, 186, 193-94, 202, 217, 225,

162, 182-83, i^sn, 194, 201,

227, 277; conscience, 8, 59-60,

245, 266

83, 105, 235-36; imperceptiv-

Dunn, W a l d o H., 88n

ity, 27-28, 36-37, 7g-8i, 146,

Dymling, Carl Anders, i35n

164; death, 43-44, 101; lust, 55-56, 5g, 60, 7g-8o, 89-gi;

Edwards, Philip, 284n

style, 80, log, 2o6n, 236, 286-

Eliot, T . S., 32, 316

87; and Hamlet, 87-88, 107,

Ellis-Fermor, Una, 221, 230n

147, 167, 246, 282; and Cleo-

Empson, William, i g s n

patra, 89-90; and Ophelia,

Euripides, Medea,

101, 108, 109-11, 180, 235,

i8on

235-36n; aside, 235-36, 237 Fairchild, Arthur H . R., 137-

gesture and stage action, 84, 115, 121, 145, 150, 157, 159-

38n, 138, ig2n

60, 161-76, 239, 265, 279-80,

Farmer, J. S., 25n, g2n Fechter, Charles Albert, 192

282-83, 312-13 Ghost (in Hamlet),

Fergusson, Francis, 3 1 - 3 2 ^ i 9 5 n . 291 First Player, 28, 97, 142-43, 152, 166, 217, 243, 244-45, 259274. 2g5 Fitzgerald, F. Scott, 130 Florio, John, 120, 312 Foakes, F. A., 6n, 47, 54, 11 in, i46n Forker, Charles R., i5on Fortinbras, 19-21, 28-29, 32, 37, 65. 75. 92. 125. 136, 177- 205, 222, 317 Fortinbras' Captain, 123

59, 88, 91,

98, 126, 146, 194, ig8, 203, 208-10; and Hamlet, 7, 15, 32. 53. 59' i°4» n 8 - i g , 126, 167-68, i6g-7o, 285, 305-7, 316; context for its entrances and exits, 18, i5g-6o, 164, 16566, 180, 181, 200; in cellarage, 24, 117, 130, 165, 171-72; military figure, 24-27, 28, 29, 169; murder, 33-36, 39-40, 58, 7677' 9 6 ' 97' i°3> i3°-3i> 209; style, 33-34, 300n, 306; and Claudius, 73; otherworldly

— 323 —

INDEX associations, 82, 96, 113, 146;

233_34n, 262; spellings, 27n;

and Gertrude, 90, 105, 146,

speech prefixes, 4 m , n o n ;

164; purgatory, 98, n o n , 117-

act-scene divisions, 201; linea-

18, 168; sense of sin, 104-5;

tion, 2i8n; punctuation,

ubiquity, 170-72

30m

Gielgud, John, 186

readings',

G l o b e theater, i7n, 121, 150-51, 157, 160, 195, 246n, 284, 315 Gold, J., 21 i n

"affection," 263;

"bitter business," ion; low,"

"Fel-

39; "handsaw," 66;

"How, sweet queen," 180;

Granville-Barker, Harley, 189,

"Lamound," 72n; "like an

ig6-97n, 20m, 223n, 234,

ape," g3n; "meant," 273ns " O , o, o, o," 313; " O , venge-

236n, 27gn Gravedigger, see Clown-grave-

ance," 143; "paiocke," 68n; "politician," i6i-62n; "rites,"

digger Greg, W . W., 3 i 3 n

110; "rots," io4n; "scullion,"

Guildenstern, see Rosencrantz

26gn; "solid," 60; "three thousand," 125; "tragical-his-

and Guildenstern

torical, tragical-comical-hisHamlet,

in its historical con-

torical-pastoral," 243; "winking," 45; "Yaughan," 9511,

text, xvi, 186, ig5; closet scene (3.4), 8, 26-28, 32n, 3637, 56, 6g, 7g-8i, 82, 85, go-

284 Hamlet,

Quarto 1 (1603), xi,

g i , 104, 107, 120, 124, 138,

184, ig5, 265, 275; stage di-

147, i4g, 164, 166, 167-68,

rections, 26, 112, 158, 184,

179. 191-92 202. 205, 235,

279; speech prefixes, 4 m ;

246, 282; prayer scene (3.3),

spellings, 66

g-10, 14, 100, 104-5, 130-31, 240, 318; fencing match (5.2), 11-13, 18-19, 39,48, 8688, 172-73, 229, 236, 239, 27980, 3 1 1 ; graveyard scene (5.1), 12, 16, 61-63, 95-96, 12728, 163-64, 189, 203, 210-11; 273' 275-80, 294-95, 318; nunnery scene (3.1), 105-6, 128, 145-46; "without words," 15860, 195; Danish allusions, 183 Hamlet,

Folio (1623),

readings:

"godly Ballet,"

185; "Tend'ring," 252n

33n>

178-79, ig5, 273n, 2gg-soon; stage directions, 19, 20-21, 48, 112, 147, 157, i6on, 169, i78n, 178-79, 181, 182, 183, i84n, 187, 191, 202, 210, 217,

Hamlet,

Quarto 2 (1604), xi,

33n> 1 9 5 , 2 7 3 1 , 2 7 5 , 3 ° o n ; stage directions, 18, 19, 112, 157, 159-60, i78n, 181, 182, i82n, 183, 184, 187, 202, 217, 233n; spellings, 21, 27n; speech prefixes, 4 m , 6gn, n o n ; lineation, 2i8n; punctuation, 30 m readings: "another

"affection," 263;

man,"

39; "bitter

day," ion; "But stay, what noise?" 180; "crants," 110; "dosie, dazzie," 273n; "handsaw," 66; " H u m , " 2i8n;

— 324 —

INDEX "Lamord," 7211; "Ostricke,"

105, 132, 164, 179, 282; Ros-

69; "paiock," 68n; "pelican,"

encrantz and Guildenstern,

i6i-62n; "roots," 104n;

23-24, 66, 92-93, 114, 124, 125,

"sallied," 60; "stallion,"

140, 150-51, 169, 174-75.

26gn; "threescore thousand,"

84, 281-82, 290, 292-93, 308;

125; "went," 27gn

Ghost, 33, 45, 67, 81, 85, 118-

Hamlet,

Quarto of 1676, i6on,

201

l83"

19, 130, 142, 146, 150, 162, 164, 167-68, 169-70, 171-72,

Hamlet, 29-30, 32, 191, 202,

261, 282-83, 292, 296, 305-7;

215-16, 246n, 316-18; Ro-

Polonius, 42, 70, 94-95, 123,

mantic criticism of, xv-xvi,

127, 142, 149-5°. 1 5 ° - 5 1 '

xx-xxii, 3, 30, 82-83, 296-97,

262, 289-90, 290-91, 292-93;

305, 316; swordsman, 7-12, 14,

Clown-gravedigger, 62-63,

l66>

87-88, 166; revenger, 8-11, 53,

127, 294-95; Horatio, 70, 86-

58-59, 100-1, 267-70; aesthetic

87' 93- 99. 119.

revulsion, 15-16, 62, 131, 274,

266, 270-71, 291, 306, 308-10,

!75> 200,

276, 318; death and military

312; Osric, 173, 260, 271, 272-

funeral, 19-21, 147, 313; mag-

75

nanimity and honor, 19, 4748, 124; madness, 44, 51, 66, 162, 187-89, 246-47, 282-83, 286, 289-92; melancholy, 53, 55, 75, 82-83, ! 3 6 '

1 5° m 5 1 '

»59:

moral questioning, 74, 79-80; tragic foreboding, 83-84, 275, 311-12; physical description, 87-88, 167-68; constraint, 11517; regeneration, 122, 189; dramatic chronology, 135-36, 210-11; costume, 145, 187-89 relation

to other

charac-

style:

221, 258-313, 317-18;

theatrical and artistic interests, 40-41, 128, i34n, 142, 149, 153, 162, 218, 244-45, 258-67, 291-92; songs, 68, 18486, 284, 292; monosyllables, 84. 3°5> 3io. 3*2, 319; poetic artifice, 84, 260; ranting, 12728, 268, 269, 276-79; puns and wordplay, 149, 251-52, 265, 286-89; parody, 169, 186, 27185, 286, 291-92; couplets, 2046; in style of Claudius, 240,

ters: Claudius, 6, 11-12, 16,

269; Polonius as critic of, 242-

23' 3 1 ' 33> 3 8 "39' 42-43' 48n,

43, 244; self-conscious, 258,

51-52, 55, 66, 67, 68-69, 73-74.

267-85, 309, 319; passionate,

77-78, 90, 93-94, 99, 101, 104-

264, 295-305; colloquial, 270,

5, 121, 130-31, 147, 187, 218,

277, 283, 292, 300, 307, 308-9,

225, 240, 259, 267, 275, 278,

310-11; repetition, 271, 299-

280-81, 287-88, 291, 292-94,

300, 305; witty, 286-95; breaks

297-98, 318; Laertes, 11, 47,

in syntax, 299, 310-11; simple,

127, 258, 275-80, 318; Ophelia,

305-13. 319

15, 105-6, 108, 131, 145-46,

soliloquies:

8-9, 21, 237,

148-49, 199, 260; Gertrude,

270, 296-305; "rogue and

16, 27n, 36, 79-81, 90-91, 104,

peasant slave" (2.2), 34, 142-

— 325 —

INDEX 43- 152-53- 166. 267-70, 295; " T o be, or not to be" (3.1), 49, 67, 83, 88, 126-27, 131,

blematic, 28, 41, 122, 253; multiple subjects, 35-36; reversibility, 37, 38-3g, 77-78; literal versus symbolic uses,

234, 301-4; "too too solid flesh" (1.2), 56, 60, 84, 103, 297-301; " H o w all occasions" (4.4), 124, 199

75-76; associative links, g2, 261; properties as a presentational imagery, igo-gi subjects:

Hapgood, Robert, 3 i 4 n

animals, 18, 43,

Harbage, Alfred, xi-xii, 263n

45> 5 1 - 54- 55. 63-74, 8g, 90-

Hardy, Thomas, 4

95, 106, 113, 161, i6i-62n,

Hart, Alfred, xviii

181, 185-86, 190, 253, 277-78,

Hazlitt, William, xv, xxi, xxii

278-79, 290, 292; armor, 24-

Heilman, Robert Bechtold, x i x

28; art, acting, and the thea-

1 Henry

IV, 72, 78, 92, 256, 273

ter, 137-53, 3ig-2o; breath,

2 Henry

IV, 33, 56, 87, 126,

85-87; card-playing, 48, 61; confinement, 115-23; corrup-

249, 256 Henry i93> 2 Henry Henry

V, 5gn, 149, 159, 174,

tion, 3, 53-113, 317; death, 60-

*9 6

63, 65, 71, 84, 94-95; disease,

VI, 133 VIII,

56

Henslowe, Philip, 111 heraldry, 14, 97 Herrick, Robert, 143 Heywood, Thomas, 153 Hilliard, Nicholas, 192 Hodges, C . Walter, 15 m Holmes, Martin, 157, 192n Horatio, 20, 69, 113, 181, 235, 274; and Hamlet, 7, 84, 8687- 93- 119- 136. 147-48. 170179, 260, 266, 270-71, 275, 280, 303, 309-10, 312; and Ghost, 24, 82, 160, 166-67, 169, 170-71, 181; and pirate sailor, 217-18 Hosley, Richard, 1 2 i n Hubler, Edward, xi, ion, 6on, 68n, 93n, 95n, 2i8n, 252n, 26gn,273n imagery, in criticism of Shakespeare, xviii-xix, 3, 31; em-

3-5> 35-39, 54, 55' 59. 63, 75" 88, 89, 100, 103, 315-16; drinking, 95, 96, 99-102; falconry, 66-68; food and eating- 35> 54- 65, 70, 89-gg, 288; foulness, 58-5g; gardens, 34, 54, 56, 57- 102-13; heart, 8385; hunting and angling, 33, 64-66; limits, 114-36, 317; milk, g6-g7, 295; money and numbers, 123-36, 252, 273-74; poison, 12-13, 22, 23, 32, 3436, 3g-44, 73, 76-77, 82, 87, g6, g7, 121; prison, 115, 117-18; rankness, 55-58, 105; secrecy and concealment, 31-34, 3639- 4 i . 44-47' 51-52- 58; smells, 33> 53-54- 57-5 8 . 62. 71, 95-96; soiling and tainting, 53, 5960, 108; sword, 7-15, 47-48, 166; violet, 106-8, iog; war, weapons, and explosives, 630, 81, 171, 177-78, 315-16 Ingegnieri, Angelo, i46n

— 326 —

INDEX Jacquot, Jean, 121n Jenkins, Harold, 178-79n, 300n, 313" Johnson, S. F., i8gn, 246n Johnson, Samuel, 10, g3n, 69, 100, 201-2, 2gon, 247-48, 289 Jonson, Ben, xvii, 149, 207, 271, 317 Jorgensen, Paul A., g7n Joseph, B. L., i62n Joseph, Sister Miriam, 272 Julius Caesar, xvii-xviii, 18, 20, 26, 64, 65, 178, 246, 312 Jump, John D., goon justice as theme, 41, 50-51, 13132 Juvenal, 262

81, 106-7, 131-33, 185, 293; and Claudius, 22, 42-43, 48, 50. 72. 133' 161-62, 225-33; style, 81, 128, 131-33, 161, 258, 276, 318; rebellion, 116, 121, 133, 177-79, 208, 225-29; and Polonius, 129, i62n, 248, 257; aside, 235, 236-37 Lamb, Charles, xxi, xxii Langbaum, Robert, 2g7n Lawrence, William J., 25n, i7on, i8on, 18m, ig2n Levin, Harry, vii, i3n, i85n, 2o6n, 226, 2gon, 2ggn Lodge, Thomas, 285 Love's Labour's Lost, 123, 144,

149-5°' 238. 243. 272-73

Lucianus, 34, 40-41, 82, 266, 285 King James I and Queen Anne of Denmark, 183 King John, 138, 183 King Lear, xix, 54, 71, 73, 74, 89, 103, 107, n o , 112-13, 272, 298, 311, 312, 3i2n, 3i3n Kitto, H.D.F., 3m, 84, 316 Kittredge, George Lyman, xii, 33n, 88n, io7n, i34n, i53n, i69n,284n Knight, G. Wilson, 54 Knights, L. C., 32n, 53n, 215-16 Kokeritz, Helge, xi, 6on, 94n, io4n, 293n Kott, Jan, 157 Kyd, Thomas, The Spanish Tragedy, 112, 186, 284-85, 302 Laertes, xvi, 70, 190, 232, 27374, 277; revenger, 9, 29, 59, 267; and Hamlet, 11-12, 64, 127-28, 132, 136, 236-37, 27580; swordsman, 12-13, 35, 72, 76-77; and Ophelia, 16-17, 72»

Macbeth, xix, 30, 41, 43, 58, 81, g2n, g6, 101, 102, 112-13, 114, 122, i2g, 140-41, i46n, 181, 183, ig3, 215, 23g-4o, 241, 285, 2g4 McManaway, James G., 181 n Macquoid, Percy, igon Mahood, M. M „ 4gn, 78n, 286n Manley, Frank, 185n Marcellus, 7, 66, 113, 117, i6g, 170-71, 175, i7g Marlowe, Christopher, 14, i34n, 144, 263n, 300 Marston, John, igo, 290 Maxwell, J. C., 88n Measure for Measure, 34, 40, 70-71 Mehl, Dieter, i83n Merchant of Venice, The, 15, 55> i°9> 111-12, 138, 139-4° Merry Wives of Windsor, The, xvii, 55, 277 Midsummer Night's Dream, A,

— 327 —

INDEX 111, 140, 147, 216-17, 279 Milton, John, 272 Montaigne, Michel Eyquem de, i2on, 312 Morozov, Mikhail M., 2ign Muir, Kenneth, xviii-xix, 4-7, 36n Murder of Gonzago, The, or The Mousetrap, 8, 15, 38, 3942, 65-66, 71, 126, 134-35, 141. 149, 182, i83n, 185-86, 194, 2o6n, 235, 237, 259, 266-67, 284, 285, 292 music, xx, 157, 181-86; Claudius' rouse, 17-18, 183; "soldiers' music," 20-21; songs, 68, 184-86; trumpets, 157, 182-83, 198; oboes, 18283; recorders, 183-84; jig, 245 mythology, Greek and Roman, Centaurs, 73, 100; Corybantes, 100; Dido, 109; Fortuna, 25, 115, 126; Hercules, 278-79; Jupiter, Jove, 18, 68, 69; Mars, 69; Mercury, 69; Odysseus, 210; river Lethe, 104; satyrs, 100; Vulcan, 59. See also Player's speech Nares, Robert, 288n Nashe, Thomas, 9-10, 2&3n nature, see Christian doctrine Newell, Alex, 30 m Nicoll, Allardyce, i46n Norton, Thomas, and Thomas Sackville, Gorboduc, 182-83, 201 Nungezer, Edwin, 279n

126, 162-63, 185, 187-88, 2o6n, 262; military imagery, 16-17; flowers, 57, 83, 106-11; death and funeral, 70-71, 101, 107-9, 180, 203, 275-76, 279-80; style, 93, 108, 126, 2o6n, 2g8n; madness, 107-10, 11920, 158, 167, 178-79, 184, 185, 227, 235-36n, 302; constraint, 119-20, 2g8n Osric, 19; bird imagery, 69; social ceremony, 173, 174; costume, 190; style, 243, 352, 260, 264, 271, 272-75, 281, 311 0sterberg, V., i35n Othello, xix, 13, 20, 48, 50, 5758, 103-4, 109, 113, 144, 147, 232, 270, 288, 308 painting, 137-40, 191-92 Papp, Joseph, 21 Parrott, Thomas Marc (ed. Hamlet, Quarto 2, with Hardin Craig), xii, ion, 34n, 92n, i04n, n o n , i62n, 244n, 26gn, 273n Partridge, Eric, 288n Pearn, B. R „ i83n Pericles,

196

Phialas, Peter G., i8gn Pirandello, Luigi, 194 pirate sailors (in Hamlet),

52,

189, 217-18 Plato, 138 Plautus, 148, 244 Player King, 23, 34, 3g-4i, 43, 51, 88, 111, 112, 134, 135, i4g, 194, 2g6, 302-3

Ophelia, 7, 100, 199-200, 25152, 255-56; and Hamlet, 15, 29-30, 44-46, 81-82, 86, 93,

Player Queen, 40, 99, 134-35, 136, 158, 194, 2o6n, 236, 295 Player's speech, 13-15, 28, 34,

— 328 —

INDEX 97-98, 128, 141, 152-53, 217, 244-45. 259. 262-64, 284, 295, 307; Pyrrhus, 13-15, 97-98, 135, 267; Hecuba, 14-15, 97, 98, 217; Priam, 14-15, 96-97, 295 Poel, William, 10911, 189 Polonius, 4in, 142, 166, 184, 186, 199-200, 203, 246n, 256, 260; death, 7, 10, 42, 46, 6061, 71, 80, 94-95, 142, 149-50, 166, 277, 292-93; precepts, 13, 16, 119, 128-29, igo, 200, 24849; and Ophelia, 16, 251-53, 254-56; and Claudius and Gertrude, 41, 163, 200, 234, 256-57; eavesdropping, 44-46; and Laertes, 59, 65, 277; and Hamlet, 64-65, 80, 151, 159, 256, 259, 262, 289-90 style: 221, 242-57, 318; complex syntax, 44, 204-5; orator and rhetorician, 45, 163, 24648, 255, 257; imagery, 124, 128-29, 253; theatrical interests, 149-50, 244-46; literary and dramatic criticism, 24244; in relation to Hamlet, 242-43, 251, 289-90; selfawareness of his art, 246-48, 255; excessive fullness, 24751; simple and brief, 247, 253-55; colloquial, 248, 251, 255-57; Polonius as senex, 248-51, 256-57, 290 Prosser, Eleanor, ion, 10m, i8gn proverbs, 5on, 53, 54, 56, 64, 66, 70, 71, 77-78, 126, 127 puns and wordplay: "abominably," 265; "act, action," 144, 145, 146-47, 158, 200; "afar," 210-11; "affront," 46; "air-

heir," 94; "antic-antique," 14; "arms," 11, 13-14; "art," 246-47; "as-ass," 281; "beautified," 242-43; "blast," 81-82; "blown," 82, 105; "bound," 118-19; "brave, bravery," 143, 269, 277; "brute-Brutus," 149; "cannon-canon," 21; "capitalCapitol," 149; "close," 44, 46; "coil," 49; "common," 286-87; "comply," 173, 175; "contracted," 120; "core," 271; "counterfeit," 138-39; "country," 245; "cousincozen," 287-88; "crafts," 33; "crammed," 94; "cunning," 153; "damnable," 266; dearly," 252; "diet of worms," 94; "disclosed," 106; "dismantled," 68-69; "double," 129, 238; "draw toward an end," 60-61; "ear," 82; "edge," 262; "enactures," 149; "encounter," 45-46; "enginer," 23; "fares," 93; "fine," 264; "fool-Fool," 142; "free," 125, 238; "gently," 265; "giantlike," 226; "gilded," 130; "globe-Globe," 150; "hoist," 23-24; "idle," 291; "lets," 7; "lively," 139; "loose," 45-46; "modesty," 263; "moor-Moor," 91; "mute," 147; "naked," 52; "nothing-noting," 293n; "numbers," 131; "offense," 39. 57; "opened," 38; "packing," 61, 269; "part," 147, 149-50; "passion, passionate," 264, 277, 295-96; "perform, performance," 145; "petar," 24; "physic," 55;

— 329 —

INDEX "play," 145; "plot," 147-48; "plurisy-pleurisy," 22, 85-86; "politic," 94; "practice," 4748; "privates," 126; "put on," 143; "questionable," 146; "quietus," 131; "rank," 55-58; "relief," 84; "remembrance," 125-26; "render," 98; "root, rot, rut," i04n; "secure," 119; "seems-seams," 288; "shadow," 114,139-41, 151; "shape," 144-46; "show," 145, 147, 148-49, 187; "shuffling," 47, 48-50; "sized-o'ersizM," 135; "tender," 251-53; "topped," 72; "touch," 77; "tropically-trapically," 65-66; "union," 43-44; "virgin crants-Rosencrantz," 110-11 ; "where," 235-36^ "Wittenberg," 94; "word," 126. See also words Rann, Joseph, 33n Ratsey, Gamaliel, 9 Raysor, Thomas Middleton, 264n revenge conventions, xviii, 915, 53, 88, 267-69, 285, 296 Reynaldo, 200, 249-51 Reynolds, George Fullmer, 11 in rhetorical figures and devices, 232, 243-44, 246-48, 272-75, 2 9 9 - 3 0 0 . 3°5> 3°9> 3 n . 3 l 8 ' 19; metaphor, xix, 27, 54, 80, 85, 87, 115; invidious comparison, 14, i34n; conceit, 16, 97, 101, 222, 295; oration, 45, 222, 224, 246-48; oxymoron, 99; "pathetic fallacy," 110; hyperbole, 132-33, 133-34". 276-79; paradox, 140, 222,

238, 241, 293; heightening, 224, 307, 311; interrogation, 226-27, 233; simile, 228-29, 230-31; cacozelia, 272; incredulous repetition, 300 Ribner, Irving, 18gn Richard II, 8, 54, 67, 97-98, 102-3, 108, 110, 173-74, 183, 223 Richard III, 40, 73, 139, 158, 288 Richards, Irving T., 30 m Rickert, R. T „ 11 in Righter, Anne, i37n Robinson, Clement, 107 Romeo and Juliet, 11, 77, 109, 196, 207, 242, 251 Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, 24-25, 110-11, 114, 130, 136, 140, 200, 258, 281-82; deaths, 12; agents of Claudius, 15, 23, 38, 48, 64, 92-93, 100, 115, 117, 125-26, 127, 174-75. !79> 203, 308 Rossi, Ernesto, 192 Rowe, Nicholas, 26, i92n, 199, 201 Sade, Marquis de, 241 Sartre, Jean-Paul, 121 Saxo Gramma ticus, 51 Schmidt, Alexander, xii, 79, 80 Schoenbaum, S., xi-xii, 263n Scoloker, Anthony, 188 Second Clown (in Hamlet), 127 self-consciousness, 39, 50, 137, i4»-53. 258, 319-20 Seltzer, Daniel, 272n Seneca, 97, 244, 307 Seng, Peter J., i82n, i84n Sewell, Arthur, ig7n Shakespeare, William, Roman

— 330 —

INDEX plays, xix; actor, 25; English history plays, 30, 193; early comedies, 203, 294; and Seneca, 307 Shepard, Warren V., 5on Sherbo, Arthur, ion Shirley, Frances Ann, i7n, i8on Sieveking, A. Forbes, 72n Simpson, Percy, 11 i n Simpson, Richard, 285 Sisson, C. J., i04n, 244n, 252n Skeat, Walter W., 288n soliloquy, xxi, 233-34, 235, 23741, 270, 296-305 Sonnets (of Shakespeare): X V , 148; X V I , 138; L X X I I I , 122; C X I , 53 Sophocles, Oedipus, 31-32 sound effects, xx, 157, 177-81; cannonading and firing of weapons, 17-21; offstage, 18, 19, 170, 178-79; under the stage, 171-72; bells, 179-80; crowing of the cock, 181 Southern, Richard, ig7n Spencer, Hazleton, ig2n Spencer, T.J.B., x v n , 124n Spevack, Marvin, xi, 258n Sprague, Arthur Colby, 168 Spurgeon, Caroline F. E., 3-6, 36, 53-54, 69-70, ? i n stage properties, xix, 157, 163, 190-95; sword, 7-15; "tables," 45, i g i , 261-62; skulls, 62, 2g5; portraits, 80, 124, 138, igi-g2; "napkin," 87; flowers, 108-11; flower bank, 11112; arbor, 112; gifts, 126, ig495; books and writings, 191, 245, 262; royal properties, >93-94; throne, 193, ig8 staging, xvi, 157-60, 172-73, 202, 207; under the stage, 7, 165,

171-72; arras, 11, 44, 45-46, ig2n; "chambers" or cannon, 17-ig; "stage" or dais, 20; traps, 25, 157, 165-66, 170, 280; torches, 41-42; doors, 121, 164, 165, i6g, 178, 198; "Swan drawing," 121; masques, 141, 171; private theaters, 141; supernumeraries, 147, 233-34n; "shadow," 151; stage directions, 157-61, 210-11; editorial staging, 161, 197; "fright wig," 168; blood, 173 scenes and uses: military procession, 20-21; metaphorical uses, 41-42; representation of time, 41-42, g5, 175, 181, ig8, 207-11, 244; eavesdropping, 44-47, 246; fencing match, 48, 101, 172-73; removal of corpses, 60, 157-58; social ceremony, 101, 173-76, 187; Ghost, 146, 170-72; royal scenes, 157, 183, ig2-g4, 198; representation of place, 16364, 165, 171, 196-99, 244; "covering" lines, 164-66, 171, 172, 262; Laertes' rebellion, 177-78; relation to art of movie, 197-98; interior and exterior scenes, ig8-gg; prayer scene (3.3), 240; "apart" convention, 275; Hamlet and Laertes in Ophelia's grave, 279-80 Steevens, George, ion, ign Sternfeld, F. W., i82n Stone, George Winchester, Jr., 6in structure, 42, 196-211, 236-37, 263; symmetry of beginning, middle, and end, 39, 75, 193;

— 331 —

INDEX ironic reversal, 43, 50-51, 101, 240; five acts, 200-3; sceneending couplets, 203-6, 206717; "bridge" scenes, 207-g Styan, J. L., 26 m style, 311, 317-18; as approach to Shakespeare, xvi-xvii, 176, 177; "Roman," xvii-xviii; archaic, 134, 2o6n, 284; moral implications, 271-72, 318

Ur-Hamlet,

25, 285

Van Buchell, Arend, 12in Van Laan, Thomas F., 5on Variorum Hamlet, xii, ion, 23n, 27n, 37n, 86n, 94n, 100n, 109n, 120n, 135n, 153n, 183n, 18gn, 192n, 199n, 262n, 282n Warhaft, Sidney, 6on

Taming of the Shrew, The, 182 Tempest, The, 216 Theobald, Lewis, 159, 161, 199, 244 Thiselton-Dyer, William T . , 34" Thorp, Margaret Farrand, 138n Tilley, Morris Palmer, xii, son, 53> 56, 71, 72n, 88n, i26n, 127, 194, 265n Timon of Athens, 85, 124n, 13839. 158-59. 283n topical allusions, 67-68, 150, 183, 246n, 259, 262-63, 28384 tragic effect, 30, 31-33, 42, 4748, 50-51, 56, 75, 84, 101-2, 113, 122-23, 132. 148. 152-53. 173, 232, 239-40, 257, 271, 307, 311-13, 319 Travers, R., xii, 24, 68n, i83n, igon Traversi, D. A., 32n Troilus and Cressida, 28-29, 69, 91, 130, 141, 158, 184, 196, 249, 262, 272 True Tragedy of Richard III, The, 285 Twelfth Night, 303 Two Gentlemen of Verona, The, 163, 194-95, 242

Warning

for Faire

Women,

A,

25 Webster, John, 190 Weiss, Samuel A., 6on Whetstone, George, 71 Whitman, Walt, 135 Wilson, John Dover, xii, ion, 11, 27n, 34n, 4gn, 6on, 62, 6gn, 78, 86n, g2, lion, i25n, 172-73, 182, i88n, 24411, 26gn, 285n, 29gn, 30m, 3i3n Wine, M. L., igon words, xi, xvi, xviii; Latinate diction, 14, 224; technical versus general senses, 23-24, 141-50; "policy" words, 47-50; "o'er" prefix, 133, 133-34^ terms of art, 137-41; inkhornism, 272-75 demonstratives: "thus," 161-63; "this-that, thesethose," 163; "here-there," 163-64; "look, look you," 164 discussed in text: "appetite," 89-go; "blister," 79; "blood," 80; "brazed," 27n; "canker," 78; "cap-a-pe," 2425; "card," 2g4; "carriages," 274; "chanson," 185; "closet," 27; "discretion," 244; "dozy," 273; "equivocation," 294;

— 332 —

INDEX "fat," 85, 87-88; "foh," 26970; "foul," 58-59; "gorge," 95-96; "gross," 56-57; "heartache," 83; "hebona," 34; "impawned," 252, 275; "imposthume," 37; "liberty," 244; "long purples," 57n, 110; "machine," 260; "mallecho," 291-92; "mobled," 243; "pith," 99-100; "posset," 96;

"prate," 277; "puzzles," 303; "rant," 276-77; "readiness," 122; "reechy," 59; "replication," 282; "rhapsody," 120; "scene," 196-97; "stuck," 42; "taint," 59-60; "tetter," 76; "thereunto," 280; "thrift," 70, 98-99, 129; "upspring," 100. See also puns and wordplay

— 333 —