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(draws back the arras and discoversPOLONIUS)
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(he pulls back the tapestry and discoversPOLONIUS)
Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell.
I took thee for thy better. Take thy fortune.
Thou find’st to be too busy is some danger.
(to GERTRUDE) Leave wringing of your hands. Peace. Sit you down
And let me wring your heart. For so I shall
If it be made of penetrable stuff,
If damnèd custom have not brassed it so
That it is proof and bulwark against sense.
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You low-life, nosy, busybody fool, goodbye. I thought you were somebody more important. You’ve gotten what you deserve. I guess you found out it’s dangerous to be a busybody. (to GERTRUDE) Stop wringing your hands. Sit down and let me wring your heart instead, which I will do if it’s still soft enough, if your evil lifestyle has not toughened it against feeling anything at all.
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40 | GERTRUDE
What have I done, that thou darest wag thy tongue
In noise so rude against me?
| GERTRUDE
What have I done that you dare to talk to me so rudely?
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45
50
| HAMLET
Such an act
That blurs the grace and blush of modesty,
Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose
From the fair forehead of an innocent love
And sets a blister there, makes marriage vows
As false as dicers' oaths—oh, such a deed
As from the body of contraction plucks
The very soul, and sweet religion makes
A rhapsody of words. Heaven’s face doth glow
O'er this solidity and compound mass
With tristful visage, as against the doom,
Is thought-sick at the act.
| HAMLET
A deed that destroys modesty, turns virtue into hypocrisy, replaces the blossom on the face of true love with a nasty blemish, makes marriage vows as false as a gambler’s oath—oh, you’ve done a deed that plucks the soul out of marriage and turns religion into meaningless blather. Heaven looks down on this earth, as angry as if Judgment Day were here, and is sick at the thought of what you’ve done.
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| GERTRUDE
Ay me, what act
That roars so loud and thunders in the index?
| GERTRUDE
C’mon, what’s this deed that sounds so awful even before I know what it is?
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55
60
| HAMLET
Look here upon this picture and on this,
The counterfeit presentment of two brothers.
See, what a grace was seated on this brow?
Hyperion’s curls, the front of Jove himself,
An eye like Mars to threaten and command,
A station like the herald Mercury
New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill—
A combination and a form indeed
Where every god did seem to set his seal
| HAMLET
A figure and a combination of good qualities that seemed like every god had set his stamp on this man.
To give the world assurance of a man.
This was your husband. Look you now, what follows.
Here is your husband, like a mildewed ear
Blasting his wholesome brother. Have you eyes?
Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed
And batten on this moor? Ha, have you eyes?
You cannot call it love, for at your age
The heyday in the blood is tame, it’s humble,
And waits upon the judgment. And what judgment
Would step from this to this? Sense sure you have,
Else could you not have motion. But sure that sense
Is apoplexed, for madness would not err,
Nor sense to ecstasy was ne'er so thralled,
But it reserved some quantity of choice
To serve in such a difference. What devil was ’t
That thus hath cozened you at hoodman-blind?
Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight,
Ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans all,
Or but a sickly part of one true sense
Could not so mope. O shame, where is thy blush?
Rebellious hell,
If thou canst mutine in a matron’s bones,
To flaming youth let virtue be as wax
And melt in her own fire. Proclaim no shame
When the compulsive ardor gives the charge,
Since frost itself as actively doth burn,
And reason panders will.
|
That was your husband. Now look at this other one. Here is your present husband, like a mildewed ear of corn infecting the healthy one next to it. Do you have eyes? How could you leave the lofty heights of this man here and descend as low as this one? Ha! Do you have eyes? You cannot say you did it out of love, since at your age romantic passions have grown weak, and the heart obeys reason. But what reason could move you from this one to that one? You must have some sense in your head, since you’re able to get around, but it seems to be paralyzed, since even if you were crazy you would know the difference between these two men. No one ever went so insane that they couldn’t get an easy choice like this one right. What devil was it that blindfolded you? Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight, ears without hands or eyes, smell without anything else, the use of even one impaired sense would not permit such a mistake as yours. Oh, for shame, why aren’t you blushing? If evil can overtake even an old mother’s bones, then let it melt my own. It turns out it’s no longer shameful to act on impulse—now that the old are doing so, and now that reason is a servant to desire. |
90
| GERTRUDE
O Hamlet, speak no more!
Thou turn’st mine eyes into my very soul,
And there I see such black and grainèd spots
As will not leave their tinct.
| GERTRUDE
Oh, Hamlet, stop! You’re making me look into my very soul, where the marks of sin are so thick and black they will never be washed away.
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95 | HAMLET
Nay, but to live
In the rank sweat of an enseamèd bed,
Stewed in corruption, honeying and making love
Over the nasty sty—
| HAMLET
Yes, and you lie in the sweaty stench of your dirty sheets, wet with corruption, making love—
| GERTRUDE
O, speak to me no more!
These words like daggers enter in my ears.
No more, sweet Hamlet.
| GERTRUDE
Oh, you must stop! Your words are like daggers. Please, no more, sweet Hamlet.
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100
| HAMLET
A murderer and a villain,
A slave that is not twentieth part the tithe
Of your precedent lord, a vice of kings,
A cutpurse of the empire and the rule,
That from a shelf the precious diadem stole,
And put it in his pocket—
| HAMLET
A murderer and a villain, a low-life who’s not worth a twentieth of a tenth of your first husband—the worst of kings, a thief of the throne, who took the precious crown from a shelf and put it in his pocket—
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| GERTRUDE
No more!
| GERTRUDE
Stop!
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| HAMLET
A king of shreds and patches—
| HAMLET
A ragtag king—
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Enter GHOST
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The GHOST enters.
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| 105 |
Save me and hover o'er me with your wings,
You heavenly guards!—What would your gracious figure?
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Oh, angels in heaven, protect me with your wings!—What can I do for you, my gracious lord?
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| GERTRUDE
Alas, he’s mad!
| GERTRUDE
Oh no! Hamlet’s gone completely crazy.
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110 | HAMLET
Do you not come your tardy son to chide,
That, lapsed in time and passion, lets go by
The important acting of your dread command?
O, say!
| HAMLET
Have you come to scold your tardy son for straying from his mission, letting your important command slip by? Tell me!
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115 | GHOST
Do not forget. This visitation
Is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose.
But look, amazement on thy mother sits.
O, step between her and her fighting soul.
Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works.
Speak to her, Hamlet.
| GHOST
Don’t forget. I’ve come to sharpen your somewhat dull appetite for revenge. But look, your mother is in shock. Oh, keep her struggling soul from being overwhelmed by horrid visions. The imagination works strongest in those with the weakest bodies. Talk to her, Hamlet.
| HAMLET
How is it with you, lady?
| HAMLET
How are you doing, madam?
|
120
125 | GERTRUDE
Alas, how is ’t with you,
That you do bend your eye on vacancy
And with th' incorporal air do hold discourse?
Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep,
And, as the sleeping soldiers in th' alarm,
Your bedded hair, like life in excrements,
Starts up and stands on end. O gentle son,
Upon the heat and flame of thy distemper
Sprinkle cool patience. Whereon do you look?
| GERTRUDE
And how are you doing, staring into the empty air and talking to nobody? Your eyes give away your wild thoughts, and your hair is standing upright, like soldiers during a call to arms. Oh my dear son, calm yourself and cool off your overheated mind! What are you staring at?
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130
| HAMLET
On him, on him! Look you, how pale he glares!
His form and cause conjoined, preaching to stones,
Would make them capable.
(to GHOST) Do not look upon me,
Lest with this piteous action you convert
My stern effects. Then what I have to do
Will want true color—tears perchance for blood.
| HAMLET
At him, at him! Look how pale he is and how he glares at me. Preaching even at stones, he could get them to act. (to the GHOST) Don’t look at me like that, unless you want me to cry instead of kill.
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| GERTRUDE
To whom do you speak this?
| GERTRUDE
Who are you talking to?
|
| HAMLET
Do you see nothing there?
| HAMLET
You don’t see anything?
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| GERTRUDE
Nothing at all, yet all that is I see.
| GERTRUDE
Nothing at all, but I can see everything that’s here.
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135 | HAMLET
Nor did you nothing hear?
| HAMLET
And you don’t hear anything?
|
| GERTRUDE
No, nothing but ourselves.
| GERTRUDE
No, nothing but us talking.
|
| HAMLET
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!
| HAMLET
Look, look how it’s sneaking away! My father, dressed just like he was when he was alive!
Look, he’s goin
| GERTRUDE
This the very coinage of your brain.
This bodiless creation ecstasy
Is very cunning in.
| GERTRUDE
This is only a figment of your imagination. Madness is good at creating hallucinations.
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145
150
155
| HAMLET
Ecstasy?
My pulse as yours doth temperately keep time
And makes as healthful music. It is not madness
That I have uttered. Bring me to the test,
And I the matter will reword, which madness
Would gambol from. Mother, for love of grace,
Lay not that flattering unction to your soul
That not your trespass but my madness speaks.
It will but skin and film the ulcerous place
Whilst rank corruption, mining all within,
Infects unseen. Confess yourself to heaven.
Repent what’s past. Avoid what is to come.
And do not spread the compost on the weeds
To make them ranker. 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.
| HAMLET
Madness? My heart beats just as evenly as yours does. There’s nothing crazy in what I’ve just uttered. Put me to the test. I’ll rephrase everything I’ve just said, which a lunatic couldn’t do. Mother, for the love of God, don’t flatter yourself into believing that it’s my madness, not your crime, that’s the problem. You’d just be concealing the rot that’s eating you from the inside. Confess your sins to heaven. Repent and avoid damnation. Don’t spread manure over the weeds in your heart; it’ll only make them more filthy. Forgive me my good intentions here since in these fat and spoiled times, virtuous people have to say, “Beg your pardon” to vile ones and beg for the chance to do any good.
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| GERTRUDE
O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain.
| GERTRUDE
Oh Hamlet, you’ve broken my heart in two!
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160
165
| HAMLET
Oh, throw away the worser part of it,
And live the purer with the other half.
Good night—but go not to mine uncle’s bed.
Assume a virtue if you have it not.
That monster, custom, who all sense doth eat,
Of habits devil, is angel yet in this:
That to the use of actions fair and good
He likewise gives a frock or livery
That aptly is put on. Refrain tonight,
And that shall lend a kind of easiness
To the next abstinence, the next more easy.
| HAMLET
Then throw away the worse half, and live a purer life with the other! Good night to you. But don’t go to my uncle’s bed tonight. At least pretend to be virtuous, even if you’re not. Habit is a terrible thing, in that it’s easy to get used to doing evil without feeling bad about it. But it’s also a good thing, in that being good can also become a habit.
Say no to sex tonight, and that will make it easier to say no the next time, and still easier the time after that. Habit can change even one’s natural instincts, and either rein in the devil in us, or kick him out. Once again, good night to you, and when you want to repent, I’ll ask you for your blessing too. I’m sorry about what happened to this gentleman (pointing toPOLONIUS), but
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