Hamlet (eBook)

 [Enter HAMLET and Players]

(1) HAMLET Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to

 you, trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it,

 as many of your players do, I had as lief the

 town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air

 too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently;

 for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say,

 the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget

 a temperance that may give it smoothness. O, it

 offends me to the soul to hear a robustious

(10) periwig-pated fellow tear a passion to tatters, to

 very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings, who

 for the most part are capable of nothing but

 inexplicable dumbshows and noise: I would have such

 a fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it

 out-herods Herod: pray you, avoid it.

FIRST PLAYER I warrant your honour.

HAMLET Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion

 be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the

 word to the action; with this special o'erstep not

 the modesty of nature: for any thing so overdone is

(20) from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the

 first and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere, the

 mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature,

 scorn her own image, and the very age and body of

 the time his form and pressure. Now this overdone,

 or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful

 laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the

 censure of the which one must in your allowance

 o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be

 players that I have seen play, and heard others

(30) praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely,

 that, neither having the accent of Christians nor

 the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so

 strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of

 nature's journeymen had made men and not made them

 well, they imitated humanity so abominably.

FIRST PLAYER I hope we have reformed that indifferently with us,

 sir.

HAMLET O, reform it altogether. And let those that play

 your clowns speak no more than is set down for them;

 for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to set on

(40) some quantity of barren spectators to laugh too; though,

 in the mean time, some necessary question of the play be

then to be considered:  That's villanous, and shows a

 most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it. And then

you have some again that keeps one suit of jests, as a man

 is known by one suit of apparel; and gentlemen quote

 his jests down in their tables before they come to the

 play; as, thus, 'Cannot you stay till I eat my porridge?'

 and 'You owe me a quarter's wages', and 'My coat

 wants a cullison', and 'Your beer is sour', and blabbering

(50) with his lips, and thus keeping in his cinquepace of

 jests, when, god knows, the warm clown cannot make a

 jest unless by chance, as the blind man catcheth a hare.

 Masters, tell him of it.

FIRST PLAYER We will, my lord.

HAMLET Well, go make you ready.

 [Exeunt Players]

 [Enter POLONIUS, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDENSTERN]

 How now, my lord! I will the king hear this piece of work?

LORD POLONIUS And the queen too, and that presently.

HAMLET Bid the players make haste.

 [Exit POLONIUS]

(60) Will you two help to hasten them?

ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN We will, my lord.

 [Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN]

HAMLET What ho! Horatio!

 [Enter HORATIO]

HORATIO Here, sweet lord, at your service.

HAMLET Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man

 As e'er my conversation coped withal.

HORATIO O, my dear lord,--

HAMLET          Nay, do not think I flatter;

 For what advancement may I hope from thee

 That no revenue hast but thy good spirits,

 To feed and clothe thee? Why should the poor be flatter'd?

(70) No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp,

 And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee

 Where thrift may follow fawning. Dost thou hear?

 Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice

 And could of men distinguish, her election

 Hath seal'd thee for herself; for thou hast been

 As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing,

 A man that fortune's buffets and rewards

 Hast ta'en with equal thanks: and blest are those

 Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled,

(80) That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger

 To sound what stop she please. Give me that man

 That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him

 In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart,

 As I do thee.--Something too much of this.--

 There is a play to-night 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

(90) Observe mine uncle: if his occulted guilt

 Do not itself unkennel in one speech,

 It is a damned ghost that we have seen,

 And my imaginations are as foul

 As Vulcan's stithy. Give him heedful note;

 For I mine eyes will rivet to his face,

 And after we will both our judgments join

 In censure of his seeming.

HORATIO Well, my lord:

 If he steal aught the whilst this play is playing,

 And 'scape detecting, I will pay the theft.

(100) HAMLET They are coming to the play; I must be idle:

 Get you a place.

 [Danish march. A flourish. Enter KING CLAUDIUS, QUEEN GERTRUDE, POLONIUS, OPHELIA, ROSENCRANTZ, GUILDENSTERN, and others]

KING CLAUDIUS How fares our cousin Hamlet?

HAMLET Excellent, i' faith; of the chameleon's dish: I eat

 the air, promise-crammed: you cannot feed capons so.

KING CLAUDIUS I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet; these words

 are not mine.

HAMLET No, nor mine now.

 [To POLONIUS]

 My lord, you played once i' the university, you say?

(110) LORD POLONIUS That did I, my lord; and was accounted a good actor.

HAMLET What did you enact?

LORD POLONIUS I did enact Julius Caesar: I was killed i' the

 Capitol; Brutus killed me.

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

 there. Be the players ready?

ROSENCRANTZ Ay, my lord; they stay upon your patience.

QUEEN GERTRUDE Come hither, my dear...