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Hamlet: Act I, Scene 4

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Hamlet
Act I, Scene 4

Elsinore. A platform before Elsinore castle., Late night

Theatrical design for Hamlet

Theatrical design for Hamlet

Dimitri Tavadze, 1974

  1. Enter Hamlet, Horatio, and Marcellus.

Hamlet

1
  1. The air bites shrewdly, it is very cold.

Horatio

2
  1. It is a nipping and an eager air.

Hamlet

3
  1. What hour now?

Horatio

4
  1.                I think it lacks of twelve.

Marcellus

5
  1. No, it is struck.

Horatio

6 - 8
  1. Indeed? I heard it not. It then draws near the season
  2. Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk.
    Aug 15, 2019 Zyzigus
    usual practice
  3. A flourish of trumpets, and two pieces goes off within.
    Aug 15, 2019 Zyzigus
    cannons
    Aug 15, 2019 Zyzigus
    cannons
  4. What does this mean, my lord?

Hamlet

9 - 13
  1. The King doth wake tonight and takes his rouse,
  2. Keeps wassail, and the swagg’ring up-spring reels;
  3. And as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,
  4. The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out
  5. The triumph of his pledge.
    Aug 15, 2019 Zyzigus
    The king is having a drink, and he wants every one in earshot to know about it.

Horatio

14
  1.                            Is it a custom?

Hamlet

15 - 40
  1. Ay, marry, is’t,
  2. But to my mind, though I am native here
  3. And to the manner born, it is a custom
  4. More honor’d in the breach than the observance.
  5. This heavy-headed revel east and west
  6. Makes us traduc’d and tax’d of other nations.
  7. They clip us drunkards, and with swinish phrase
  8. Soil our addition, and indeed it takes
  9. From our achievements, though perform’d at height,
  10. The pith and marrow of our attribute.
  11. So, oft it chances in particular men,
  12. That for some vicious mole of nature in them,
  13. As in their birth, wherein they are not guilty
  14. (Since nature cannot choose his origin),
  15. By their o’ergrowth of some complexion
  16. Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason,
  17. Or by some habit, that too much o’er-leavens
  18. The form of plausive manners—that these men,
  19. Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect,
  20. Being nature’s livery, or fortune’s star,
  21. His virtues else, be they as pure as grace,
  22. As infinite as man may undergo,
  23. Shall in the general censure take corruption
  24. From that particular fault: the dram of ev’l
  25. Doth all the noble substance of a doubt
  26. To his own scandal.
  1. Enter Ghost.

My fate cries out, and makes each petty artere in this body as hardy as the Nemean lion’s nerve.

John Masey Wright, circa 1800

Horatio

41
  1.                     Look, my lord, it comes!

Hamlet

42 - 60
  1. Angels and ministers of grace defend us!
  2. Be thou a spirit of health, or goblin damn’d,
  3. Bring with thee airs from heaven, or blasts from hell,
  4. Be thy intents wicked, or charitable,
  5. Thou com’st in such a questionable shape
  6. That I will speak to thee. I’ll call thee Hamlet,
  7. King, father, royal Dane. O, answer me!
  8. Let me not burst in ignorance, but tell
  9. Why thy canoniz’d bones, hearsed in death,
  10. Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre,
  11. Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn’d,
  12. Hath op’d his ponderous and marble jaws
  13. To cast thee up again. What may this mean,
  14. That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel
  15. Revisits thus the glimpses of the moon,
  16. Making night hideous, and we fools of nature
  17. So horridly to shake our disposition
  18. With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
  19. Say why is this? Wherefore? What should we do?
  20. Ghost beckons Hamlet.

Horatio

61 - 63
  1. It beckons you to go away with it,
  2. As if it some impartment did desire
  3. To you alone.

Marcellus

64 - 66
  1.               Look with what courteous action
  2. It waves you to a more removed ground,
  3. But do not go with it.

Horatio

67
  1.                        No, by no means.

Hamlet

68
  1. It will not speak, then I will follow it.

Horatio

69
  1. Do not, my lord.

Hamlet

70 - 74
  1.                  Why, what should be the fear?
  2. I do not set my life at a pin’s fee,
  3. And for my soul, what can it do to that,
  4. Being a thing immortal as itself?
  5. It waves me forth again, I’ll follow it.

Byam Shaw, 1901

Horatio

75 - 84
  1. What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,
  2. Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff
  3. That beetles o’er his base into the sea,
  4. And there assume some other horrible form
  5. Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason,
  6. And draw you into madness? Think of it.
  7. The very place puts toys of desperation,
  8. Without more motive, into every brain
  9. That looks so many fathoms to the sea
  10. And hears it roar beneath.

Hamlet

85 - 86
  1.                            It waves me still.—
  2. Go on, I’ll follow thee.

Marcellus

87
  1. You shall not go, my lord.

Hamlet

88
  1.                            Hold off your hands.

Horatio

89
  1. Be rul’d, you shall not go.

Hamlet

90 - 95
  1.                             My fate cries out,
  2. And makes each petty artere in this body
  3. As hardy as the Nemean lion’s nerve.
  4. Still am I call’d. Unhand me, gentlemen.
  5. By heaven, I’ll make a ghost of him that lets me!
  6. I say away!—Go on, I’ll follow thee.
  1. Exeunt Ghost and Hamlet.

Horatio

96
  1. He waxes desperate with imagination.

Marcellus

97
  1. Let’s follow. ’Tis not fit thus to obey him.

Horatio

98
  1. Have after. To what issue will this come?

Marcellus

99
  1. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

Horatio

100
  1. Heaven will direct it.

Marcellus

101
  1.                        Nay, let’s follow him.
  1. Exeunt.
Selwyn & Blount edition of Hamlet

From: Selwyn & Blount edition of Hamlet

John Austen, 1922

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