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Hamlet (Michael Almereyda) (2000)
I have of late,
wherefore I know not... Iost all my mirth. What a piece of work is a man. How noble in reason, how infinite in faculties. In form, in moving, how express and admirable. In action, how like an ngel. In apprehensin, how like a god. The beauty of the worid, the paragon of animals. And yet to me... what is this quintessence of dust? Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death... our memory be green and that it is us befitted to bear our heart in grief, and our whole kingdom to be contracted in one brow of woe. Yet so far hath discretion fought with nature that we with wisest sorrow think on him together with remembrance of ourselves. Therefore our sometime sister, now our Queen, the imperial jointress to this warlike state have we, as 'twere, with a defeated joy, with an auspicious and dropping eye, with mirth and funeral, and with dirge in marriage, in equal scale, weighing delight and dole, taken to wife. Nor have we herein barred your better wisdoms which have freely gone with this affair along. For all... Our thanks. Now follow that you know, young Fortinbras, holding a weak supposal of our worth or thinking by our late dear brother's death our state to be disjoint and out of frame, co-leagued with this dream of his advantage, he hath not failed to pester us with message, importing the surrender of those lands lost by his father, with all bond of law to our most valiant brother. So much for him. And now, Laertes, what's the news with you? The head is not more native to the heart, the hand to the mouth, than the throne of Denmark to thy father. What wouldst thou have, Laertes? My dread lord, your leave and favour to return to France, from whence, though willing I come to show my duty in your coronation, now I must confess that duty done, my thoughts bend again to France. Have you your father's leave? What says Polonius? He has wrung from me by slow leave, by laboursome petition and at last upon his will I sealed my hard consent. I do beseech you give him leave to go. Take thy fair hour, Laertes. Time be thine, and thy best grace. Spend it at thy will. My cousin Hamlet, and my son. How is it that the clouds still hang on you? Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off, and let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. Do not with veiled lids seek for thy noble father in the dust. Thou know'st 'tis common. All that lives must die, passing through nature to eternity. Ay, madam, it is common. If it be, why seems it so particular with thee? Seems, madam? Nay, it is. I know not seems. 'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother, nor customary suits of solemn black, nor windy suspiration of forced breath. No. Nor the fruitful river in the eye that can denote me truly. These indeed seem. They are actions that a man might play. But I have within that passeth show these but the trappings and the suits of woe. 'Tis sweet and commendable in your nature, Hamlet, to give these mourning duties to your father. That father lost, lost his, and the survivor bound in filial obligation for some term to do obsequious sorrow. But to persevere in condolement is impious stubbornness. 'Tis unmanly grief. It shows a will most incorrect to heaven, a heart unfortified, a mind impatient. For your intent on going back to school in Wittenberg is most retrograde to our desire. We beseech you to remain in the care and comfort of our eye. Let not thy mother lose her prayers, Hamlet. Stay with us, go not to Wittenberg. I shall in all my best obey you, madam. O that this too too solid flesh would melt, thaw and resolve itself into a dew. Or the Everlasting had not fixed his canon against self slaughter. O God, how weary, stale, flat and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this worid. 'Tis an unweeded garden that grows to seed. Things rank and gross in nature possess it merely. That it should come to this. But two months dead, nay, not so much, not two. So excellent a king, that was to this, Hyperion to a satyr. So loving to my mother that he might not beteem the winds visit her face too roughly. She would hang on him as if increase of appetite grew by what it fed on, yet within a month, I may not think on it. Frailty, thy name is woman. O little month, or ere these shoes were old with which she followed my poor father's body, like Niobe, all tears. Why she, even she, O, God. A beast that wants discourse of reason would have mourned longer. Married with my uncle, my father's brother, but no more like my father than I to Hercules. Within a month. Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears had left the flushing in her galled eyes, she married. O most wicked speed, to post with such dexterity to incestuous sheets. It is not, nor it cannot come to good, but break my heart for I must hold my tongue. What make you from Wittenberg? Marcella. My good lord. I am very glad to see you. Good even, sir. But what, in faith, make you from Wittenberg? A truant disposition, good my lord. What is your affair in Elsinore? I came to see your father's funeral. I prithee, do not mock me, it was to see my mother's wedding. Indeed, it followed hard upon. Thrift, Horatio. The funeral baked meats did coldly furnish the marriage tables. Would I have met my dearest foe in Heaven or ever I had seen that day. My father. Methinks I see my father. Where, my lord? In my mind's eye. I saw him once. He was a goodly king. He was a man, take him for all, I shall not see his like again. I think I saw him, yesternight. Saw? Who? My lord, the King, your father. The King, my father? Season your admiration for a while with an attent ear while I deliver upon witness of this gentleman this marvel to you. In the dead waste of the middle of the night, the apparition comes. Where was this? Upon the platform where we watched. 'Tis here. Did you not speak to it? I did, but answer made it none. Yet once, methought, it lifted up its head, like as if it would speak. Stay, illusin. If thou hast any sound or use of voice, speak to me. It is offended. If there be good to be done that may to thee do ease, and grace to me, speak to me. Speak! Speak! I charge thee, speak. 'Tis very strange. As I do live, my lord, 'tis true. And we did think of it our duty to let you know of it. Indeed, indeed, but this troubles me. Hold you the watch again tonight? I do, my lord. What looked he, frowningly? A countenance more in sorrow than in anger. And fixed his eyes upon you? Most constantly. How would I have been there. I would have much amazed you. I will watch tonight. I will speak to it though hell itself should gape and bid me hold my peace. And I pray you all, if you have hitherto concealed this sight, let it be tenable in your silence still. And what shall hap tonight, give it understanding but no tongue. I will require your loves. So fare you well. Upon on the platform, twixt 11 and 12, I'll visit you. Our duty to your honour. Your loves as mine to you. Farewell. Would the night were come. Till then, sit still my soul. Foul deeds will rise, though all the earth o'erwhelm them to men's eyes. Perhaps he loves you now, and now no soil nor cautel doth besmirch the virtue of his will. But you must fear. His virtue weighed, his will is not his own, for he is subject to his birth. He may not, as unvalued persons do, carve for himself, for on his choice depends the health and safety of this state. Therefore must his choice be circumscribed unto the voice of that body whereof he is head. Then if he says he loves you, it fits your wisdom to believe it as he in his particular act and place may give his saying deed which is no further than the main voice of Denmark goes withal. Then weigh what loss your honour may sustain if with too... credent ear you list his songs, or lose your heart. Or your chaste treasure open to his ummastered importunity. Fear it, Ophelia. Fear it, my dear sister. Keep you in the rear of your affection, out of shot and danger of desire. Best safety lies in fear. Youth to itself rebels, though none else near. I shall the effect of this good lesson keep, as watchman to my heart. But good my brother do not, as some ungracious pastors do, show me the steep and thorny way to heaven while like a puffed and reckless libertine himself the primrose path of dalliance treads... and recks not his own creed. Fear me not. I stay too long. A double blessing is a double grace. Occasin smiles upon a second leave. Yet here, Laertes? Aboard, aboard for shame. The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail, and you stayed for? My blessing with thee. And these few precepts, in thy memory look thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, nor unproportioned thought his act. Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar. Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel. But do not dull thy palm with entertainment of each new-hatched, unpledged comrade. Beware of entrance to a quarrel, but being in it, bear it that the opposed may beware of thee. Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice. Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgement. Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, but not expressed in fancy. Rich, not gaudy. For the apparel oft proclaims the man. Neither a borrower nor a lender be, for loan oft loses both itself and friend. This above all, to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not be false to any man. I humbly take my leave, my lord. The time invites you. Go. Farewell, Ophelia. Remember well what I said to you. Angels and ministers of grace defend us! Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damned, bring with thee airs of heaven or blasts from hell, thou com'st in such questionable shape that I'll speak to thee. Mark me. I will. My hour is almost come when I to sulphurous and tormenting flames must render up myself. Alas, poor ghost. Pity me not. But lend thy serious hearing to what I shall unfold. Speak. I am bound to hear. I am thy father's spirit, doomed for a term to walk the night and by day to fast in fires till the foul crimes done in my days of nature of are burnt and purged. But that I am forbid to tell the secrets of my prison house, I could a tale unfold whose lightest word would harrow thy soul, freeze thy young blood, make thy two eyes like stars start from their spheres, thy knotted and combined locks to part, and each to stand on end like upon the fretful porcupine. But this eternal blazon must not be the ears of flesh and blood. List, list, o list! If thou did'st ever thy dear father love. O God! Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder. Murder? Murder most foul, as in the best it is, but this most foul, strange, unnatural. Now, Hamlet, dear. 'Tis given out that sleeping in my orchard, a serpent stung me. So the whole ear of Denmark is by a forged process of my death rankly abused. But know, nobled youth, the serpent that did sting thy father's life now wears his crown. My uncle! Ay, that incestuous, adulterate beast with witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts, wicked gifts with the power to seduce, won to his shameful lust the will of my most seeming-virtuous queen. O, Hamlet, what a falling off was there from me, whose love was of a dignity that it went hand in hand with the vow I made to her in marriage. And to decline upon a wretch whose natural gifts were poor to those of mine. But soft, methinks I scent the morning air. Brief let me be. Sleeping in my orchard, my custom of the afternoon, upon my secure hour thy uncle stole with juice of cursed hebona in a vial, and in the porches of my ears did pour the leprous distillment whose effect holds such enmity with the blood of man that swift as quicksilver it courses through the body and with sudden vigour it curds like eager droppings into milk, the thin and wholesome blood. So did it mine. Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand... unhouseled, disappointed, no reckoning made, but sent to my account with all my imperfections on my head. O horrible, horrible, most horrible! If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not. Let not the royal bed of Denmark be a couch for luxury and damned incest. But howsoever thou pursuest this act, taint not thy mind. Nor let thy soul contrive against thy mother. Leave her to Heaven and to those thorns that in her bosom lodge, to prick and sting her. Fare thee well at once. Remember me. The time is out of joint. O cursed spite, that ever I was born to set it right. My lord. What news, my lord? O day and night, but this is wondrous strange. Therefore as a stranger give him welcome. There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in our philosophy. My fate cries out. What is it, Ophelia, he hath sent you? So please you, something touching the lord Hamlet. Marry, well bethought. What is between you? Give me up the truth. He hath, of late, made many tenders of his affection to me. Affection! Think yourself a baby, that you take these tenders for true pay, which are not sterling. Tender yourself more dearly. He hath importuned me with love in honourable fashion. When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul doth lend the tongue vows. These blazes, daughter, given more light than heat, extinct in both, even in their promise as it is a-making, you must not take for fire. I do not know what I should think. From this time, be scanter of your maiden presence. Set your entreatments at a higher rate, than a command to parley. The Lord Hamlet, believe in him so much that he is young and with a larger tether may he walk than may be given you. Do not believe his vows. I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth, have you so slander any moment leisure as to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet. Look to it. I charge you. We have the word "to be". But what I propose s the word "to Inter-be". "Inter-be". It s not possble to be alone, to be by yourself. You need other people n order to be. You need other bengs n order to be. Not only you need father, mother, but also uncle, or brother, sster, socety. But you also need sunshne, rver, ar, trees, brds, elephants, and so on. So t s mpossble to be by yourself, alone. You have to "nter-be" wth everyone and everythng else. And therefore to be means to "nter-be". To the celestial and my soul's idol... the most beautified Ophelia. Doubt that the stars are fire, doubt that the sun doth move, doubt truth to be a liar, but never doubt my love. To be or not to be. To be or not to be. So oft t chances n partcular men that for some vcous mole of nature n them or by some habt that too much overleavens the form of plausble manners, that these men, carryng, I say, the stamp of one defect, ther vrtues else they as pure as grace, shall n the general censure take corrupton... How goes my good Lord Hamlet? Well, God-a-mercy. Do you know me, my lord? Excellent well. You are a fishmonger. Not I, my lord. Then I would you were so honest a man. Honest, my lord? Ay, sir. To be honest, as this worid goes, s to one man of ten thousand. That s very true, my lord. Have you a daughter? I have, my lord. Let her not walk in the sun. Conception is a blessing, but as your daughter may conceive, friend, look to it. How say you by that? Stll harpng on my daughter. He s far gone. And truly n my youth I suffered much for love. Will you go out into the air? Into my grave. My honourable lord, I humbly take my leave of you. You cannot take from me anything I will not willingly part, except my life. Except my life. Except my life. Except my life. My liege. My liege, and madam. To expostulate... what majesty should be, what duty is, why day is day, night, night, and time is time, where nothing but to waste... night, day and time. Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit and tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief. Your noble son is mad. Mad call I it, for to define true madness, what is it but... to be nothing else but mad? But let that go. More matter, less art. I swear I use no art at all. That he is mad, 'tis true, 'tis true, 'tis pity, and pity 'tis, 'tis true a foolish figure, but farewell it, for I will use no art. Mad let us grant him then. Now remains for us to find out the cause of this effect. Or rather the cause of this defect. For this effect, defective comes by cause. Thus it remains, and the remainder thus. Perpend: I have a daughter, have while she is mine, who in her duty, and obedience, mark, hath given me this. Gather now and surmise. Came this from Hamlet to her? "I have no art to reckon my groans. I love thee best, O most best. Every thought of thine, ever more whist this machine is to him, Hamlet." This in obedience hath my daughter shown to me. And more above, hath his solicitings as they fell out by time, means and place all given to my ear. How hath she received his love? What do you think of me? As of a man, faithful and honourable. I would fain prove so. But what might you think had I seen this hot love on the wing, as I perceived before my daughter told me, what might you or my dear Majesty think if I had looked upon this love with idle sight? What might you think? No, I went round to work and my young mistress thus I did bespeak: "Lord Hamlet is a prince, out of thy star. This must not be." She took the fruits of my advice and he repelled, a short tale to make, fell into a sadness, then into a fast, thence to a watch, thence into a weakness, thence to a lightness and by this declensin into the madness wherein now he raves, and all we mourn for. Do you think 'tis this? It may be, very like. Take this from this, if this be otherwise. If circumstances lead me, I will find where truth is hid, though it were hid, indeed, within the centre. To be or not to be, that is the question. Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing, end them. To die, to sleep... no more. And by a sleep to say we end the heartache and the thousand natural shocks the flesh is heir to. 'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep, perchance to dream. There's the rub. For in that sleep of death, what dreams may come, when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause. There's the respect that makes calamity of so long a life. For who could bear the whips and scorns of time, the proud man's contumely, the insolence of office, the law's delay, the pangs of disprized love, when he himself might his own quietus make with a bare bodkin? Who would fardles bear, to grunt and sweat under a weary life were it not the dread of something after death? The undiscovered country to whose bourn no traveller returns puzzles the will and makes us rather bear those ills we have than fly to others we know not of. And thus conscience does make cowards of us all. And thus the native hue of resolution is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought and enterprises of great pitch and moment in this regard their currents turn awry and lose the name of action. My excellent good friend! How dost thou, Guildenstern? Ah, Rosencrantz! Good lads, how do you both? As the indifferent children of the earth. Happy in that we are not overhappy. On fortune's cap we are not the very button. - Nor the soles of her shoes? - Neither, my lord. What news? None, my lord, but that the worid's grown honest. Then doomsday is near. But your news is not true. Let me question more in particular. What have you my friends deserved at the hands of fortune that she has sent you to prison hither? Prison, my lord? Denmark is a prison. Then the worid is one. A goodly one, with confines, wards and dungeons, Denmark being one of the worst. We think not so, my lord. Well then 'tis none to you, for their is neither good nor bad but thinking makes it so. To me it is a prison. Your ambition makes it so. 'Tis too narrow for your mind. O God, I could be bound in a nutshell and count myself king of infinite space. Were it not that I have bad dreams. What make you here? To visit you, my lord, no other occasin. Can you by no conference get from him why he puts on this confusin grating so harshly his days with turbulent and dangerous lunacy? He confesses he feel dstracted, but from what cause he wll 'a no means speak. Nor do we fnd hm forward to be sounded but wth a crafty madness keeps aloof when we would brng hm to confess hs true state. Did he receive you well? Most lke a gentleman. But forces hs dsposton. Nggard of queston, but of our demands most free n hs reply. Thank you, Rosencrantz and gentle Guildenstern. Thank you, Guildenstern and gentle Rosencrantz. We lay our servce freely at your feet. O what a rogue and peasant slave am I. Is it not monstrous that this player here, but in a fiction, in a dream of passin, could force his soul so to his own conceit, that from her working all his visin waned, his whole function suiting with forms to his conceit? And all for nothing. What would be do, had he the motive and cue for passin that I have? I've heard that guilty creatures, sitting at a play have by the cunning of the scene, been struck so to the soul that presently they have proclaimed their malefactions. For murder, though it hath no tongue, will speak with most miraculous organ. I know my course. The spirit I have seen may be a devil. And the devil hath power to assume a pleasing shape, yea, and perhaps out of my weakness and melancholy abuses to damn me. I'll have grounds more relative than this. The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King. 'Tis most true and he beseeched me to entreat your majesties to hear and see the matter. With all my heart and it doth content me to hear him so inclined. Good gentlemen, give him a further edge and drive his purpose into these delights. We shall, my lord. And for your part, Ophelia, I do wish your beauties be the happy cause of Hamlet's wildness. So shall I hope your virtues will bring him to his wonted way again. How does your honour? I humbly thank you. Well. I have remembrances of yours I have longed to redeliver. I pray you, receive them. No, not I. I never gave you aught. My honoured lord, you know right well you did. And with words of so sweet a breath that made these things more rich. Their perfume lost, take them. For to the noble mind, rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind. There, my lord. Are you honest? Lord? Are you fair? What means your lordship? I did love you once. Indeed, you made me believe so. You should not have believed me. I loved you not. I was the more deceived. Get thee to a nunnery. Why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest, yet could accuse me of things, better my mother had not borne me. I am very proud, revengeful, ambitious, with more offences than I have thought to put them in, imagination to give them shape, or time to act them in. What should such fellows as I do, crawling between earth and heaven? We are errant knaves all, believe none of us. Where is thy father? Let the doors be shut upon him that he play the fool nowhere but in his own house! Get thee to a nunnery! Two messages. If thou dost marry, I'll gve thee ths plague for thy dowry. Be thou as chaste as ce, as pure as snow, thou shall not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery. Go! Farewell. We shall have no more marrage! Those that are marred already, all but one, shall lve. The rest shall keep as they are. To a nunnery, go. Give me that man that is not passin's slave and I will wear him in my heart's core, in my heart of heart, as I do thee. Tonight one scene comes near the circumstances of which I have told thee of my father's death. I pray thee, when thou seest that act afoot, observe... my uncle. If his occulted guilt do not itself unkennel in one speech, it is a damned ghost we have seen. Give him heedful note, for I mine eyes will rivet to his face and after we will our judgements join in censure of his seeming. Well, my lord. Get you a place. I must be idle. Hamlet, come sit by me. No, mother, here's metal more attractive. Lady, shall I sit in your lap? No, my lord. I mean, my head upon your lap. Think you I meant country matters? I think nothing, my lord. Well that's a fair thought, to lie between maid's legs. What is, my lord? Nothing. You are merry, my lord. What should a man do but be merry? Look how cheerful my mother looks and my father died within 2 hours. Nay, 'tis twice 2 months. So long? Nay then, let the Devil wear black, for I'll have a suit of sables. O heavens! Died 2 months ago and not forgotten yet? Then there's hope a great man's memory may outlive half a year. How fares our cousin Hamlet? Excellent. What means this, my lord? It means mischief. My lord. Give me some light. Light! Cry you with false fire? Away! My lord! O good Horatio, I'll take the ghost's word for a thousand pounds. Didst perceive? Very well, my lord. - Upon the poisoning? - I did well note. Some must watch while some must sleep. Thus runs the worid away. Good. My lord. Hello, ths s Eartha Ktt. Cats have nne lves, but unfortunately you only have one. So buckle your seat belt for safety. Good my lord, vouchsafe me a word with you. The King, sir... Ay, sir, what of him? ...is marvellous distempered. With drink? Good my lord, try to put your discourse into some frame. I'm tame. Pronounce. The Queen, your mother, in great affliction of spirit, has sent me to you. You're welcome. Nay, my lord, this courtesy is not of the right breed. If it shall please you to make me a wholesome answer. I cannot. What? Make you a wholesome answer. My wit's diseased. Now is the very witching time of night, when churchyards yawn and Hell itself breathes out contagion into this worid. Now could I drink hot blood and do such bitter business as the day would quake to look on. I like him not, nor stands it safe with us to let his madness range. Therefore prepare you. Your commissin will forthwith dispatch and he to England shall along with you. We wll ourselves provde. Most holy and relgous fear, to keep those many bodes safe that feed upon your majesty. Never alone dd the Kng sgh but wth a general groan. Arm you, I pray you to this speedy voyage. For we will fetter this fear which now goes too free-footed. We wll haste us. O, my offence is rank. It smells to heaven. It has the primal eldest curse upon it. What if this cursed hand were thicker with brother's blood? Is there rain enough in the sweet heavens to wash it white as snow? Forgive me my foul murder. That cannot be, for I still possess those effects for which I did the murder. My crown, mine own ambition, my queen. What then? What rests? Try what repentance can. What can it not? My words fly up, my thoughts remain below. Words without thoughts never to heaven go. Look you lay home to him. Tell him his pranks are too broad to bear with, and that Your Grace hath screened and stood between much heat and him. Fear me not. Mother! I'll shroud me in here. Pray you, be round with him. Mother, what's the matter? Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended. Mother, you have my father much offended. You answer with an idle tongue. You question with a wicked tongue. Have you forgot me? No, not so. You are the Queen, your husband's brother's wife. And would it were not so, you are my mother. Then I'll set those to you that can speak. Come sit you down! You shall not budge. Not till I set you up a glass where you see inmost part of you. What, thou wilt not murder me? - Help! - Help! What hast thou done? Nay, I know not. Is it the King? O what rash... and bloody deed is this? Almost as bad, good mother... as kill a king and marry with his brother. Kill a king? Ay, lady, it was my word. 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. 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. What have I done? Have you eyes? You cannot call it love, for at your age the blood is tame. It's humble. It waits upon the judgement. O shame! Where is thy blush? To live in the rank sweat of an enseamed bed, honeying and making love over the nasty sty! No more! Nay, a kept villain, a murderer, a king of shreds and patches! No more. How would you, gracious figure? Do not chide your tardy son. Alas, he's mad. Do not forget. This visitation is but to whet thy almost blunted purpose. But look, amazement on thy mother sits. Step between her and her fighting soul! Speak to her, Hamlet. How is it with you, lady? Where on do you look? On him! Look you how pale he glares. Do not look upon me. To whom do you speak this? Do you see nothing there? Nothing at all. This is the very coinage of your brain. My pulse as yours doth temporately keep time and makes as healthful music. It is not madness I have uttered. Mother, for the love of grace, confess yourself to heaven. Repent what is past. Avoid what is to come. Do not spread the compost on the weeds to make them ranker. O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain. Throw away the worser part of it, and live the purer with the other half. Good night. For the same lord, I do repent. But heaven hath pleased it so to punish me with this and this with me. I will bestow him, and answer well the death gave him. One word more, good lady. What shall I do? Not ths, by no means, let that bloat Kng tempt you agan to bed, pinch wanton on your cheek, call you his mouse, and let him, for a pair of reechy kisses, make you ravel this matter out, that I essentially am not in madness, but mad in craft. Be thou assured. If words are made of breath, and breath of life, I have no life to breathe what thou has said to me. I must to England, you know that. Alack, I had forgotten. 'Ts so concluded on. I'll lug the guts into the neighbouring room. Mother, good night. Indeed this counsellor is most still, most silent, and most grave, who was in life a foolish, prating knave. Come sir, to draw toward an end with you. Good night, mother. What have you done, my lord, with the dead body? Compounded it with dust, whereto 'tis kin. Tell us where 'tis, so we may bear it to the chapel. Do not believe it. Believe what? That I can keep your counsel and not my own. Besides, to be demanded of by a sponge... You take me for a sponge? Ay, sir. Soaking up the King's countenance, his awards, his authorities. You must tell us where the body is and go with us to the King. The body is with the King, but the King is not with the body. The King is a thing... A thing, my lord? ...of nothing. How now, what hath befallen? Where the dead body is bestowed, my lord, we cannot get from him. Now Hamlet, where is Polonius? At supper. At supper? Where? Not where he eats, but where he is eaten. A convocation of politic worms are eaten at him. We fat all creatures to fat us, we fat ourselves for maggots. Your fat king and lean beggar is but variable service. Two dishes, but to one table. That's the end. Where is Polonius? In heaven. Send thither to see. If your messenger find him not, seek in the other place yourself. But indeed if you find him not within the month, you shall nose him as you go up the stairs into the lobby. Go seek him there. He will stay till you come. Hamlet, this deed, for thine especial safety which we do tender, as we dearly grieve for that which thou hast done, must send thee hence with fiery quickness. Therefore prepare thyself. The bark is ready, wind helps, associates tend, for England. For England? - Ay, Hamlet. - Good. If thou knowest our purpose. Farewell, my mother. Thy loving father, Hamlet. My mother. Father and mother is man and wife, man and wife is one flesh, and so my mother. For everything... is sealed and done that leans on the affair. The present death of Hamlet. Do it, England, for like the hectic in my blood he rages and thou must cure me. Good sir, whose powers are these? The nephew to old Norway, Fortinbras. How all occasions do inform against me and spur my dull revenge. What is a man if the chief good and market of his time be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more. Sure he that made us with such large discourse, looking before and after, gave us not that capability and godlike reason to fust in us unused. Now... whether it's bestial oblivion or some craven scruple of thinking too precisely on the event. A thought quartered has one part wisdom, three parts coward. I know not why yet I live to say: "This thing's to do." Sith I have cause, and means and strength and will to do it. Examples gross as earth exhort me. Rightly to be great is not to stir without great argument, but greatly to find quarrel in a straw when honour is at stake. How stand I then, that have a father killed, a mother stained, excitements of my reason and my blood... and let all sleep? From this time forth, may my thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth. To my sick soul, as sin's true nature is, each joy seems prologue to some great amiss. So full of artless jealousy is guilt. It spills itself in fearing to be spilt. Where is the beauteous majesty of Denmark? How now, Ophelia? How should I your true love know from another one? Alas, sweet lady, what imports this song? What say you? He is dead and gone, dead and gone. At his head, grassgreen turf, at his heels, a stone. Nay, but Ophelia... Pray you mark! My lord, alas look here. How do you, pretty lady? Pray, let's have no more words of this. But when they ask you, say this: Up he rose and donned his clothes and dug the chamber door, but in the maid and out the maid, never departed more. I hope all will be well. We must be patient. But I cannot choose but to weep, to think they lay him in the cold ground. My brother will know of this. And so I thank you for your good counsel. Good night, good night, sweet ladies. Good night! How long has she been thus? Calmly, good Laertes. A drop of calm blood proclaims me bastard, cuckold's my father, brands the harlot even here between the unsmirched brow of my true mother. What causes thy rebellion to look so giantlike? Let him go, Gertrude. Do not fear our person. Such divinity doth hedge a king. Where is my father? Dead. But not by him. How came he dead? I'll not be juggled with. - No, Laertes! - To hell allegiance! Conscience and grace to the profoundest pit! I dare damnation! Let come what comes, only I'll be revenged most thoroughly for my father. Who shall stay you? My will, not all the worid's. For my means, I'll husband them so well they will go foul with little. Thou speaks like a good child and a true gentleman. That I am guiltless of your father's death and sensibly in grief for it, I shall to your level judgement peer as day doth to your eye. He will not come again? No, no, he's dead. Go to thy deathbed. He will never come again. O rose of May, dear maid. Kind sister, sweet Ophelia. Hadst thou thy wits to persuade revenge, it could not move thus. How is it possible a young maid's wits should be as mortal as an old man's life? There's rosemary, that's for remembrances. I pray you, love, remember. And there's pansies, that's for thoughts. Fennel for you and columbine. There's rue for you, and some for me too. We may call it herb of grace of Sundays. You must wear your rue with a difference. There's a daisy. I would give you some violets, but they withered all when my father died. They say he came to a good end. Where the offence is let the great axe fall. Now must your conscience my acquittal seal. And you must put me in your heart for friend. Sith you heard that he which hath your noble father slain pursued my life. Tell me why you proceed not against these feats so... crimeful and capital in nature. The Queen, his mother, lives almost by his looks. And for myself, my virtue or my plague, I know not which, she is so conjunctive to my life that as a star moves not but in his sphere, I could not but by her. So I have a noble father lost, a sister... driven to desperate terms, whose worth stood challenger on mount of all the age for her perfections. But my revenge will come. Break not your sleeps for that. You must not think we are made of stuff so flat and dull that we can let our beard be shook with danger and think it pastime. You shortly shall hear more. I loved your father and we love ourself. And that, I hope, will teach you to imagine. From Hamlet. Laertes, you shall hear. "High and mighty, you shall know I am set naked on your kingdom. Tomorrow I shall beg your leave to your kingly eyes, where I shall, asking your pardon, there unto recount the occasin of my sudden and more strange return. Hamlet." "Naked"... and in the postscript he says "alone". Can you devise me? I am lost in it, my lord. But let him come. It warms the very sickness in my heart. If he be now returned, I shall work him to an exploit now ripe in my device, under the which he shall not choose but fall. And for his death, no wind of blame shall breathe. Not even his mother shall uncharge and call it accident. Was your father dear to you? Or are you like a painting of sorrow, a face without a heart? Why ask you this, my lord? There live within the flame of love a kind of wick or snuff that will abate it. And nothing is as a like goodness still. Goodness, growing to a pleurisy, dies in its own too much. That we would do, we should do when we would. For that "would" changes and hath abatements and delays as many as there are tongues, are hands, are accidents, and then this "should" is like a spendthrift sigh that hurts by easing. But to the quick of the ulcer. What wouldst thou undertake to show yourself your father's son in deed more than in word? One woe doth tread upon another's heels, so fast they follow. Your sister is drowned, Laertes. Drowned? Drowned. Drowned. Not to have strewed thy grave. And but that great command o'ersways the order, she should in ground unsanctified have lodged till the last trumpet. Must there be no more done? No more be done. Lay her in the earth, and from her fair and unpolluted flesh... Ophelia, may violets spring. Hold off the earth till I have caught her once more in my arms. Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead till of this flat you have a mountain made. What's he whose grief bears such an emphasis, whose phrase of sorrow conjures the wandering stars and makes them stand like wonder-wounded hearers? The devil take thy soul! I loved Ophelia. Forty thousand brothers with all their love cannot make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her? Show me what thou wilt do. Wilt thou weep, wilt fight, wilt tear thyself, wilt drink up easel, eat a crocodile? Dost thou come here to whine? Pluck them asunder. What is the reason you use me thus? I loved you ever. But it doth not matter. In my heart there was a fighting that would not let me sleep. Praised be rashness, for it lets us know our indiscretions... do sometimes serve us well when our deep plots do pall. That should teach us there's a divinity that shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we will. Will thou hear how I did proceed? I do beseech you. From my cabin, in the dark, groped I, to unseal their grand commissin. I found, Horatio, an exact command. My head should be struck off. Here's the commissin. Read it at more leisure. Thus rounded with villainies, I sat me down, devised a new commissin, wrote it fair. An earnest conjuration from the King that upon view and knowing of these contents he should these bearers put to death. So Guildenstern and Rosencrantz go to it. Why, man, they did make love to this employment. They are not near my conscience. Their defeat is their insinuation. 'Tis dangerous when baser nature comes between pass and fell incense points of mighty opposites. Think that he that killed my king, whored my mother, it not conscience to quit him with this arm? It must be shortly known from England what is the business there. It will be short. The interim is mine. A man's life's no more than to say "one". But I am very sorry, good Horatio, that to Laertes I forgot myself. For by the image of my cause I see the portraiture of his. I'll court his favours. The King, sir. He wagers that in a dozen passes between yourself and Laertes he shall not exceed you three hits. He hath laid on 12-9, and it would come to immediate trial if your lordship answer. How if I answer no? If it please His Majesty, it is the breathing time of day with me. You'll lose, my lord. I do not think so. But thou wouldst not think how ill all's here about my heart. If your mind dislike anything, obey it. I will forestall their repair hither, say you are not fit. No, not a whit. We defy augury. There is a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come. If it be not to come, it will be now, or yet it will come. The readiness is all. Since no man has what he leaves, what is it to leave betimes? Let be. Hamlet, this pearl is thine. Here's to thy health. Give me your pardon, sir. I have done you wrong. Pardon it, as you are a gentleman. This presence knows how I am punished with a sore distraction. What I have done that might your nature and honour roughly awake I here proclaim was madness. Let my disclaiming from a purposed evil free me so far in your most generous thoughts, that I have shot my arrow over the house and hurt my brother. Give us the foils. This is too heavy. Let me see another. This one likes me well. These foils are all a length? Ay, my good lord. Is your skill like a star in darkest night, fiery indeed. You mock me, sir. No, by this hand. Cousin Hamlet, you know the wager? Very well. Your Grace has laid odds on the weaker side. I do not fear it. I have seen you both, but since he is bettered, we have odds. Set stoups of wine on the table. The King drinks to Hamlet. Come, sir. Come, my lord. Judgement? A hit. A palpable hit. Well, again. Stay, give me drink. Give him the cup. I'll play this bout first. Set it aside awhile. Another hit. What say you? A touch. I do confess it. Our son shall win. Hamlet, take my napkin. Rub thy brows. The Queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet. I pray you, pardon me. Come... let me wipe thy face. Come, Laertes. You do but dally. Pass with your best violence. Say you so. Come on. Thy mother's poisoned. The King. The King's to blame. Horatio... I am dead. Thou livest. Report me and my cause aright to the unsatisfied. And if thou didst ever hold me in thy heart, absent thee from felicity awhile and in this harsh worid draw thy breath in pain to tell my story. The rest is silence. Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince. And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest. This quarry cries on havoc. O proud death, what feast is toward in thine eternal cell that thou so many princes at a shot so bloodily has struck? The sight is dismal. Our wills and fates do so contrary run that our devices still are overthrown. Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own. A Subtitle by Nexus23.net |
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