The opening line by the characters in Hamlet is, “Who's there?”This itself is a great question in the context of the play and the western literature. This is also a question of identity asking, “Who am I?” and “Who are you?” And the answer only increases the puzzle when it is said, “Nay, answer me.
Act 1 scene 1
Horatio comes to investigate and Marcellus informs the other guards that Horatio has said ''tis but our fantasy, / And will not let belief take hold of him'. Suddenly, the apparition appears looking exactly like Old Hamlet, the dead King of Denmark. The ghost of the king is dressed in his battle armour.
The most often used word, “lord,” is a result of everyone referring to all of the male characters as “lord.” “Good” is another word that is more about how people speak than about some thematic concern.
The story begins after his royal father has been murdered by his brother, Hamlet's uncle, who not only claims the throne, but also takes Hamlet's widowed mother for his wife. All this is revealed to Hamlet by the ghost of his dead father (who may have originally been played by Shakespeare).
Lean into the characters and encourage your students to infuse desperation into Hamlet's words, innocence and naivety into Ophelia's words, and conniving evil into Claudius' words. As much as possible, bring the text to life and present it in a way that honors how Shakespeare would want it to be presented.
Prince Hamlet has two problems. Firstly, in the wake of his father's death, trying to figure out how to move through the grief process. He's also depressed. This is clear both through how he talks about his own feelings and how other characters react to him.
It has since become a standard English proverb. To be, or not to be, that is the question. Spoken by Hamlet during his soliloquy in the nunnery scene. It remains one of Shakespeare's most famous quotes.
“To thine own self be true.” “Though this be madness, yet there is method in 't.” “Brevity is the soul of wit.” “There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”
'To be, or not to be: that is the question'. Arguably the most famous quotation in the whole of Hamlet, this line begins one of Hamlet's darkest and most philosophical soliloquies.
' Nothing is certain. this time of night, Together with that fair and warlike form in which the majesty of buried Denmark / Did sometimes march.
"To be, or not to be" is the opening phrase of a speech given by Prince Hamlet in the so-called "nunnery scene" of William Shakespeare's play Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 1.
The last words Hamlet speaks are to his friend Horatio: "The rest is silence." These words were crucial to audiences at the time because they provided a sense of ease in death and the afterlife. Hearing that Hamlet could now rest in peace for avenging his father's death meant he was no longer suffering.
For variety, get a friend or relative to speak lines to you from a piece of paper, and repeat them. Try making an audio recording of yourself speaking the lines, and listen to yourself over. If you can't stand the sound of your own voice, try using free Text-to-Speech software like Balabolka, or listen to audiobooks.
"My words fly up, my thoughts remain below. Words without thoughts never to heaven go." "I must be cruel only to be kind; Thus bad begins, and worse remains behind." "...my two school fellows, whom I will trust as I will adders fangs."
Best Hamlet Quotes About Love
“Love is begun by time, And time qualifies the spark and fire of it.” “This is the very ecstasy of love.” “Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear; when little fears grow great, great love grows there.”
This quote from the play Hamlet, “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?” The idea of whether is it better to live or to die.
Hamlet's tragic flaw is his inability to avenge his father's death because he hasn't been able to conquer himself in his internal conflict. This recalls the cliche – “One's greatest enemy is no other than oneself”.
In the first soliloquy, Hamlet bemoans the fact that he cannot commit suicide. He wishes that his physical self might cease to exist. He says: "O that this too too solid flesh would melt, Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!"
By this point, Ophelia would be well aware of her pregnancy, and well aware that she would soon begin to show outward signs of it.
"To be, or not to be: that is the question." Perhaps the most famous of Shakespearean lines, the anguished Hamlet ponders the purpose of life and suicide in this profound soliloquy.
The first line of Hamlet's soliloquy, “To be, or nor to be” is one of the best-known quotes from all the Shakespearean works combined. In the play, “Hamlet” the tragic hero expresses this soliloquy to the audience in Act 3, Scene 1.
For the Elizabethans, Hamlet was the prototype of melancholy male madness, associated with intellectual and imaginative genius; but Ophelia's affliction was erotomania, or love-madness.
The interpretation which best fits the evidence best is that Hamlet was suffering from an acute depressive illness, with some obsessional features. He could not make a firm resolve to act. In Shakespeare's time there was no concept of acute depressive illness, although melancholy was well known.
He concluded that Hamlet suffered from rapid cycling bipolar disorder, and he retrieved from the text exact quotes that met DSM criteria and substantiated his view that Hamlet was insane. The jury, which included Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, found Hamlet sane.