10
QuizMultiple Choice

Conflicting Perspectives — Quiz

Question 10 • Language Arts 12

Read the excerpt from Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard. [ CLAUDIUS ] The need we have to use you did provoke Our hasty sending. . . . Something have you heard Of Hamlet’s transformation, so call it, Sith nor th’exterior nor the inward man Resembles that it was. What it should be, More than his father’s death, that thus hath put him, So much from th’understanding of himself, I cannot dream of. I entreat you both That, being of so young days brought up with him And sith so neighboured to his youth and haviour That you vouchsafe your rest here in our court Some little time, so by your companies To draw him on to pleasures, and to gather So much as from occasion you may glean, Whether aught to us unknown afflicts him thus, That opened lies within our remedy. Which lines from the excerpt best show Claudius’s attitude toward Rosencrantz and Guildenstern?

Answer
A
“I entreat you both / That, being of so young days brought up with him”
B
“The need we have to use you did provoke / Our hasty sending.”
C
“Something have you heard / Of Hamlet’s transformation, so call it”
D
“That you vouchsafe your rest here in our court / Some little time”