Hamlet, Part 7: Plot and Character Answers

In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, what plot events undermine Queen Gertrude’s confidence?

Laertes returns to Denmark to confront Claudius about his father’s death. This is part of the plot’s

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Read the excerpts from Shakespeare’s Hamlet.Which statement best describes Gertrude’s development between Act I and Act IV?

Hamlet stages a performance about a murder to discern Claudius’s guilt. This is part of Hamlet’s

Read the excerpt from Act IV of Hamlet.Claudius: He made confession of you, And gave you such a masterly report For art and exercise in your defence, And for your rapier most especially, That he cried out, 'twould be a sight indeed If one could match you; the scrimers of their nation, He swore, had neither motion, guard, nor eye, If you oppos'd them. Sir, this report of his Did Hamlet so envenom with his envy That he could nothing do but wish and beg Your sudden coming o'er, to play with him. No

Read the excerpt from Act IV of Hamlet.Claudius: Where are my Switzers? Let them guard the door. What is the matter?Gentleman: Save yourself, my lord; The ocean, overpeering of his list, Eats not the flats with more impetuous haste Than young Laertes, in a riotous head, O'erbears your officers. The rabble call him lord; And, as the world were now but to begin, Antiquity forgot, custom not known, The ratifiers and props of every word, They cry, 'Choose we; Laertes shall be king!' Caps, hands, and

Read the excerpt from Act IV of Hamlet.Claudius: Follow her close; give her good watch, I pray you. [Exit HORATIO.] O! this is the poison of deep grief; it springs All from her father's death. O Gertrude, Gertrude! When sorrows come, they come not single spies, But in battalions. First, her father slain; Next, your son gone; but he most violent author Of his own just remove: the people muddied, Thick and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispers, For good Polonius’ death; and we have done but greenly, In hugger-mugger to inter him: poor Ophelia Divided from herself and her fair judgment, Without the which we are pictures, or mere beasts

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Read the excerpt from Act IV of Hamlet.Gentleman: She speaks much of her father; says she hears There's tricks i' the world; and hems, and beats her heart; Spurns enviously at straws; speaks things in doubt, That carry but half sense: her speech is nothing . . .Horatio: 'Twere good she were spoken with, for she may strew Dangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds.Gertrude: Let her come in. [Exit Gentleman.] To my sick soul, as sin's true nature is, Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss: So full of artless jealousy is guilt, It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.