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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.
Read the excerpt from Hamlet. Hamlet: O! that this too too solid flesh would melt, Thaw and resolve itself into a dew; Or that the Everlasting had not fix’dHis canon ’gainst self-slaughter! O God! O God! How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable Seem to me all the uses of this world. Fie on ’t! O fie! ’tis an unweeded garden, That grows to seed; things rank and gross in naturePossess it merely. That it should come to this!
Read the excerpt from Act V of Hamlet.Gertrude: Sweets to the sweet: farewell! [Scattering flowers.] I hop'd thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's wife;I thought thy bride-bed to have deck'd, sweet maid, And not have strew'd thy grave.
Which passage from Hamlet, Act II, Scene i is an example of setting?
Read an excerpt from an analysis of Act III of Hamlet.Rosencrantz and Guildenstern follow orders without question throughout the play. In this scene, Claudius tells them his life is in danger from Hamlet, and they must take Hamlet away. They agree immediately.
Read the excerpt from Hamlet.Laertes: Be wary then; best safety lies in fear: Youth to itself rebels, though none else near.Ophelia: I shall th’ 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, Whiles, like a puff’d and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads,And recks not his own rede.
Read the excerpt from Act IV of Hamlet.Claudius: I ha ’t: When in your motion you are hot and dry,— As make your bouts more violent to that end,— And that he calls for drink, I’ll have prepar’d him A chalice for the nonce, whereon but sipping,If he by chance escape your venom’d stuck, Our purpose may hold there.
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building suspensecharacter developmentplot eventsrising action
Read the excerpt from Act I of Hamlet.Bernardo: ’Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco.
Read the excerpt from Hamlet.Hamlet: My fears forgetting manners—to unsealTheir grand commission; where I found, Horatio, O royal knavery! an exact command, Larded with many several sorts of reasons Importing Denmark’s health, and England’s too, With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life, That, on the supervise, no leisure bated, No, not to stay the grinding of the axe, My head should be struck off.
Read the excerpt from Hamlet.Claudius: Why to a public count I might not go, Is the great love the general gender bear him; Who, dipping all his faults in their affection, Would, like the spring that turneth wood to stone, Convert his gyves to graces; so that my arrows,Too slightly timber’d for so loud a wind, Would have reverted to my bow again, And not where I had aim’d them.
allusionapostrophemetaphorsimile
Read the passage from Hamlet, Act II, Scene ii.Gertrude: Thanks, Guildenstern and gentle Rosencrantz; And I beseech you instantly to visit My too much changed son. Go, some of you, And bring these gentlemen where Hamlet is.
Read the excerpt from an analysis of Hamlet’s "To be or not to be” speech in Act III of Hamlet.Shakespeare begins the speech with the line "To be, or not to be: that is the question” and then proceeds to ask multiple questions throughout the speech.
Read the excerpt from Hamlet.Hamlet: No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with modesty enough, and likelihood to lead it; as thus: Alexander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander returneth into dust; the dust is earth; of earth we make loam, and why of that loam, whereto he was converted, might they not stop a beer-barrel?Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay,Might stop a hole to keep the wind away
Read the excerpt from Act II of Hamlet. Hamlet: I’ll observe his looks; I’ll tent him to the quick: if he but blench I know my course. The spirit that I have seen May be the devil: and the devil hath power To assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps Out of my weakness and my melancholy— As he is very potent with such spirits— Abuses me 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.
Read the excerpt from Act II of Hamlet.Ophelia: Alas! my lord, I have been so affrighted.Polonius: With what, in the name of God?Ophelia: My lord, as I was sewing in my closet, Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbrac'd; No hat upon his head; his stockings foul'd, Ungarter'd, and down-gyved to his ancle; Pale as his shirt; his knees knocking each other; And with a look so piteous in purport As if he had been loosed out of hell To speak of horrors, he comes before me.
To view the excerpt through a historical lens, which questions should the reader ask? Select 2 options.
Read the excerpt from Hamlet.Hamlet: Follow him, friends: we’ll hear a play to-morrow. [Exit POLONIUS, with all the Players but the First.] Dost thou hear me, old friend; can you play the Murder of Gonzago?First Player: Ay, my lord.Hamlet: We’ll ha ’t to-morrow night. You could, for a need, study a speech of some dozen or sixteen lines, which I would set down and insert in ’t, could you not?First Player: Ay, my lord.
Read the excerpt from Act IV of Hamlet.Hamlet: Rightly to be great Is not to stir without great argument, But greatly to find quarrel in a straw When honour’s at the stake.
Read the excerpt from Hamlet. Voltimand: . . . On Fortinbras; which he, in brief, obeys, Receives rebuke from Norway, and, in fine, Makes vow before his uncle never more To give the assay of arms against your majesty. Whereon old Norway, overcome with joy,Gives him three thousand crowns in annual fee, And his commission to employ those soldiers, So levied as before, against the Polack; With an entreaty, herein further shown, [Giving a paper.]
Read the excerpt from Hamlet. Hamlet: Let me see.—[Takes the skull.]—Alas! poor Yorick. I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy; he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rises at it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now, to mock your own grinning?
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