Hamlet
Hamlet
By William Shakespeare.
Imprint
This ebook is the product of many hours of hard work by volunteers for Standard Ebooks, and builds on the hard work of other literature lovers made possible by the public domain.
This particular ebook is based on a transcription produced for Massachusetts Institute of Technology and on digital scans available at the HathiTrust Digital Library.
The writing and artwork within are believed to be in the U.S. public domain, and Standard Ebooks releases this ebook edition under the terms in the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication. For full license information, see the Uncopyright at the end of this ebook.
Standard Ebooks is a volunteer-driven project that produces ebook editions of public domain literature using modern typography, technology, and editorial standards, and distributes them free of cost. You can download this and other ebooks carefully produced for true book lovers at standardebooks.org.
Dramatis Personae
Claudius, king of Denmark
Hamlet, son to the late, and nephew to the present king
Polonius, lord chamberlain
Horatio, friend to Hamlet
Laertes, son to Polonius
Voltimand, courtier
Cornelius, courtier
Rosencrantz, courtier
Guildenstern, courtier
Osric, courtier
A gentleman, courtier
A priest
Marcellus, officer
Bernardo, officer
Francisco, a soldier
Reynaldo, servant to Polonius
Players
Two clowns, grave-diggers
Fortinbras, prince of Norway
A Captain
English Ambassadors
Gertrude, queen of Denmark, and mother to Hamlet
Ophelia, daughter to Polonius
Lords, ladies, officers, soldiers, sailors, messengers, and other attendants
Ghost of Hamlet’s father
Scene: Denmark.
Hamlet
Act I
Scene I
Elsinore. A platform before the castle.
Francisco at his post. Enter to him Bernardo. Bernardo Who’s there? Francisco Nay, answer me: stand, and unfold yourself. Bernardo Long live the king! Francisco Bernardo? Bernardo He. Francisco You come most carefully upon your hour. Bernardo ’Tis now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco. Francisco For this relief much thanks: ’tis bitter cold,
And I am sick at heart.Bernardo Have you had quiet guard? Francisco Not a mouse stirring. Bernardo Well, good night.
If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus,
The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.Francisco I think I hear them. Stand, ho! Who’s there? Enter Horatio and Marcellus. Horatio Friends to this ground. Marcellus And liegemen to the Dane. Francisco Give you good night. Marcellus O, farewell, honest soldier:
Who hath relieved you?Francisco Bernardo has my place.
Give you good night. Exit.Marcellus Holla! Bernardo! Bernardo Say,
What, is Horatio there?Horatio A piece of him. Bernardo Welcome, Horatio: welcome, good Marcellus. Marcellus What, has this thing appear’d again to-night? Bernardo I have seen nothing. Marcellus Horatio says ’tis but our fantasy,
And will not let belief take hold of him
Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us:
Therefore I have entreated him along
With us to watch the minutes of this night;
That if again this apparition come,
He may approve our eyes and speak to it.Horatio Tush, tush, ’twill not appear. Bernardo Sit down awhile;
And let us once again assail your ears,
That are so fortified against our story
What we have two nights seen.Horatio Well, sit we down,
And let us hear Bernardo speak of this.Bernardo Last night of all,
When yond same star that’s westward from the pole
Had made his course to illume that part of heaven
Where now it burns, Marcellus and myself,
The bell then beating one—Enter Ghost. Marcellus Peace, break thee off; look, where it comes again! Bernardo In the same figure, like the king that’s dead. Marcellus Thou art a scholar; speak to it, Horatio. Bernardo Looks it not like the king? mark it, Horatio. Horatio Most like: it harrows me with fear and wonder. Bernardo It would be spoke to. Marcellus Question it, Horatio. Horatio What art thou that usurp’st this time of night,
Together with that fair and warlike form
In which the majesty of buried Denmark
Did sometimes march? by heaven I charge thee, speak!Marcellus It is offended. Bernardo See, it stalks away! Horatio Stay! speak, speak! I charge thee, speak! Exit Ghost. Marcellus ’Tis gone, and will not answer. Bernardo How now, Horatio! you tremble and look pale:
Is not this something more than fantasy?
What think you on’t?Horatio Before my God, I might not this believe
Without the sensible and true avouch
Of mine own eyes.Marcellus Is it not like the king? Horatio As thou art to thyself:
Such was the very armour he had on
When he the ambitious Norway combated;
So frown’d he once, when, in an angry parle,
He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice.
’Tis strange.Marcellus Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour,
With martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.Horatio In what particular thought to work I know not;
But in the gross and scope of my opinion,
This bodes some strange eruption to our state.Marcellus Good now, sit down, and tell me, he that knows,
Why this same strict and most observant watch
So nightly toils the subject of the land,
And why such daily cast of brazen cannon,
And foreign mart for implements of war;
Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task
Does not divide the Sunday from the week;
What might be toward, that this sweaty haste
Doth make the night joint-labourer with the day:
Who is’t that can inform me?Horatio That can I;
At least, the whisper goes so. Our last king,
Whose image even but now appear’d to us,
Was, as you know, by Fortinbras of Norway,
Thereto prick’d on by a most emulate pride,
Dared to the combat; in which our valiant Hamlet—
For so this side of our known world esteem’d him—
Did slay this Fortinbras; who, by a seal’d compact,
Well ratified by law and heraldry,
Did forfeit, with his life, all those his lands
Which he stood seized of, to the conqueror:
Against
