Notes on Hamlet Minilogue for Acting Class

Character Notes and on the positioning of the minilog from Hamlet Near the end of Act II Scene 2:

“Wanting to uncover the cause of Hamlet’s strange behavior, his uncle and his mother want to ascertain if it is love that has altered Hamlet’s mental state. When this encounter proves inconclusive, Claudius decides to send Hamlet on a trip to England, and Polonius suggests that he attempt to eavesdrop yet again—this time on a conversation between Hamlet and his mother, Queen Gertrude. (We know the source of Hamlet’s strange behavior.) 

“Meanwhile, inspired by the arrival of an acting troupe, Hamlet decides to have them perform a play that will mimic his father’s murder.  Hamlet closely watches Claudius during the murder scene, and he interprets Claudius’ suspicious reaction as a confirmation of his guilt.  After the play, Hamlet spies Claudius at prayer and realizes that this would be the perfect time to enact his revenge and kill him.  However, he reasons that it would be too lenient to allow Claudius to go to heaven cleansed of his sins and decides that he should wait to act.” https://www.enotes.com/topics/hamlet

The story:

Opens: Elsinore Castle—Denmark.  The king is dead; the queen, Gertrude, married, hastily, to Claudius, the king’s brother, and he has assumed the throne.
  

Hamlet has returned from school for the funeral and the re-marriage.

Ophelia is the object of Hamlet’s affection but all of that is sidelined by the action.

A ghost appears and tells Hamlet that Claudius killed his father.

Hamlet begins to act oddly as a result and Claudius and the queen try to figure out why.  Unable to do so they decide to send Hamlet to England.  Claudius arranges for Hamlet to be killed en route.

Before he goes, Hamlet produces a play (the minilogue is his plan to do so) and during the performance he becomes convinced of Claudius’ guilt.  He sets out to kill him but waits.  Meanwhile, Hamlet kills Polonius who is hidden in the drapes in his mother’s bedroom.  It is more or less an accident.

Hamlet is sent to England and his death but discovers the plot and returns to Denmark.  A contest to the death is arranged with poisonous swords and wine that results in the entire royal family dying one way or another.  Hamlet wills the throne to Fortinbras and asks his friend Horatio to tell the world the truth of what all happened.

The Characters: (among many others)

Hamlet, son of the king and Gertrude, he is the prince of Denmark.  At the time of the play he would have been about 17 or so, late adolescence.  He is somewhat superstitious, very suspicious, and tends to reach his own conclusions without the aid of advisors, which points to his immaturity.

Gertrude, queen and mother

Claudius, uncle and now king

Ophelia, Hamlet’s love interest

Polonius, Ophelia’s father

Laertes, Ophelia’s brother

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, friends of Hamlet

Horatio, friend of Hamlet

Fortinbras, pretender to the Norwegian throne

This is an excerpt the entire speech, Act 2 Scene 2 near the end.

HAMLET: (to the First Player) 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.

HAMLET: Very well. Follow that lord; and look you mock him

not.  (Exit FIRST PLAYER)

My good friends, I'll leave you till night: you are

welcome to Elsinore.

ROSENCRANTZ: Good my lord!

HAMLET: Ay, so, God be wi' ye;

Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTERN

HAMLET: Now I am alone.

O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!

Is it not monstrous that this player here,

But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,

Could force his soul so to his own conceit

That from her working all his visage wann'd,

Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspect,

A broken voice, and his whole function suiting

With forms to his conceit? and all for nothing!

For Hecuba!

What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,

That he should weep for her? What would he do,

Had he the motive and the cue for passion

That I have? He would drown the stage with tears

And cleave the general ear with horrid speech,

Make mad the guilty and appall the free,

Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed

The very faculties of eyes and ears. Yet I,

A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak,

Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause,

And can say nothing; no, not for a king,

Upon whose property and most dear life

A damn'd defeat was made. Am I a coward?

Who calls me villain? breaks my pate across?

Plucks off my beard, and blows it in my face?

Tweaks me by the nose? gives me the lie i' the throat,

As deep as to the lungs? who does me this?  Ha!

'Swounds, I should take it: for it cannot be

But I am pigeon-liver'd and lack gall

To make oppression bitter, or ere this

I should have fatted all the region kites

With this slave's offal: bloody, bawdy villain!

Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain!

O, vengeance!

Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave,

That I, the son of a dear father murder'd,

Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,

Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words,

And fall a-cursing, like a very drab, A scullion!

Fie upon't! foh! About, my brain! I have heard

That guilty creatures sitting at a play

Have by the very cunning of the scene

Been struck so to the soul that presently

They have proclaim'd their malefactions;

For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak

With most miraculous organ.  I'll have these players

Play something like the murder of my father

Before mine uncle: 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.