Hamlet: Act III
Episode 55
To three or not to three, that is the question Professor Pipes is here to answer. In this episode, Hamlet will have his play within a play, Claudius' guilt will be revealed, and the story will take a turn turn at the Shakespearean Act 3 fork toward tragedy.
TRIGGER WARNING: Death, Murder, Domestic Abuse
Transcript
Introduction:
Ahh to read or not to read - that… isn’t the question. Because you should definitely still read! But if you need a little help with Shakespeare, you’ve come to the right place. Welcome to Piper’s Paraphrases. I’m Professor Pipes, and today I’m here to discuss Act 3 of Hamlet, so grab your popcorn, because we’re heading to a play… within a play.
Previously:
Previously in Hamlet, Prince Hamlet’s dad died and his ghost told Hamlet that the murderer was his uncle, Claudius, who married Hamlet’s mom and became king. Hamlet vowed revenge, but… was having trouble going through with it. You see, he wasn’t totally sure he could trust the ghost, so he hatched two ridiculous plans. He decided to act crazy in order to hide his true intentions and he also told some actors to perform a play that mimics the murder, so he can watch his uncle’s response and determine his guilt. Meanwhile, his mom and uncle invited Hamlet’s friends, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to spy on Hamlet to “find out what’s wrong.” Claudius’ advisor Polonius thought Hamlet’s love for Ophelia drove him mad, so he came up with another spying plan: to send his daughter to talk to Hamlet while he and Claudius spy on their interaction. So let’s get to spying!
Plot Summary:
At the start of Scene 1, Claudius and Gertude ask Rosencrantz and Guildenstern about their secret mission, and the friends say that Hamlet is distracted, but won’t tell them why. They also tell the king and queen that Hamlet asked a group of actors to perform a play. The king sends everyone but Polonius and Ophelia out because it’s time for their spy mission. On her way, Gertrude tells Ophelia that she hopes Hamlet will recover soon so the two of them can be happy. Aww, what a nice potential mother-in-law! Ophelia reads, while Polonius and Claudius hide. Hamlet enters and performs his famous soliloquy, To Be or Not to Be. Oh wait! He doesn’t hold a skull during this speech! Anyways, Hamlet contemplates existence and compares the struggles of life and death. Bit of a downer. Eventually, he sees Ophelia and asks her to pray for him. While she first asks how he’s been, she quickly remembers her orders and tells Hamlet that she wants to return the gifts he gave her. Cold, girl! Hamlet says he’s never given her anything, but Ophelia insists that he did, along with words of love. Hamlet then goes back and forth saying he loved her once – no wait, he never loved her! Which is it, dude? Suddenly he tells her to go to a nunnery, a convent, to protect herself from having sinful children like himself. Oooookay. He then asks where her father is, and when she lies that he’s at home, Hamlet gets even angrier and starts insulting Ophelia and making lots of inappropriate, sexual innuendos. After a barrage of insults about women, he storms off, leaving Ophelia heartbroken and, frankly, confused. Polonius and Claudius emerge with very different reactions. Claudius thinks his madness has nothing to do with love and decides to ship Hamlet off to England to… help him recover. Sure. Polonius still thinks it’s all because of neglected love and tells Claudius to have Gertrude talk to Hamlet “alone” tonight, while Polonius spies on their conversation. Oh, spy tracker!
Scene 2 starts with Hamlet giving the actors advice about how to perform the play. Everyone’s a critic. Before the show, he tells Horatio to watch Claudius, and places himself near the royal crew and Ophelia. He uses some of his classic puns to confuse and insult Polonius and Claudius and to make inappropriate comments to Ophelia. And now, the show within a show within this show begins! There’s a silent pantomime which summarizes the plot. First there’s a loving couple, a king and queen, and then someone kills the king by putting poison in his ear. Hmmm… where have I seen that before? Soon the regular play begins with the queen telling the king that she will always love him, no matter what happens and claims she could never remarry. Oh, I will never love again! We’ll see. Claudius starts to ask questions about the play, and Hamlet says it’s called The Mousetrap and is about a real murder that happened… uh, in Vienna. He insults Ophelia some more and the play continues, but as soon as the villain comes out and pours poison in the king’s ear, Claudius stands up and ends the play. *BLACKOUT No, not our play, Cooper, the play within the play. Thank you. Hamlet is in great spirits now that Claudius’ actions have proven his guilt! Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and Polonius tell Hamlet that his parents are upset, and his mom wants to talk to him. Oooooh, you’re in trouble! After some wild conversation, everyone else heads out, and Hamlet hypes himself up to go talk to his mom.
Scene 3 begins with Claudius telling Rosencrantz and Guildenstern that Hamlet’s mental state is dangerous (to him), so he orders them to take Hamlet to England and they readily agree, you know, to protect king and country. With friends like that, Hamlet doesn’t need enemies. Polonius informs Claudius that Hamlet is heading to meet Gertrude, but Polonius will hide himself behind a tapestry first, so he can listen in. Once he’s alone, Claudius soliloquizes about his guilty conscience for having killed his brother. Aha! I knew he did it! He wants to pray, but his guilt won’t let him. Even though he can’t repent, he kneels and decides to try. Just then, Hamlet enters and realizes he has the perfect opportunity to kill Claudius. However, he decides that he can’t do it while Claudius is praying for forgiveness, since he would go to heaven. Hamlet wants to wait until Claudius is sinning again – which shouldn’t take long – so he goes to see Gertrude. Just after Hamlet leaves, Claudius states that his prayers didn’t work. Aw. Bummer.
Scene 4 happens in Gertrude’s private room. Polonius tells Gertrude to be strict with Hamlet, and then hides behind a tapestry so he can listen in. Once Hamlet arrives, both Gertrude and he accuse each other of offending Hamlet’s father – though they clearly are referring to two different men. Awkward. After some angry back and forth, Gertrude starts to leave, but Hamlet stops her and says she can’t leave until she takes a good look at her true self in the mirror. Terrified, she calls for help. Behind the curtain, Polonius also calls for help. Ruh roh. Hearing this, Hamlet stabs through the curtain, killing Polonius, whom he had assumed was actually Claudius. When Gertrude calls this murder a bloody deed – true in more ways than one – Hamlet agrees and says it’s almost as bad as killing a king and marrying her brother. Uhhh… pretty sure Claudius is the one who killed the king. Gertrude is shocked by his accusation, but Hamlet keeps arguing with and insulting her, eventually comparing Old King Hamlet with Claudius, to point out how horrific it is that Gertrude would ever marry Claudius. Gertrude begins to feel some guilt, and as Hamlet keeps escalating the insults and accusations, the Ghost appears and tells Hamlet Hamlet to back off… only, Gertrude can’t see it, so when he starts to talk with, well, thin air, she says he’s crazy. Fair. Hamlet says it’s not madness, and begs her to confess, repent, and… not sleep with Claudius. Again, awkward. He eventually calms down a bit and tells her that he’s being sent away to England and doesn’t trust what Rosencrantz and Guildenstern have agreed to do for Claudius. And as Hamlet leaves, dragging the corpse of Polonius with him, the act ends. Ominous, right?
Characterization:
Let’s start off with some very two-faced characters: Rosencrantz, Guildenstern and Polonius. I mean, we already knew that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern came to spy on Hamlet, but up until now, we might have believed that they were doing so in order to help him. However, that’s pretty clearly not the case now. While both of them tell Hamlet that they love and care for him in scene 2, they agree to betray him in the very next scene. When Claudius tells them to take Hamlet to England, they whole-heartedly agree. After all, they must “keep those many many bodies safe / That live and feed upon your majesty.” In other words, the most important thing is to protect the king, which will therefore protect the kingdom. Whatever happened to bros before… kings? And I know it’s not polite to speak ill of the dead, but come on, Polonius, could your duplicity be any more obvious? Hamlet full on makes a joke of it when he points to a cloud and says it looks like a camel, and Polonius agrees. Oh wait, it’s a weasel, and Polonius agrees. No, no, a whale – same story. Polonius is the epitome of a yes man, just agreeing with whatever he’s told, but betraying people behind their back. Or, well, behind their tapestry.
Now we know for sure that Claudius killed his brother. And even though he knows that what he did is “rank,” he won’t ask for forgiveness. And his reasoning is both good and… well, terrible. At first he says that his “stronger guilt defeats my strong intent” so he just feels too guilty to pray, but then he admits that he really can’t ask for forgiveness, since he is “still possessed / Of those effects for which I did the murder: / My crown, mine own ambition, and my queen.” In other words, he can’t be forgiven because he’s not willing to give up the things that he murdered for. Oh! And, now that he sees Hamlet as a threat, he’s shipping him off to England, and might even be plotting worse. What a guy.
In this act, both Gertrude and Ophelia, while not actively conspiring against Hamlet like the others, are complicit, which makes them equally guilty in Hamlet’s eyes. At first, he greets Ophelia fondly, but as soon as she returns his gifts, making it clear that she sides with her father, he turns on her, gaslights her about the gifts, and starts insulting her and calling her two faced. And once she lies about where her father is, his anger increases even more, and he curses her, saying “I'll give thee this plague for thy / dowry: be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou / shalt not escape calumny.” Similarly, when he goes to talk to Gertrude, Hamlet says that she is guilty of an awful crime. However, when Gertrude finally gets him to say what she has done, he just points out how inferior Claudius is compared to King Hamlet. In other words, her real crime is just marrying her brother-in-law, but he equates it with “kill[ing] a king.” Maybe neither woman is entirely guiltless, since both are involved in Claudius’ and Polonius’ plans to spy on Hamlet, but both do genuinely seem to want to help him.
Speaking of Hamlet, this act represents a major turning point for him, in multiple ways. He is still struggling with suicidal ideation, as evidenced in his “to be or not to be” speech, and he still struggles to take action, which is shown when he chooses not to kill Claudius… yet. However, he does commit murder, killing Polonius, so he has chosen his path and begun to seek revenge.
Analysis:
First up, let’s talk about Gender. And boy does Hamlet have some stuff to say about… girls. It seems that he sees a woman’s value as being directly tied to their chastity, so he uses sexual innuendos as his primary means of attack or derision. When he is mad at Ophelia, he repeats, “Get thee to a nunnery” and says that she shouldn’t be a “breeder of sinners.” This is both a suggestion that her virtue lies in her chastity and a cruel joke, since “nunnery” could refer to a convent (for nuns) or a brothel (for sex workers). Similarly, he tells Gertrude not to sleep with Claudius, which will allow her to “Assume a virtue if you have it not.” He continues to make inappropriate and sexual comments to both women throughout the act, such as the exchange after he asks Ophelia if he can “lie in [her] lap?” and hints that they had a physical relationship. By this act, it seems that Hamlet has grown to hate and distrust all women. He tells Ophelia that “God has given you one face, and you make yourself / another.” In other words, even makeup is a sign that women are inherently two-faced, or not to be trusted. Whoops. He goes on to list women’s other flaws, saying, “You jig, you amble, and you lisp, and / nickname God's creatures, and make your wantonness / your ignorance.” Ah yes, here I go prancing about, playing dumb, and… making up nicknames. Hamlet says that “wise men know well enough what monsters you make of / them.” Pretty harsh. However, it doesn’t seem like we’re supposed to fully believe Hamlet’s assertions about women. For one thing, he describes all these flaws to Ophelia, who doesn’t really resemble his picture of an evil woman. Then, there’s the fact that Hamlet’s obsession with Gertrude’s chastity is sometimes believed to be Oedipal, meaning there is sexual tension between them. Yikes. To any audience – Renaissance or contemporary – that idea would elicit disgust, so maybe Hamlet isn’t an authority on women.
Next up, let’s discuss “Madness” or Mental Health. By the end of this act, we really should be asking ourselves if Hamlet is a reliable protagonist. In Scene 2, he demonstrates some questionable behavior. After seeing Claudius’ reaction to the play within a play, Hamlet appears to be in an almost manic state, wild with excitement. He talks to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern about a flute, repeatedly asking them to play it. However, as is often the case, his “wild” behavior serves a purpose, since he uses playing the flute as a metaphor for how his friends have been “playing” him. So maybe he really is mentally sound. However, earlier in the same scene, he says to Ophelia that his “father died within these two hours.” When Ophelia says that it’s been four months, he replies, “So long? Nay.” So was it hyperbole or is he really losing touch with reality? And then of course we have the ghost. In Scene 4, he sees and talks to the ghost of his father, but his mother can’t see or hear it. This could be symbolic of her extreme guilt or her total innocence, but it could also mean that Hamlet is experiencing hallucinations. However, he certainly believes he is mentally sound and in control, telling his mother, “I essentially am not in madness / But mad in craft.” It’s really left up for us to decide whether he is “mad” or just playing the part.
Which is a perfect transition to Performance. In this act, we have a pantomime play within a play within a play, which creates a sense of distance between us, the audience, and the performance. This distance has several effects, so I’ll mention a couple. For one, it makes us see the action more in the way that Hamlet sees it, since he has provided lines for the characters to say. For another, it pulls us out of the action, causing the audience to reflect more upon the role that performance has taken in the drama and in our interpretation of it. Ironically, performance is also what makes the actual characters most themselves, since Claudius has an authentic reaction to seeing an actor perform the murder that he himself committed. So it turns out “The Mousetrap,” as Hamlet calls it, has allowed us to catch the rat!
Next up, we should talk about Death and the Human Condition. “To be or not to be – that is the question.” This is one of Shakespeare’s most famous lines, as well as one of his most debated soliloquies. However, what we can all agree upon, is that this speech discusses the human condition, particularly our shared experiences of struggle, morality, fear, and death. The first line offers up two clear options: to exist or not to exist. Therefore, some interpret much of this speech as evidence of Hamlet’s suicidal ideation, and for good reason. For example, when he compares death to sleep, he speaks favorably of it, saying “we end / The heartache and the thousand natural shocks / That flesh is heir to — ‘tis a consummation / Devoutly to be wished.” He also asks why anyone would want to bear the burdens of life, “When he himself might his quietus make / With a bare bodkin” or knife. All of this, along with his previous talk of suicide, would suggest that he is overwhelmed by his problems and is seriously considering whether he should continue to deal with his struggles or end them, and his life. However, after asking “to be or not to be,” Hamlet goes on to wonder, “Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer / The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, / Or to take arms against a sea of troubles / And, by opposing, end them.” Considering that he is asking what is “nobler,” some people interpret much of the speech as contemplating his own moral dilemma about revenge. He might be asking if it’s nobler, or more virtuous, to just live with his struggles or to oppose them directly, through revenge and murder, thus ending them. This soliloquy also discusses humanity’s natural fear of death in general, whatever the cause. He muses, “in that sleep of death, what dreams may come… / Must give us pause.” In life, we know what we’re dealing with, but no one returns from “The undiscovered country” of death, so we can’t know what to expect. The fear of the unknown causes us to want to prolong our life, even if it prolongs our problems.
And this leads right into other themes in this act: the Complexity of Morality and the struggle between Thought and Action. Near the end of his soliloquy, he states that “conscience does make cowards of us all,” meaning that our consciousness, or thoughtfulness about death, as well as our conscience, or understanding of right and wrong, turns us into cowards, meaning we won’t take action. He’s dealing with a moral dilemma: whether to kill his uncle or not. So perhaps he fears what might come after death – the possibility of hell. Again, he’s stuck wondering which is “nobler” – to live with his problems, and therefore deny his father’s wishes, or to murder another person. He ends the speech by saying that “the native hue of resolution / Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought; / And, enterprises of great pith and moment, / With this regard, their currents turn awry / And lose the name of action.” In other words, constantly worrying about the “right” thing to do freezes people up, and their indecision means that they just never end up taking action, even if it’s important. Hamlet deals with the complexity of morality even more in Scene 3, when he is given the opportunity to kill Claudius. He chooses not to, since he believes that Claudius will go to heaven if he is killed while praying, whereas his father was unable to ask for forgiveness and is therefore stuck in purgatory. He decides that it would be better to kill Claudius when he is in the midst of sinning. Hamlet’s moral conscience prevents him from murdering Claudius, just as it prevented him from suicide back in the first act. So really we have to ask ourselves if he’s using his religious beliefs as an excuse for inaction, or if he’s struggling with a deeper problem than sending Claudius to heaven: killing someone at all. He may still be wondering if it is the “noble” choice. However, once he kills Polonius, the choice is made.
Food for Thought:
As you reflect upon Act 3 and get ready to continue the play, consider the following questions.
First, Act 3 in a Shakespearean play tends to contain a turning point, often a decision that determines the ending. It’s like the point of no return. What is the turning point of Hamlet? What scene or event determines that this play can only have a tragic ending, and why?
Second, examine the scene where Claudius tries to pray. In what ways are his morals and character similar to Hamlet? In what ways are they different?
Third, at this point, do you think that Hamlet’s “madness” is genuine or fake? What evidence do you have to support your interpretation?
Fourth, why do you think Shakespeare chose to include the “play within the play”? What is the effect of this framing choice?
Finally, what is your take on the famous “to be or not to be” speech? How does it demonstrate Hamlet’s existential crisis, and what is its significance in the context of the play?
Thanks for watching this episode of Piper’s Paraphrases. Now go forth, read a bunch, and be good people who don’t scream at their mothers and partners.
