Читать книгу The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark - William Shakespeare - Страница 10

Ham. It wafts me still; goe on, Ile follow thee. [Sidenote: waues]

Mar. You shall not goe my Lord.

Ham. Hold off your hand. [Sidenote: hands]

Hor. Be rul'd, you shall not goe.

Ham. My fate cries out, And makes each petty Artire[4] in this body, [Sidenote: arture[4]] As hardy as the Nemian Lions nerue: Still am I cal'd? Vnhand me Gentlemen: By Heau'n, Ile make a Ghost of him that lets me: I say away, goe on, Ile follow thee.

Exeunt Ghost & Hamlet.

Hor. He waxes desperate with imagination.[5] [Sidenote: imagion]

Mar. Let's follow; 'tis not fit thus to obey him.

Hor. Haue after, to what issue will this come?

Mar. Something is rotten in the State of Denmarke.

Hor. Heauen will direct it.

Mar. Nay, let's follow him. Exeunt.

Enter Ghost and Hamlet.

Ham. Where wilt thou lead me? speak; Ile go no further. [Sidenote: Whether]

Gho. Marke me.

Ham. I will.

[Footnote A: Here in the Quarto:—

The very place puts toyes of desperation

Without more motiue, into euery braine

That lookes so many fadoms to the sea

And heares it rore beneath.]

[Footnote 1: 1st Q. 'beckles'—perhaps for buckles—bends.]

[Footnote 2: Note the unbelief in the Ghost.]

[Footnote 3: sovereignty—soul: so in Romeo and Juliet, act v. sc. 1, l. 3:—

My bosom's lord sits lightly in his throne.]

[Footnote 4: The word artery, invariably substituted by the editors, is without authority. In the first Quarto, the word is Artiue; in the second (see margin) arture. This latter I take to be the right one—corrupted into Artire in the Folio. It seems to have troubled the printers, and possibly the editors. The third Q. has followed the second; the fourth has artyre; the fifth Q. and the fourth F. have attire; the second and third Folios follow the first. Not until the sixth Q. does artery appear. See Cambridge Shakespeare. Arture was to all concerned, and to the language itself, a new word. That artery was not Shakspere's intention might be concluded from its unfitness: what propriety could there be in making an artery hardy? The sole, imperfect justification I was able to think of for such use of the word arose from the fact that, before the discovery of the circulation of the blood (published in 1628), it was believed that the arteries (found empty after death) served for the movements of the animal spirits: this might vaguely associate the arteries with courage. But the sight of the word arture in the second Quarto at once relieved me.

I do not know if a list has ever been gathered of the words made by Shakspere: here is one of them—arture, from the same root as artus, a joint—arcere, to hold together, adjective arctus, tight. Arture, then, stands for juncture. This perfectly fits. In terror the weakest parts are the joints, for their artures are not hardy. 'And you, my sinews, … bear me stiffly up.' 55, 56.

Since writing as above, a friend informs me that arture is the exact equivalent of the [Greek: haphae] of Colossians ii. 19, as interpreted by Bishop Lightfoot—'the relation between contiguous limbs, not the parts of the limbs themselves in the neighbourhood of contact,'—for which relation 'there is no word in our language in common use.']

[Footnote 5: 'with the things he imagines.']

[Page 50]

Gho. My hower is almost come,[1] When I to sulphurous and tormenting Flames Must render vp my selfe.

Ham. Alas poore Ghost.

Gho. Pitty me not, but lend thy serious hearing To what I shall vnfold.

Ham. Speake, I am bound to heare.

Gho. So art thou to reuenge, when thou shalt heare.

Ham. What?

Gho. I am thy Fathers Spirit, Doom'd for a certaine terme to walke the night;[2] And for the day confin'd to fast in Fiers,[3] Till the foule crimes done in my dayes of Nature Are burnt and purg'd away? But that I am forbid To tell the secrets of my Prison-House; I could a Tale vnfold, whose lightest word[4] Would harrow vp thy soule, freeze thy young blood, Make thy two eyes like Starres, start from their Spheres, Thy knotty and combined locks to part, [Sidenote: knotted] And each particular haire to stand an end,[5] Like Quilles vpon the fretfull[6] Porpentine [Sidenote: fearefull[6]] But this eternall blason[7] must not be To eares of flesh and bloud; list Hamlet, oh list, [Sidenote: blood, list, ô list;] If thou didst euer thy deare Father loue.

Ham. Oh Heauen![8] [Sidenote: God]

Gho. Reuenge his foule and most vnnaturall Murther.[9]

Ham. Murther?

Ghost. Murther most foule, as in the best it is; But this most foule, strange, and vnnaturall.

Ham. Hast, hast me to know it, [Sidenote: Hast me to know't,] That with wings as swift

[Footnote 1: The night is the Ghost's day.]

[Footnote 2: To walk the night, and see how things go, without being able to put a finger to them, is part of his cleansing.]

[Footnote 3: More horror yet for Hamlet.]

[Footnote 4: He would have him think of life and its doings as of awful import. He gives his son what warning he may.]

[Footnote 5: An end is like agape, an hungred. 71, 175.]

[Footnote 6: The word in the Q. suggests fretfull a misprint for frightful. It is fretfull in the 1st Q. as well.]

[Footnote 7: To blason is to read off in proper heraldic terms the arms blasoned upon a shield. A blason is such a reading, but is here used for a picture in words of other objects.]

[Footnote 8: —in appeal to God whether he had not loved his father.]

[Footnote 9: The horror still accumulates. The knowledge of evil—not evil in the abstract, but evil alive, and all about him—comes darkening down upon Hamlet's being. Not only is his father an inhabitant of the nether fires, but he is there by murder.]

[Page 52]

As meditation, or the thoughts of Loue,

May sweepe to my Reuenge.[1]

Ghost. I finde thee apt, And duller should'st thou be then the fat weede[2] [Sidenote: 194] That rots it selfe in ease, on Lethe Wharfe,[4] [Sidenote: rootes[3]] Would'st thou not stirre in this. Now Hamlet heare: It's giuen out, that sleeping in mine Orchard, [Sidenote: 'Tis] A Serpent stung me: so the whole eare of Denmarke, Is by a forged processe of my death Rankly abus'd: But know thou Noble youth, The Serpent that did sting thy Fathers life, Now weares his Crowne.

[Sidenote: 30,32] Ham. O my Propheticke soule: mine Vncle?[5] [Sidenote: my]

Ghost. I that incestuous, that adulterate Beast[6] With witchcraft of his wits, hath Traitorous guifts. [Sidenote: wits, with] Oh wicked Wit, and Gifts, that haue the power So to seduce? Won to to this shamefull Lust [Sidenote: wonne to his] The will of my most seeming vertuous Queene: Oh Hamlet, what a falling off was there, [Sidenote: what failing] From me, whose loue was of that dignity, That it went hand in hand, euen with[7] the Vow I made to her in Marriage; and to decline Vpon a wretch, whose Naturall gifts were poore To those of mine. But Vertue, as it neuer wil be moued, Though Lewdnesse court it in a shape of Heauen: So Lust, though to a radiant Angell link'd, [Sidenote: so but though] Will sate it selfe in[8] a Celestiall bed, and prey on Garbage.[9] [Sidenote: Will sort it selfe] But soft, me thinkes I sent the Mornings Ayre; [Sidenote: morning ayre,] Briefe let me be: Sleeping within mine Orchard, [Sidenote: my] My custome alwayes in the afternoone; [Sidenote: of the] Vpon my secure hower thy Vncle stole

[Footnote 1: Now, for the moment, he has no doubt, and vengeance is his first thought.]

[Footnote 2: Hamlet may be supposed to recall this, if we suppose him afterwards to accuse himself so bitterly and so unfairly as in the Quarto, 194.]

[Footnote 3: Also 1st Q.]

[Footnote 4: landing-place on the bank of Lethe, the hell-river of oblivion.]

[Footnote 5: This does not mean that he had suspected his uncle, but that his dislike to him was prophetic.]

[Footnote 6: How can it be doubted that in this speech the Ghost accuses his wife and brother of adultery? Their marriage was not adultery. See how the ghastly revelation grows on Hamlet—his father in hell—murdered by his brother—dishonoured by his wife!]

[Footnote 7: parallel with; correspondent to.]

[Footnote 8: 1st Q. 'fate itself from a'.]

[Footnote 9: This passage, from 'Oh Hamlet,' most indubitably asserts the adultery of Gertrude.]

[Page 54]

With iuyce of cursed Hebenon[1] in a Violl, [Sidenote: Hebona]

And in the Porches of mine eares did poure [Sidenote: my]

The leaperous Distilment;[2] whose effect

Holds such an enmity with bloud of Man,

That swift as Quick-siluer, it courses[3] through

The naturall Gates and Allies of the Body;

And with a sodaine vigour it doth posset [Sidenote: doth possesse]

And curd, like Aygre droppings into Milke, [Sidenote: eager[4]]

The thin and wholsome blood: so did it mine;

And a most instant Tetter bak'd about, [Sidenote: barckt about[5]]

Most Lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,

All my smooth Body.

Thus was I, sleeping, by a Brothers hand,

Of Life, of Crowne, and Queene at once dispatcht; [Sidenote: of Queene]

[Sidenote: 164] Cut off euen in the Blossomes of my Sinne,

Vnhouzzled, disappointed, vnnaneld,[6] [Sidenote: Vnhuzled, | vnanueld,]

[Sidenote: 262] No reckoning made, but sent to my account

With all my imperfections on my head;

Oh horrible, Oh horrible, most horrible:

If thou hast nature in thee beare it not;

Let not the Royall Bed of Denmarke be

A Couch for Luxury and damned Incest.[7]

But howsoeuer thou pursuest this Act,

[Sidenote: howsomeuer thou pursues]

[Sidenote: 30,174] Taint not thy mind; nor let thy Soule contriue

[Sidenote: 140] Against thy Mother ought; leaue her to heauen,

And to those Thornes that in her bosome lodge,

To pricke and sting her. Fare thee well at once;

The Glow-worme showes the Matine to be neere,

And gins to pale his vneffectuall Fire:

Adue, adue, Hamlet: remember me. Exit. [Sidenote: Adiew, adiew, adiew, remember me.[8]]

Ham. Oh all you host of Heauen! Oh Earth: what els? And shall I couple Hell?[9] Oh fie[10]: hold my heart; [Sidenote: hold, hold my] And you my sinnewes, grow not instant Old;

[Footnote 1: Ebony.]

[Footnote 2: producing leprosy—as described in result below.]

[Footnote 3: 1st Q. 'posteth'.]

[Footnote 4: So also 1st Q.]

[Footnote 5: This barckt—meaning cased as a bark cases its tree—is used in 1st Q. also: 'And all my smoothe body, barked, and tetterd ouer.' The word is so used in Scotland still.]

[Footnote 6: Husel (Anglo-Saxon) is an offering, the sacrament. Disappointed, not appointed: Dr. Johnson. Unaneled, unoiled, without the extreme unction.]

[Footnote 7: It is on public grounds, as a king and a Dane, rather than as a husband and a murdered man, that he urges on his son the execution of justice. Note the tenderness towards his wife that follows—more marked, 174; here it is mingled with predominating regard to his son to whose filial nature he dreads injury.]

[Footnote 8: Q. omits Exit.]

[Footnote 9: He must: his father is there!]

[Footnote 10: The interjection is addressed to heart and sinews, which forget their duty.]

[Page 56]

But beare me stiffely vp: Remember thee?[1] [Sidenote: swiftly vp]

I, thou poore Ghost, while memory holds a seate [Sidenote: whiles]

In this distracted Globe[2]: Remember thee?

Yea, from the Table of my Memory,[3]

Ile wipe away all triuiall fond Records,

All sawes[4] of Bookes, all formes, all presures past,

That youth and obseruation coppied there;

And thy Commandment all alone shall liue

Within the Booke and Volume of my Braine,

Vnmixt with baser matter; yes, yes, by Heauen:

[Sidenote: matter, yes by]

[Sidenote: 168] Oh most pernicious woman![5]

Oh Villaine, Villaine, smiling damned Villaine!

My Tables, my Tables; meet it is I set it downe,[6]

[Sidenote: My tables, meet]

That one may smile, and smile and be a Villaine;

At least I'm sure it may be so in Denmarke; [Sidenote: I am]

So Vnckle there you are: now to my word;[7]

It is; Adue, Adue, Remember me:[8] I haue sworn't.

[Sidenote: Enter Horatio, and Marcellus]

Hor. and Mar. within. My Lord, my Lord. [Sidenote: Hora. My]

Enter Horatio and Marcellus.

Mar. Lord Hamlet.

Hor. Heauen secure him. [Sidenote: Heauens]

Mar. So be it.

Hor. Illo, ho, ho, my Lord.

Ham. Hillo, ho, ho, boy; come bird, come.[9] [Sidenote: boy come, and come.]

Mar. How ist't my Noble Lord?

Hor. What newes, my Lord?

Ham. Oh wonderfull![10]

Hor. Good my Lord tell it.

Ham. No you'l reueale it. [Sidenote: you will]

Hor. Not I, my Lord, by Heauen.

Mar. Nor I, my Lord.

Ham. How say you then, would heart of man once think it? But you'l be secret?

[Footnote 1: For the moment he has no doubt that he has seen and spoken with the ghost of his father.]

[Footnote 2: his head.]

[Footnote 3: The whole speech is that of a student, accustomed to books, to take notes, and to fix things in his memory. 'Table,' tablet.]

[Footnote 4: wise sayings.]

[Footnote 5: The Ghost has revealed her adultery: Hamlet suspects her of complicity in the murder, 168.]

[Footnote 6: It may well seem odd that Hamlet should be represented as, at such a moment, making a note in his tablets; but without further allusion to the student-habit, I would remark that, in cases where strongest passion is roused, the intellect has yet sometimes an automatic trick of working independently. For instance from Shakspere, see Constance in King John—how, in her agony over the loss of her son, both her fancy, playing with words, and her imagination, playing with forms, are busy.

Note the glimpse of Hamlet's character here given: he had been something of an optimist; at least had known villainy only from books; at thirty years of age it is to him a discovery that a man may smile and be a villain! Then think of the shock of such discoveries as are here forced upon him! Villainy is no longer a mere idea, but a fact! and of all villainous deeds those of his own mother and uncle are the worst! But note also his honesty, his justice to humanity, his philosophic temperament, in the qualification he sets to the memorandum, '—at least in Denmark!']

[Footnote 7: 'my word,'—the word he has to keep in mind; his cue.]

[Footnote 8: Should not the actor here make a pause, with hand uplifted, as taking a solemn though silent oath?]

[Footnote 9: —as if calling to a hawk.]

[Footnote 10: Here comes the test of the actor's possible: here Hamlet himself begins to act, and will at once assume a rôle, ere yet he well knows what it must be. One thing only is clear to him—that the communication of the Ghost is not a thing to be shared—that he must keep it with all his power of secrecy: the honour both of father and of mother is at stake. In order to do so, he must begin by putting on himself a cloak of darkness, and hiding his feelings—first of all the present agitation which threatens to overpower him. His immediate impulse or instinctive motion is to force an air, and throw a veil of grimmest humour over the occurrence. The agitation of the horror at his heart, ever working and constantly repressed, shows through the veil, and gives an excited uncertainty to his words, and a wild vacillation to his manner and behaviour.]

[Page 58]

Both. I, by Heau'n, my Lord.[1]

Ham. There's nere a villaine dwelling in all Denmarke But hee's an arrant knaue.

Hor. There needs no Ghost my Lord, come from the Graue, to tell vs this.

Ham. Why right, you are i'th'right; [Sidenote: in the] And so, without more circumstance at all, I hold it fit that we shake hands, and part: You, as your busines and desires shall point you: [Sidenote: desire] For euery man ha's businesse and desire,[2] [Sidenote: hath] Such as it is: and for mine owne poore part, [Sidenote: my] Looke you, Ile goe pray.[4] [Sidenote: I will goe pray.[3]]