Medieval Meanings
Osric: I commend my duty to your lordship
offer, give
Hamlet: [tests a rapier] This likes me well. These foils have all a length?
[He tests a sword] This one is good for me. Are they all the same length?
Queen: No, no the drink, the drink! O, my dear Hamlet! THe drink, the drink! I am poisoned.
Gertrude
I loved Ophelia. Forty thousand brothers Could not with all their quantity of love Make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her?
Hamlet
Act 1:
The ghost urges Hamlet to:
Avenge his murder
Hamlet: But soft, but soft awhile! Here comes the King, The Queen, the courtiers. Who is this they follow? And with such maimed rites?
Impaired, diminished
Hamlet: I will receive it, sir, with all diligence of spirit. Put your bonnet to his right use. ‘Tis for the head.
Sir, I’ll listen, with all of my being. Now put your hat to its proper use. Put it on your head.
Hamlet: Here, thou incestuous murd'rous, damned Dane, Drink off this potion. Is thy union here
Claudius
It is here, Hamlet. Hamlet, thou art slain. No med'cine in the world can do thee good. In thee there is not half an hour's life. The treacherous instrument is in they hand, Unbated and envenomed. The foul practice Hath turned itself on me. Lo, here I lie, Never to rise again. Thy mother's poisoned I can no more. The King, the King's to blame.
Laertes
Act 2:
The play's the thing. Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king.
Speaker: Hamlet
Hamlet refers to his altered story of the play in order to gauge the reaction of Claudius and determine if he is guilty of murder
Osric: I mean sir, for his weapon. But in the 'reputation laid on him by them, in his meed he's 'unmatched'
merit, skill
GraveDigger: You lie out on't sir and therefore 'tis not yours. For my part, I do not lie in't yet it is mine.
You’re lying outside of it, sir, so therefore it’s not yours. As for me, I’m not lying in it—it’s really mine.
The potent poison quite o'ercrows my spirit. But I do prophesy th' election lights On Fortinbras; he has my dying voice. So tell hi, with th' occurrents, more and less, Which have solicited--the rest is silence.
Hamlet
Stay, give me drink-Hamlet, this pearl is thine. here's to thy health.
King
Act 3: Hamlet knows that he will be escorted to England by Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. What does he confess to Gertrude about the arrangements?
He suspects its a set up and has plans to run his own scheme against them
Queen: He's fat and scant of breath. Here, Hamlet take my napkin; rub they brows. The Queen carouses to they fortune, Hamlet.
drinks a toast
Fortinbras: This quarry cries on havoc. O proud death, What feast is toward in thine eternal cell,That thou so many princes at a shot So bloodily hast struck?
These corpses suggest a massacre. Oh, proud Death, what banquet are you preparing that you’ve struck down so many princes at once?
He is justly served. It is a poison tempered by himself. Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet. Mine and my father's death come not upon thee, Nor thine on me.
Laertes
Let four captains Bear Hamlet like a soldier to the stage, For he was likely, had he been put on, TO have proved most royal; and for his passage, The soldier's music and the rite of war Speak loudly for him. Take up the bodies such a sight as this Becomes the field but here shows much amiss. Go, bid the soldiers shoot.
Fortinbras
Act 1:
Oh that this too, too sullied flesh would melt, Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew, Or that the Everlasting had not fixed His canon 'gainst self-slaughter! O' God, God!
Speaker: Hamlet
Hamlet wants to kid himself due to his grief over his father's death and would should God not forbid it in his law
Laertes: Lay her i' the' earth, And from her fair and unpolluted flesh May violets spring! I tell thee, churlish priest, a minist'ring angel shall my sister be When thou liest howling.
in hell
King: Set me the stoups of wine upon that table.If Hamlet give the first or second hit Or quit in answer of the third exchange,Let all the battlements their ordnance fire!The king shall drink to Hamlet’s better breath, And in the cup an union shall he throw Richer than that which four successive kings In Denmark’s crown have worn.
Put the cups of wine on that table. If Hamlet gets the first or second hit, or even responds to Laertes challenge by just making the third hit, then we will fire the cannons in his honor! I’ll then drink to Hamlet’s health, and into his cup I’ll drop a pearl more valuable than those the last four Danish kings worn in their crowns.
O, I am slain!
Polonius
Cannot you tell that? Every fool can tell that. It was that very day that young Hamlet was born-He that is mad, and sent to England?
Gravedigger
Act 2:
Your bait of falsehood take this carp of truth And thus do we of wisdom and of reach, With windlasses and with assays of bias By indirections find directions out
Speaker: Polonius Addresse: Reynaldo
Plant a lie about Laertes to see if anyone takes the bait with this rumor find out the truth about what he is doing in France.