Hamlet Act Five

Two gravediggers discuss Ophelia’s suicide. Hamlet and Horatio engage in philosophical

discussion. Ophelia’s funeral takes place. Laertes’ display of grief for Ophelia enrages

Hamlet and the two men fight by her graveside.

5.1.

Is she to be buried in Christian burial that wilfully seeks her own salvation?

The Church forbade suicides Christian funeral rites and burial in consecrated ground until the nineteenth century. Consider Hamlet’s first soliloquy ‘’Or that the Everlasting had not fixed/ His canon ‘gainst self-slaughter.’

Alas poor Yorick!

In this famous speech, Hamlet recalls all the jester’s frivolity, vitality and energy to emphasise the nothingness he has become: ‘Not one now, to mock your own grinning’.

Surrounded by physical reminders of death, Hamlet reflects on the ultimate insignificance of great warriors such as Caesar. Hamlet imagines that Julius Caesar has disintegrated and is now part of the dust used to patch up a wall:

“Imperious Caesar, dead and turned to clay,Might stop a hole, to keep the wind away.’

'Swounds, show me what thou'lt do: Woo't weep? woo't fight? woo't fast? woo't tear thyself? Woo't drink up eisel? eat a crocodile? I'll do't. Dost thou come here to whine? To outface me with leaping in her grave? Be buried quick with her, and so will I:

Write your own speech detailing what Hamlet would do to prove his love for Ophelia. Make the claims original and overstated.

‘I loved Ophelia.

Eat A Crocodile

Hamlet reveals how he arranged the deaths of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

Hamlet agrees to fight Laertes, saying that “all’s ill here about my heart,” but that one must be ready for death, since it will come no matter what one does.

Hamlet apologises to Laertes. Gertrude drinks from the poisoned cup.

Five Two

Hamlet and Laertes are wounded by the same poisoned sword.

Hamlet, in a fury, runs Claudius through with the poisoned sword and forces him to drink down the rest of the poisoned wine.

Hamlet tells Horatio that he is dying and exchanges a last forgiveness with Laertes, who dies after absolving Hamlet.

Hamlet tells Horatio that he is dying and exchanges a last forgiveness with Laertes, who dies after absolving Hamlet.

Sir, in my heart there was a kind of fighting,     That would not let me sleep: methought I lay     Worse than the mutines in the bilboes. Rashly,     And praised be rashness for it, let us know,     Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,     When our deep plots do pall: and that should teach us     There's a divinity that shapes our ends,     Rough-hew them how we will,--

 Does it not, think'st thee, stand me now upon--     He that hath kill'd my king and whored my mother,     Popp'd in between the election and my hopes,     Thrown out his angle for my proper life,     And with such cozenage--is't not perfect conscience,     To quit him with this arm? and is't not to be damn'd,     To let this canker of our nature come     In further evil?

But I am very sorry, good Horatio,     That to Laertes I forgot myself;     For, by the image of my cause, I see     The portraiture of his: I'll court his favours.     But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put me     Into a towering passion.

Hamlet expresses his sorrow over how he treated Laertes.

there's a special     providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now,     'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be     now; if it be not now, yet it will come: the     readiness is all:

Providence- God’s care/ power

Hamlet expresses forcefully his belief in God. All that matters is being prepared for the next world. Death will happen when God decides; there is no need to struggle against it or to wish for it to happen sooner.

LAERTES

    Why, as a woodcock to mine own springe, Osric;     I am justly kill'd with mine own treachery.

Claudius will also be killed by his own poison. All the deaths are the result/climax of the corruption that Claudius’ regicide and incest have infected Denmark with.

Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane,     Drink off this potion. Is thy union here?     Follow my mother.

Claudius is forced to drink his own poison, to join Gertrude in death.

The rest is silence.

Hamlet’s final words. After Fortinbras takes charge, the play will end and become silence. ‘rest’ can refer to Hamlet’s death (to die, to sleep). It is silence because he will speak no more, but does this also suggest the afterlife as a terrifying void?

Now cracks a noble heart. Good night sweet prince:     And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!

Horatio voices the audience’s feelings over the death of Hamlet. It is a tragic waste of human potential.