Home
This site uses cookies
log out

Hamlet: Act V, Scene 1

Sign in with Google to add your annotations.
1 annotation

Hamlet
Act V, Scene 1

Scene 1

Elsinore. A churchyard.

  1. Enter two Clowns with spades and mattocks.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

1 - 2
  1. Is she to be buried in Christian burial when she willfully
  2. seeks her own salvation?

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

3 - 4
  1. I tell thee she is, therefore make her grave straight. The
  2. crowner hath sate on her, and finds it Christian burial.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

5 - 6
  1. How can that be, unless she drown’d herself in her own
  2. defense?

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

7
  1. Why, ’tis found so.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

8 - 11
  1. It must be se offendendo, it cannot be else. For here lies
  2. the point: if I drown myself wittingly, it argues an act,
  3. and an act hath three branches—it is to act, to do, to
  4. perform; argal, she drown’d herself wittingly.

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

12
  1. Nay, but hear you, goodman delver—

First Clown (Gravedigger)

13 - 18
  1. Give me leave. Here lies the water; good. Here stands the
  2. man; good. If the man go to this water and drown himself, it
  3. is, will he, nill he, he goes, mark you that. But if the
  4. water come to him and drown him, he drowns not himself;
  5. argal, he that is not guilty of his own death shortens not
  6. his own life.

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

19
  1. But is this law?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

20
  1. Ay, marry, is’t—crowner’s quest law.

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

21 - 23
  1. Will you ha’ the truth an’t? If this had not been a
  2. gentlewoman, she should have been buried out a’ Christian
  3. burial.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

24 - 28
  1. Why, there thou say’st, and the more pity that great folk
  2. should have count’nance in this world to drown or hang
  3. themselves, more than their even-Christen. Come, my spade.
  4. There is no ancient gentlemen but gard’ners, ditchers, and
  5. grave-makers; they hold up Adam’s profession.

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

29
  1. Was he a gentleman?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

30
  1. ’A was the first that ever bore arms.

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

31
  1. Why, he had none.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

32 - 35
  1. What, art a heathen? How dost thou understand the Scripture?
  2. The Scripture says Adam digg’d; could he dig without arms?
  3. I’ll put another question to thee. If thou answerest me not
  4. to the purpose, confess thyself—

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

36
  1. Go to.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

37 - 38
  1. What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the
  2. shipwright, or the carpenter?

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

39 - 40
  1. The gallows-maker, for that frame outlives a thousand
  2. tenants.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

41 - 45
  1. I like thy wit well, in good faith. The gallows does well;
  2. but how does it well? It does well to those that do ill. Now
  3. thou dost ill to say the gallows is built stronger than the
  4. church; argal, the gallows may do well to thee. To’t again,
  5. come.

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

46 - 47
  1. Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, or a
  2. carpenter?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

48
  1. Ay, tell me that, and unyoke.

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

49
  1. Marry, now I can tell.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

50
  1. To’t.

Second Clown (Gravedigger)

51
  1. Mass, I cannot tell.
  1. Enter Hamlet and Horatio afar off.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

52 - 60
  1. Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your dull ass will
  2. not mend his pace with beating, and when you are ask’d this
  3. question next, say “a grave-maker“: the houses he makes
  4. lasts till doomsday. Go get thee in, and fetch me a sup of
  5. liquor.
  6. Exit Second Clown.
  7. First Clown digs.
  8. Song.
  9. “In youth when I did love, did love,
  10. Methought it was very sweet,
  11. To contract—O—the time for-a-my behove,
  12. O, methought there-a-was nothing-a-meet.”

Hamlet

61 - 62
  1. Has this fellow no feeling of his business? ’A sings in
  2. grave-making.

Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, or a carpenter?

Thomas Charles Wageman, 19th century

Horatio

63
  1. Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness.

Hamlet

64 - 65
  1. ’Tis e’en so, the hand of little employment hath the
  2. daintier sense.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

66 - 69
  1. Song.
  2. “But age with his stealing steps
  3. Hath clawed me in his clutch,
  4. And hath shipped me into the land,
  5. As if I had never been such.”
  1. Throws up a shovelful of earth with a skull in it.

Hamlet

70 - 74
  1. That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once. How the
  2. knave jowls it to the ground, as if ’twere Cain’s jaw-bone,
  3. that did the first murder! This might be the pate of a
  4. politician, which this ass now o’erreaches, one that would
  5. circumvent God, might it not?

Horatio

75
  1. It might, my lord.

Hamlet

76 - 79
  1. Or of a courtier, which could say, “Good morrow, sweet lord!
  2. How dost thou, sweet lord?” This might be my Lord
  3. Such-a-one, that prais’d my Lord Such-a-one’s horse when ’a
  4. meant to beg it, might it not?

Horatio

80
  1. Ay, my lord.

Hamlet

81 - 85
  1. Why, e’en so, and now my Lady Worm’s, chopless, and knock’d
  2. about the mazzard with a sexton’s spade. Here’s fine
  3. revolution, and we had the trick to see’t. Did these bones
  4. cost no more the breeding, but to play at loggats with them?
  5. Mine ache to think on’t.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

86 - 89
  1. Song.
  2. “A pickaxe and a spade, a spade,
  3. For and a shrouding sheet:
  4. O, a pit of clay for to be made
  5. For such a guest is meet.”
  1. Throws up another skull.

Hamlet

90 - 103
  1. There’s another. Why may not that be the skull of a lawyer?
  2. Where be his quiddities now, his quillities, his cases, his
  3. tenures, and his tricks? Why does he suffer this mad knave
  4. now to knock him about the sconce with a dirty shovel, and
  5. will not tell him of his action of battery? Hum! This fellow
  6. might be in ’s time a great buyer of land, with his
  7. statutes, his recognizances, his fines, his double vouchers,
  8. his recoveries. Is this the fine of his fines, and the
  9. recovery of his recoveries, to have his fine pate full of
  10. fine dirt? Will his vouchers vouch him no more of his
  11. purchases, and double ones too, than the length and breadth
  12. of a pair of indentures? The very conveyances of his lands
  13. will scarcely lie in this box, and must th’ inheritor
  14. himself have no more, ha?

Horatio

104
  1. Not a jot more, my lord.

Hamlet

105
  1. Is not parchment made of sheep-skins?

Horatio

106
  1. Ay, my lord, and of calves’-skins too.

Hamlet

107 - 108
  1. They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance in that.
  2. I will speak to this fellow. Whose grave’s this, sirrah?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

109 - 111
  1. Mine, sir.
  2. Sings.
  3. “O, a pit of clay for to be made
  4. For such a guest is meet.”

Hamlet

112
  1. I think it be thine indeed, for thou liest in’t.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

113 - 114
  1. You lie out on’t, sir, and therefore ’tis not yours; for my
  2. part, I do not lie in’t, yet it is mine.

Hamlet

115 - 116
  1. Thou dost lie in’t, to be in’t and say it is thine. ’Tis for
  2. the dead, not for the quick; therefore thou liest.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

117
  1. ’Tis a quick lie, sir, ’twill away again from me to you.

Hamlet

118
  1. What man dost thou dig it for?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

119
  1. For no man, sir.

Hamlet

120
  1. What woman then?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

121
  1. For none neither.

Hamlet

122
  1. Who is to be buried in’t?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

123
  1. One that was a woman, sir, but, rest her soul, she’s dead.

Hamlet

124 - 129
  1. How absolute the knave is! We must speak by the card, or
  2. equivocation will undo us. By the Lord, Horatio, this three
  3. years I have took note of it: the age is grown so pick’d
  4. that the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel of the
  5. courtier, he galls his kibe. How long hast thou been
  6. grave-maker?
Costume design for the Doctor of Divinity, in some versions called the priest

Costume design for the Doctor of Divinity, in some versions called the priest

John Miller, George Scharf, 1825

First Clown (Gravedigger)

130 - 131
  1. Of all the days i’ th’ year, I came to’t that day that our
  2. last king Hamlet overcame Fortinbras.

Hamlet

132
  1. How long is that since?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

133 - 135
  1. Cannot you tell that? Every fool can tell that. It was that
  2. very day that young Hamlet was born— he that is mad, and
  3. sent into England.

Hamlet

136
  1. Ay, marry, why was he sent into England?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

137 - 138
  1. Why, because ’a was mad. ’A shall recover his wits there, or
  2. if ’a do not, ’tis no great matter there.

Hamlet

139
  1. Why?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

140 - 141
  1. ’Twill not be seen in him there, there the men are as mad as
  2. he.

Hamlet

142
  1. How came he mad?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

143
  1. Very strangely, they say.

Hamlet

144
  1. How strangely?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

145
  1. Faith, e’en with losing his wits.

Hamlet

146
  1. Upon what ground?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

147 - 148
  1. Why, here in Denmark. I have been sexton here, man and boy,
  2. thirty years.

Hamlet

149
  1. How long will a man lie i’ th’ earth ere he rot?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

150 - 153
  1. Faith, if ’a be not rotten before ’a die—as we have many
  2. pocky corses, that will scarce hold the laying in—’a will
  3. last you some eight year or nine year. A tanner will last
  4. you nine year.

Hamlet

154
  1. Why he more than another?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

155 - 158
  1. Why, sir, his hide is so tann’d with his trade that ’a will
  2. keep out water a great while, and your water is a sore
  3. decayer of your whoreson dead body. Here’s a skull now hath
  4. lien you i’ th’ earth three and twenty years.

Hamlet

159
  1. Whose was it?

First Clown (Gravedigger)

160
  1. A whoreson mad fellow’s it was. Whose do you think it was?

Hamlet

161
  1. Nay, I know not.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

162 - 164
  1. A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! ’A pour’d a flagon of
  2. Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, sir, was, sir,
  3. Yorick’s skull, the King’s jester.

Hamlet

165
  1. This?
  1. Takes the skull.

First Clown (Gravedigger)

166
  1. E’en that.

Hamlet

167 - 177
  1. Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio, a fellow of infinite
  2. jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath bore me on his back a
  3. thousand times, and now how abhorr’d in my imagination it
  4. is! My gorge rises at it. Here hung those lips that I have
  5. kiss’d I know not how oft. Where be your gibes now, your
  6. gambols, your songs, your flashes of merriment, that were
  7. wont to set the table on a roar? Not one now to mock your
  8. own grinning-quite chop-fall’n. Now get you to my lady’s
  9. chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this
  10. favor she must come; make her laugh at that. Prithee,
  11. Horatio, tell me one thing.

Horatio

178
  1. What’s that, my lord?

Hamlet

179 - 180
  1. Dost thou think Alexander look’d a’ this fashion i’ th’
  2. earth?

Horatio

181
  1. E’en so.

Hamlet

182
  1. And smelt so? Pah!
  1. Puts down the skull.

Horatio

183
  1. E’en so, my lord.

Hamlet

184 - 186
  1. To what base uses we may return, Horatio! Why may not
  2. imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, till ’a find
  3. it stopping a bunghole?

Horatio

187
  1. ’Twere to consider too curiously, to consider so.

Hamlet

188 - 202
  1. No, faith, not a jot, but to follow him thither with modesty
  2. enough and likelihood to lead it: Alexander died, Alexander
  3. was buried, Alexander returneth to dust, the dust is earth,
  4. of earth we make loam, and why of that loam whereto he was
  5. converted might they not stop a beer-barrel?
  6. Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay,
  7. Might stop a hole to keep the wind away.
  8. O that that earth which kept the world in awe
  9. Should patch a wall t’ expel the winter’s flaw!
  10. But soft, but soft awhile, here comes the king.
  11. Enter King, Queen, Laertes, and a Doctor of Divinity,
  12. following the corpse, with Lords attendant.
  13. The Queen, the courtiers. Who is this they follow?
  14. And with such maimed rites? This doth betoken
  15. The corse they follow did with desp’rate hand
  16. Foredo it own life. ’Twas of some estate.
  17. Couch we a while and mark.
  1. Retiring with Horatio.
Hamlet and the skull of Yorick

Hamlet and the skull of Yorick

Victor Humareda, circa 1985

Laertes

203
  1. What ceremony else?

Hamlet

204
  1. That is Laertes, a very noble youth. Mark.

Laertes

205
  1. What ceremony else?

Doctor

206 - 214
  1. Her obsequies have been as far enlarg’d
  2. As we have warranty. Her death was doubtful,
  3. And but that great command o’ersways the order,
  4. She should in ground unsanctified been lodg’d
  5. Till the last trumpet; for charitable prayers,
  6. Shards, flints, and pebbles should be thrown on her.
  7. Yet here she is allow’d her virgin crants,
  8. Her maiden strewments, and the bringing home
  9. Of bell and burial.

Laertes

215
  1. Must there no more be done?

Doctor

216 - 219
  1.                             No more be done:
  2. We should profane the service of the dead
  3. To sing a requiem and such rest to her
  4. As to peace-parted souls.

Laertes

220 - 224
  1.                           Lay her i’ th’ earth,
  2. And from her fair and unpolluted flesh
  3. May violets spring! I tell thee, churlish priest,
  4. A minist’ring angel shall my sister be
  5. When thou liest howling.

Hamlet

225
  1.                          What, the fair Ophelia!

Gertrude

226 - 229
  1. Scattering flowers.
  2. Sweets to the sweet, farewell!
  3. I hop’d thou shouldst have been my Hamlet’s wife.
  4. I thought thy bride-bed to have deck’d, sweet maid,
  5. And not have strew’d thy grave.

Laertes

230 - 238
  1.                                 O, treble woe
  2. Fall ten times treble on that cursed head
  3. Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense
  4. Depriv’d thee of! Hold off the earth a while,
  5. Till I have caught her once more in mine arms.
  6. Leaps in the grave.
  7. Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead,
  8. Till of this flat a mountain you have made
  9. T’ o’ertop old Pelion, or the skyish head
  10. Of blue Olympus.

Hamlet

239 - 243
  1. Coming forward.
  2.                  What is he whose grief
  3. Bears such an emphasis, whose phrase of sorrow
  4. Conjures the wand’ring stars and makes them stand
  5. Like wonder-wounded hearers? This is I,
  6. Hamlet the Dane!
    Jul 3, 2019 Zyzigus
    The king of Denmark?
  1. Hamlet leaps in after Laertes.

Laertes

244
  1. The devil take thy soul!
  1. Grappling with him.

Hamlet

245 - 249
  1. Thou pray’st not well.
  2. I prithee take thy fingers from my throat.
  3. For though I am not splenitive and rash,
  4. Yet have I in me something dangerous,
  5. Which let thy wisdom fear. Hold off thy hand!

Claudius

250
  1. Pluck them asunder.

Gertrude

251
  1.                     Hamlet, Hamlet!

John Austen, circa 1922

Ophelia’s Pallbearers

252
  1.                 Gentlemen!

Horatio

253
  1. Good my lord, be quiet.
  1. The Attendants part them, and they come out of the grave.

Hamlet

254 - 255
  1. Why, I will fight with him upon this theme
  2. Until my eyelids will no longer wag.

Gertrude

256
  1. O my son, what theme?

Hamlet

257 - 259
  1. I lov’d Ophelia. Forty thousand brothers
  2. Could not with all their quantity of love
  3. Make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her?

Claudius

260
  1. O, he is mad, Laertes.

Gertrude

261
  1. For love of God, forbear him.

Hamlet

262 - 272
  1. ’Swounds, show me what thou’t do.
  2. Woo’t weep, woo’t fight, woo’t fast, woo’t tear thyself?
  3. Woo’t drink up eisel, eat a crocodile?
  4. I’ll do’t. Dost thou come here to whine?
  5. To outface me with leaping in her grave?
  6. Be buried quick with her, and so will I.
  7. And if thou prate of mountains, let them throw
  8. Millions of acres on us, till our ground,
  9. Singeing his pate against the burning zone,
  10. Make Ossa like a wart! Nay, and thou’lt mouth,
  11. I’ll rant as well as thou.

Gertrude

273 - 277
  1.                            This is mere madness,
  2. And thus a while the fit will work on him;
  3. Anon, as patient as the female dove,
  4. When that her golden couplets are disclosed,
  5. His silence will sit drooping.

Hamlet

278 - 282
  1.                                Hear you, sir,
  2. What is the reason that you use me thus?
  3. I lov’d you ever. But it is no matter.
  4. Let Hercules himself do what he may,
  5. The cat will mew, and dog will have his day.
  1. Exit Hamlet.

Claudius

283 - 289
  1. I pray thee, good Horatio, wait upon him.
  2. Exit Horatio.
  3. To Laertes.
  4. Strengthen your patience in our last night’s speech,
  5. We’ll put the matter to the present push.—
  6. Good Gertrude, set some watch over your son.
  7. This grave shall have a living monument.
  8. An hour of quiet shortly shall we see,
  9. Till then in patience our proceeding be.
  1. Exeunt.

Byam Shaw, 1901

© 2021 Unotate.com • contact • privacy policy • Creative Commons text from PlayShakespeare.com • All illustrations are public domain or Creative Commons • Header illustration by Byam Shaw