Eugène Delacroix (1843) – Act I, scene 5. The ghost and Hamlet on the battlement.
Act I, Scene 5 (The Ghost and Hamlet) / Act I, Scene 5 (Hamlet)
Like the first act's beginning, Shakespeare also devotes almost the act's entire last (fifth) scene to the appearance of the Ghost of Hamlet's father, in addition to a substantial share of the preceding Scene 4. Thus, the importance of the Ghost and all that he stands for – the unnatural, inverted state of the world brought about by Claudius's act – is further highlighted; not only because it is now, towards the end of this foundation-building first act, that we explicitly learn what Claudius has actually done (and of course we learn it from none other than the Ghost himself), but also because of the act's very structure.
I am thy father's spirit,
Hold it right there, though. You have to kind of wonder why the Ghost says this, don't you? I mean, we've spent the better part of the fourth scene already watching Hamlet interact with him, finally following him against the warnings – even against rather forceful physical attempts to hold him back – on the part of Horatio and Marcellus, whom our Prince eventually has to threaten with his own sword in order to make them back off. Given the Ghost's terrifying appearance (and terrifying, quite obviously, also to Hamlet), there's got to have been some rather strong compulsion for him to react in such a manner, and then to follow the Ghost all the way to a remote parapet. Now, clearly he is eager to find out why the Ghost is appearing in the first place; and clearly also he has his misgivings about the rotten state of affairs in Denmark. But it is just as clear that – like Horatio on the night before – he has no doubt whatsoever at whose outward appearance he is looking; indeed, this is the very reason why, uncertain about the apparition's purposes as he is, he instantly resolves to address it ("Be thy intents wicked or charitable, thou com'st in such a questionable shape that I will speak to thee") – and of course he then proceeds, "I'll call thee Hamlet, King, father, royal Dane." What else could he possibly say, given that – as we have heard again and again from the Ghost's very first appearance onwards – the apparition indeed looks exactly like the deceased King, Hamlet's father?
So what, then, is the Ghost doing here, telling Hamlet, "I am thy father's spirit"? After everything that we have already seen, can't we take it that the Prince is at least certain of this by now? (For that matter, what's the biblical language doing there – are we looking at a Christ-like figure in our Prince after all?) Well, as always in Shakespeare's works, and in fact, hardly anywhere more so than here, I think, it comes down to how you actually read that statement. To me, it's primarily a confirmation – a reassurance. For while Hamlet knows that he is looking at something that is his father on the outside, he is anything but certain (although he would very much like to believe) that it's also got his father inside. Therefore, the Ghost is not introducing himself or making any reference to a higher power; he is not telling the Prince, "I am thy father's spirit;" but rather, "don't fear me – you can trust me. Because I really am thy father's spirit." And by way of further explanation, he then proceeds to tell Hamlet how he has come to nightly walk the earth at all, before actually charging him with the revenge of his murder.
Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night,
And for the day confin'd to fast in fires,
Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature
Are burnt and purg'd away.
A description of Purgatory, quite clearly and expressly; and as if anybody needed any further confirmation, we'll hear the Ghost's voice coming from "beneath," i.e. from the area below the stage, at the end of this very scene, when he exhorts Horatio and Marcellus to accede to Hamlet's demands of an oath of strict silence: speaking from the area, in other words, which was even literally referred to as "hell" in Shakespearean theatre. But if the former King was such a shining figure of light, a model ruler much admired by his son and his people alike, why are we talking about Purgatory in connection with him at all? Why should he be fasting in its fires – what can his "foul crimes" possibly have been?
Here, again, I think it's important to remember the religious and social context of the times when the play was written – and also by whom it was written. For although Elizabeth I succeeded in (re-)establishing Anglicanism as England's official religion, at the beginning of her reign the country came out of a religious war as brutal as any of those ravaging the era's European societies; and quite crucially, Shakespeare's own family is widely believed to have had Catholic leanings. Catholicism, however, to this day embraces Purgatory as a key religious concept, and in the 16th century, that was true to an even greater degree: this was the reason why, after all, the reformatory movement on the European Continent so substantially rested on – and why the leadership of the Catholic Church was so particularly incensed by – Martin Luther's preaching against the practice of indulgences, as embodied in his famous 95 Theses, published in Wittenberg (!), in 1517; i.e., against the notion that any- and everyone could purchase their own or a relative's salvation by a donation made in exchange for a letter of indulgence issued by the Church. (Or, as the infamous slogan publicised by Luther's adversary John Tetzel had it, "When money in the coffer rings, the soul from Purgatory springs.") So the idea that every human being – even the King, God's representative on earth – was subject to Purgatory for even the slightest of transgressions was a very powerful and frightening one. I think it is this, primarily, that Shakespeare is referring to here. Thus, the dead King's "foul crimes" need not necessarily have been anything akin to the seven deadly sins – in fact, if you think about it, as a ruler he was in an optimal position to do a little evil to achieve a lot of good without ever even being questioned; and even acts no longer meeting the description of "a little" evil by earthly standards, in a sovereign would have gone entirely unnoticed (or at the very least, remained without earthly consequences) ... and would nevertheless have sent the King's soul on the fast track to Purgatory forthwith after his death.
But that I am forbid
To tell the secrets of my prison house,
I could a tale unfold whose lightest word
Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood,
Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres,
Thy knotted and combined locks to part,
And each particular hair to stand on end
Like quills upon the fretful porcupine.
But this eternal blazon must not be
To ears of flesh and blood.
If you absolutely insist on turning "Hamlet" into a horror movie, the things implied here should be more than enough material to work with for a whole plethora of gruesome scenes (although even then you'd probably be hard-pressed to match those conjured up by the mind's eye of Hieronymus Bosch) ... and I can just picture David Garrick's wig hair beginning to rise at these words, until they finally stood on end during the Ghost's revelations about "murder most foul, strange and unnatural." Of course the effect of his words is also what makes the Ghost such a tremendously compelling figure – terrifying in his appearance and thus, profoundly harrowing; but by the same token also himself harrowed through and through by his afterlife experience. And I absolutely love the way this latter aspect comes across in Paul Scofield's rendition in Franco Zeffirelli's movie ... the screenplay excises this passage's entire second part, and yet, you can hear every single word in Scofield's voice alone.
List, list, O, list!
If thou didst ever thy dear father love –
O God!
Now, that I call downright emotional blackmail. What's the poor kid to say to this, "no, you know, I've always hated you; actually I'm glad that you're gone?" Which I think our Prince would never say in the first place, because unlike the Freudians I do believe he genuinely loved and revered his father – in fact, one of the intriguing interpretative possibilities of this and the second half of the preceding scene is how father and son eventually reconnect despite all the adversities of the outward circumstances of their meeting. Which later, of course, makes it all the more terrible for Hamlet to realise how overwhelmingly difficult he finds his father's charge ...
Revenge his foul and most unnatural murther.
... which charge, in turn, follows straight on the heels of the reconfirmed parental bond, not without a first reference to the "foul and most unnatural" nature of Claudius's deed.
Murther?
Murther most foul, as in the best it is;
But this most foul, strange, and unnatural.
But since Hamlet is still so in shock that he has missed the important part, his father even gets to repeat it – for his son's benefit as much as for that of the audience, just in case we really need another reminder, too (and it is here that Mr. Garrick's wig hair would really have stood on end – for a (wind-aided) approximation, also see Innokenti Smoktunovsky's pose in the movie by Grigori Kosintzev, where, with both arms outstretched, Smoktunovsky even mirrors David Garrick's body language as depicted in the latter's famous 18th century portrait).
Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swift
As meditation or the thoughts of love,
May sweep to my revenge.
I find thee apt;
And duller shouldst thou be than the fat weed
That roots itself in ease on Lethe wharf,
Wouldst thou not stir in this.
This time the Prince clues in on what his father is telling him, and he hurries to assure him that now indeed he has gotten the message ... although almost a bit too quickly, methinks. And his father knows him very well (and of course he also knows the burden he will be placing on him): he in essence tells Hamlet, "good, I didn't expect anything else from you; but don't you dare ever forget what you just promised me." Because Lethe is a river in Hades, the Greek mythological underworld, whose waters, when drunk, were believed to make you forgetful and oblivious to the past. And sure enough, this is one of those things that will come to bite our hero in the backside in a major way in no time at all.
Now, Hamlet, hear.
(Can't you just hear that father's voice there?)
'Tis given out that, sleeping in my orchard,
A serpent stung me. So the whole ear of Denmark
Is by a forged process of my death
Rankly abus'd. But know, thou noble youth,
The serpent that did sting thy father's life
Now wears his crown.
'Tis of course no accident at all if this reminds you
Of Mans First Disobedience, and the Fruit
Of that Forbidden Tree, whose mortal taste
Brought Death into the World, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden
(John Milton, Paradise Lost: Book 1)
– for this is a description of Denmark's fall from grace: the King's murder at the hand of his own brother; regicide and fratricide in one doubly sinful act, committed in the King's orchard, and publicised to the country as the bite of a snake ... which indeed it was, only the snake in question is none other than an instrument of Satan himself. (Also note the reference to Denmark's "ear" being "rankly abus'd": there are echoes of this, and also of the King's self-praise which we will hear in a minute, in Hamlet's later characterisation of Claudius as "a mildew'd ear" when driving home the truth about the new King and about the nature of her second marriage to Gertrude after the "play within the play.")
O my prophetic soul!
My uncle?
And Hamlet now sees all his worst fears confirmed.
Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast,
With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts –
O wicked wit and gifts, that have the power
So to seduce! – won to his shameful lust
The will of my most seeming-virtuous queen.
The emphasis being on "seeming-virtuous," I suppose ...
Th' infernal Serpent; he it was, whose guile
Stirr'd up with Envy and Revenge, deceiv'd
The Mother of Mankind, what time his Pride
Had cast him out from Heav'n
(John Milton, Paradise Lost: Book 1)
Or in the words of the Founders of Catholic doctrine:
O Hamlet, what a falling-off was there,
From me, whose love was of that dignity
That it went hand in hand even with the vow
I made to her in marriage, and to decline
Upon a wretch whose natural gifts were poor
To those of mine!
I have to tell you, this much self-praise tends to make me downright woozy – although of course it almost exactly mirrors what Hamlet will later tell Gertrude when comparing her two husbands, past and present, during their exchange after the "play within the play." Yet, somehow it's still a different matter to hear the dead King say it himself. (And yes, I can hear that Freudian faction pipe up again, too. "See, we told you. Over-identification with his father leading to unavowed rebellion, that's what you're really looking at," they're saying. And yet, I just don't buy it.) But then, I don't suppose any man who finds himself sidelined for another guy – particularly for this kind of competition – will exhibit much restraint in talking about the subject. (Nor any woman, either, for that matter, in the inverse constellation ...)
But virtue, as it never will be mov'd,
Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven,
So lust, though to a radiant angel link'd,
Will sate itself in a celestial bed
And prey on garbage.
... and it's clearly come as quite a shock to the former King to see his "most seeming-virtuous queen" succumb so quickly to Claudius's overtures. Like for his son, there only seems to be virtue or vice, only black and white for King Hamlet when it comes to women – in fact, particularly so when it comes to the Queen, because she is supposed to set an example for the country as a whole. For how can the country possibly be expected to remain in a state of order and propriety if she herself so quickly forgets what virtue and decorum demand of her – how should Mankind not fall from grace and be cast out of Eden if even its own Mother succumbs to the temptations of Satan? And yet, unlike Hamlet himself, his father does ultimately recognise Claudius as the real culprit: all that talk about virtue being courted by lewdness thus merely constitutes the prologue to yet another comment reinforcing the "rotten, evil seducer" image, which is now even contrasted with that of a "radiant angel." (Gertrude, the Queen, after all?)
But soft! methinks I scent the morning air.
Brief let me be.
Having squandered three nights in a row already – and having come particularly close to speaking on the previous night – the former King knows, of course, that he has no time to waste. And as befits a true undead, his senses are now much more refined than those of a human; thus he feels the morning air much more quickly, too. "So," he at last tells Hamlet, collecting himself, "here's what really happened."
Sleeping within my orchard,
My custom always of the afternoon,
Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole,
A murder while the victim was sleeping: another circumstance that's important for two separate, although related reasons. First – and Hamlet's father will refer to this more directly again in a minute – because it prohibits the victim from seeking a priest's absolution and last rites; the only thing that could possibly prevent his soul from going straight to Purgotory. And secondly, because traditionally the killing of an unsuspecting, defenceless victim – such as here – in other words, a killing where the murderer doesn't openly confront the victim and gives him/ her a chance of self-defence, was for a long time considered particularly reprehensible; in fact, some criminal codes to this day penalise such an act more severely than other forms of intentional killings. Add to that the "regicide and fratricide in one act" element, and you're really looking at the worst possible deed imaginable; truly a murder "most foul, strange, and unnatural," as the former King has described it.
With juice of cursed hebona in a vial,
Hebona: either a poisonous weed (henbane, a/k/a hyoscyamus niger); or the poisonous juice of ebony.
And in the porches of my ears did pour
The leperous distilment;
The ears – the body's only cavities open even when a person is sleeping; thus, the poisoner's only access at that moment.
whose effect
Holds such an enmity with blood of man
That swift as quicksilver it courses through
The natural gates and alleys of the body,
And with a sudden vigour it doth posset
And curd, like eager droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood. So did it mine;
And a most instant tetter bark'd about,
Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust
All my smooth body.
A description that makes you wonder whether Shakespeare talked to a doctor or an alchemist before he wrote it, doesn't it? Even a person returned from the grave couldn't have given a better ... or a more chilling account. "Enmity with blood of man" – "quicksilver" – "curd, like eager droppings into milk, the thin and wholesome blood" – "a tetter bark'd about" – "lazar-like" – "vile and loathsome crust" ... is a more violent and painful process of decay for one man's "smooth body" even conceivable?
Thus was I, sleeping, by a brother's hand
Of life, of crown, of queen, at once dispatch'd;
So let's sum up, shall we?
What a litany indeed. And Hamlet all alone is to go up against the man who did all this? And who by this very act has also secured the seat of the kingdom's earthly power for himself? "O all you host of heaven ..."
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
Unhous'led, disappointed, unanel'd,
No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my head.
(Just in case the "without last rites and absolution" part hasn't sunk in yet, let me spell that out again, too ...)
O, horrible! O, horrible! most horrible!
But Hamlet understands clearly enough.
If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not.
"Nature" used not only synonymously with "feeling" but with life itself, similarly to the way "the foul crimes done in my days of nature" are referenced in the dead King's earlier description of Purgatory; thus underscoring again his own unnatural state, which is now once and for all linked to Claudius's evil deed. Notably, also, Hamlet's father not once specifically tells the Prince to kill Claudius – but then, he doesn't really need to. There is only one form of vengeance for what Claudius has done; only one way to truly show that his act will not be borne.
Let not the royal bed of Denmark be
A couch for luxury and damned incest.
And of course, the ill effects of Claudius's act come in two parts: first, there is the King's, his brother's murder; this can no longer be remedied but only avenged. But secondly, there is also an ongoing crime – an unredeemable, deadly sin every bit as bad as murder – whose continuous commission can still be prevented and which, if permitted to persist, will drive the country even further into ruin and decay.
But, howsoever thou pursuest this act,
"I don't care whether you strangle my villainous brother with your bare hands, stab him, shoot him, poison him ... just make sure he gets his just deserts, alright?"
Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive
Against thy mother aught. Leave her to heaven,
And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge
To prick and sting her.
Yet, there is a lingering softness towards Gertrude. Remnants of the (self-described) "dignified" love the King used to feel for her? Recognition of the fact that, while acting most imprudently and improperly, she is but an unwitting accomplice to the worst part of Claudius's crime (even if not to their marriage as such), and thus deserves at least some clemency? The belief that Gertrude must surely at least feel the immorality of her marital alliance with Claudius, and nobody can punish her more severely than her own conscience? Hmmm ... and here, again, I also wonder why Sir Laurence Olivier (of all people, given his interpretative approach!) cut this passage in its entirety?
Fare thee well at once.
The glowworm shows the matin to be near
And gins to pale his uneffectual fire.
Recall that in Act 1 Scene 1, Marcellus describes the Ghost's disappearance as "fading" at the crowing of the cock. This is mirrored here in the firefly's diminishing light – an unmistakable indication of the dead King's impending exit, even before he himself has actually said his adieus.
Adieu, adieu, adieu! Remember me.
And poor Hamlet doesn't even get to return his father's farewell – he's just saddled with this enormous charge and a last, meaningful "remember me." All alone, with nobody to confide in or stand by his side. Can you blame him for being at the absolute, extreme tip of his emotional tether?
O all you host of heaven! O earth! What else?
And shall I couple hell?
Yes, for that's the heart of the matter, isn't it? Frankly, I'm amazed our Prince is still able to utter a single word at all. If I had been though what he has just experienced – if I found myself left with this kind of charge, I'd be gasping for air and trying to swallow a lump in my throat big enough to choke me and instantly relieve me of any and all further earthly troubles for good.
Hold, hold, my heart!
And you, my sinews, grow not instant old,
But bear me stiffly up.
And Sir Laurence's Hamlet in particular makes us understand what this indeed feels like to Hamlet – he darn near faints on us.
Remember thee?
Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe. Remember thee?
Yea, from the table of my memory
I'll wipe away all trivial fond records,
All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past
That youth and observation copied there,
And thy commandment all alone shall live
Within the book and volume of my brain,
Unmix'd with baser matter. Yes, by heaven!
Hamlet's vow – and his acceptance of the code of revenge now inseparably linked to his father's memory by virtue of his father's own words; and Hamlet even makes his promise everlasting ("while memory holds a seat in this distracted globe") ... unless, of course, one has drunk of Lethe's waters. And then he moreover repeats it, this time referencing all the brainy pursuits that have occupied his thoughts so far, as well as "all trivial fond records;" thus characterising memory as a matter of both reason and feelings, although even in the case of the latter, clearly controlled by the brain. (Ah yes – and this from our self-described intellectual, who is speaking these very words while working himself into another state of extreme emotions, I very much imagine.)
O most pernicious woman!
O villain, villain, smiling, damned villain!
What was it that his father's Ghost just told him about Gertrude? "Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive against thy mother aught"? Well, I guess a single outburst is permitted under the circumstances. Because for the moment, the focus of his thoughts quite properly is indeed Claudius, as we shall see anon:
My tables! Meet it is I set it down
That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain;
At least I am sure it may be so in Denmark.
So, uncle, there you are.
Oh, good old Will Shakespeare; truly the actors' ultimate playwright. What, for Heaven's sake, are we to do with this bit, huh? Should we really see Hamlet writing at all – or does he merely remember his "tables" (read: "scrap book," "note paper," etc.) and resolve to write down this all-important thought later, e.g., as soon as he gets back to his room? Although some text versions contain a stage direction here, no such thing is to be found in either the 1623 "First Folio" or the 1604 Second Quarto; and anyway, where would Hamlet get any writing materials in the first place ... on the battlements, alone, in the middle of the night? This really is the Bard at his best – he just throws stuff like this at you, and then entirely leaves it up to you however much fun you want to have with it. Well, I'll tell you this much, folks, I do think we should see Hamlet writing here. And for all the imaginative ways in which I've seen this sequence being handled – for some of the best, look no further than the movies by Sir Kenneth Branagh and Franco Zeffirelli (and pity 'tis that both Sir Laurence Olivier and Grigori Kosintzev bow out entirely here) – I have yet to come across a screen version that uses it in exactly the same way I would ...
Now to my word:
It is 'Adieu, adieu! Remember me.'
I have sworn't.
Finally, a last confirmation of Hamlet's fervent vows, and of the code of revenge embedded therein. And with that, the rest of the world, as represented by Horatio and Marcellus, rejoins our Prince ...
Copyright 2002 – 2009: Ulrike Böhm, all rights reserved.
