Enter Fortinbras with his army over the stage. FORTINBRAS
Go, Captain, from me greet the Danish king.
Tell him that by his license Fortinbras
Craves the conveyance of a promised march
Over his kingdom. You know the rendezvous.
If that his Majesty would aught with us, 5
We shall express our duty in his eye;
And let him know so. CAPTAIN I will do ’t, my lord. FORTINBRAS Go softly on. All but the Captain exit. Enter Hamlet, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and others. HAMLET Good sir, whose powers are these? 10 CAPTAIN They are of Norway, sir. HAMLET How purposed, sir, I pray you? CAPTAIN Against some part of Poland. HAMLET Who commands them, sir? CAPTAIN
The nephew to old Norway, Fortinbras. 15 | Hamlet is on his way to England. More specifically, he's on the Danish coast near the Danish castle. And what does he see but the armies of Prince Fortinbras of Norway, who has decided to wage war with Poland instead of with Denmark. |
HAMLET
Goes it against the main of Poland, sir,
Or for some frontier? CAPTAIN
Truly to speak, and with no addition,
We go to gain a little patch of ground
That hath in it no profit but the name. 20
To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it;
Nor will it yield to Norway or the Pole
A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee. HAMLET
Why, then, the Polack never will defend it. CAPTAIN
Yes, it is already garrisoned. 25 HAMLET
Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats
Will not debate the question of this straw.
This is th’ impostume of much wealth and peace,
That inward breaks and shows no cause without
Why the man dies.—I humbly thank you, sir. 30 CAPTAIN God be wi’ you, sir. He exits. | Hamlet assumes Fortinbras must be taking on the whole country, but after talking with one of his Captains he learns that this is a huge conflict being waged over a tiny, unimportant piece of territory. |
ROSENCRANTZ Will ’t please you go, my lord? HAMLET
I’ll be with you straight. Go a little before. All but Hamlet exit. How all occasions do inform against me
And spur my dull revenge. What is a man 35
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more.
Sure He that made us with such large discourse,
Looking before and after, gave us not
That capability and godlike reason 40
To fust in us unused. Now whether it be
Bestial oblivion or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on th’ event
(A thought which, quartered, hath but one part
wisdom 45
And ever three parts coward), I do not know
Why yet I live to say “This thing’s to do,”
Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and means
To do ’t. Examples gross as Earth exhort me:
Witness this army of such mass and charge, 50
Led by a delicate and tender prince,
Whose spirit with divine ambition puffed
Makes mouths at the invisible event,
Exposing what is mortal and unsure
To all that fortune, death, and danger dare, 55
Even for an eggshell. Rightly to be great
Is not to stir without great argument,
But greatly to find quarrel in a straw
When honor’s at the stake. How stand I, then,
That have a father killed, a mother stained, 60
Excitements of my reason and my blood,
And let all sleep, while to my shame I see
The imminent death of twenty thousand men
That for a fantasy and trick of fame
Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot 65
Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,
Which is not tomb enough and continent
To hide the slain? O, from this time forth
My thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth! He exits. | This makes Hamlet think. He seems to keep finding examples of people taking action to avenge some wrong. It's almost like the universe is trying to tell him something. He concludes that, if Fortinbras can lead 20,000 men to their death over a little patch of land, then he should be able to rain vengeance upon the man who has killed his father and "stained" his mother. Right? He swears to follow Fortinbras' example, stop delaying and finally carry out his revenge. Suuuuuuuure he will. |