The staged meeting with Ophelia

Scene summary

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern tell Claudius, Gertrude and Polonius that Hamlet admits to feeling estranged but does not reveal the reason, that he has cheered up at the arrival of the actors, and that he has asked for a play for that night, to which he invites the king and queen. The two leave. Claudius asks Gertrude to leave as well: he and Polonius will hide to watch the "chance" meeting of Hamlet with Ophelia and judge whether his disorder is love. The queen hopes that Ophelia's charms are the cause of Hamlet's unrest and that her virtues will cure him. Polonius has Ophelia read a prayer book, to disguise the scene, and says that with a devout face and a pious gesture we sugar over the very devil. Claudius remarks aside that the phrase lashes his conscience: his deed is as ugly, beside his fine words, as a harlot's face beneath her paint.

Hamlet enters alone and speaks the soliloquy "To be, or not to be." He asks whether it is nobler to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take arms against a sea of troubles. To die would be to sleep, but perhaps to dream, and the fear of the undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns makes us prefer the ills we have. He concludes that conscience makes cowards of us all, and that the native hue of resolution is sicklied over with the pale cast of thought. When he sees Ophelia, she says she wants to return the gifts he gave her, and he denies having given them. He asks whether she is honest and beautiful, says he loved her once and then that he never loved her, and sends her to a convent. He asks where her father is, and Ophelia lies: "At home." Hamlet gives her curses as a dowry, sends her again to the convent, says that this has driven him mad, and leaves. Ophelia laments that a mind so noble is ruined.

Claudius and Polonius come out of hiding. The king says that what Hamlet said sounds neither like love nor like madness: there is something in his soul that is a nest of melancholy, and he fears what will hatch from these eggs. He decides to send him to England to demand the overdue tribute, in the hope that the voyage will drive out what troubles him. Polonius still believes the origin is rejected love and approves the voyage, but suggests that, after the play, the queen speak alone with her son and make him show his sorrows while he listens in secret; if she does not understand him, they should send him to England or confine him. Claudius agrees and observes that the madness of a great man at court requires much vigilance.