It is true, technically. It’s not like they’re there in Elsinore to attend the chestnut festival or something. They are there to visit Hamlet. They’re not there of their own volition, however. The visit is compulsory and covert and coerced by the king. But it is the only occasion. Well, that and the annual Elsinore Egg Hunt. I mean, who’d want to miss that?
Author: erainbowd
To visit you, my lord.
At one point in my life, I did an extraordinary amount of visiting friends. It didn’t seem extraordinary at the time. At the time, it seemed to be the normal amount. But given how rarely I visit friends now, it strikes me as extraordinary. Now, if I visit friends, it’s coupled with another mission, to reconnect to some business contacts, to go to a conference, a wedding or a festival. I never just visit someone. I’d like to though. If I could, I’d buy a ticket to Vancouver and a ticket to Berlin. I’d buy one to Portland, one to Seattle and one to Bakersfield. I’d get one for Australia, too and for Spain. There would absolutely be a trip to Iowa and a trip to Montreal. To visit you, I’d go anywhere.
But in the beaten way of friendship, what make you at Elsinore?
I don’t know what to make of the beaten way of friendship. It feels like Hamlet is appealing to the shared history he has with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, appealing to their previously established bonds of friendship.
I think of a path between houses in a wood. At first the path between the two friend’s homes requires a bit of bushwacking but over time, with all the coming and going, the visiting and such, the path gets clearer, wider, the dirt beaten down until it is almost paved. I might call it a well-trodden path of affection between people. As such, the beaten way is a quite lovely idea – but it does feature the word BEATEN, which calls to mind more violent associations. Is it possible that Hamlet means to both threaten and appeal to their shared history?
In any case, he does need to work out what they’re doing there.
For, to speak to you like an honest man, I am most dreadfully attended.
Elsinore Economics: Who’s taking care of the books?
Servants to Hamlet are either a) very bad at their jobs or b) fewer than he’d like or is used to.
Let’s assume this dreadful attendance has happened in recent months. Has Claudius rearranged the budgets to have a sumptuous wedding or prepare for war and not only deprived Hamlet of his title but his servants as well? I mean, both wars and weddings are expensive and the money must come from somewhere. Or is Polonius in charge of the ledgers? If so, Hamlet has a lot more reason to be annoyed and frustrated by him. It explains his taunting of someone who might otherwise be sympathetic. Might. Depending on the production.
What does dreadful attendance look like to the Prince of Denmark? How populated was the Danish court? Does he have someone to dress, to wash him, to carry his stuff? How many people is a paucity for a prince?
I will not sort you with the rest of my servants.
It is the “rest of’ that I am confused by here. Are Rosencrantz and Guildenstern servants? Or are they friends? It’s not usual for one’s servants to be one’s friends. One can be friendly with servants and servile with friends but the two roles rarely mix. I guess I’m wondering if Hamlet is somehow digging at his two friends here and suggesting both that they are servants and that they are better than the servants Hamlet has. I suppose, as a Prince, everyone could be seen as servants – if servants might stand in for subjects. But still, he’s grouping Rosencrantz and Guildenstern with the rest of his servants, labeling them as the best of a group. It’s very curious. Maybe it’s a deliberate slight so that he can see Rosencrantz and Guildenstern exchange looks again?
No so much matter.
There is so much matter running around in my head I can’t really find any matter of which there is no such. Finishing my Feldenkrais supervision, seeing two unexpected old friends in one day, getting to have lunch with one new friend, it all feels like matter, matter, matter.
Hamlet is dismissing Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s suggestion (eerily spoken together) that they wait upon him and I don’t have much matter on that matter – except that I wouldn’t want my friends waiting on me either. I don’t even like to go to restaurants where my friends are waiting tables.
We’ll wait upon you.
This is a funny phase to say together. It’s not the most natural response to “For, by my fay, I cannot reason.” Maybe “Shall we to th’court?” Okay – maybe. It’s just so oddly solicitous all of a sudden and it seems more like something someone in service would say. A butler, a footman, a waiter – whatever. It’s weird for Hamlet’s friends to say it and even weirder that they say it at the same time.
For, by my fay, I cannot reason.
This is one of those lines that Hamlet can mean one way and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern can interpret another. It makes sense that Hamlet would be talking about reason as it relates to the little intellectual game they’ve been playing around ambition, etc – that he cannot reason anymore along those lines. And it would make sense that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, primed to look for Hamlet’s madness, would see this as an admission of his mental difficulties. It might inspire a knowing look between them, which in turn might explain why Hamlet doesn’t take them straight to the court as he just suggested he would but starts to investigate their motives. And thus this transition in the scene, which has baffled me before suddenly makes sense. This may be why that trip to the court stalls for a moment.
Shall we to th’ court?
Where is the court and where isn’t it? It sort of seems like everywhere royalty is is the court. I think of Touchstone’s debate with Corin about court life versus country life. Court isn’t a room in that case, I don’t think. It’s, like, the castle, the environs. Duke Frederick in that same play suggests that Rosalind isn’t really gone until she’s 20 miles from court.
But. . .maybe sometimes it’s just a room. Certainly today it’s a room, not for royalty but for justice. But what constituted a court to Hamlet and what constituted a court to Shakespeare? In other words, where is Hamlet suggesting they go now? To go see Claudius? To a more formal setting? He’s not suggesting they go to the pub or to play at some sport. He’s not suggesting they go to their quarters. What are his intentions at the court? And what/where is it?
Then are our beggars bodies, and our monarchs and outstretched heroes the beggar’s shadows.
Ah, so because it is heroes and monarchs who are ambitious and if ambition is a shadow’s shadow, then, the ambitious shadow the unambitious. Is that the logic here? It’s funny. I’ve heard this line a million times but this is the first time I’ve tried to think it through.
Is every monarch ambitious? Don’t some of them just fall into the role by virtue of being born? But it’s interesting that Hamlet, a man who’s known some kings, should think it a necessary ingredient.
The Hamlet Project 