I don’t buy this story of Hamlet suspecting that the drink is poisoned. I mean – would he sit idly by and watch his mother be poisoned? He has some complicated feelings about her, for sure, but I feel pretty sure that he’d leap to save her life if she were in danger.

He’s not drinking for many very logical reasons as far as I can tell.

The note on Genius suggests that this line is evidence that Hamlet knows the drink is poisoned.

I don’t see it.

I see how it COULD be possible.

But it is certainly not evidence.

For one thing, this line is as open as the most open scene. It could be a way to say, “What the heck, mom!”

He could be responding to his mother drinking and given that we know how Hamlet feels about Claudius’ drinking, it’s possibly not positive.

Or it could be a way to accept the toast. It could be a cheers, or a response to the cheers. It could be a salute.

It could be a way to accept the toast. It could be a cheers, or a response to the cheers. It could be a salute.

It could be punctuated as

Good, madam.

Like. Good.

The exclamation point that some editor put here might lead one toward an expression of alarm – but still…

I feel that if Hamlet really thought the cup was poisoned and he really wanted to prevent his mother from drinking it, he’d do more than say “Good madam.” There’s a lot more effective ways to prevent someone from drinking a glass of wine.

Also – the notion that Gertrude knows it’s poisoned, too, and drinks it, is equally bonkers. Again, I see how it COULD be pushed in that direction but it lacks a clear motivation. Why not just spill it if she’s trying to keep Hamlet from drinking? What reason could she have for killing herself?

I mean, you could invent some, sure – she is stuck between a rock and a hard place with her husband and her son – but killing herself doesn’t SOLVE that – it just gets her out of it. I feel like we’d need a whole lot more back story to buy a Gertrude who drinks poison on purpose.

After the last point was contested, Hamlet takes the question directly to Laertes first. He could have continued to ask for judgement from the outside authority but he goes to Laertes first. It’s a nice move, really. Or at least interpersonally sharp. Better to get the point from Laertes himself – keep the fight between them, rather than the outside authorities.

Ultimately none of it REALLY matters – they’re all gong to to die in a few moments – but at least – if, in death, we have to watch our last moments over and over, Hamlet won’t have to do a lot of wincing about his behavior.

Hamlet begins the round/bout every time. It’s not until Laertes decides to go ahead and just kill him that he initiates any fighting and his “Have at you now!” is hardly an official beginning of a round. It’s not an invitation to play or an announcement or even, really, directed to Hamlet. It feels more like words used to power his own sword.

But Hamlet’s beginnings, like this one, are invitations, are starts to the bouts, each time.

This is something that is perfectly reasonable to do with a glass of wine. There is no reason to hurry to drink it. It’s not like ice cream. It’s not going to melt. And unless it’s like, champagne or a white that really needs chilling, which seems unlikely in Denmark in this period before refrigeration or iceboxes, it can only be made better by sitting for a bit. Claudius trying to insist on Hamlet having a drink in the middle of an athletic event could be seen as suspicious by anyone looking for it. I mean – we know why Claudius wants Hamlet to drink that wine and it IS suspicious. Wine is for spectators not athletes.

A bout is related to about which comes from the sense of a roundabout. The circularity is in all of them. A bout is also called a round. I think this is to do with it completing a circuit in each section.

About isn’t always round – sometimes if someone is, say, skipping about, they’re traveling all over the place, not necessarily a circle.

And when we ask what a story is about, we’re not necessarily thinking of a summary as a circle. There is a great deal more circularity under our language than I realized.

There are some words that we spell differently in American English that don’t necessarily make a lot of sense. Some pop out in their difference. Color and colours. Labor and labour. And others that don’t involve just adding or subtracting a u. But they’re sort of obvious.

Judgment and judgement are a kind of sneaky example. I think I was already confused about how to spell this word when I started experiencing cross cultural spelling. However, I spelled it, whenever I spelled it, I’d trigger the spelling alarm.

Curiously, in reckoning with the truth of the two spellings, I finally figured it out. I think.

There’s a lot in this one word.

The stage direction before says simply “They play.” It doesn’t describe the duel in any manner and a fight director has to work out what happens to allow Hamlet to earn this point. How does Hamlet, who has been described as the underdog in this contest by MULTIPLE characters, manage to score this point? And why does Laertes  deny it?

All we have is “one” and that word is a window on a cascading list of questions.

And so the duel begins.

Having not really been in or witness to many physical fights, I have to wonder if unformalized fights share this same sort of pre-amble.

What do they say now?

Come at me?

Do people want the other person to make the first move? Is it illustrative of a certain confidence to say “Come on”?

It is very different than “Let’s go” or “Let’s do this.”
It’s inviting a beginning not actually beginning.