HAMLET

 Hamlet was the only son of the King of Denmark. He loved his father and mother dearly--and was happy in the love of a sweet lady named Ophelia. Her father, Polonius, was the King's Chamberlain.

 

While Hamlet was away studying at Wittenberg, his father died. Young Hamlet hastened home in great grief to hear that a serpent had stung the King, and that he was dead. The young Prince had loved his father so tenderly that you may judge what he felt when he found that the Queen, before yet the King had been laid in the ground a month, had determined² to marry again--and to marry the dead King's brother.

 

Hamlet refused to put off mourning for the wedding.

 

“It is not only the black I wear on my body,” he said, “that proves my loss. I wear mourning in my heart for my dead father. His son at least remembers him, and grieves still.”

 

Then said Claudius the King's brother, “This grief is unreasonable³. Of course you must sorrow at the loss of your father, but--”

 

“Ah,” said Hamlet, bitterly, “I cannot in one little month forget those I love.”

 

With that the Queen and Claudius left him, to make merry over their wedding, forgetting the poor good King who had been so kind to them both.

 

And Hamlet, left alone, began to wonder and to question as to what he ought to do. For he could not believe the story about the snake-bite. It seemed to him all too plain that the wicked Claudius had killed the King, so as to get the crown and marry the Queen. Yet he had no proof, and could not accuse Claudius.

 

And while he was thus thinking came Horatio, a fellow student of his, from Wittenberg.

 

“What brought you here?” asked Hamlet, when he had greeted his friend kindly⁴.

 

“I came, my lord, to see your father's funeral.”

 

“I think it was to see my mother's wedding,” said Hamlet, bitterly. “My father! We shall not look upon his like again.”

 

“My lord,” answered Horatio, “I think I saw him yesternight.”

 

Please keep photo with html Then, while Hamlet listened in surprise, Horatio told how he, with two gentlemen of the guard, had seen the King's ghost on the battlements. Hamlet went that night, and true enough, at midnight, the ghost of the King, in the armor he had been wont⁵ to wear, appeared on the battlements in the chill moonlight. Hamlet was a brave youth. Instead of running away from the ghost he spoke⁶ to it--and when it beckoned⁷ him he followed it to a quiet place, and there the ghost told him that what he had suspected was true. The wicked Claudius had indeed killed his good brother the King, by dropping poison into his ear as he slept in his orchard⁸ in the afternoon.

 

“And you,” said the ghost, “must avenge⁹ this cruel murder-- on my wicked brother. But do nothing against the Queen-- for I have loved her, and she is your mother. Remember me.”

 

Then seeing the morning approach, the ghost vanished.

 

“Now,” said Hamlet, “there is nothing left but revenge. Remember thee--I will remember nothing else--books, pleasure, youth--let all go--and your commands alone live on my brain.”

 

So when his friends came back he made them swear to keep the secret of the ghost, and then went in from the battlements, now gray with mingled¹⁰ dawn and moonlight, to think how he might best avenge his murdered father.

 

The shock of seeing and hearing his father's ghost made him feel almost mad, and for fear that his uncle might notice that he was not himself, he determined to hide his mad longing¹¹ for revenge under a pretended madness in other matters.

 

And when he met Ophelia, who loved him--and to whom he had given gifts, and letters, and many loving words--he behaved so wildly to her, that she could not but think him mad. For she loved him so that she could not believe he would be as cruel as this, unless he were quite mad. So she told her father, and showed him a pretty letter from Hamlet. And in the letter was much folly¹², and this pretty verse--

 

 

“Doubt that the stars are fire;

 

Doubt that the sun doth move;

 

Doubt truth to be a liar¹³;

 

But never doubt I love.”

 

 

And from that time everyone believed that the cause of Hamlet's supposed madness was love.

 

Poor Hamlet was very unhappy. He longed to obey his father's ghost--and yet he was too gentle and kindly to wish to kill another man, even his father's murderer. And sometimes he wondered whether, after all, the ghost spoke truly.

 

Just at this time some actors came to the Court, and Hamlet ordered them to perform a certain play before the King and Queen. Now, this play was the story of a man who had been murdered in his garden by a near relation, who afterwards married the dead man's wife.

 

You may imagine the feelings of the wicked King, as he sat on his throne, with the Queen beside him and all his Court around, and saw, acted on the stage, the very wickedness that he had himself done. And when, in the play, the wicked relation poured poison into the ear of the sleeping man, the wicked Claudius suddenly rose, and staggered from the room--the Queen and others following.

 

Then said Hamlet to his friends--

 

“Now I am sure the ghost spoke true. For if Claudius had not done this murder, he could not have been so distressed¹⁴ to see it in a play.”

 

Now the Queen sent for Hamlet, by the King's desire, to scold him for his conduct during the play, and for other matters; and Claudius, wishing to know exactly what happened, told old Polonius to hide himself behind the hangings in the Queen's room. And as they talked, the Queen got frightened at Hamlet's rough, strange words, and cried for help, and Polonius behind the curtain cried out too. Hamlet, thinking it was the King who was hidden there, thrust with his sword at the hangings, and killed, not the King, but poor old Polonius.

 

So now Hamlet had offended his uncle and his mother, and by bad hap¹ killed his true love's father.

 

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“Oh! what a rash and bloody¹⁵ deed is this,” cried the Queen.

 

And Hamlet answered bitterly, “Almost as bad as to kill a king, and marry his brother.” Then Hamlet told the Queen plainly all his thoughts and how he knew of the murder, and begged her, at least, to have no more friendship or kindness of the base Claudius, who had killed the good King. And as they spoke the King's ghost again appeared before Hamlet, but the Queen could not see it. So when the ghost had gone, they parted.

 

When the Queen told Claudius what had passed, and how Polonius was dead, he said, “This shows plainly that Hamlet is mad, and since he has killed the Chancellor¹⁶, it is for his own safety that we must carry out our plan, and send him away to England.”

 

So Hamlet was sent, under charge of two courtiers who served the King, and these bore letters to the English Court, requiring that Hamlet should be put to death. But Hamlet had the good sense to get at these letters, and put in others instead, with the names of the two courtiers who were so ready to betray him. Then, as the vessel¹⁷ went to England, Hamlet escaped on board a pirate ship, and the two wicked courtiers left him to his fate, and went on to meet theirs.

 

Hamlet hurried home, but in the meantime a dreadful thing had happened. Poor pretty Ophelia, having lost her lover and her father, lost her wits too, and went in sad madness about the Court, with straws, and weeds, and flowers in her hair, singing strange scraps¹⁸ of songs, and talking poor, foolish, pretty talk with no heart of meaning to it. And one day, coming to a stream where willows¹⁹ grew, she tried to bang a flowery garland on a willow²⁰, and fell into the water with all her flowers, and so died.

 

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And Hamlet had loved her, though his plan of seeming madness had made him hide it; and when he came back, he found the King and Queen, and the Court, weeping at the funeral of his dear love and lady.

 

Ophelia's brother, Laertes, had also just come to Court to ask justice for the death of his father, old Polonius; and now, wild with grief, he leaped into his sister's grave, to clasp her in his arms once more.

 

“I loved her more than forty thousand brothers,” cried Hamlet, and leapt into the grave after him, and they fought till they were parted.

 

Afterwards Hamlet begged Laertes to forgive him.

 

“I could not bear,” he said, “that any, even a brother, should seem to love her more than I.”

 

But the wicked Claudius would not let them be friends. He told Laertes how Hamlet had killed old Polonius, and between them they made a plot to slay²¹ Hamlet by treachery.

 

Laertes challenged him to a fencing match, and all the Court were present. Hamlet had the blunt foil always used in fencing, but Laertes had prepared for himself a sword, sharp, and tipped with poison. And the wicked King had made ready a bowl of poisoned wine, which he meant to give poor Hamlet when he should grow warm with the sword play, and should call for drink.

 

So Laertes and Hamlet fought, and Laertes, after some fencing, gave Hamlet a sharp sword thrust. Hamlet, angry at this treachery--for they had been fencing, not as men fight, but as they play--closed with Laertes in a struggle; both dropped their swords, and when they picked them up again, Hamlet, without noticing it, had exchanged his own blunt sword for Laertes' sharp and poisoned one. And with one thrust of it he pierced Laertes, who fell dead by his own treachery.

 

At this moment the Queen cried out, “The drink, the drink! Oh, my dear Hamlet! I am poisoned!”

 

She had drunk of the poisoned bowl the King had prepared for Hamlet, and the King saw the Queen, whom, wicked as he was, he really loved, fall dead by his means.

 

Then Ophelia being dead, and Polonius, and the Queen, and Laertes, and the two courtiers who had been sent to England, Hamlet at last found courage to do the ghost's bidding and avenge his father's murder--which, if he had braced²² up his heart to do long before, all these lives had been spared, and none had suffered but the wicked King, who well deserved to die.

 

Hamlet, his heart at last being great enough to do the deed he ought, turned the poisoned sword on the false King.

 

“Then--venom--do thy work!” he cried, and the King died.

 

So Hamlet in the end kept the promise he had made his father. And all being now accomplished²³, he himself died. And those who stood by saw him die, with prayers and tears, for his friends and his people loved him with their whole hearts. Thus ends the tragic²⁴ tale of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark.

 

1 hap   

n.运气；v.偶然发生

参考例句：

• Some have the hap,some stick in the gap.有的人走运, 有的人倒霉。
• May your son be blessed by hap and happiness.愿你儿子走运幸福。

2 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

3 unreasonable   

adj.不讲道理的，不合情理的，过度的

参考例句：

• I know that they made the most unreasonable demands on you.我知道他们对你提出了最不合理的要求。
• They spend an unreasonable amount of money on clothes.他们花在衣服上的钱太多了。

4 kindly   

adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地

参考例句：

• Her neighbours spoke of her as kindly and hospitable.她的邻居都说她和蔼可亲、热情好客。
• A shadow passed over the kindly face of the old woman.一道阴影掠过老太太慈祥的面孔。

5 wont   

adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯

参考例句：

• He was wont to say that children are lazy.他常常说小孩子们懒惰。
• It is his wont to get up early.早起是他的习惯。

6 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

7 beckoned   

v.（用头或手的动作）示意，召唤( beckon的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He beckoned to the waiter to bring the bill. 他招手示意服务生把账单送过来。
• The seated figure in the corner beckoned me over. 那个坐在角落里的人向我招手让我过去。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 orchard   

n.果园，果园里的全部果树，(美俚)棒球场

参考例句：

• My orchard is bearing well this year.今年我的果园果实累累。
• Each bamboo house was surrounded by a thriving orchard.每座竹楼周围都是茂密的果园。

9 avenge   

v.为...复仇，为...报仇

参考例句：

• He swore to avenge himself on the mafia.他发誓说要向黑手党报仇。
• He will avenge the people on their oppressor.他将为人民向压迫者报仇。

10 mingled   

混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系]

参考例句：

• The sounds of laughter and singing mingled in the evening air. 笑声和歌声交织在夜空中。
• The man and the woman mingled as everyone started to relax. 当大家开始放松的时候，这一男一女就开始交往了。

11 longing   

n.（for）渴望

参考例句：

• Hearing the tune again sent waves of longing through her.再次听到那首曲子使她胸中充满了渴望。
• His heart burned with longing for revenge.他心中燃烧着急欲复仇的怒火。

12 folly   

n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话

参考例句：

• Learn wisdom by the folly of others.从别人的愚蠢行动中学到智慧。
• Events proved the folly of such calculations.事情的进展证明了这种估计是愚蠢的。

13 liar   

n.说谎的人

参考例句：

• I know you for a thief and a liar!我算认识你了，一个又偷又骗的家伙！
• She was wrongly labelled a liar.她被错误地扣上说谎者的帽子。

14 distressed   

痛苦的

参考例句：

• He was too distressed and confused to answer their questions. 他非常苦恼而困惑，无法回答他们的问题。
• The news of his death distressed us greatly. 他逝世的消息使我们极为悲痛。

15 bloody   

adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染

参考例句：

• He got a bloody nose in the fight.他在打斗中被打得鼻子流血。
• He is a bloody fool.他是一个十足的笨蛋。

16 chancellor   

n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长

参考例句：

• They submitted their reports to the Chancellor yesterday.他们昨天向财政大臣递交了报告。
• He was regarded as the most successful Chancellor of modern times.他被认为是现代最成功的财政大臣。

17 vessel   

n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管

参考例句：

• The vessel is fully loaded with cargo for Shanghai.这艘船满载货物驶往上海。
• You should put the water into a vessel.你应该把水装入容器中。

18 scraps   

油渣

参考例句：

• Don't litter up the floor with scraps of paper. 不要在地板上乱扔纸屑。
• A patchwork quilt is a good way of using up scraps of material. 做杂拼花布棉被是利用零碎布料的好办法。

19 willows   

n.柳树( willow的名词复数 )；柳木

参考例句：

• The willows along the river bank look very beautiful. 河岸边的柳树很美。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Willows are planted on both sides of the streets. 街道两侧种着柳树。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

20 willow   

n.柳树

参考例句：

• The river was sparsely lined with willow trees.河边疏疏落落有几棵柳树。
• The willow's shadow falls on the lake.垂柳的影子倒映在湖面上。

21 slay   

v.杀死，宰杀，杀戮

参考例句：

• He intended to slay his father's murderer.他意图杀死杀父仇人。
• She has ordered me to slay you.她命令我把你杀了。

22 braced   

adj.拉牢的v.支住( brace的过去式和过去分词 )；撑牢；使自己站稳；振作起来

参考例句：

• They braced up the old house with balks of timber. 他们用梁木加固旧房子。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The house has a wooden frame which is braced with brick. 这幢房子是木结构的砖瓦房。 来自《简明英汉词典》

23 accomplished   

adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的

参考例句：

• Thanks to your help,we accomplished the task ahead of schedule.亏得你们帮忙,我们才提前完成了任务。
• Removal of excess heat is accomplished by means of a radiator.通过散热器完成多余热量的排出。

24 tragic   

adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的

参考例句：

• The effect of the pollution on the beaches is absolutely tragic.污染海滩后果可悲。
• Charles was a man doomed to tragic issues.查理是个注定不得善终的人。