Line 258 - Commentary Note (CN)

Commentary notes (CN):

1. SMALL CAPS Indicate editions. Notes for each commentator are divided into three parts:

In the 1st two lines of a record, when the name of the source text (the siglum) is printed in SMALL CAPS, the comment comes from an EDITION; when it is in normal font, it is derived from a book, article, ms. record or other source. We occasionally use small caps for ms. sources and for works related to editions. See bibliographies for complete information (in process).

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4. Words from the play under discussion (lemmata). In the third line or lines of a record, the lemmata after the TLN (Through Line Number] are from Q2. When the difference between Q2 and the authors' lemma(ta) is significant, we include the writer's lemma(ta). When the gloss is for a whole line or lines, only the line number(s) appear. Through Line Numbers are numbers straight through a play and include stage directions. Most modern editions still use the system of starting line numbers afresh for every scene and do not assign line numbers to stage directions.

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6. References to other lines or other works. For a writer's reference to a passage elsewhere in Ham. we provide, in brackets, Through Line Numbers (TLN) from the Norton F1 (used by permission); we call these xref, i.e., cross references. We call references to Shakespearean plays other than Ham. “parallels” (//) and indicate Riverside act, scene and line number as well as TLN. We call references to non-Shakespearean works “analogues.”

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Notes for lines 0-1017 ed. Bernice W. Kliman

For explanation of sigla, such as jen, see the editions bib.

258 Tis not alone my incky cloake {coold} <good> mother	1.2.77

1854 del2

del2

258 coold] Delius (ed. 1854): “Die Variante einer Q. coold (d.h.cold) mother, woraus eine spätere das unsinnige could smother macht, mag wenigstens erwähnt werden.” [The Q2 variant coold (that is, cold) mother, which a later 4to [Q3] changed to the senseless could smother, may at least be mentioned.]

1854 White

White: mcol1, col2

258 coold mother] White (1854, pp. 47-): <p. 47> “Now, it is remarkable that in the fifth quarto impression of this play, published in 1611 [Q3], these lines are printed thus. </p.47 ><p. 48>‘Seemes, maddam, nay it is, I know not seemes, Tis not alone my incky cloake could smother,‘ &c.

“Here is proof positive that ‘good mother’ not only could be, but was, misunderstood could smother; a mistake, in its principle features, identical with that made by the corrector of Mr. Collier’s folio, and which suggests another mode of accounting for the manuscript emendation. It is evident that whoever made the emendations in that volume, studied the quartos thoroughly; Indeed, Mr. Collier frequently claims that such was the case . . . . ” </p.48>

Ed. note: White in a note(p. 48) explains that he is using Steevens text of various 4tos (1766)., which records Q3 only.

1865 hal

hal

258 incky cloake] Halliwell (ed. 1865): “The form of the ancient mourning cloak is seen in the annexed engraving taken from a monument of the fourteenth century, but I am not sure if one of this fashion were worn at other times than at funerals.”

Ed. note: The picture shows a man in a hooded cape and a short, skirted tunic, with buttons down the front to the waist, his legs in stockings and wearing soft pointed shoes, the right hand holding a dagger in front of his middle, the left hand at the throat, clutching the hood.

1872 cln1

cln1

258 incky] Clark & Wright (ed. 1872): “Applied to ‘brows’ in [AYL 3.5.46 (0000)].”

1880 Tanger

Tanger

258 coold] Tanger (1880, p. 122): “probably owing to the negligence, inattention, or criticism of the compositor.”

1924 vand

vand

258 coold] Van Dam (ed. 1924, p. 148) considers Q2 a misprint subsequently miscorrected by F1. He lists as other examples of this type of error [I show his emendations in parentheses] sallied/ solid in 313 (sailled); , in assistant /_^ is assistant in 464 (, in assistance); Wrong/ Roaming in 575 (Tendring = Q1); imploratotors / implorators in 595 (implorers = pope); Hebona / Hebenon in 747 (Hebon = elze1); &c.

Of his emendation coole he says, “Q is right after the correction of a misprint. Good mother [F1] is a most common expression without any particular meaning, whereas coole mother quite fits in which the text, enhancing the value and emphasizing the meaning of it.”

1982 ard2

ard2:

258 Tis not alone] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “Implying a contrast with the character of his mother’s own mourning.”

1985 Belsey

Belsey

258-67 Belsey (1985, pp. 40-1, quoted by Griffiths, 2005, p. 115): “ ’That within’ is here distinguished from ’actions that a man might play,’ and this interiority, this essence, the heart of Hamlet’s mystery, has been the quarry not only of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, agents of the king’s surveillance, but of the liberal-humanist criticism [not for Belsey a univeralizing term] of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Hamlet’s irresolution, his melancholy, his relations to Ophelia, his career at Wittenberg and his Oedipal tendencies have all been thoroughly investigated and commented in the attempt to find the truth of Hamlet’s subjectivity, the reason why he says what he says, and acts, or fails to act, as he does.”

1987 oxf4

oxf4: standard

258 alone] Hibbard (ed. 1987): "only, simply."

1987 Mercer

Mercer

258-67 Mercer (1987, pp. 144-5): <p. 144> This speech’s “scornful eloquence asserts Hamlet’s dramatic centrality, his authority, his quality . . . . Hamlet’s rude shattering of the conspiracy of calm cries out that nothing about his appearance defines his truth. . . . It is they, his uncle and his mother, who are the seemers, whose mourning was nothing but the outward show, the practised gestures he so expertly catalogues.” As for himself, “it is his inky cloak, his sighs and tears, that fail to denote him truly. . . . </p. 144> <p. 145> Hamlet thus engages, in his first speech, with the problem of the utter inadequacy of gesture and language that haunts him throughout the play.” He hints, dangerously, that his show of mourning, which while unpleasant is not intolerable, hides something else more dangerous. . . . “What matters is that the King . . . is played with, kept on the acute edge of uncertainty as to what his nephew really knows or intends.” </p. 145>

1992 fol2

fol2: standard

258-64 Tis . . . truely] Mowat & Werstine (ed. 1992): “i.e., it is not only my black clothes, my sighs and tears, my downcast face, and other outward signs of grief that indicate my real feelings”

1995 Maus

Maus

258-67 Maus (1995, pp. 1-4) begins her book on Inwardness and Theater in the English Renaissance with the speech by Hamlet, which discusses inwardness and playing a role: <p.1> “Hamlet’s conviction that truth is unspeakable implicitly devalues any attempts to express or communicate it. The exemplary instance of this devaluation is the theater: ‘For they are actions that a man might play’.” </p.1> <p. 2> She disagrees with Francis Barker (The Tremulous Private Body [New York: Methuen, 1984], pp. 31, 58), who “argues that Hamlet’s sense of inwardness is ‘anachronistic,’ a premature manifestation of what he calls ‘bourgeois subjectivity.’ ” Other critics she contrasts to her own position assert that any Renaissance subjective inwardness is connected to public institutions. </p.2> The differences between inwardness and external behavior can lead to deceit on the one side and disbelief on the other.

1994 OED

OED

258 coold] OED: cooled (kuld), ppl. a. [f. COOL v.1 + -ED.] Made cool (or cold); lowered in temperature. c 1440 Promp. Parv. 87 Coolyd of heete, frigefactus. 1599 A. M. tr. Gabelhouer’s Bk. Physicke 356/2 Anoynte the cooled ioyntes. 1682 FLAVEL Fear 88 Mortified and cooled hearts.

2005 Shakespeare. Journal of the British Shakespeare Association

Holderness

258-67 Holderness (2005, p. 164): “Hamlet’s claim to sincerity serves only to darken the veil. He is not, he affirms, simulating mourning, or playing a part.”

2006 ard3q2

ard3q2

258 not alone] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “not only. The subsequent list of four parallel items with nor between each is a classic example of the rhetorical device of syndeton.”

ard3q2: dent, oxf4; xref

258 coold mother] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “Q2’s reading is preserved in the Restoration and eighteenth-century ’players’ quartos’ and was presumably spoken by actors, although most editors prefer F’s ’good Mother’. Hamlet could be accusing Gertrude of being cold in her failure to display grief. Andrews [dent], following Q2, reads ’coold’, arguing that Hamlet implies his mother’s affection towards him and his father has ’cooled’. oxf4 ’good-mother’ is a term for stepmother or mother-in-law, used sarcastically here (and perhaps at [1964] and [2409]).”

2007 de Grazia

de Grazia

258-9 incky cloake] de Grazia (2007, p. 194) “Black clothing is associated on stage with the devil.” See also 1983-4.

258 1983 1984

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