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Line 157 - 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).

2. How comments are related to predecessors' comments. In the second line of a record, a label "without attribution" indicates that a prior writer made the same or a similar point; such similarities do not usually indicate plagiarism because many writers do not, as a practice, indicate the sources of their glosses. We provide the designation ("standard") to indicate a gloss in common use. We use ≈ for "equivalent to" and = for "exactly alike."

3. Original comment. When the second line is blank after the writer's siglum, we are signaling that we have not seen that writer's gloss prior to that date. We welcome correction on this point.

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.

5. Bibliographic information. In the third line of the record, where we record the gloss, we provide concise bibliographic information, expanded in the bibliographies, several of which are in process.

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.

157 Some {say} <sayes,> that euer gainst that season comes	1.1.158

1640 Anon.

Anon.: quotation from memory possibly?

157-60, 163 Anon. (A Helpe to Discourse, 1640, apud Ingleby (signed note), 1932, 1: 464): “Q. What Birds are those, that are called Prophets twice borne? A. The Cocke: first an egge from the Henne, and a Cocke from the Egge: they foretell seasons and changes of weather, according to the Verse:

Some say for ever ’gainst that season comes,

Wherein our Saviours birth is celebrated,

The bird of dawning singeth all Night long,

And then they say no Spirit dares walk abroad,

So sacred and so hallow’d is that time.

W. Shakesp.

1752 Anon.

Anon.

157-63 Anon. (1752, p. 14): “If Ignorance is the Mother of Devotion, it is to be wished that this Age had not excelled the former in Knowledge. Our Ancestors, believed too much, We, too little. Pity it is, but some Medium had been found between these Extremes, that might have restrained Superstition and Atheism in closer Bounds.”

Ed. note: This note continues with 162

1765- mDavies

mDavies

157-63 Some . . . time] Davies (1765-): “This and the following six lines are very beautiful; they are equally invigorated by ye proven fancy & harmonious versification.”

1784 Davies

Davies

157-63 Some . . . time] Davies (1784, 3: 9): “These lines, which are omitted in the representation of the play, are remarkably beautiful; they are invigorated by fancy and harmonized by versification.”

Ed. note: Davies’s note continues in 160, 162.

1870 Abbott

Abbott

157 gainst] Abbott (§ 142): “Against used metaphorically to express time. This is now restricted to colloquial language: . . [quotes 157 and 2433]. ‘As against the doom,’ i.e. ‘as though expecting dooms-day.’” MND 3.2.99 (1122).

1877 v1877

v1877 = Abbott

157 gainst]

v1877: molt; cald; knight (note in 165) +

157 season] Moltke (apud Furness, ed. 1877): “This passage, in connection with Francisco’s remark, ‘’Tis bitter cold’ [157], and then with, ‘But two months dead’ [322], and lastly with “Sleeping within my orchard’ [744], intimates to us in the clearest manner the time of year in which Sh. wishes us to conceive the opening of this tragedy—namely, in winter, but a little before Advent; for, two months previously, about September, the older Hamlet could have taken his after-dinner nap in the open air.”

1878 rlf1

rlf1: Abbott §142 on metaphor with xref. 2433; MND 3.2.99 (1122)

157 gainst]

1880 Tanger

Tanger

157 say] Tanger (1880, p. 122): F1 variant is “probably owing to the negligence, inattention, or criticism of the compositor.”

1880 meik

meik: Abbott without attribution; // in MND + // AYL 4.1.152 (2060)

157 gainst]

1903 rlf3

rlf3 = rlf1 minus Abbott attribution

157 gainst]

1909 subb

subb = Abbott without attribution including xref 2433; meikeljohn MND // without attribution

157 gainst]

subb = moltke; knt discussion of time in the play +

157 that season] Subbarau (ed. 1909): [[But Ophelia’s death took place in February, more than two months after the time of the opening scene, and surely the pathos of Ophelia’s distraction is marred by the supposition that she correctly produces the flowers which she mentions. . . . ]]

1912 dtn3

dtn3: standard gloss Abbott including xref.

157 gainst . . . comes] Deighton (ed. 1912): “in anticipation of the coming of that time; cp. below, [2433], and see Abb. § 142.”

1917 yal1

yal1

157 gainst] Crawford (ed. 1917): ’gainst that: by the time that

1929 trav

trav

157-63 Travers (ed. 1929) compares the “‘gracious’ purification for the moment in this speech with that on the temple-haunting martet “with which the saintly Duncan and Banquo open the sixth scene of Macbeth [1.6.3-10 (437-44).”

1934 cam3

cam3 = Jefferies

157-61 Wilson (ed. 1934): “I have not been able to trace any source for this legend. But a corespondent in T. L. S, (Ap. 7, 1932) quotes R. Jefferies Wild Life in a Southern Country (ch, xvii): ‘Towards the end of December the cocks, reversing their usual practice, crow in the evening, hours before midnight. The cockcrow is usually associated with the dawn, and the change of habit, just when the nights are longest, is interesting.’ It is not difficult to imagine the legend springing from these facts.”

1935 Wilson

Wilson WHH

157-63 Wilson (1935, p. 67) believes that Marcellus’s beautiful words add a religious element to the scene’s supernatural visitations.

1939 kit2

kit2

157 gainst] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “just before.”

1957 pel1

pel1 = kit2 without attribution

157 gainst] Farnham (ed. 1957): “just before.”

1970 pel2

pel2 = kit2 without attribution

157 gainst] Farnham (ed. 1970): “just before”

1974 evns1

evns1 = pel2 without attribution

157 gainst]

1980 pen2

pen2 ≈ cam3 without attribution

157-63 Spencer (ed. 1980) indicates that the fable is not found elsewhere.

1980 pen2

pen2

157-74 Spencer (ed. 1980) comments on the change of mood, from terror to “the contemplation of the health and grace of Christmas nights, and then to the dawn of the new day with a revival of courage and determination.”

1987 oxf4

oxf4 ≈ Tanger without attribution

157 say] Hibbard (ed. 1987) thinks that the F1 error could have resulted from a compositor’s taking some as equivalent to someone.

1992 fol2

fol2: standard

157 gainst] Mowat & Werstine (ed. 1992): “just before“

2006 ard3q2

ard3q2: standard

157 gainst] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “just before, in anticipation of”

ard3q2

157 that season] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “i.e. late December, in the Christian calendar (see [12 CN). Despite the fact that Marcellus seems to be saying that ghosts cannot walk abroad at this time, earlier editors sometimes took his words as an indication that the play begins in midwinter; this, however, gave them a problem with the flowers Ophelia distributes in 4.5, and those she is said to pick in 4.7.”

2007 Wilson

Wilson: Kernan

157 Some say] Wilson (2007, pp. 235-7): <p. 235> In Shakespeare, the King’s Playwright, Alvin Kernan proposes that Hamlet probably was the chosen play to open the Christmas season, for he </p. 235> <p. 236> "thinks Marcellus’s ’sacramental description of Christmas struck the right holiday note’ for the new Stuart regime . . . . " On the contrary, Wilson believes that Marcellus’s reservations ["Some say" (157) and "they say" (160)] and Horatio’s half-hearted response (164), are buttressed by Hamlet’s dampening remark about Claudius’s festivities [621+1 - 621+6]. Wilson detects a sourness </p. 236> <p. 237> that he thinks is directed to the new regime. In 1623, 621+1 - 621+22, specific references to revels, were cut. but "what cannot be cut from Hamlet is a rising apprehension, as the new age dawns, of the disaster of Stuart rule." </p. 237> [See also Wilson, CN 678.]