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Line 176 - 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.

176 {Florish.} Enter Claudius, King of Denmarke, Gertradt he Queene,	..

1773 SJC

Anon. [D.]

176 Gertradt he Queene] Anon. [D.] (St. James’s Chronicle no. 1981, 23-26 Oct. 1773, p. 3): “The Reader should likewise have been told that the Qu’s and Fo’s give Gertrard and Gertrad, instead of Gertrude. Verstegan says that Gertrude or Gartrude is as much as to say All truth; Gar signifying all, and Trude, Truth. But our exact Poet would never have appropriated such an Appellation to a Woman who had been all Falsehood to her Husband. Gertrude will therefore be more properly derived from Girt-rude alluding to the two Cinctures, or Girdles with which the Dames of Denmark were anciently encircled or girt.”

Ed. note: Tongue-in-cheek, directed against Jennens. See also 99, 1019.

1819 mclr2

mclr2:

176-8 Coleridge (ms. notes, 1819, in Ayscough, ed. 1807; rpt. Coleridge, 1998, 12.4:841): “Relief by change of Scene to the Royal Court—this on any occasion; but how judicious that Hamlet should not have to take up the Leavings of Exhaustion.”

1864 Daily News

Anon.: Fechter

176, 178 Florish. . . Hamlet] Anon. (Daily News, in Fechter, p. 2): “The King and Queen advance among the fanfares of trumpets, bowing their salutations right and left; the Prince follows sadly, from which they are never raised” until his first words.

1877 v1877

v1877 = Coleridge w/ main variations from mclr2 in magenta; rug2 [see 179] minus some minor phrases.

176-8 Florish. . . . him] Coleridge (apud Furness, ed. 1877): “The audience now relieved by a change of scene to the royal court, in order that Ham. may not have to take up the leavings of exhaustion.”

1880 Tanger

Tanger

176-8 Tanger (1880, p. 115): “ . . . it was, no doubt, the poet’s intention to represent Hamlet as entered dejectedly among the last persons appearing. F1 effaces this trait, as it does a similar feature in [3674]. In [178] too we notice that F1 makes Ophelia enter for the sake of stage-effect, for she has not to speak a single syllable, and seems altogether strangely out of place in this scene. It may have been common practice then; and Shakspere may be supposed to have not seriously objected to such trifling departures from his original intention.

“The words Counsaile: as Polonius are perhaps also worthy of remark, being probably so put by Shakspere to intimate the position Polonius occupies at the Danish Court. F1 omits this characteristic.”

1930 Granville-Barker

Granville-Barker: agrees with Dover Wilson

187 Th’imperiall ioyntresse] Granville-Barker (1930, rpt. 1946, 1: 49 n.4): The only excuse for the queen to attend the council meeting is this title. “This may not precisely mean that she is the Queen Mary to Claudius’ King William [Mary ruled Britain jointly with her husband from 1689 until her death in 1694], but the impression conveyed is certainly that she has a right to be present.”

1931 crg1

crg1

176-8 Craig (ed. 1931, p. 711): “To have had the king surrounded by an armed guard, so that access to his person was impossible without finesse, would have made Hamlet’s pretense of insanity plausible. It was so in Saxo and Bellesforest and we may believe also in some measure in Kyd, since guards are mentioned in Fratricide Punished, but it apparently did not suit Shakespeare to write a tragedy in which the tragic obstacles were physical. Thus Hamlet’s delay is unmotivated, since when the ghost appears and its mandate is accepted, there is no obstacle to serve as an excuse for delay.”

1934 Wilson

Wilson MSH

176 Gertradt] The name appears elsewhere as Gertrard (1078, 1678, 2378, 2592, 2615, 2626, 2744, 2814 [bis], 2831, 2867, 2871, 3185, 3495, 3760). Wilson (1934, p. 307), who thinks the name should be Gertrude as it is throughout F1, ascribes the difference in Q2 to the compositor’s mistaking of u for a, and vice versa, of which instances abound in Sh. and especially in Q2. He gives among other examples, course for coarse (287) and quietas for quietus (1729).

1934 Wilson

Wilson MSH

176-7 Wilson (1934, pp. 34-5) <p. 34> criticizes the F1 version of the SD and asserts that they cannot be by Sh. because they lose the impact: the Q2 SD introduces a “meeting of the King’s Council,” which Wilson says is the first “to transact business since the combined marriage and coronation festivities. The SD has Hamlet enter last, “in mourning and with downcast mien,” with the brilliant costumes of the others in contrast. F1 on the other hand, has no council, and Hamlet enters 3rd, in ordinary order of precedence, “changes which at once ruin the colour-scheme and deprive the scene of its political significance.” He also assumes that by “Counsailors,” as he spells the word, Sh. meant to include Voltemand and Cornelius. F1 awkwardly has them enter only when they are needed. </p.34> <p.35> He thinks the tardy entry can be explained by doubling: if Marcellus and Bernardo were to double the roles of V & C, they would have needed time to change. </p.35>Wilson repeats this point on p.183.

Ed. note: Wilson’s argument has flaws: 1) with “Cum Aliji” following Hamlet, he would not have come at the tail end. He can make a striking figure whichever position he is in. 2) Wilson makes free with Q2 spelling and punctuation, while at the same time suggesting by old-spelling style (he explains below) that he is being perfectly true to the text. E.g. Q2 has Counsaile: as Polonius, and his Sonne Laertes, which suggests that the only councilors specifically indicated are Polonius and Laertes. 3) Voltemand & Cornelius are not necessary as high up as Councilor level. The fact that they are not to go further than outlined for them suggests a messenger role rather than an ambassadorial role. The Lords attendant suggest a council meeting. There is no indication that this is the first occasion after the coronation, though it seems likely it is the first after the marriage. Unless the coronation was a result of the marriage. See Tony Burton.

F1’s entrance has a more intimate quality, with Ophelia present.

1934 cam3

cam3

176 Claudius] Wilson (ed. 1934): “Not named in the dialogue; appears only in [SD 176 and Q2-only SP 179] . “Possibly the name was spoken in the sixteenth-century version of the play.”

1934 cam3

cam3

176 Claudius] Wilson (ed. 1934, pp. xxiii-xxix), <p. xxiii> considering the possibility of an Italian source for The Murder of Gonzago, thinks that the king derives from that same source because in Ham. but not in the Danish sources, he is “effeminate and Italianate. Not without courage and possessed of considerable intellectual powers, he presents nevertheless a mean and contemptible figure. He is a prey to lust, works by spying, and listen behind </p. xxiii> <p. xxiv> hangings; if murder is to be done, he eggs on others, when he can, to do it for him; and his trump card, when all else fails, is poison—poison in a ‘vial,’ a drinking-cup, or on the point of an unbated foil. It is in keeping with all this that he should out his brother out of the world by an act which could only have originated in decadent Italy, an act which revolts us less by its base treachery than by its hideous and unnatural character. Claudius was a ‘politician’ in the sixteenth-century meaning of that word, a man who lived by dropping poison into other people’s ears, and his supreme crime is but the symbol of his personality. Such a being was bred not at Elsinore, but at some petty Italian court. Yet his insertion into the Hamlet frame was a masterly stroke. The man of violence, the Laertes type, is useful as a foil to Hamlet; but for his antagonist it was essential to have a man of great cunning, since one of the main interests of the play is the spectacle of two extraordinarily subtle men engaged in a deadly duel of wits.”

cam3

176 Gertrad] Wilson (ed. 1934): “Q2 misprints ‘Gertrard.’ She is ‘Geruth’ in the Belleforest story. v. Introd. p. xvi [which merely repeats the Belleforest name].”

1935 Wilson

Wilson WHH ≈ MSH

176-7

1937 Schücking

Schücking

176, 179 Claudius] Schücking (1937, p, 60) considers it a lapse that Sh. names a servant Claudio, because it’s unlikely that a king’s servant would have the same name as the king. He points out that the king’s name occurs only in 1 SD.

1939 kit2

kit2

176 Kittredge (ed. 1939): "The scene takes place on the same day as scene 1. The time is still the forenoon, for Horatio, Marcellus, and Bernardo enter at [344]."

1980 pen2

pen2

176 Flourish] Spencer (ed. 1980): “This royal trumpet call would have been very prominent in production.”

1982 ard2

ard2:

176 Claudius] Jenkins (ed. 1982, p. 163) believes the name was “suggested by that of the Roman emperor, who married Agrippina, his niece . . . , ” the parents of Nero [mentioned 2265]. Erasmus in Institutio Principis Christiani named him as the type of bad ruler.

ard2:

176 Gertrad] Jenkins (ed. 1982, p. 163): The various forms in Q1, Q2, and F1 are “an Anglicization of Saxo’s Gerutha and Belleforest’s Geruthe.”

ard2: survey of possibilities

176-8 Jenkins (ed. 1982): S.D.] "Claudius, instead of the Feng(on) of Saxo and Belleforest, is an unexpected name for a Danish king, and Yngve Olsson has noted that in Krantz’s Chronica Regnorum Aquilonariwn, Strasburg, 1545, the same page (p. 619) includes references to the Danish ’Ambletus’ and to the Roman Emperor Claudius [ShSt., 4, 208-9]. But see Dramatis Personae, Claudius, n. To begin by providing a character with a name which is not subsequently used is not uncharacteristic of Shakespeare. Cf. ’Eskales’ in the first entry-direction for the Prince in Rom.; ’Solinus’ for the Duke in the first line of Err.. In LLL the King of Navarre is called Ferdinand in the opening S.D. and in speech-headings in two scenes but not in the text. The editorial Council, including here corresponds to the Q2 Counsaile: as. This is taken by Dover Wilson and some subsequent editors for a misreading of ’Counsailors’; but as, in the sense of ’such as,’ ’for example,’ is acceptable as introducing the names of some of the persons present. The inclusion in the Council of Cornelius and Voltemand may be implied by their being given no separate entry in Q2 (cf. Greg, [The Shakespeare First Folio] p. 330). The postponement of their entry to line 25 in F is attributed by Dover Wilson (MSH, p. 35) to doubling of their parts with those of Barnardo and Marcellus. The naming of Hamlet. last in Q2 instead of in order of rank may indicate the order of entry; it has been taken to isolate Hamlet dramatically from the rest of the court (MSH, p. 34). It should be noted, however, that the Q2 stage-direction names the characters in the order in which the ensuing scene takes notice of them: it is possible that the author’s S.D. ended with Counsaile and that as Polonius, and his Sonne Laertes, Hamlet, Cum Alijis represents an addition by the book keeper. That the last two words at least are his is probable. For Hamlet in black, see [248]ff."

1986 McLeod

McLeod

176 Enter Claudius] McLeod (1987, p. 162) points out that in MM only the F1 cast list at the end names Vincentio: the Duke. In Ham. the king’s name is only slightly less absent: yet, “‘Claudius’ rather than ‘King’ or ‘Uncle’ has become the name of choice when literates discuss the character,” a usage McLeod deplores.

1987 oxf4

oxf4: MSH; WHH

176-8 Hibbard (ed. 1987, p. 382): Hibbard thinks the presence of Ophelia is an error by "the revising Shakespeare." Neither Q1 nor Q2 names her. Accepting Dover Wilson’s view that the occasion is a council meeting, she would not be needed. On the other hand, rejecting Wilson’s placement of Hamlet in last place, Hibbard places Hamlet third, as affirmed by Q1 and F1. This placement allows the audience to understand who he is in spite of his silence for 60 lines and is appropriate to the occasion "orchestrated" by the king. Hibbard sees in Q2’s SD, Sh. laying out the progress of the court scene, ending with the confrontation between the king and Hamlet.

Ed. note: The great majority of productions include Ophelia in the scene. Those that reveal Hamlet’s presence at line 244 show his refusal to play a role in the king’s plan.

1993 Kliman

Kliman: occurrences of Florish

176 Florish] Kliman (1993): In Q2 only, for first formal entrance of king. See also Q2 only, for Exeunt (311); Q2 only, offsstage for the king’s celebration (610); Q2 only, for second entrance of king (1019), Q2 and F1, for the Players (1415), Q2 only, for Hamlet’s first hit (3747).

1999 Dessen&Thomson

Dessen&Thomson

176 Florish] Dessen & Thomson(1999): “a widely used signal (over 500 examples) for . . . a fanfare usually played within on a trumpet or cornet, primarily when important figures enter and exit but also at such events as the reading of proclamations and the start of entertainments. . . . theatrical fanfares were likely the same patterned sounds as those used in the real world and probably varied little from play to play. . . .”

2006 ard3q2

ard3q2: standard

176 Florish] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “a fanfare of trumpets to announce the entry of the King”

ard3q2: standard

176 Claudius] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “This entry direction and the first speech prefix are the only times the King is named in Q2; his name is never used in the dialogue and he is simply King in all subsequent directions and prefixes . . . (F is even more sparing with the name, using it only in this entry direction.)”

Ed. note: The editors discuss the names of all the characters in their “List of Roles,” 140-5.