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Line 681 - 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.

681 Enter Ghost, and Hamlet.	..

1781 Schroeder

Schroeder

681 Schroeder (apud Furness, ed. 1877): “A Graveyard with the Church in the background.’”

This is the SD in the promptbook, I suppose, for the 1781 production at the Hamburg theatre. Shattuck does not list this. See v1877 below.

1853 Collier

Collier

681 Enter] Collier (1853, p. 422): “This, according to the ancient stage arrangements, and according to the representations of the old editions, was probably not a new scene; for Hamlet and the Ghost have gone out, as it were to ‘a more removed ground,’ Horatio and Marcellus say a few words and reture: Hamlet and the Ghost then return to the scene, and it seems to have been left to the audeince to imagine that the ground on which they stood was not, in fact, the same they had before occupied.

“It is to be observed that the Acts and Scenes are not divided in the quartos; and in the folios, though Actus Primus and Actus Secundus are marked (with the distinction of some of the scenes), we are without any printed notes of the kind during the rest of the tragedy. The emendator of the folio, 1632, was, therefore, the first to supply the deficiency: he appears to have done so accurately (with one or two exceptions) according to the practice of his age, but by no means precisely the same as in modern editions.”

1854 del2

del2

681 Delius (ed. 1854): “Ob diese von den Herausgebern hinzugefügte Ortsbezeichnung den Sinn des Dichters trifft, lässt sich schwerlich ermitteln. Nach der langen Zwischenzeit, die Hamlet’s Freunde gebrauchen, ehe sie ihn wieder finden, ist es sogar unwahrscheinlicht, dass das Gespräch zwischen Hamlet und dem Geiste auf derselben Terrasse Statt fand, auf der Hamlet sich von seinen Begleitern losriss. Indess gibt Sh. selbst in der Scene keinen nähern Fingerzeig über die Localität, wie er allerdings nach der Einrichtung seiner Bühne auch ganz davon absehen konnte.” [Whether this place location supplied by editors meets the poet’s sense is difficult to ascertain. Given the long interval that his friends employ before they find Hamlet again it is completely improbable that the conversation between Hamlet and the ghost takes place on the same platform where Hamlet tore away from his companions. However, Sh. himself gives no closer indication about the locality, as he indeed could avoid considering the arrangement of his stage.]

He’s saying that it’s unbelievable that Horatio and Marcellus would take so long to find Hamlet, that Sh. is not specific about locality.

1869 tsch

tsch

681 Tschischwitz (ed. 1869, apud Furness, ed. 1877): “changes the scene to ‘A Wilderness,’ because Ham. must have followed the Ghost a long distance, since he refuses to go further. His question also, ‘Whither wilt thou lead me?’ shows that, despite his courage, horror is beginning to creep over him; and at the close of the scene the Ghost speaks from under the ground.”

1877 v1877

v1877: del, tsch, Schroeder

681 Furness (ed. 1877): “Owing to the length of time that elapses before the companions of Ham. rejoin him, Delius thinks it unlikely that the dialogue with the Ghost took place on the same Platform where Ham. broke loose from his friends. [tschisch as above]. The earliest change in this stage direction that I can find is in Schroeder’s adaptation of the play for the Hamburg theatre, in 1781. Here the scene is laid in: ‘A Graveyard with the Church in the background.’”

Ed. note:The graveyard is the setting for the Chamberlain Ham. for Hallmark in 1970, which influenced Branagh to use that setting also for his 1996 film.

1929 trav

trav

681 platform Travers (ed. 1929) notes that though Sh.’s audience would not have cared where, precisely, the scene takes place the text suggests its remoteness: the time it takes for Marcellus and Horatio to find Hamlet, the allusion to “a more removed ground” [648], and “I’ll go no further” [682].

1930 Granville-Barker

Granville-Barker ≈ Collier without attribution on no scene change

681 Enter] Granville-Barker (1930, rpt. 1946, 1: 57): There is no scene change, though technically the stage is cleared. “At such a critical juncture Shakespeare will not want the impetus of the action to be checked, as it will be if the integrity of the scene is broken even by a moment’s clearing of the stage ”

1987 oxf4

oxf4: standard on no scene change

681 Hibbard (ed. 1987): "There is no break here in the action as it mounts to its first great climax. On Shakespeare’s stage the Ghost and Hamlet, having made their exit through one of the two stage doors, move backstage across to the other while Horatio and Marcellus are still talking. Then, as Horatio and Marcellus go out though the first door, the Ghost and Hamlet return through the other. The main purpose of these manoeuvres is, of course, to get rid of Horatio and Marcellus, rather than to signal any change of location, though Hamlet’s first words do suggest that there has been some shift."

1988 bev2

bev2: standard

681 Bevington (ed. 1988): “Location: The battlements of the castle.”