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.”

7. Further information: See the Introduction for explanations of other abbreviations. Click here for more information about browsing the entries and here for more information about the special symbols used in Hamletworks. Click the question mark icon above to remove this help message.

1793 v1793

v1793: Pouffin

138-41 Hor.] Steevens (ed. 1793): “I am unwilling to suppose that Shakspeare could appropriate these absurd effusions to Horatio, who is a scholar, and has sufficiently proved his good understanding by the propriety of his addresses to the phantom. Such a man must have know that ‘As easy might be the intrenchant air With his keen sword impress,’ as commit any act of violence on the royal shadow. The words—Stop it, Marcellus,—and Do, if it will not stand—better suit the next speaker, Bernardo, who, in the true spirit of an unlettered officer, nihil non arroget armis. Perhaps the first idea that occurs to a man of this description, is to strike at what offends him. Nicholas Pouffin, in his celebrated picture of the Crucifixion, has introduced a similar occurrence. While lots are casting for the sacred vesture, the graves are giving up their dead. This prodigy is perceived by one of the soldiers, who instantly grasps his sword, as if preparing to defend himself, or resent such an invasion from the other world.

“The next two speeches—’Tis here!—’Tis here!—may be allotted to Marcellus and Bernardo; and the third—’Tis gone! &c. to Horatio, whose superiority of character seems to demand it.—As the text now stands, Marcellus proposes to strike the Ghost with his partizan, and yet afterwards is made to descant on the indecorum and impotence of such an attempt.

“The names of speakers have so often been confounded by the first publishers of our author, that I suggest this change with less hesitation than I should express concerning any conjecture that could operate to the disadvantage of his words or meaning.—Had the assignment of the old copies been such [as he recommends], would it have been liable to objection?”

1803 v1803

v1803 = v1793

138-41

1813 v1813

v1813: =v1803

138-41

1819 Jackson

Jackson: v1813; ≈ Stubbs (see n. 136)

138-41 Jackson (1819, pp. 342-3): <p. 342> “Mr. Steevens observes, — ‘I am unwilling to suppose that Shakspeare could appropriate these absurd effusions to Horatio, who is a scholar, and has sufficiently proved his good understanding by the propriety of his addresses to the phantom.’ These effusions Mr. Steevens would have transferred to Bernardo.

“In many parts of these plays there are what would be deemed incongruities, but that our Commentators have most judiciously explained, and pointed them out, to be, in our Author, Strokes of Nature. In the present instance—Stop it Marcellus, and afterwards the hemistich, Do, if it will not stand, I consider entitled to some marks of distinction: for, we are not to suppose, that Horatio, though he has addressed the Ghost with great propriety, is not alarmed: Behold his agitation when, on hearing the cock crow, the Ghost retires. Here he loses all that energetic language with which reason and reflection aided him, and he exclaims, Stay, and speak: but, however bold this may be, it proceeds from agitation; and, anxious to obtain an answer, he cries to his companion, Stop it Marcellus: here he partly forgets it is a phantom; he sees the form move; and, with the undaunted courage of a soldier, Marcellus demands, —Shall I strike at it with y partizan? To this agitated Nature replies,— Do, if it will not stand, But </p.342> <p. 343> vain their words, vain their courage: In the moment ’tis before Bernardo, the next before Horatio:—At length Marcellus exclaims, ‘Tis gone! and then returning wisdom points out to both the absurdity of that courage, which, in a moment of forgetfulness, they imagined could obstruct the passage of a phantom, on which their own vain blows would prove malicious mockery: —See how fear operated on Marcellus and Bernardo, in Horatio’s account of the phantom in Hamlet: [and he quotes 393b-397a]

“In my opinion, Nature could not dictate to man language more like her own.”

1821 v1821

v1821 = v1813

138-41

1860 Walker

Walker

138-41 Walker (1860, 3: 261): “Perhaps we should arrange, to avoid the broken line, ‘’Tis gone’ which here seems to me irregular,— [quotes 137-41]”

Ed. note: Walker arranges ‘Do’ as belonging to line [138], reading ‘If’t will not . . . gone’ as one line.

1877 v1877

v1877= Walker

138-41

1912 dtn3

dtn3

138 will not stand] Deighton (ed. 1912): “refuses to halt when called upon to do so.”

1980 bev1

bev1

138 With an added SD calling for all to “strike at it,” Bevington (ed. 1980) puts all the men into a flurry of action and accounts for the We in 142.

1999 Kliman

Kliman

138-40 Kliman (1999): One line in most editions. Some editors indicate this by staggering, but clearly this is one line without the stagger. Among twentieth-century editons, crg1, crg2, evns1, pen2, bev1, cam4, dent stagger but ard2, chal, bev2, bev3a do not.

2006 ard3q2

ard3q2

138 stand] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “i.e. stay to be questioned”