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Line 885 - 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.”

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.

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

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

885 The time is out of ioynt, ô cursed spight	1.5.188

1768 cap

cap

885-6 ô . . . right] Capell (ed. 1768) marks the ejaculation with low dashes before and after, indicating that it is not directed to the same person to whom Hamlet directed 884-5a.

1773 gent1

gent1

1-886 Gentleman (ed. 1773): “This Act, though exceedingly well supported by character, incident, and writing, is, after great reduction, too long; Mr. Garrick, in a late alteration of this play [1772], has judiciously shortened it. The Ghost is certainly too much in view.”

1774 gent2

gent2 = gent1 minus last sentence.

1780 Mackenzie

Mackenzie

885-6 Mackenzie (1780, 3: 234): “Even after his father’s ghost has informed him of his murder, and commissioned him to avenge it, we find him complaining of that situation in which his fate has placed him. ‘The time is out of joint; oh! cursed spight, That ever I was born to set it right!’”

1782- mCooke

mCooke ≈ cap SD

885-6 Cooke (ms. notes, ed. 1782): “The two last lines not directed to his Companions.”

Perhaps 1782 omitted the last line, 897, which Hamlet says to the companions, most certainly.

-1796 Goethe

Goethe

885-6 Goethe (-1796, 4:13: 145-6): The eponymous hero of Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister described Hamlet influentially: “In these words, so I believe, lies the key to Hamlet’s whole behavior, and it is clear to me what Shakespeare has set out to portray: a heavy deed placed on a soul which is not adequate to cope with it. An oak tree planted in a precious pot which should only have held delicate flowers. The roots spread out, the vessel is shattered. . . . A fine, pure, noble and highly moral person, but devoid of that emotional strength that characterizes a hero, goes to pieces beneath a burden that it can neither support nor cast off. Every obligation is sacred to him, but this one is too heavy. The impossible is demanded of him—not the impossible in any absolute sense, but what is impossible for him.”

1805 Seymour

Seymour

885-6 Seymour (1805, 2:164-5): <p. 164>“Hamlet does not lament that the disjointed time is to be set right by him, but that he, the son to the criminal queen, and, to the king that must be immolated, though ‘less than kind a little more than kin,’ and whose duty it of necessity becomes, to set the time right, should have been bor’n: </p. 164><p. 165>‘The time is out of joint—O cursed spight! That ever I was bor’n— to set it right.’” </p. 165>

1817 Drake

Drake

885-6 Drake (1817, 2:393): “ . . . though, on the first communication of the murder, his bosom burns with the thirst of vengeance, yet reflection and the gentleness of his disposition soon induce him to regret that he has been chosen as the instrument of effecting it, [quotes 886].

1855 Wade

Wade

885-6 Wade (1855, p. 7): “And Horatio and Marcellus arriving in search of him, after some admirable buffoonery with them and the Ghost, whose subterraneous voice announces his still neighboring presence, he makes them to swear to a needless secrecy, declares the time to be ‘out of joint,’ and curses his stars—‘That ever he was born to set it right.’”

1859 Werder

Werder

885-6 Werder (1859, trans. 1907, pp. 108-9) <p. 108> attempts to explain these lines so as to exonerate Hamlet from the accusation of weakness. Hamlet, says Werder, just means that the situation is horrendous and that he is “the poorest upon whom this unholy task falls . . . .” </p. 108> <p. 109> He is not, as Schlegel thought, a man addicted to crooked rather than straightforward ways. Horatio would not have loved him so much had he been as Schlegel describes. </p. 109>

1873 rug2

rug2 ≈ Drake without attribution

885-6 ô . . . right] Moberly (ed. 1873): “Hamlet is no Hercules born to combat monsters, and the shrinking from action is strengthening upon him.”

1875 Schmidt

Schmidt

885 spight] Schmidt (1875): “3) vexation, mortification [quotes Ham. among others.”

1877 v1877

v1877 = Seymour (minus middle)

885-6 Furness (ed. 1877): “Seymour: Ham. does not lament that the disjointed time is to be set right by him, but that he, . . . whose duty it of necessity becomes to set the time right, should have been born.”

1885 macd

macd ≈ Seymour (prob. via v1877) without attribution

885-6 ô . . . right] MacDonald (ed. 1885): “not merely that he had been born to do hangman’s work, but that he should have been born at all—of a mother whose crime against his father had brought upon him the wretched necessity which must proclaim her ignominy. Let the student do his best to realize the condition of Hamlet’s heart and mind in relation to his mother.”

1900 N&Q

Anon. [W. C. B]

885 out of ioynt] Anon. [W. C. B.] (1900, p. 85): “Tho. de Gray, ‘Compleat Horseman,’ 1639.— P. 53. ‘Horses are often brought out of ioynt and temper, by reason of the assidual warfare of the never-ceasing-jarring elements.’—Pp. 333-4. ‘He will be out of ioynt, that is, out of good temper throughout every part and member of his body.’ . . . . W. C. B.”

1904 ver

ver

885-6 York Powell (apud Verity, ed. 1904): “We must remember all through Hamlet that the duty of ‘blood revenge’ was ‘one of the strongest links of the family in archaic Teutonic society’ (York Powell). The Northern sagas are full of this motive.”

1907 Rolfe

Rolfe

885-6 Rolfe (1907, “intro,” pp. 37-8) <p. 37> Hamlet says these lines to his companions </p. 37><p. 38> to hint “that the situation is most serious.” These words “suggest a profound sense on Hamlet’s part that the problem he has to solve is a peculiarly complicated and perplexing one, involving far more than the killing of Claudius.” </p. 38>

1913 Trench

Trench

885-6 Trench (1913, p. 83): “Here . . . is the full sense of the burden of a known responsbility for which the speaker knows himself unfit. A moral reformer Hamlet is indeed by temper . . .” but not “for strenuous deeds performed in the physical arena.”

1926 Bradby

Bradby: standard

885-6 Bradby (1926, p. 50): “Rhyme has a peculiarly clinching effect. It gives a kind of finality to the summing up of a situation or the conclusion of an argument; e.g. [quotes 885-6 and 1644-5 “the play’s the thing Wherein Ile catch the conscience of the King”].

1929 trav

trav

885-6 Travers (ed. 1929): “The rhyme sonorously marks off [885-6] not only as an aside . . ., a kind of vehement articulate sigh, but as practically concluding the scene . . .: a scene at the beginning of which Hamlet yearned to ‘sweep to his revenge with wings as swift as the thoughts of love.’ The revelation about his mother was, however, still to come.”

1931 Waldock

Waldock contra Bradley

385-6 Waldock (1931, rpt. 1973, pp. 30-1): <p. 30> We can agree with Bradley that the second revelation “ ’strikes home the last rivet’ in his melancholy. But why should the issue be, so necessarily, a paralysis of the will? Even his burdened moan—[quotes 385-6]—does not imply, very clearly, a feeling that his task will be beyond him. He may not dance lightly to meet such a task. He may well feel bowed beneath a despair that was already heavy for bearing. His duty, we may under- </p. 30> <p. 31> stand, will be joyless, for joy has departed from this world become black. But the words do not definitely suggest that he fears inadequacy as such: . . . nothing hinders us from feeling that the task will somehow yet be performed.” </p. 31>

Waldock contra proponents of delay theories

885-6 Waldock (1931, rpt. 1973, p. 84), though he calls this a significant speech, “wishes one could decide precisely in what way. . . . . [Hamlet] is not savouring his revenge (for the savour has gone from all things); he is not anticipating it (as we may imagine his prototype doing) with gusto; we get the impression that he may not, for all his earlier outburst, ’sweep to it’ [717]. But there is nothing, if we remember the indications we have already had of his state of mind, very puzzling about all this. Nor is it clear why we should be obliged to draw from the words the further inference, namely, that he is already feeling twinges of inadequacy, fearing that he will not, for some reason that he scarcely knows himself, be equal to the tasks.”

1935 Wilson

Wilson WHH

885-6 Wilson (1935, p. 83) thinks that the couplet results not merely from Ham.’s feeling of inadequacy but also from his doubts about the ghost’s origins owing to its having responded from the cellarage.

1939 kit2

kit2

885 cursed spight] Kittredge (ed. 1939): "This phrase, in Elizabethan usage, was equivalent to our modern ’What an infernal nueisance!" though more dignified than our own idiom. Hamlet is resolved to avenge his father, but he is too highly civilized to welcome the duty that the savage code of his nation and time imposes. Thus he differs from the stock ’revenger’ in the old plays, who (in Senecan fashion) revels in bloodthirstiness."

Ed. note: With his gloss, Kittredge minimizes Hamlet’s abhorrence of the task.

1950 Tilley

Tilley

885 The . . . ioynt] Tilley (1950, J 75): “to be out of Joint” c1591 Horsey Travels, p. 262: [The Times are] all owt of jointe.”

1967 ShSur

Weimann

885-6 Weimann (1967, p. 119): “ . . . Hamlet’s tragedy developed not from any modernized dilemma, but from a contradiction built up from the text itself, between his advanced view of man. . . and the over-mighty courtly powers that thwarted his plans and ideas about the world and how ’to set it right.’ ”

1980 pen2

pen2: Job

885-6 cursed . . . right] Spencer (ed. 1980): “Hamlet seems to be following Job (3.1-3) in cursing the day of his nativity. He laments, not merely his task, but that he was ever born.”

pen2

885 spight] Spencer (ed. 1980): “(of Fortune).”

1982 ard2

ard2: analogue; Tilley; xref

885 out of ioynt] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “In utter disorder. For this idiom see Horsey, Travels (Hakluyt Soc., p. 262), ’This turbulent time . . . all out of joint, not likely to be reduced a long time to any good form of peaceable government’; Tilley J 75. Cf. 198 ’our state . . . disjoint and out of frame.”

1985 cam4

cam4

885 cursed spight] Edwards (ed. 1985): "the accursèd malice of life!"

1987 oxf4

oxf4: Dent

885-6 ô. . . right] Hibbard (ed. 1987): "‘Alas that ever I was born’ (Dent B140.1) had been in use since the mid-15th century. Hamlet has quickly come to realize the magnitude and difficulty of the task the Ghost has imposed on him."

oxf4: Tilley

885 out of ioynt] Hibbard (ed. 1987): "dislocated, disordered. ‘To be out of joint’ (Tilley J75) was already a common expression when Hamlet was written."

1988 bev2

bev2: standard

885 The time] Bevington (ed. 1988): “i.e., that state of affairs.”

bev2: standard

885 spight] Bevington (ed. 1988): “i.e., the spite of Fortune.”

1997 SQ

Charnes

885 Charnes (1997, p. 6): “Incapable of narrativizing himself, of finding his place in the story, Hamlet literally ’lack[s] advancement’ [2210; 3.2.322]. [Quotes 885-6] The shift from classical to the noir universe instantiates a vertiginous jolt out of the sequential and into the synchronic. Within this multiplicitous miasma in which time cannot be accounted for, the whole meaning of solving a crime changes.”

1999 Mallin

Mallin

885-6 Mallin (1999, p. 135): “From the grandiosity of [quotes 885-6], the prince moves to a version of humility [by 3509-10]. a reconciliation with mortality derived from the certainty of his own constructedness and his limited self authority.”

2000 Brigden

Brigden

885 The time is out of ioynt] Susan Brigden (New Worlds, Lost Worlds: The Rule of the Tudors 1485-1603 [London, 2000; New York: Viking, 2001], 364; apud Thompson & Taylor ed. 2006, p. 38) believes that “the lament of Shakespeare’s hero that ’the time is out of joint’ was topical in 1600. Hamlet embodies lingering doubts about the ’lost world’ of traditional Catholicism; he lives in a court poisoned by corruption at the centre; he agonizes over the discrepancy between the ’new worlds’ opening up to the human mind and spirit and the inadequacy of individuals to live up to their potential.”

2001 Kliman

Kliman

885 The . . . ioynt] Kliman (2001): The vivid image is of a bone painfully dislocated that must, even more painfully, be set into its socket.

2006 ard3q2

ard3q2: Hapgood

885-6 Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “Some performers make this a kind of aside in which Hamlet speaks to himself (see Hapgood). The metaphor is from the practice of setting broken bones to mend.”

ard3q2

885 The time] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “the age, i.e. things in general”

ard3q2

885 cursed] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “cursèd”

ard3q2

885 spight] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “ill or outrageous fortune”