Notes for lines 2951-end ed. Hardin A. Aasand
| 3756 Quee. Hee’s fat and scant of breath. | 5.2.287 |
|---|
3757 {Heere Hamlet take my} <Heere’s a> napkin rub thy browes,
3758 The Queene carowses to thy fortune Hamlet.
1627 Massinger
Massinger
3756 Gifford, ed. Massinger sees a likeness to Sh’s 3756 in (The Great Duke of Florence, 1627, printed 1636 (3.1 Works, 1813, 2: 480, apud Ingleby et al. 1932, 1: 298): “So: come neerer; This exercise hath put you into a sweat; Take this and dry it.” Gifford comments, “This is from Shakspeare; if he had been suffered to remain in quiet possession of it, the reader would have little to regret on the score of delicacy.” Gifford seems to take fat to mean sweaty. Ed. note: Theater for a New Audience’s Spring 2009 production starring a very lean Hamlet substituted the word sweating for fat.
1729 [Roberts]
[Roberts]
3756 Hee’s fat and scant of breath]
[Roberts] (1729, p. 36): <p. 36> “And I think he [Lowin] was the Original
Hamlet. That he was Sizeable to play
Henry the Eighth, and yet perfform’d the Part of
Hamlet is reconciled by observing the
Queen says, in the fighting Scene between
Him and
Laertes,’He
is Fat and scant of Breath.”</p. 36>
[This is the “Answer to Mr. Pope’s Preface” published in 1729. Identified as Robert by Furness in v1877.]
mtby2 1723-33? ms. notes in pope1
mtby2
3757 Heere Hamlet take my napkin] Thirlby (ms. notes in Pope, ed. 1723 [1723-33?]): “Possibly they that made the change did it because they did not understand w[ha]t the Queen sh[oul]d carry a napkin about with her for. But it is her handkerchief. ut et alibi [and elsewhere] v.v. [see] 270.14. v. infra [see below] 535.26 536.3 Iv. 227.24 v infra 537.9.”
1760 John2
John2
3757 napkin] Johnson (2nd ed. 1760, napkin): “s. [from nap] 2. a handkerchief. Obsolete. Shaksp.”
1770 han3
han3
3757 napkin] Hanmer (ed. 1770, 6:Glossary): “a handkerchief.”
1778 v1778
v1778
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Steevens (ed. 1778) : “It seems that John Lowin, who was the original Falstaff, was no less celebrated for his performance of Henry VIII. and Hamlet . See the Historia Histrionica, &c. If he was adapted, by the corpulence of his figure, to appear with propriety in the two former of these characters, Shakespeare might have put this observation into the mouth of her majesty, to apologize for the want of such elegance of person as an audience might expect to meet with in the representative of the youthful Prince of Denmark, whom Ophelia speaks of as ‘the glass of fashion and the mould of form.’ This, however, is mere conjecture, as Joseph Taylor likewise acted Hamlet during the life of Shakespeare. STEEVENS”
v1778
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet] Steevens (ed. 1778) : “So, in Dauid and Bethsabe, 1599:‘With full carouses to his fortune past. And bind that promise with a full carouse.’ Ibid. “Now, lord Urias, one carouse to me.’ Ibid. STEEVENS”
1784 Davies
Davies
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Davies (1784, pp. 141-2) : “In a note to this passage, Mr. Steevens says, that John Lowin, who was the original Falstaff, was no less celebrated for his Henry VIII. and Hamlet. Mr. Steevens had forgotten, in a note of his on Henry IV. that Lowin had ever acted Falstaff: for the letters
Old, placed to a speech of that character, he, rather than suppose it to stand for
Oldcastle, which, I believe, was originally intended, would insinuate, they might be the first letters of the actor’s name who played Falstaff: this it is to support an hypothesis at all events.—I believe that Betterton, who was un unlimited stage-genius, was the only actor that ever represented the three parts of Hamlet, Falstaff, and Harry VIII. How Lowin could be said to have acted Hamlet is somewhat surprising, as he was celebrated chiefly for </p. 141> <p. 142>parts of humour.* Taylor is generally allowed to be the original Hamlet; and, at the time these words, of ‘fat and scant of breath,’ were put in the Queen’s mouth, he might have been plumper, in person, than the author wishes he should be for the actor of young Hamlet.” </p. 142>
<n>*That Lowin sometimes acted tragic characters cannot be denied.—He played Domitian in the Roman Actor, and Aubrey in Rollo, when the actors were interrupted by the soldiers, at Holland-House.”</n>
1785 v1785
v1785 = v1778
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
v1785 = v1778
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet]
1787 ann
ann = v1785
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
ann = v1785
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet]
1790 mal
mal = v1785 + magenta underlined
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Malone (ed. 1790) : “The authour of Historia Histrionica , and Downes the prompter, concur in saying that Taylor was the performer of Hamlet. Roberts the player alone has asserted, (apparently without any authority,) that this part was performed by Lowein. MALONE”
1791- rann
rann
3757 napkin] Rann (ed. 1791-) : “handkerchief.”
rann
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet] Rann (ed. 1791-) : “drinks.”
1793 v1793
v1793 = mal
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
v1793 = v1785
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet]
1796 Goethe
Goethe
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Goethe (1796; rpt. 1989, 5:6:185): “Do you think Shakespeare thought about such things as that?
“I don’t find it expressly stated, but I think it is undeniable if one considers certain passages in the play. The fencing is hard for him, sweat runs off his face, and the queen says, ‘He’s fat and scant of breath.’ How can you imagine him, except as blond and portly? For people who are dark-haired are rarely like that when they are young. And do not his fits of melancholy, the tenderness of his grief, his acts of indecisiveness, better suit someone like that than a slim youth with curly brown hair from whom one would expect more alacrity and determination?”
“You are spoiling my whole image of him,” said Aurelie. “Get rid of that fat Hamlet! Don’t show us a portly prince. Give us instead some substitute to please us and engage our sympathies. We are not as much concerned with the author’s intentions as we are with our own pleasure, and we therefore expect to be attracted by someone like ourselves.” </p. 185>
1803 v1803
v1803 = v1793 + magenta underlined
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Steevens (apud Reed, ed. 1803) : “In Ratsie’s Ghost , (Gamaliel) no date, about 1605, bl. 1. 4o. the second part of his madde prankes &c.---He robs a company of players. ‘Sirra, saies he to the chiefest of them, thou hast a good presence on a stage---get thee to London, for if one man were dead, [Lowin, perhaps,] there would be none fitter than thyself to play his parts---I durst venture all the money in my purse on thy head to play Hamlet with him for a wager.’ He knights him afterwards, and bids him---’Rise up, Sir Simon two shares & a halfe .’ I owe this quotation to one of Dr. Farmer’s memoranda. STEEVENS”
v1803 ≈v1793
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet] Steevens (ed. 1803) : “i.e. (in humbler language) drinks good luck to you. A similar phrase occurs in Dauid and Bethsabe , 1599: ‘With full carouses to his fortune past.’ STEEVENS”
1813 v1813
v1813 = v1803
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
v1813 = v1803
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet]
1819 cald1
cald1 = v1813
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet]
1821 v1821
v1821 = v1813 + magenta underlined
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Malone (apud Boswell, ed. 1821) : “But in truth I am convinced that it was neither Taylor nor Lowin, but probably Burbage. Taylor apparently was not of the company till late, perhaps after 1615, and Lowin not till after 1603. MALONE”
v1821 = v1813
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet]
v1821
3757 napkin] Boswell (ed. 1821, 21:Glossary): “handkerchief.”
1822 Nares
Nares
3757 napkin] Nares (1822; 1906): “s. A pocket handkerchief. Of this use of the word, Dr. Johnson has given only one instance, which is from Othello; but it was very common, and occurs in many other passages of Shakespeare; [cites AYL, 4.3]’And to that youth he calls his Rosalind He sends this bloody napkin.’ ‘And tread on corked stills a prisoner’s pace, And make their napkin for their spitting place.’ Hall, Sat., IV, vi, 1.11. . . .
“Barrett, in his Alvearie, has napkin, or handkerchief, rendered accordingly; and table napkin is there a distinct article.
“A napkin, the diminutive of nappe, in its modern sense, was the badge of office of the maître d’ hôtel or, as we should call him, the butler, in great houses: ‘The hour of meals being come, and all things are now in readiness, le maitre hostel takes a clean napkin, folded at length, but narrow, and throws it over his shoulder, remembering that this is the ordinar mark and a particular sign and demonstration of his office; and to let men see how credible (sic) his charge is, he must not be shamefaced, nor so much as blush, no not before any noble personage, because his place is rather an honour than a service, for he may do his office with his sword by his side, his cloak upon his shoulders, and his hat upon his head; but his napkin must always be upon his shoulder, just in the posture I told you of before.’ Giles Rose’s School of Instructions for the Officers of the Mouth , 1682, p.4.’”
1826 sing1
sing1
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet] Singer (ed. 1826) : “i.e. the queen drinks to thy good success.”
1832 cald2
cald2 = cald1
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
cald2 = cald1
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet]
1843 col1
col1 : v1821
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Collier (ed. 1843) : “On the authority of ‘Wright’s Historia Histrionica,’ 1609, it has been supposed that Taylor was the original Hamlet. This is a mistake: Wright says that ‘Taylor acted Hamlet incomparably well;’ but he had the advantage of seeing Burbage in the part until 1619. We know, on the authority of MS. epitaph upon Burbage, that he was celebrated for his Hamlet, and Shakespeare’s words are employed, with reference to the obesity of the actor:—‘No more young Hamlet, though but scant of breath, Shall cry revenge for his dear father’s death.’These lines must have been written very soon after the decease of the subject of them, and they are decisive upon the point that Burbage wsa the performer who first acted the part of Hamlet. See the Introduction.”
1844 verp
Verp : col1
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Verplanck (ed. 1844): “There are few readers among the young of either sex—very few, it is to be feared, among the ladies—who are not somewhat shocked at this notice of Hamlet’s person, slight and transient as it is. In our own day, especially, the shadowy Hamlet of the imagination has been filled up and made distinct to the mind’s eye by the grand, graceful, and intellectual representation of the Prince in the Kemble-Hamlet of Sir T. Lawrence, and the excellent engravings from that majestic portrait.
“The probable, though very unpoetical, explanation of the apparently needless introductionof these words, is drawn from one of those hard necessities of the stage which so often mar the delicate creations of the fancy, by embodying them in the coarses forms of material imitation. It arose from the necessity of apologizing for the personal appearance and action of Richard Burbage, the “English Roscius’ of his time, who was the original Hamlet.
“Mr. Collier has corrected the opinion of former editors that Taylor was the original actor of Hamlet. We know from the manuscript Elegy upon Burbage, sold among Heber’s books, that he was the earleist representative of Hamlet; and there the circumstance of his being ‘fat and scant of breath,’ in the fencing-scene, is noticed the very words of Shakespeare:—’Not more young Hamlet, though but scant of brath, Shall cry ‘Revenge!’ for his dear father’s death.’
“Thus it happened, oddly enough, that the original Hamlet resembled in all respects, the original Orestes of Racine, (and Orestes is the Hamlet of the classic drama,) in which Montfleuri’s impassioned declamation produced a wonderful effect, ‘malgré (says the critical Geoffroy) l’énormité de son embonpoint.’
“Yet it would require no great ingenuity to array a fair show of reasons (it may, perhaps, already have been done in Germany) why this casual speech may not be meant as a hint of the poet’s own notion of our hero’s constitution and temperament. His own observation had noted that the formidable conspirator, the dangerous enemy, the man of iron will and prompt execution, resembled the lean and hungry Cassius;’ while a fuller habit denoted a more indolent will, though it might be accompanied with an active intellect. But, to consider it so, ‘were to consider too curiously.’ We may be content to acquiesce in Mr. Collier’s solution.
“With this matter-of-fact explanation, these words may be considered as no more than a stage-direction for a particular purpose, not a permanent part of the text; and the reader’s imagination may be free to paint for itself, according to its own tasts and associations, the ideal presence of him who is elsewhere described as —’That unmatch’d form and feature of blown youth,’ ‘The expectancy and rose of this fair state, The glass of fashion, and the mould of form.’
1853 Col
Col
3757 Collier (1853, pp. 431-2): <p. 431>“During the fencing-match, the Queen interposes that Hamlet may take breath: in the quartos, her words are,—’He’s fat and scant of breath.—Here, Hamlet, take my napkin, rub thy brows.’</p. 431> <p. 432> In the folios, the passage is merely this:—’He’s fat and scant of breath.—Here’s a napkin, rub thy brows.’ The second line is obviously defective, and the corrector of the folio, 1632, does not, in this instance, cure it by adopting the text of the quartos, but tht of some independent authority: perhaps his emendation here, as in some other places, represents the paggase as it was delivered by the player of the part of the Queen:—’He’s fat and scant of breath.—Here
is a napkin, rub thy brows,
my son.’”</p. 432>
1854 del2
del2
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Delius (ed. 1854) : “Hamlet’s Wohlbeleibtheit, die jedoch natürlich keine übertriebene und entstellende zu sein braucht, muss hier zur Erklärung dienen, dass ihm in der hitzigen Bewegung des Fechtens der Athem leicht ausgeht, und dass er dabei inSchweiss geräth. Die Herausgeber wollen zum Theil, dass Sh. nicht aus diesem augenscheinlichen Grunde hier Hamlet’s ‘Fettheit’ bemerke, sondern dass er damit auf die Wohlbeleibtheit des Schauspielers, der zuert den Hamlet darstellte, ziele—also ein Motiv, das ganz ausserhalb des Dramas läge.” [Hamlet’s great plumpness, which however natural, no exaggeration and distortion be needed, must serve here as a clarification, that for him in his heated movements of the duel, the light air fades and that he thereby falls into sweat. The editors want to point out in this section that Shakespeare lends a hand not to the apparent foundation here of Hamlet’s ‘fatness’’ on the contrary, he therein alludes to the heft of the actor who first played Hamlet—also a motive, which lay entirely outside of the drama.]
del2
3757 Delius (ed. 1854): “So lautet der Vers vollständig in den Qs., und wenn der alte Corrector ihn so gekannt hätte, würde er sich füglich die Mühe haben sparen können, den unvollständigen Vers, den er in seiner Fol. fand: ‘Here’s a napkin, rub thy brows’ auf eigene Hand folgendermassen auszuflicken: ‘Here is a napkin, rub thy brows, my son.*)
<n>*In der oben erwähnten Abhandlung über die ‘alten handschriftlichen Emendationen’ hatte ich S. 18 zu dieser Stelle bemerkt, dass die Königin im ganzen Drama ihren Sohn nie mit my son anrede. Ich hatte dabei ausser Acht gelassen, dass sie A.5, Sc.1. einmal sagt: O my son, what theme!’ Für den Punkt, auf der hier allein gültigen Autorität der Qs. unternommenen Versmacherei des alten Correctors trägt begreiflicher Weise dieses kleine Versehen nicht das Mindeste aus.’ </n>
[The verse reads perfectly thus in the Qs, and if the old Corrector had recognized it as such, he would rightly have spared the labor on the incomplete verse which he found to repair in his own hand in his folio: ‘Here’s a napkin rub thy brows” to the following: ‘Here is a napkin, rub thy brows, my son*
*In the above mentioned discussion of the ‘old handwritten emendations’, I had observed on page 18 at this spot that the Queen never addressed her son in the entire play as my son.. I had neglected entirely that she says once in Act 5.1, O my son, what theme? For the point on which it alone can be determined, for the justification of the unauthorized, in contradition with it, here alone the valid authority of the Qq does not resolve satisfactorally in the least the rhymes undertaken by the old corrector.”]
del2
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet] Delius (ed. 1854) : “”die Königin trinkt auf Hamlet’s gutes Glück im Fechten, um ihn, den die körperliche Anstrengung anzugreifen scheint, zu erinuntern und zu ermuthigen.—to carouse ist nicht immer=stark zechen, sondern, wie hier, einfach=zutrinken.” [The Queen drinks to Hamlet’s good luck in the duel, for him when the bodily exertion appears to grip him, in order to encourage and rouse him.—To carouse is not always, to carouse strongly, on the contrary, as here, simply to drink.]
1855 Wade
Wade
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Wade (1855, pp. 31-32): <p. 31>“And here we must pause a moment, to reflect upon this singular fact in Hamlet’s physical history. ‘He’s fat, and scant o’ breath,’ Alas! how must ‘Hamlet, the Dane,’ have degenerated—he who once possessed ‘The courtier’s, soldier’s scholar’s, eye, tongue, sword.’ </p. 31> <p. 32> How weather-spoiled, this ‘rose of the fair state!’ How flawed and disfigured, this ‘glass of fashion!’ this ‘mould of form!’ this ‘observed of all observers!’ this ‘unmatch’d form and feature’ of full-flowered youth!—Now—name it not I the hig places of idealism and romance! now, at but thirty years old, ‘Fat, and scant o’breath!’ We have heard Hamlet ‘tracing the noble dust of Alexander till he found it stopping a beer-barrel,’ and we may as ‘too curiously’ and debasingly trace the noble form of Hamlet till we find it aldermanic and asthmatic! as thus—Hamlet ate, Hamlet drank, Hamlet was buried in inaction—and so forth. The ‘heavey-headed revels,’ to the ‘manner’ of which he describes himself as being ‘born,’ coupled with his constitutional inactivity, ‘—Takes From his achievements, tho’ perform’d at height, The pith and marrow of his attribute’—’ and so metamorphoses his once symmetric person, that his own mother does not scruple to stigmatise it as ‘Fat, and scant o’ breath!’ ‘Quite, quite down!’ indeed.” </p. 32>
1856 hud1 (1851-6)
hud1 ≈ col1
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Hudson (ed. 1856) : “This speaking of Hamlet as ‘fat and scant of breath’ is greatly at odds with the idea we are apt to form of him; though there is no good reason why the being somewhat fat should in any point take off from his excellences as a man or a prince. It is thought by some, however, and seems indeed likely enough to have been true, that the expression was used with special reference to Burbage, the original actor of Hamlet’s part. Burbage died in 1619; and in a manuscript elegy upon his death, sold, not many years since, among Heber’s books, are the following lines, which both ascertain his original performance of the part, and also render it probable that the words inq uestion had reference to him: ‘No more young Hamlet, though but scant of breath, Shall cry ‘Revenge!’ for his dear father’s death.’ H”
1856 sing2
sing2 : col1 or hud1
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Singer (ed. 1856) : “It appears from the Epitaph on Burbage that he was celebrated for his performance of Hamlet:— ‘No more young Hamlet, though but scant of breath, Shall cry ‘Revenge!’ for his dear father’s death.’ And it has been conjectured that the words have reference to the obesity of the actor.”
1857 elze1
elze1: Nares (scant)
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Elze (ed. 1857, 259): <p. 259>"Vgl. Einleitung XXXII. Nares . Scant.)."
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Elze (ed. 1857, xxxii): <p. xxxii>"Ja nach einer andern Stelle derselben Elegie gewinnt es den Anschein, als sei die Rolle des hamlet ausdrücklich für Burbage geschrieben gewesen, und als sei die Wohlbeleibtheit und Kurzathmigkeit Hamlets, gegen welche Göthe’s Aurlie im Wilheim Meister einen so grossen Widerwillen zeigt, vom Darsteller entlehnt und auf die dargestellte Person übertragen worden. Die Stelle lautet: ’No more young Hamlet, thought but scant of breath, Shall cry revenge for his dear father’s death.’ Dass Burbage den Hamlet in Shakespeare’s Sinne und vielleicht nach seiner ausdrücklichen Unterweisung dargestellt hat, ist nicht zu bezweifeln." [Indeed, according to another place of the same elegy it is gained in the appearance, as if the role of Hamlet may have been written expressly for Burbage, and as if the great popularity and short-windedness of Hamlet, against which Göethe’s Aurelie in Wilhelm Meister exhibits such a great reluctance, may have been borrowed from the actor and carried over to the represented person. The passage reads: ’No more young Hamlet, though but scant of breath, Shall cry revenge for his dear father’s death.’ That Burbage acted Hamlet in Shakespeare’s time and perhaps according to his explicit instruction, is not to be doubted.]
elze1: mcol1
3757 Heere . . .
browes]
Elze (ed. 1857, 259): <p. 259>"QB folgg. Ebenso hat QA, nur dass sie statt ’rub thy brows’ liest ’wipe thy face.’ Fs: here’s a napkin, rub thy brows. Mc füllt den Vers: here is a napkin, rub thy brows, my son." [Q2ff. Even Q1 has [it], only that in place of ’rub thy brows’ it reads ’wipe thy face.’
1858 col3
col3 = col1 + magenta underlined
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Collier (ed. 1858) : “ See the Introduction, and ‘The Lives of the Actors in Shakespeare’s Plays’ (printed by the Shakesp. Soc. in 1846), pp. 21.52”
col3
3757 Heere . . . browes] Collier (ed. 1858) : “So the 4tos: the folio, defectively, ‘Here’s a napkin: rub thy brows,’ which in the corr. fo. 1632, is made to run thus: ‘Here is a napkin, rub thy brows, my son .’”
1859 stau
stau
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Staunton (ed. 1859) : “Does the Queen refer to Hamlet or Laertes?”
1861 wh1
wh1
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] White (ed. 1861) : “See the ‘Remarks on the Preliminary Matter,’ &c., Vol. II. p. xli.”
1864 N&Q
Dixon
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Dixon (1865, 52): <p. 52> “Commentators have been struck with this ludicrous description of one who is elsewhere spoken of as ‘the glass of fashion, and the mould of form,’ and they have got up a very improbable story about a certain corpulent performer who used to act the part of Hamlet. Can we suppose that Shakspeare was so short-sighted as to have written his plays with an especial eye to the bodily peculiarities of his contemporaries?
“May not ‘fat’ be a misprint for faint? If the latter word were written in the original MS. in the contracted form of fait, with a stroke above the letters, the mistake might easily occur. . . . J. Dixon” </p. 52>
1864 glo
glo
3756 scant] Clark & Wright (ed. 1864, Glossary) : “adj. scanty, short.”
1864 Ktly
Ktly : standard
3758 carowses] Keightley (ed. 1864 [1866]: Glossary): “drinks.”
1864-68 c&mc
c&mc ≈ standard
3757 napkin] Clarke (ed. 1864, Glossary)
3757 napkin] Clarke & Clarke (ed. 1864-68, rpt. 1874-78): “‘Handkerchief.’ See Note 69, Act iii., [JC].”
c&mc ≈ standard
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Clarke & Clarke (ed. 1864-68, rpt. 1874-78): “By some commentators it has been proposed to substitute ‘faint’ for ‘fat;’ by others, who retain the original word, the passage has been explained as referring apologetically to the obesity of the first actor who played the part—Burbage. We believe, however, that the expression in the text refers to Hamlet himself; who, as a sedentary student, a man of contemplative habits, one gtiven rather to reflection than to action, might naturally be supposed to be of somewhat plethoric constitution. This accords well with his not daring to ‘drink’ while he is heated with the fencing bout; with his being of a ‘complexion’ that makes him feel the weather ‘sultry and hot;’ with his custom of walking ‘four hours together in the lobby;’ with his having a special ‘breathing time of the day;’ and with his telling Horatio that he has ‘been in continual practice’ of fencing,—as though he took set exercise for the purpose of counteracting his constitutional tendency to that full habit of body which is apt to be the result of sedentary occupation and a too sedulous addiction to scholarly pursuits.
1865 N&Q
Dixon
3756 Dixon (1865, p. 52): <p. 52> “In these days of Shakspeare-worship, every line the poet ever wrote, good, bad, and indifferent, is undergoing such rigid scrutiny, that one hardly dares to propose the most trifling verbal emendation, for fear of suggesting something which has been already published. I would, therefore, humbly deprecate the wrath of critics, while noticing the line in
Hamlet, where the Queen says of her son, ‘He is fat, and scant of breath.’
“Commentators have been struck with this ludicrous description of one who is elsewhere spoken of as ‘the glass of fashion, and the mould of form,’ and they have got up a very improbable story about a certain corpulent performer who used to act the part of Hamlet. Can we suppose that Shakspeare was so short-sighted as to have written his plays with an especial eye to the bodily peculiarities of his contemporaries?
“May not ‘fat’ be a misprint for faint? If the latter word were written in the original MS. in the contracted form of fait, with a stroke above the letters, the mistake might easily occur.
“Have I been anticipated in this suggestion? J. Dixon.” </p. 52>
1867 Ktly
Ktly
3758 carowses]
Keightley (1867, p. 391): <p. 391> ‘a drinking-bout, a large draught. It is usually derived from Germ.
gar aus, ‘all out,’ which seems to be confirmed by ‘boire
caraus et
alluz’ (Rabelais, iii. prol.). In German
Rausch is intoxication; and this
may be the origin of
carouse.” </p. 391>
1869 tsch
tsch
3756 Tschischwitz (ed. 1869): “Einige Ausleger bezweifeln die Richtigkeit des Ausdrucks und wollen hot lesen; andere meinen gar der Ausdruck characterisire die körperliche Beschaffenheit des Hamletdarstellers Burbage. Ich halte die Stelle für unverderbt; wenigstens lehrt König Jacob in der Dämonologie in Betreff der Melancholiker: plerique fuerunt pingues et corpulenti. S. m. Shaksp.—Forsch. I.p. 46.” [“Some commentators doubt the correctness of this expression and desire to read hot; others mean the expression absolutely to characterize the corpulent shape of the Hamlet actor, Burbage. I hold this passage as incorruptible; at least, King James in Demonology teaches about the shape of the melancholic: pleuretics were pinques[?] and corpulent. See my Shakesp.—Forsch. I. p. 46.”]
tsch
3756 scant of] Tschischwitz (ed. 1869): “scant of, s. oben slow of [[4.7.17 (587)]. [scant of, see above slow of [[4.7.17 (587)]].
tsch
3758 carowses] Tschischwitz (ed. 1869): “carouse—bechern, hier zutrinken. In dem Worte mag wohl rôs, rowsa, rouse, Becher enthalten, das ganze ein Compos. sein, dessen ersten Theil vielleicht das Verb chêrjan, umwenden, ganz umkehren, bildet. Sollte damit das deutsche ‘Kehraus’ zusammenhängen, d.h. der Tanz, welcher den Ball beschloss?” [carouse--here, to drink beakers. In this word, I prefer to include still rôs, rowsa, rouse, Beaker, the entire compound to be one, of which the first part perhaps forms the word chêrjan,, to turn around, to turn completely. In this the German ‘Kehraus” is associated, i.e. the dance, which concluded the ball?]
1872 del4
del4 = del2
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
del4 = del2 + magenta underlined
3758 The Queen carowses to thy fortune, Hamlet] Delius (ed. 1854) : “Die vorige Zeile [3757] ist aus den Qs.; in der Fol. lautet sie: Here’s a napkin, rub thy brows.” [The previous part is from the Qs.; in the Folio, it appears: Here’s a napkin, rub thy brows.]
1872 cln1
cln1 : standard
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Clark & Wright (ed. 1872): “There is a tradition that this line was appropriate to Richard Burbage, who first acted the character of Hamlet. In some lines from an elegy upon him, quoted in Collier’s Memoirs of the principal Actors in Shakespeare’s plays, p. 52, we find: [cites Burbage’s Epitaph; see SING2 above]”
cln1
3757 napkin] Clark & Wright (ed. 1872): “handkerchief. Compare [Oth. 3.3.290 (1925-6)], ‘I am glad I have found this napkin: This was her first remembrance from the Moor,’ with [3.4.55 (2221-2)]: ‘That handkerchief Did an Egyptian to my mother give.’”
1872 hud2
hud2 ≈ hud1 (minus sold, not many years since, among Heber’s books)
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
1873 rug2
rug2 ≈ standard
3757 napkin] Moberly (ed. 1873): “A handkerchief, as in Othello.”
1877 col4
col4 : col3
3757 Heere . . . browes] Collier (ed. 1877) : “So the 4tos: the folio, defectively, ‘Here’s a napkin: rub thy brows,’ which in the corr. fo. 1632, is made to run thus: ‘Here is a napkin, rub thy brows, my son .’”
1877 v1877
v1877 ≈ Roberts ; ≈ v1778 (steevens) ; ≈ v1821 (malone) ; Collier (Memoirs of the Principal Actors . . .) ; ≈ stau ; ≈ clarke ; ≈ Wright (N&Q March 9 1867) ; ≈ Plehwe (Hamlet, Prinz von Danemark)
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Furness (ed. 1877): “Roberts, the player, in his
Answer to Pope, 1729, stated that John Lowin acted Henry VIII and Hamlet; it is also known on the authority of Wright, in his
Historia Histrionica, 1699, that Lowin acted Falstaff. Hence
Steevens conjectured that, if the man who was corupulent enough to act Falstaff and Henry VIII should also appear as Hamlet, this observation was put by Sh. into ‘the mouth of her majesty to apologize for the want of such elegance of person as an audience might expect to meet with in the representative of the youthful Prince of Denmark, whom Oph. speaks of as the ‘glass of fashion and the mould of form.’
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Furness (ed. 1877):”
Collier, in his
Memoirs of the Principal actors in the Plays of Sh., Sh. Soc. Publications, 1846, p. 51, shows conclusively that Burbadge was the original Hamlet, and cites in proof the
Elegy upon him, copied from a MS in the possession of Heber, containing an enumeration of the various parts in which Burbadge was distinguished. Shakespeare’s words are there used in ference to the fatness of the actor: ‘No more young Hamlet, though but scant of breath, shall cry ‘Revenge!’ for his dear father’s death.’”
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Clarke (
apud Furness, ed. 1877): “We believe that
this refers not to Burbadge, but to Ham. himself, who, as a sedentary student, a man of contemplative habits, one given rather to reflection than to action, might naturally be supposed to be of somewhat plethoric constitution. This accords well with his not daring to ‘drink’ while he is heated with the fencing bout; with his being of a ‘complexion’ that makes him feel the weather ‘sultry and hot;’ with his custom of walking ‘four hours together in the lobby;’ with his having a special ‘breathing time of the day;’ and with his telling Hor. that he has ‘been in continual practice’ of fencing,—as though he took set exercise for the purpose of counteracting his constitutional tendency to that full habit of body which is apt to be the result of sedentary occupation and a too sedulous addiction to scholarly pursuits.
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Furness (ed. 1877): “
W. Aldis Wright (
N & Qu, 9 March 1867, p 202) states that, in 1864, he received a letter from Dr. Ingleby, communicating a ‘fine reading’ proposed by ‘Mr.
H. Wyeth, of Winchester,’ of
faint for ‘fat.’
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Furness (ed. 1877): “
Plehwe (
Hamlet, Prinz of Dänemark, Hamburg, 1862, p. 214) refers to [4.7.158 (3148)], and conjectures that the same word is here used:
hot.”
1877 Gervinus
Gervinus
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Gervinus (1877, p. 561): <p. 561>“His mother depicts Hamlet, as to his appearance, as ‘fat and scant of breath;’ thus Burbage represented him, and not in that common youthful elegance in which wer are accustomed to see him portrayed since Garrick’s time, which is even more repugnant to the higher conception of this chracter than the representation of the ‘smiling villain’ Claudius as a gloomy, thick-bearded tyrant. In accordance with this intimation of his mother’s, Hamlet says himself that his uncle is no more like his father than he to Hercules. He lacked, therefore, says Goethe, the external strength of the hero, or we might say, more simply, the strength of a practical and active nature.” </p. 561>
1878 Bulloch
Bulloch : cam1
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Bulloch (1878, p. 240) : <p. 240> “The only conjectures in the Cambridge notes bearing on the first line of the queen’s speech, are
faint by Wyeth, and
hot by Brady. The former is plausible, but the most probable reading for ‘fat’ is
fey, signifying
possessed, under some fatal influence, and which the eye of the mother could at once detect. The idea that Hamlet, the young man, the avenger of his father’s murder could have grown fat, is contrary to all likelihood; and though ‘fey’ does not occur in Shakespeare, it was probably picked up in Scotland, and misprinted
fat.” </p. 240>
1881 hud3
Hud3 : standard
3757 napkin] Hudson (ed. 1881): “Napkin was continually used for handkerchief.”
hud3 : v1877
3756 fat]
Hudson (ed. 1881): “
hot]] Instead of
hot, the old text has
fat; which seems deciedly out of place here, as a word is required signifying soemthing peculiar to Hamlet in his present situation or at the present moment. The reading in the text was lately proposed by Plehwe, A German Shakespearian, who justly quotes in support of it from [4.4.158 (3148)]: ‘When in your motion you are
hot and dry.’ It has also been proposed, by ‘Mr. H. Wyeth, of Winchester,’ to read
finat, which is perhaps better in itself, but does not infer so easy a misprint. For this reading and reference I am indebted, immediately to Mr.
Furness’s
Variorum.—For another like instance, see note on ‘Come out of that
fat room,’ vol. xi. page 139.”
1882 elze2
elze2
3756 Quee. Hee’s fat and scant of breath] Elze (ed. 1882): “The King has just drunk to Hamlet’s ‘better breath’. See note on §222 (For my complexion). Compare J. Dixon in N.&Q, 1865, No. 160. H.A.Kennedy in N.&Q., June 20, 1874, p. 484 seq. Reply in N.&Q., July 25, 1874, p. 64. Vischer, Kritische Gänge, Neue Folge, II, 108.—It is a masterly stroke of the poet to bring Hamlet’s indecision and inertness, his melancholy and heartache, into connexion with his physique, so as to account physiologically for his turn of mind and character; Hamlet is thus distinctly contrasted with the arch-conspirator Cassius with the ‘lean and hungrey look’, concerning whom Cæsar cannot suppress the wish: ‘Would he were fatter! I am ignorant, whether or not this latter remark have already been made by any former commentator.”
elze2
3758 The Queene carowses to thy fortune Hamlet] Elze (ed. 1882): “Shee drinkes]] Only in [Q1], after the words thy mother drinkes to thee [2160]. The line: “I will my Lord &c. is not in [Q1].”
1883 wh2
Wh2 : standard
3756 fat] White (ed. 1883): “Burbadge [sic], the first Hamlet, was a portly man.”
1885 Leo
Leo : v1877
3756 Quee. Hee’s fat and scant of breath]
Leo (1885, p. 108): <p. 108> “I recommend the reading of Plehwe, that has been received by Moltke and mentioned in the
Furness edition [v1877]: ‘
He’s hot and scant of breath’ (See [
Jn. 4.3.74 (2074): ‘
I am hot with haste.’)
“Hamlet being hot, there is a reason for the Queen to give him her handkerchief, and we are quit of the most unsympathetic fat Hamlet, as well as we are quit of the thirty-years Hamlet by Yorick’s skull, that tells us that Hamlet is not more than twenty-six years.” </p. 108>
1885 macd
macd
3756 MacDonald (ed. 1885): “She is anxious about him. It may be that this speech, and that of the king before [3731], were fitted to the person of the actor who first represented Hamlet.”
1885 mull
mull ≈ standard
3757 napkin
mull : ≈ stau ; ≈ Gervinus
3756 Quee. Hee’s fat and scant of breath]
Mull (ed. 1885, pp. lix-lx): <p. lix>“
The accepted reading, it seems to me, is as gross in the mouth of the Queen as it is repugnant to the situation and the facts. The coarseness of the word fat well befits the stupidity of the mutilation. ‘The mould of form’ corpulent! </p. lix> <p. lx>
“Manifestly, womanly fear is expressed that Hamlet is becoming exhausted, and therefore faint. For the Queen to declare that he is fat (if even he were) is to suppose the wildest absurdity; and as impossible is it to suppose, as so many commentators do, that the word is fitted to the person of the actor who first represented Hamlet.
“The mutilation has led Staunton seriously to ask, ‘Does the Queen refer to Hamlet or Laertes?’ And Gervinus commits himself as follows:—’His mother depicts Hamlet, as to his appearance, as ‘fat and scant of breath;’ thus Burbage represented him, and not in that common youthful elegance in which we are accustomed to see him portrayed since Garrick’s time, which is even more repugnant to the higher conception of this character than the representation of the ‘smiling villain’ Claudius as a gloomy, thick-bearded tyrant.’”</p. lx>
1888 Mull
Mull : Lytton (Blackwood’s)
3756 Quee. Hee’s fat and scant of breath]
Mull (1888, p. 26): <p. 26> “Without suspecting the corruption of ‘fat’ for ‘faint’ (see my edition), the late Lord Lytton, in his delightful ‘Caxtoniana,’ criticizes Goethe in this manner:—’Goethe, in examining the depths of meaning in ‘Hamlet,’ introduces the line, ‘He’s fat and scant of breath,’ in order to give a physical clue to the intricate moral character of the Danish prince. “The fencing tires him,” says Wilhelm Meister; “and the Queen remarks, ‘He’s fat and scant of breath.’ Can you conceive him to be otherwise than plump and fair-haired? Brown-complexioned people, in their youth, are seldom plump; and does not his wavering melancholy, his soft lamenting, his irresolute activity, accord with such a figure? From a dark-haired young man you would look for more decision and impetuosity.’
“The dogmas conveyed in this criticism are neither historically nor physiologically correct . . . . . . . Nor is it true that the fiar-haired children of the North are more inclined in youth to be plump than the dark-haired inhabitants of the same climate. But is it clear that the Queen’s remark is intended to signify that Hamlet is literally fat? . . . . . . Though Goethe wastes so much exquisite ingenuity on the pinguous temperament of Hamlet, no one would have acknowledged more readily than Goethe the general proposition that an author himself is unaware of the best and deepest moral deductions which a reader may draw from his works.’— Blackwood’s Magazine, Aug. 1862, p. 166.” </p. 26>
1889 Barnett
Barnett
3756 scant of]
Barnett (1889, p. 64): <p. 64> “
deficient in, Icel.
skant,
short; to
scamp is from the same root.” </p. 64>
1890 irv2
irv2 : standard
3757 napkin] Symons (in Irving & Marshall, ed. 1890): “handkerchief.”
irv2 ≈ v1877 (furness) +
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath] Symons (in Irving & Marshall, ed. 1890): [cites Elegy from v1877 above] “Further on the elegist describes him as of ‘stature small,’ and that, I believe, is all the knowledge we possess of Burbage’s personage.”
1899 ard1
ard1 = cln1 ; ≈ v1877 (Wyeth ref. ; Plehew ref.)
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
ard1
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Dowden (ed. 1899, Appendix III, p. 237): <p. 237>“Mr.
Craig understands
fat to mean not reduced to athletic condition by a fencer’s training.”
ard1 ≈ cln1 (Oth. //) w/o attribution
3757 napkin]
1905 rltr
rltr : standard
3757 napkin]
1906 nlsn
nlsn: standard
3757 napkin] Neilson (ed. 1906, Glossary)
1928 TLS
Derocquigny
3756 Hee’s fat] Derocquigny (Revue Anglo-Américaine August, 1927, apud Farmer, “Hamlet’s Fatness,” TLS 1928: 313) says that there is a prior reference to Hamlet’s fatness in the fat weede [719], which occurs to the ghost upon seeing Hamlet, who is fat. Referring to Fortinbras as “a delicate and tender Prince” (2743+42), Hamlet is thinking of his own weight. These allusions prepare the audience for the queen’s description of Hamlet as “fat.”
1928 TLS
Farmer, A. J. contra Derocquigny
3756 Hee’s fat] Farmer (1928, p. 313) observes that the N.E.D. defines “fat” in 719 as “lazy” and “indolent” rather than corpulent. Nor is it necessary to think that Hamlet means his description of Fortinbras in 2743+2 to contrast with himself : “gloss.”
1929 trav
trav: Wyeth; Plehwe ; Koszul ; Wilson [cam3 below?]
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Travers (ed. 1929): “Prof. Koszul, of Strasbourg University, most kindly suggested re-examination of another interpretation ((first proposed, in Germany, by Bieber, 1913). That sweat was melted fat, was the current belief ((e.g. III, iv, 92)). Why should not ‘
fat’ here mean what Plehwe’s ‘hot’ implied, i.e. perspiring ((the ‘scantness of breath’ being then temporary also))? Of such a use ((vulgarly not impossible, even now]) E. v. Schaubert (
Anglia, 1928) has adduced one case, in Elizabethan verse ((at least as early as 1581)): ‘
With courses and kerereyes fat the prancing steeds to tame," Studley’s boisterous paraphrase of Seneca’s ‘cursibus domitent equos’ ((Hippolytus, II, 464)). The translator’s diction, however, is notoriously mixed; and the speaker, Phaedra’s nurse, has just called the hero a ‘churlish country-clown, Hodge-like’ ((+ Seneca’s ‘truculentus et silvester ‘)). But that perspiring
is the meaning here, Prof. Wilson, I now find, has also ‘little doubt’.”
1931 crg1
crg1 ≈ standard
3756 fat] Craig (ed. 1931): “It has been recently suggested that fat means ‘sweaty.’ Emendations faint and hot have been proposed.”
crg1 ≈ standard
3758 carowses]
1934 rid1
rid1
3756 fat] Ridley (ed. 1934): “the trouble over this word seems to be resolved by the account given by a trio of American schoolboys of their reception, while hiking on a very hot day, at a Middle Western farmhouse. They asked for a drink of water. ‘Sure,’ said the farmer’s wife, ‘come in and sit down; you’re all so fat.’ ‘Fat?’ said they, somewhat insulted. ‘Why,’ said she,’ it’s dripping off you.’ She meant simply ‘sweating,’ with no allusion to their figures. Hence, in the present passage, the Queen’s offer of a napkin. And cf. Falstaff ‘larding’ the lean earth. (I had this, in casual conversation, from an American professor, who had had it at first hand, but whose name I have unhappily forgotten, and to whom, if it has since appeared in print over his name, I owe my apologizes for the lack of formal acknowledgment. I should add that the story was rounded off by the statement—not gone bail for—that the farmer’s wife’s forbears had come from Warwickshire!).”
rid1 : standard
3756 fat] Ridley (ed. 1934, Glossary):
1934 cam3
cam3
3756 Wilson (ed. 1934): “for if Burbadge in 1601 was getting over-stout for the part of a young student, Sh. would hardly deliberately call attention to the fact (cf. note 1.2.129(. I have little doubt that ‘fat’ simply means ‘sweaty,’ an interpretation which suits the double use of the handekerchief (ll. 286, 292), and Ham.’s reluctance to drink; cf. [1H4 2.4.1 (964)] ‘come out of that fat (=sweaty, or stuffy) room,’ and [2H4 2.4.234-35 (1239-40)] ‘how thou sweatest! come, let me wipe thy face.’ The trickling of sweat from the brows into the eyes might seriusly embarass a swordsman. J.C. Maxwell supplies me with an apt parallel from a seventeenth-century romance, quoted in Sir Charles Firth’s Essays Historical and Literary, p. 158: ‘The sweat of the Gyants browes ran into his eyes, and by the reason that he was so extreame fatte he grew so blinde that he could not see to endure combat with him any longer.’”
3756 fat] Wilson (ed. 1934, Glossary): “sweaty (v. note [above]).”
cam3 : standard
3757 napkin] Wilson (ed. 1934, Glossary)
1939 kit2
kit2
3755 shall] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “will surely.”
kit2
3756 fat] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “This adjective has given unnecessary trouble. The Queen, who understands sport (as her metaphor in [4.5.109-10 (2849)] shows, sees that Hamlet is panting and perspiring a little and remarks that he is fat, i.e., ‘not in perfect training,’ ‘not quite trained down.’ A modern trainer might use the same word, or he might say that Hamlet is ‘rather soft.’ Fat does not here mean ‘corpulent.’ Nobody who remembers how fat was used by old people in New England sixty years ago will be misled by this adjective.1”
<n> “1For Shakespeare’s time and later cf. Sidney, Arcadia, I, 16, 5 9ed. 1590, fol. 69 vo): ‘very faire, and of a fatnes rather to allure, then to mislike’; Greene, Never Too Late, 1590 (ed. Grosart, VIII, 187): ‘a louely fat paire of cheekes’; The London Prodigall, 1605 (B3, leaf 2 ro): ‘fat, faire, and louely’; Heywood, The Wise Woman of Hogsdon, iv (Pearson ed., V, 328): ‘fat, fresh and fayre’; Defoe Roxana (Cripplesgate ed., XII, 20): ‘They saw me . . . thin and looking almost like one starved, who was before fat and beautiful.’ Wilson accepts the suggestion of Bieber (Anglistisehe Arbeiten, III [1913], 69), Tilley (Journal of English and Germanic Philology, XXIV p1925], 315 ff.), and W.H. Dunn (Times Literary Supplement, May 26, 1927) that fat means ‘sweaty.’ Cf. E.v. Schaubert, Anglia, LII (1928), 93-96.”
kit2
3758 carowses] Kittredge (ed. 1939): “drinks a full draught. See [1.4.8 (611)].”
kit2 ≈ standard
3756 fat] Kittredge (ed. 1939, Glossary):
3757 napkin
3757 napkin] Kittredge (ed. 1939, Glossary):
3758 carowses] Kittredge (ed. 1939, Glossary):
1936 cam3b
cam3b
3756 Wilson (2nd ed. 1936, Additional Notes): “Cf. M.P. Tilley, Journ. Eng. and Germ. Phil. xxiv. 315-19, who calls attention to the popular belief of Sh.’s time that perspiration was oozing fat, and corr. T.L.S. May 26, 1927. Cf. above 3.4.92-3 [2469-70].”
1938 parc
parc ≈ standard (Cam3 ?)
3756 fat]
1942 n&h
n&h ≈ standard
3756 fat]
1947 cln2
cln2 ≈ standard
3756 fat]
cln2 ≈ standard
3757 napkin
Cln2
3756 fat] Rylands (ed. 1947, Notes): “It is ludicrous to suppose that Shakespeare is referring to the increasing corpulence of his tragic actor Richard Burbage. ‘Fat’ means no more than puffed or overheated, out of condition.”
1951 alex
Alex ≈ standard
3756 fat]
1951 crg2
crg2=crg1
3756 fat] Craig (ed. 1951): “It has been recently suggested that fat means ‘sweaty.’ Emendations faint and hot have been proposed.”
crg2=crg1
3758 carowses]
1951 crg2
crg2≈ standard
3757 napkin] Craig (ed. 1954, Glossary)
1954 sis
sis ≈ standard
3757 napkin] Sisson (ed. 1954, Glossary):
1956 Sisson
Sisson : cam3 ; alex ; kit2
3756 fat]
Sisson (1956, 2:229): <p. 229>“
Steevens has a charming note upon
fat. John Lowin, he suggests, was the original Falstaff, and his corpulence is again referred to here when playing Hamlet.
fat ((‘corpulent’)) is now happily abandoned.
Dover Wilson glosses as ‘sweaty’,
Alexander as ‘hot’, and
Kittredge, correctly, as ‘out of condition’, ‘out of training.’ The debate may perhaps be helped by the precise phrasing of evidence given in Chancery in 1578 ((C 24/130/Nicholas v Nicholas)): the black nag, ‘but new taken vp from gresse ((grass)) . . . is fatt and ffoggy’, and therefore should not be put to hard work at once. ‘fat and foggy’ clearly has the sense of ‘out of training and
scant of breath’.”
1957 pel1
pel1 : standard
3756 fat]
pel1 : standard
3757 napkin]
1970 pel2
pel2=pel1
3756 fat]
1974 evns1
evns1≈ crg2 w/o attribution
3756 fat]
1980 pen2
pen2 ≈ standard
3757 napkin]
pen2
3756 fat] Spencer (ed. 1980): “The word fat (in both Q2 and F) is incongruous. There is slight evidence that it could mean ‘sweaty’, but the usual meaning was the same as today. Possibly the Queen’s tone is bantering, giving expression to her motherly happiness at her now well-behaved son. But the word may be wrong. What the sense needs is something like ‘he sweats and scants his breath.’ None of the emendations suggested so far (e.g. ‘faint’, ‘hot’) is satisfactory.”
pen2
3757 napkin] Spencer (ed. 1980): “This move of the Queen can appear significant: she openly goes over to Hamlet’s ‘side’, leaving the throne and the King. It may be a relic of the old motivation which appears in Q1: having secretly allied herself with Hamlet against the King, she suspects some treachery and is warning her son.”
pen2
3758 The Queene] Spencer (ed. 1980): “((as well as the King)).”
1980 Smith
Smith
3758-62 ] Smith (1980, p. 206): the queen’s “death is symbolic of the internal disharmony caused by her divided loyalties. In order to honor Hamlet, she directly disobeys Claudius for the first time. . . . Gertrude dies asserting that she is poisoned and calling out for her ’dear Hamlet,’ but still not attacking Claudius.”
1982 ard2
ard2
3756 fat] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “sweaty; alternatively, out of condition. LN [Longer Notes].”
ard2 : Wilson (WHH) ; Tilley ; Sisson (NR) ; contra Hotson
3756 fat]
Jenkins (ed. 1982, Longer Notes, 568-9): <p. 568>“The precise meaning of this word is difficult to establish. But few now see in it an allusion to the actor’s corpulence, any more than in the ‘thirty years’ since Hamlet’s birth ((see [5.1.139-57] and LN)) a reflection of Burbage’s age. Cf.
WHH, p 284n. In association with ‘scant of breath’
fat must refer to </p. 568><p. 569>Hamlet’s state at the moment rather than to a permanent characteristic, and the offer of the ‘napkin’ to wipe his face indicates what his state is. With [3757, 3766], cf. [
2H4 2.4.207], where Doll says to Falstaff when he has beaten Pistol downstairs, ‘how thou sweat’st! Come, let me wipe thy face!’ The equation of
fat with ‘sweating’ is strongly supported by Tilley with evidence for the notion that sweat was produced by the melting of fat ((
JEGP, xxiv, 315-19), and Shakespearean instances include
Hamlet [3.4.92]. But no certain and authenticated parallel has been given for
fat as an epithet for the condition, rather than the cause, of sweating. A passage cited from Richard Johnson’s
Seven Champions of Christendom describes a giant with sweat running into his eyes, who was ‘so extremely fat, he grew blind’ ((1608, p. 52)); but it is far from clear that
fat here describes the giant’s sweating without attributing it to his bulk. It seems likely, however, that an ancient usage was preserved by the farmer’s wife in Wisconsin in 1923 who is reported to have greeted perspiring visitors with ‘How fat you all are!’ (
TLS, 1927, p. 375)).
“The alternative interpretation, out of condition, would make fat denote no so much the accompaniment as the cause of being out of breath. Sisson (NR, ii. 229)) cites a Chancery case of 1578 in which a nag ‘but new taken up from grass’ and so not ready for hard work, was said to be ‘fat and foggy’; and a 19th-century survival of this sense occurs in the Autobiography of Sir Harry Smith, who describes troops as ‘fat and in bad wind’ after a long time on board ship ((I.199)). It is not fatal to this interpretation that it does not square with the ‘continual practice’ of [3660].
“Less plausible than either of these is Hotson’s assumption that fat means full ((Spectator, 1952, p. 701)): supposing that Hamlet has but just dined, he would draw a parallel with his father, killed in his resting-time when ‘full of bread’ ((III.iii.80)).”
ard2 ≈ standard
3757 napkin]
1984 chal
chal : standard
3757 napkin]
1985 cam4
cam4 ≈ ard2
3756 fat] Edwards (ed. 1985): “It is hard indeed to think of Hamlet as a fat man—and if Burbage was corpulent, all the less reason for calling attention to it. ‘sweaty’ has been suggested as the meaning of ‘fat’ but it is not properly attested. Probably the queen meens that he is soft, out of condition, in poor trim. It is interesting that the word ‘fat’ is associated with shortness of breath at 3.4.154, in the phrase, ‘the fatness of these pursy times’ ((see the note)).”
cam4 ≈ standard
3757 napkin]
cam4 ≈ standard
3758 carowses]
1987 oxf4
oxf4 ≈ standard
3757 napkin]
oxf4 : contra standard
3756 fat] Hibbard (ed. 1987): “This remark has been the subject of much debate because it has been taken as an objective one. It looks more like a bit of maternal solicitude. Gertrude is eager to find ane xcuse for her sons hould he lose the match; and her solicitude becomes all the more evident if Hamlet is neither fat nor scant of breath.”
1988 bev2
bev2: standard
3756 fat]
bev2: standard
3757 napkin]
bev2: standard
3758 carowses]
1993 dent
dent ≈ ard2
3757 fat]
dent
3758 carowses] Andrews (ed. 1989): “offers a toast and then drinks a full cup without pausing to breathe.”
1992 fol2
fol2≈ standard
3757 napkin]
fol2≈ standard
3758 carowses]
n.d. Tannenbaum
Tannenbaum
3756 He’s fat, and scant of breath]
Tannenbaum (n.d., pp. 378-9): <p. 378> “A line about which there has been much throwing about of brains is the Queen’s remark that ‘He’s fat and scant of breath’. A fat hamlet seems about as impossible as a lean Falstaff. Commentators have therefore proposed either to substitute ‘hot’ or ‘faint’ for ‘fat’, or to interpret ‘fat’ as meaning ‘not in good form’, ‘untrained’, or ‘perspiring’. Some have taken refuge in the conjecture that Shakspere was referring not to Hamlet’s physique tbut to that of Burbage, the first impersonator of the rôle. But I am not satisfied that Burbage was the first Hamlet or that Shakspere would have done violence to his creation by an unnecessary and indefensible reference to one of the physical caracteristics [sic] of the actor. If Hamlet (Burbage) had been fat and dyspnoeic the King’s remark about drinking ‘to Hamlet’s better breath’ would have had such a comic effect as Shakspere could not have intented [sic] at that moment. A panting Hamlet would not have accepted the challenge, in the first place. A perspiring Hamlet seems to me pointless, inasmuch as perspiration during a fencing bout does not impair one’s skill or endurance. ‘Hot’ and ‘faint’ are equally objectionable readings. Is there, then, no solution for the difficulty? Must we continue to read of a fat Hamlet but think of a slender one? Was the ‘mould of form’ overweighted with avoirdupois? Not at all. When the Queen made her much-discussed remark she was thinking of Laertes, not of Hamlet. That this is so should be evident from a careful consideration of this part of the scene. </p. 378>
<p. 379> “Hamlet scores a hit which Laertes seeks to delay. Osric decides that it was ‘ a very palpable hit’. Immediatily [sic] thereafter Hamlet scores another hit. Thereupon the King, thoroughly alarmed at Laertes’ lack of skill, but concealing his chagrin, affably assures the Queen ‘our son shall win’. The proud mother suppresses her satisfaction—as we all do when we or those who belong to us are praised—and with a slightly deprecating look in the direction of Laertes says: ‘He’s fat and scant of breath’.
“Hamlet, we must remember, has been ‘in continual practice’ since Laertes went to France. Laertes, on the contrary, was in all probability ‘plying his music’ besides indulging in those ‘taints of liberty’ (‘drinking, fencing, swearing, quarrelling, drabbing’, etc.) which his father sanctioned. We may rest assured that Lamond’s praises were greatly exaggerated by the King—for the purpose, undoubtedly, of making the conceited Laertes the instrument of Hamlet’s death.
“Under the circumstances, the Queen’s words cannot be differently interpreted. She surely does not mean to say to the King: ‘I do not think our son will win,—he’s too fat and short-winded for that.’ Nor can we imagine her saying: ‘How wonderful! Our son is so clever! He will win though he is afflicted with dyspnoea and obesity!’ And neither would a fond mother be likely to say: ‘I am not so optimistic as your Majesty, even though he has scored the first two hits; he is too fat and short-winded to keep up the pace.’ It is because he is in such good form that she carouses to her son’s fortune.” </p. 379>
719 2743+42 3756 3757 3758
[Ed. HLA:Given the ranges of conjectures (“faint” and “hot”, this probably follows the date of N&Q 1864, perhaps also the
Furness variorum, since Tannenbaum summarizes the conjectures contained in
Furness.?]
