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Line 3902 - 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 2951-end ed. Hardin A. Aasand

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

3902 Take vp the {bodies,} <body;> such a sight as this,	5.2.401

1773 jen

jen

3902 bodies] Jennens (ed. 1773) : “body]] “So according to these editors [POPE, THEOBALD, HANMER, WARBURTON], only the body of Hamlet was to be taken up, and the rest lie and rot where they were.”

[1839] knt1 (nd)

knt1

3902 bodies] Knight (ed. [1839]) : “Fortinbras has ordered ‘Let four captains Bear Hamlet, like a soldier, to the stage.’ This was a peculiar honour which he meant for him. We give the concluding stage direction, as we find it in the folio. ‘Exeunt, bearing off the bodies ,’ is a modern addition.”

1854 del2

del2 : standard

3902 bodies] Delius (ed. 1854) : “So die Fol. mit Recht, da es sich hier um den mit kriegerischen Ehren zu geleitenden Leichnam Hamlet’s handelt. Die meisten Herausgeber lesen mit den Qs. bodies.” [So the Fol, correctly [with body], because it handles here the escorting of Hamlet’s body with military honor. Most editors read with the Qq bodies.]

1857 dyce1

dyce1

3902 Take vp the bodies] Dyce (ed. 1857) : “The folio has ‘Take up the body,’ &c.—which Caldecott, Mr. Knight, and Mr. Collier, adopt, though it is such a manifest error, that, even without the authority of any old copy, an editor would be bound to make the word plural. Fortinbras is now speaking of the bodies generally,—of Hamlet, the King, the Queen, and Laertes, who are all lying dead, and who, he says, present a spectacle tht only becomes the field of battle. It would almost seem that the restorers of ‘body’ had forgotten what precedes the present speech, viz,— [cites 3872-94]

1857 elze1

elze1

3902 bodies] Elze (ed. 1857, 263-4): <p. 263>"QB folgg. Obgleich QA und FA in </p. 263> <p. 264>der Lesart: Take up the body, übereinstimmen, sind wir hier doch ((mit Schlegel)) QB gefolgt. Fortinbras meint offenbar die übrigen Leichen, welche er, im Gegensatze zu Hamlets Leichnam, ohne irgend eine Feierlichkeit wegtragen lässt." [Q2ff. Although Q1 and F1 correspond in their reading, ’Take up the body,’ we are here though (with Schlegel)) following Q2. Fortinbras means clearly the remaining bodies, which he, in opposition to Hamlet’s body, allows to be carried away without any ceremony.]

1859 Dyce3

Dyce3 : col

3902 Take vp the bodies] Dyce (1859, pp. 192-3) : <p. 192> “In this passage Mr. Collier most improperly prints, with </p. 192> <p. 193> the folio, ‘Take up the body,’ instead of adopting the reading of the quartos, 1604, &c., ‘Take up the bodies,’— ‘the bodies of Hamlet, the King, the Queen, and Laertes; which bodies are manifestly alluded to in what immediately follows, ‘Such a sight as this,’ &c.” </p. 192>

1866 dyce2

dyce2 = dyce1

3902 Take vp the bodies]

1869 tsch

tsch

3902 bodies] Tschischwitz (ed. 1869): “Dass es bodies heissen muss, beweisen die Worte: Such a sight as this becomes the field (dem Schlactfelde), was doch von dem einen Körper des Hamlet nicht gesagt werden kann.” [“That bodies must name it the words (Such a sight as this becomes the field (the battlefield)), which however one would not have from the single body of Hamlet.”]

1872 del4

del4

3902 bodies] Delius (ed. 1872) : “So die Qs. in Verbindung mit den folgenden Worten und in Beziehung auf Horatio’s frühere Worte: give order that these bodies etc.—Q.A. [Q1] und dieFol. haben body, auf Hamlet’s Leiche bezüglich.” [So the Qs. in the conjunction with the following words and in relation to Horatio’s earlier words: give order that these bodies etc.—Q1 and the Folio have body, referring to Hamlet’s body.]

1877 neil

neil ≈ Hunter ; Kreyssig

3902ff Neil (ed. 1877, Notes): “Joseph Hunter objects to the conclusion of this tragedy, that it exhibits a ‘pandering to the corrupt English taste in tragedy,’ that the audience loves ‘a clear stage.’ ‘We start,’ he says ‘with a ghost of a murdered king; then there die, two children, Laertes and Ophelia, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern. Of the conspicuous characters only Horatio is left alive’—New Illustrations of Shakespeare, vol. ii, p. 207. But a distinguished Shakespearian critic defends the poet from this opprobrium by thus explaining the morale of the catastrophe: ‘The horrible harvest of death in the fifth act shows that aimless weakness, even though clad in the finest garb of intellectual keenness, spreads around it far mroe misery than the most inconsiderate violence’—F. Kreyssig’s Vorlesungen über Shakespeare, p. 263.”

1882 elze2

elze2

3902 bodies] Elze (ed. 1882): “The agreement between [Q1] and [F1] decides. Although in §240 Horatio expresses a wish ‘that these bodies High on a stage be placed to the view’ [3872-3], yet Fortinbrasse is here speaking of Hamlet’s body exclusively, Hamlet being the only one to whom he accords military honours.”

1937 pen1a

pen1a :

3902 bodies] Harrison (ed. 1937): "On the stage presumably the King, the Queen and Laertes die within the inner stage, and their bodies are hidden by the curtain, thereby leaving only Hamlet’s body to be carried away ceremoniously."