Previous posts:
Act I, Scene 1: The Crazy Occult Forays of Marcellus and Horatio.
Act I, Scene 2: Claudius is the villain, but he's still hotter than you.



Enter LAERTES and OPHELIA
LAERTES
My necessaries are embark'd: farewell:
And, sister, as the winds give benefit
And convoy is assistant, do not sleep,
But let me hear from you.

OPHELIA
Do you doubt that?

LAERTES
For Hamlet and the trifling of his favour,
Hold it a fashion and a toy in blood,
A violet in the youth of primy nature,
Forward, not permanent, sweet, not lasting,
The perfume and suppliance of a minute; No more.

Ophelia is...rather important to me. I doubt she would be, naturally speaking, if I hadn't decided years ago that no one understood her but me and thus adopted her as my own personal cause celebre, but I did, and I have, and there it is.

I put a lot of stock in the first appearances and first lines of major characters. By that token, I will point out that Ophelia's first line is a question that her brother doesn't answer. He seems not even to hear it.

"A violet in the youth of primy nature": I wrote a paper when I was in school on the uses of violets in Hamlet. Wish I knew where it was now. Laertes uses violets here as a metaphor for intense, passionate, dangerous feelings that don't last. Compare that to Ophelia's later line, when she's mad: "I would give you violets, but they withered all when my father died." Is she saying that her love for Hamlet died when he murdered her father? There are a number of things that I wish Shakespeare had written, just to see what they would look like after being translated through his brain. A play about Elizabeth I, for instance. I wish Hamlet had seen Ophelia mad, because once she goes mad everyone listens to her. More about that later.

OPHELIA
No more but so?

LAERTES
Think it no more;

"Don't trust your own judgment. Do what your brother says. By the way, here's a pamphlet for a nice convent."

For nature, crescent, does not grow alone

That would be the first of a number of very awkward penis metaphors that Ophelia will have to endure from both Laertes and Polonius as this scene continues. Christ, give a girl a complex, why don't you.

Perhaps he loves you now,
And now no soil nor cautel doth besmirch
The virtue of his will: but you must fear,
His greatness weigh'd, his will is not his own;
For he himself is subject to his birth:
He may not, as unvalued persons do,
Carve for himself; for on his choice depends
The safety and health of this whole state;
And therefore must his choice be circumscribed
Unto the voice and yielding of that body
Whereof he is the head.

"Face it, sis: you're cute, but you're not exactly queen material." This seems reasonable to me---considering who her father is, very little material advantage would return to the throne of Denmark from a union between Hamlet and Ophelia. I shouldn't think it would be allowed either. And yet, at Ophelia's funeral, Gertrude plainly says that she expected Ophelia and Hamlet to marry. Is she just letting her romantic sensibilities run away with her, or did Claudius think perhaps that Ophelia was a nice, safe person for Hamlet to marry, in that all her relatives were already under his thumb and not likely to make any trouble for Denmark as the family of a foreign princess might?

Anyway, I don't care that he's making sense, it is still icky that Laertes is having this conversation with his sister. ICKY.

Then if he says he loves you,
It fits your wisdom so far to believe it
As he in his particular act and place
May give his saying deed; which is no further
Than the main voice of Denmark goes withal.
Then weigh what loss your honour may sustain,
If with too credent ear you list his songs,
Or lose your heart, or your chaste treasure open
To his unmaster'd importunity.

I go back and forth wondering whether Ophelia actually did have sex with Hamlet. I think there's evidence both ways. More to the point, however, I don't think it MATTERS. A girl in her position is made by what other people chose to think about her, and anything she does can be interpreted either innocently or lewdly, depending on the agenda of the people around her. I think Ophelia is probably a very young teenager, 15-16 or thereabouts, because the evidence would suggest that she's grown up in the royal court, but she hasn't yet acquired the guile of an experienced courtier. Unfortunately, the only people around her to correct that are Polonius and Laertes, and she's light-years smarter than either of them.

Fear it, Ophelia, fear it, my dear sister,
And keep you in the rear of your affection,
Out of the shot and danger of desire.
The chariest maid is prodigal enough,
If she unmask her beauty to the moon:
Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes:
The canker galls the infants of the spring,
Too oft before their buttons be disclosed,
And in the morn and liquid dew of youth
Contagious blastments are most imminent.

"Basically, and I'm not about to fix this because you're my sister and EW, but you probably don't quite get how sex works, so just take my advice and run whenever you see Hamlet coming. EW, SISTER, DOUBLE ENTENDRE, SQUICK."

Be wary then; best safety lies in fear:
Youth to itself rebels, though none else near.

That just sums up everything Ophelia's family thinks of her in a trice, doesn't it? She's a child and they don't want her to grow up or develop the ability to judge for herself. Why should she need to? They'll always be around to look after her. Unless, you know, Laertes is about to fuck off to France, and Polonius is about to get his ass killed or something.

OPHELIA
I shall the effect of this good lesson keep,
As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother,
Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven;
Whiles, like a puff'd and reckless libertine,
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads,
And recks not his own rede.

I told you Ophelia was smarter than the rest of her family. She's a little bit clever; she has a gentle, teasing wit that she probably doesn't dare give much reign to because Polonius would have no use for a mouthy daughter. I used to wonder, just a bit, what drew Hamlet to her, and that may be it---a spark of something special in her that in time might have grown into something less fragile and more enduring.

LORD POLONIUS
Yet here, Laertes! aboard, aboard, for shame!
The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,
And you are stay'd for. There; my blessing with thee!
And these few precepts in thy memory
See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue,
Nor any unproportioned thought his act.
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new-hatch'd, unfledged comrade. Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in,
Bear't that the opposed may beware of thee.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy;
For the apparel oft proclaims the man,
And they in France of the best rank and station
Are of a most select and generous chief in that.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to thine ownself be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Farewell: my blessing season this in thee!

You know, Polonius is undeniably an idiot, but I have always found that passage rather moving. It's chock full of common sense, and a kid traveling into a foreign country could do worse for advice. On the other hand, Polonius has probably made this speech to Laertes several times already.

LAERTES
Farewell, Ophelia; and remember well
What I have said to you.

OPHELIA
'Tis in my memory lock'd,
And you yourself shall keep the key of it.

"I am using this key metaphor so that neither one of us will have to examine your 'chaste treasure' line too closely."

LORD POLONIUS
What is't, Ophelia, be hath said to you?

"There will be no privacy in this house, young lady. Only whores need privacy."

OPHELIA
So please you, something touching the Lord Hamlet.

LORD POLONIUS
Marry, well bethought:
'Tis told me, he hath very oft of late
Given private time to you; and you yourself
Have of your audience been most free and bounteous:
If it be so, as so 'tis put on me,
And that in way of caution, I must tell you,
You do not understand yourself so clearly
As it behoves my daughter and your honour.

"WHAT DID I JUST SAY ABOUT PRIVACY. From now on, there will be no more locks in the house. Or keys. In fact, no more doors either."

What is between you? give me up the truth.

Laertes and Polonius both seem to be in the habit of speaking to Ophelia as though she were at any moment on the point of doing something evil and profligate. Ophelia has been in the grip of control freaks all her life.

OPHELIA
He hath, my lord, of late made many tenders
Of his affection to me.

LORD POLONIUS
Affection! pooh! you speak like a green girl,
Unsifted in such perilous circumstance.
Do you believe his tenders, as you call them?

OPHELIA
I do not know, my lord, what I should think.

LORD POLONIUS
Marry, I'll teach you: think yourself a baby;
That you have ta'en these tenders for true pay,
Which are not sterling. Tender yourself more dearly;
Or--not to crack the wind of the poor phrase,
Running it thus--you'll tender me a fool.

Ophelia's relationship with Laertes is a very different thing from her relationship with Polonius. When Laertes launched into his monologue about keys and treasure chests and other sexy things, Ophelia apparently went into a smile-and-nod mode of sisterly placation, a bit like she didn't take him seriously enough to argue with him. He's just her brother, after all, and he's about to fuck off to France. Polonius, on the other hand, has the ability to make her life a living hell. With Laertes, she answered questions with questions and never bothered to give him her opinion; here with Polonius, she tries to pretend she doesn't even have one. She betrays herself a second later, as though stirred up by the harsh tone Polonius takes with her. He mocks her fiercely with the repetition of "tenders", and she can't keep herself from responding, even though she submits in the end. Laertes was kinder---he spoke of the loss of Ophelia's own honor, while Polonius speaks only of the damage she may do to his. Laertes, whom she does not fear, is gone, and her only advisor now is Polonius, to whom she's not really a person.

OPHELIA
My lord, he hath importuned me with love
In honourable fashion.

LORD POLONIUS
Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to.

OPHELIA
And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord,
With almost all the holy vows of heaven.

I love the brief glimpse of her, bristling with indignation---although for a moment I see her as Polonius must, and wince, because she does sound dreadfully naive.

LORD POLONIUS
Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know,
When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul
Lends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter,
Giving more light than heat, extinct in both,
Even in their promise, as it is a-making,
You must not take for fire.

"Did I ever tell you about your Grandpappy Polonius, who hunted woodcocks with springes for nigh on thirty years? That's why everyone in the family uses that particular metaphor at least once in this play. It's a Polonius family tradition."

And again, although I hate to admit it, he's making sense. He knows what men are. But he's the type of person whose insight never exceeds the boundaries of his experience, so he's incapable of applying the same degree of understanding to his daughter.

For Lord Hamlet,
Believe so much in him, that he is young
And with a larger tether may he walk
Than may be given you: in few, Ophelia,
Do not believe his vows; for they are brokers,
Not of that dye which their investments show,
But mere implorators of unholy suits,
Breathing like sanctified and pious bawds,
The better to beguile. This is for all:
I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth,
Have you so slander any moment leisure,
As to give words or talk with the Lord Hamlet.
Look to't, I charge you: come your ways.

I like that he tries to give Hamlet credit for maybe thinking he's sincere, much as Laertes did. Or maybe he's just figured out that badmouthing Hamlet isn't the way to make Ophelia listen to him.

But oh, that awful, final interdiction. She's trapped, and she knows it.

OPHELIA
I shall obey, my lord.

What else can she do?



Tomorrow: Act I, Scene 4: A scene that would be hilarious if animated by the creators of Strong Bad.