Hamlet - Act 5 Scene 1

A churchyard.

The script labels these characters as "Clowns," though the audience would see two working-class men; those familiar with the company might recognize them as comic performers.

The audience would infer that this conversation deals with Ophelia, even though she is never mentioned by name.

Suicides were forbidden Christian burial, and were buried outside of the cemetery, with no rites (some superstitions dictated burying them at a crossroads, with a stake through their heart, just in case).

Part of the Clown's comic routine is misusing academic words, as in his substitution of "argal" for "ergo."

Enter two Clowns [with spades and mattocks]

First Clown
Is she to be buried in Christian burial that wilfully seeks
her own salvation?

Second Clown
I tell thee she is: and therefore make her grave straight:
the crowner hath sat on her, and finds it Christian burial.

First Clown
How can that be, unless she drowned herself in her own
defence?

Second Clown
Why, 'tis found so.

First Clown
It must be 'se offendendo;' it cannot be else. For here lies
the point: if I drown myself wittingly, it argues an act:
and an act hath three branches: it is to act, to do, to
perform. Argal, she drowned herself wittingly.

Second Clown
Nay, but hear you, goodman delver–

This conversation, though comic in mode, continues discussion of the notion that actions in life will determine one's fate in the afterlife, recalling Hamlet's contemplation of murder and suicide, as well as Claudius' attempts at repentance.

First Clown
Give me leave. Here lies the water; good. Here stands
the man; good. If the man go to this water, and drown
himself, it is, will he, nill he he goes – mark you that; but
if the water come to him and drown him, he drowns not
himself: argal, he that is not guilty of his own death
shortens not his own life.

Second Clown
But is this law?

The First Clown's mistaken term for "coroner's inquest law," i.e. the determination of the coroner regarding the body.

First Clown
Ay, marry, is't; crowner's quest law.

Second Clown
Will you ha' the truth on't? If this had not been a
gentlewoman, she should have been buried out
o'Christian burial.

First Clown
Why, there thou say'st: and the more pity that great
folk should have countenance in this world to drown or
hang themselves, more than their even Christian. Come,
my spade. There is no ancient gentleman but gardeners,
ditchers, and grave-makers: they hold up Adam's
profession.

Second Clown
Was he a gentleman?

Here the First Clown quibbles on the meaning of "bearing arms," which can mean literally having or using arms, but more figuratively refers to having a coat of arms, which only noblemen or gentlemen would possess.

First Clown
He was the first that ever bore arms.

Second Clown
Why, he had none.

First Clown
What, art a heathen? How dost thou understand the Scripture?
The Scripture says 'Adam digged:' could he dig without arms?
I'll put another question to thee: if thou answerest me not to
the purpose, confess thyself—

The colloquial phrase would be "confess thyself, and be hanged;" the First Clown offers an ultimatum to test the Second's knowledge.

Second Clown
Go to. 35

First Clown
What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the
shipwright, or the carpenter?

Second Clown
The gallows-maker; for that frame outlives a thousand
tenants.

The First Clown casually jokes about death a fair bit. Here he reasons that, since the Second Clown insults the church in praising the gallows, he may himself be destined for a hanging.

First Clown
I like thy wit well, in good faith: the gallows does well;
but how does it well? It does well to those that do ill:
now thou dost ill to say the gallows is built stronger than
the church: argal, the gallows may do well to thee. To't
again, come.

Second Clown
'Who builds stronger than a mason, a shipwright, or a
carpenter?'

First Clown
Ay, tell me that, and unyoke.

Second Clown
Marry, now I can tell.

First Clown
To't.

Second Clown
Mass, I cannot tell.

Enter HAMLET and HORATIO, at a distance

"Your" here is colloquial, simply meaning "a;" the observation is about donkeys, not the Second Clown's anatomy.

Yaughan is presumably a local tavern-keeper, able to furnish the Clowns with drinks as they work.

The staging of the "digging" is challenging; original productions probably used a trapdoor, which would be used later in the scene as Ophelia's grave. More modern productions have used raised platforms, moving sections, split-level stages, or simply a space on the floor.

First Clown
Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your dull ass will
not mend his pace with beating; and, when you are asked
this question next, say 'a grave-maker: 'the houses that
he makes last till doomsday. Go, get thee to Yaughan:
fetch me a stoup of liquor.

Exit Second Clown
He digs and sings

In youth, when I did love, did love,
Methought it was very sweet,
To contract, O’the time, for, ah, my behove,
O, methought, there was nothing meet.

HAMLET
Has this fellow no feeling of his business, that he sings
at grave-making?

Horatio and Hamlet make essentially the same observation: being accustomed to something (even death) renders one desensitized to it, whereas those who have little experience with it are more affected.

The Clown's song, which may be sung quite cheerfully for comic effect, is nevertheless about aging, death, and burial.

HORATIO
Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness. 60

HAMLET
'Tis e'en so: the hand of little employment hath the
daintier sense.

First Clown
[Sings]
But age, with his stealing steps,
Hath clawed me in his clutch,
And hath shipped me intil the land,
As if I had never been such.

[Throws up a skull]

Hamlet's syntax is unusual here, but the reference is to the biblical Cain, who committed the first murder. According to Medieval legend, he murdered his brother Abel using the jaw-bone of an ass.

Hamlet moves from one speculation about the skull to another, imagining the indignity of having an important person's remains handled by a coarse fellow like the Clown.

HAMLET
That skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once; how
the knave jowls it to the ground, as if it were Cain's
jawbone, that did the first murder! It might be the pate
of a politician, which this ass now o'er-reaches; one that
would circumvent God, might it not?

HORATIO
It might, my lord.

HAMLET
Or of a courtier; which could say 'Good morrow, sweet
lord! How dost thou, good lord?' This might be my lord
such-a-one,that praised my lord such-a-one's horse,
when he meant to beg it; might it not?

HORATIO
Ay, my lord.

The language is convoluted, but Hamlet is repulsed and fascinated by the idea that these objects, which were once functioning, living human beings, now remain to be hurled about and mistreated by a common grave-digger.

HAMLET
Why, e'en so: and now my Lady Worm's; chapless, and
knocked about the mazzard with a sexton's spade; here's
fine revolution, an we had the trick to see't. Did these
bones cost no more the breeding, but to play at loggats
with 'em? Mine ache to think on't.

First Clown
[Sings]
A pick-axe, and a spade, a spade,
For and a shrouding sheet:
O, a pit of clay for to be made
For such a guest is meet.

Throws up another skull

Both Shakespeare and Hamlet here display a knowledge of legal terms: quiddities, quillets, etc. Similarly, statutes, recognizances, etc. are all terms dealing with land contracts. The main idea here is that after a lifetime of success in buying and selling land, a person will still end up with no more than a grave.

HAMLET
There's another: why may not that be the skull of a
lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets, his
cases, his tenures, and his tricks? Why does he suffer
this rude knave now to knock him about the sconce
with a dirty shovel, and will not tell him of his action of
battery? Hum! This fellow might be in's time a great
buyer of land, with his statutes, his recognizances, his
fines, his double vouchers, his recoveries: is this the fine
of his fines, and the recovery of his recoveries, to have
his fine pate full of fine dirt? Will his vouchers vouch
him no more of his purchases, and double ones too,
than the length and breadth of a pair of indentures?
The very conveyances of his lands will hardly lie in this
box; and must the inheritor himself have no more, ha?

HORATIO
Not a jot more, my lord.

HAMLET
Is not parchment made of sheepskins?

Parchment for contracts was made from very fine leather. Hamlet is playing with meanings again, as "sheep" and "calves" are also terms for simple-minded fools. He is suggesting that only fools could be comforted by contracts, legalities, or property, knowing that death will make them lose everything.

HORATIO
Ay, my lord, and of calf-skins too.

HAMLET
They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance in
that. I will speak to this fellow. Whose grave's this,
sirrah?

First Clown
Mine, sir.

Sings

O, a pit of clay for to be made
For such a guest is meet.

HAMLET
I think it be thine, indeed; for thou liest in't.

Hamlet has finally met an opponent who can equal him (or even excel him) at twisting meanings: the Clown and Hamlet play on various senses of owning or possessing a grave.

First Clown
You lie out on't, sir, and therefore it is not yours: for
my part, I do not lie in't, and yet it is mine.

HAMLET
Thou dost lie in't, to be in't and say it is thine: 'tis for
the dead, not for the quick; therefore thou liest.

First Clown
'Tis a quick lie, sir; 'twill away again, from me to you.

HAMLET
What man dost thou dig it for?

First Clown
For no man, sir.

HAMLET
What woman, then?

First Clown
For none, neither.

HAMLET
Who is to be buried in't?

First Clown
One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she's
dead.

Hamlet complains that society has become mixed and confused: peasants such as the Clown use language appropriate for a courtier. A "kibe" is a sore on the heel, so the image is that where the peasant and courtier were once decently distant, they now are so close together that the peasants' toe touches the courtier's heel.

HAMLET
How absolute the knave is! We must speak by the card,
or equivocation will undo us. By the Lord, Horatio,
these three years I have taken a note of it; the age is
grown so picked that the toe of the peasant comes so
near the heel of the courtier, he galls his kibe. How long
hast thou been a grave-maker?

First Clown
Of all the days i' the year, I came to't that day that our
last King Hamlet overcame Fortinbras.

HAMLET
How long is that since?

According to this revelation, and the detail below, Hamlet is 30 years old, and 30 years have passed since Old Hamlet's victory over Fortinbras. This age seems at odds with the references to "young Hamlet," and to some of the character's traits. It may be more important that the grave-digger began his work on the day Hamlet was born, a detail which makes the Clown into an allegorical figure representing death in general, and Hamlet's death in particular. Unlike Hamlet's notion in 3.1 of death as a terrifying mystery, this version of death seems comfortable, even companionable.

First Clown
Cannot you tell that? Every fool can tell that: it was the
very day that young Hamlet was born; he that is mad,
and sent into England.

HAMLET
Ay, marry, why was he sent into England?

First Clown
Why, because he was mad: he shall recover his wits
there; or, if he do not, it's no great matter there.

HAMLET
Why?

First Clown
’Twill not not be seen in him there; there the men are as
mad as he.

HAMLET
How came he mad?

First Clown
Very strangely, they say.

HAMLET
How strangely?

First Clown
Faith, e'en with losing his wits.

HAMLET
Upon what ground?

The Clown shifts abruptly here from toying with Hamlet to directly answering the question. Some physical business may fit in here to explain the shift-- Hamlet may begin to exit, or may threaten the Clown in some way.

This grisly consideration echoes earlier concerns and twists them: rather than focusing on the survival of a person's memory, the concern is now for the duration of physical remains.

First Clown
Why, here in Denmark. I have been sexton here, man
and boy, thirty years.

HAMLET
How long will a man lie i' the earth ere he rot?

First Clown
I' faith, if he be not rotten before he die – as we have
many pocky corses now-a-days, that will scarce hold the
laying in – he will last you some eight year or nine year:
a tanner will last you nine year.

HAMLET
Why he more than another?

First Clown
Why, sir, his hide is so tanned with his trade, that he
will keep out water a great while; and your water is a
sore decayer of your whoreson dead body. Here's a
skull now; this skull has lain in the earth three and
twenty years.

HAMLET
Whose was it?

First Clown
A whoreson mad fellow's it was: whose do you think it was?

HAMLET
Nay, I know not.

Yorick manages to be a remarkably memorable character, despite not actually appearing in the play. He also seems to provide a counterpoint and counterbalance to the image of Old Hamlet the warrior-king. Hamlet remembers his father as a distant god, but remembers Yorick for playfulness, joy, and physical contact.

First Clown
A pestilence on him for a mad rogue! A' poured a flagon
of Rhenish on my head once. This same skull, sir, was
Yorick's skull, the King's jester.

HAMLET
This?

First Clown
E'en that.

HAMLET
Let me see.

[Takes the skull]

Hamlet's abstract considerations of death now become concrete and specific, as he contemplates a lively, energetic jester reduced to a silent, stinking skull.

Hamlet returns to his thoughts of Ophelia and of make-up, realizing that no matter how thick the make-up (and, by extension, outward appearance of any kind), in the end, every person becomes a barren skull. The audience is reminded here of Ophelia's death, of which Hamlet is not yet aware.

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of
infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath borne me
on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred
in my imagination it is! My gorge rises at it. Here hung
those lips that I have kissed I know not how oft. Where
be your gibes now? Your gambols? Your songs? Your
flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on
a roar? Not one now, to mock your own grinning? Quite
chap-fallen? Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell
her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must
come; make her laugh at that. Prithee, Horatio, tell me
one thing.

HORATIO
What's that, my lord?

HAMLET
Dost thou think Alexander looked o' this fashion i' the
earth?

HORATIO
E'en so.

HAMLET
And smelt so? Pah!

[Puts down the skull]

HORATIO
E'en so, my lord.

A bung-hole is the stoppered hole in a barrel. Hamlet concocts a chain of events whereby Alexander might logically become a cork in a barrel of beer, and then improvises a poem or song on the subject.

HAMLET
To what base uses we may return, Horatio! Why may
not imagination trace the noble dust of Alexander, till
he find it stopping a bung-hole?

HORATIO
'Twere to consider too curiously, to consider so.

HAMLET
No, faith, not a jot; but to follow him thither with
modesty enough, and likelihood to lead it: as thus:
Alexander died, Alexander was buried, Alexander
returneth into dust; the dust is earth; of earth we make
loam; and why of that loam, whereto he was converted,
might they not stop a beer-barrel?
Imperious Caesar, dead and turned to clay,
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away.
O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,
Should patch a wall to expel the winter’s flaw!
But soft! But soft awhile: here comes the King.

This is another processional entrance, echoing the entrance to the court in 1.2 or the play in 3.2. Here the tone is somber and subdued, and the entrance may be accompanied by funeral music.

Enter in procession; Priest, the Corpse of OPHELIA, LAERTES and Mourners
following; CLAUDIUS, GERTRUDE

The Queen, the courtiers: who is this they follow?
And with such maimèd rites? This doth betoken
The corse they follow did with desperate hand
Fordo its own life: 'twas of some estate.
Couch we awhile, and mark.

Hamlet and Horatio are visible to the audience throughout, though not seen by the other characters until Hamlet interrupts the funeral. The staging here depends greatly on the stage and set, and whether there are physical objects behind which to hide, or whether they simply stand (or crouch) at some distance from the grave.

The Priest is forthright to the point of direct insult, which suggests that he is not pleased to be performing this ceremony, and elicits Laertes' anger.

[Retiring with HORATIO]

LAERTES
What ceremony else?

HAMLET
That is Laertes,
A very noble youth: mark.

LAERTES
What ceremony else?

First Priest
Her obsequies have been as far enlarged
As we have warranty: her death was doubtful;
And, but that great command o'ersways the order,
She should in ground unsanctified have lodged
Till the last trumpet: for charitable prayers,
Shards, flints and pebbles should be thrown on her;
Yet here she is allowed her virgin crants,
Her maiden strewments and the bringing home
Of bell and burial.

LAERTES
Must there no more be done?

Despite the official decision to bury Ophelia in hallowed ground, the Priest seems convinced that she was in fact a suicide, and that any rites accorded to her would thus be an insult to the honored dead.

First Priest
No more be done.
We should profane the service of the dead
To sing a requiem and such rest to her
As to peace-parted souls.

LAERTES
Lay her i' the earth:
And from her fair and unpolluted flesh
May violets spring! I tell thee, churlish priest,
A ministering angel shall my sister be,
When thou liest howling.

By convention, Hamlet is able to hear the funeral-goers, while remaining hidden from them.

HAMLET
What, the fair Ophelia!

GERTRUDE
Sweets to the sweet: farewell!

Ophelia is linked to flowers one final time, as Gertrude re-iterates her desire to have seen Hamlet and Ophelia wed.

[Scattering flowers]

I hoped thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's wife;
I thought thy bride-bed to have decked, sweet maid,
And not have strewed thy grave.

Laertes is once again caught between grief and rage, calling down curses on Hamlet, then, in a shockingly bold gesture, leaping in the grave to hold Ophelia's body.

LAERTES
O, treble woe
Fall ten times treble on that cursèd head,
Whose wicked deed thy most ingenious sense
Deprived thee of! Hold off the earth awhile,
Till I have caught her once more in mine arms.

Leaps into the grave

Mount Pelion, in Thessaly, was one of three mountains piled up by the Titans in their attempt to reach Olympus.

Now pile your dust upon the quick and dead,
Till of this flat a mountain you have made,
To o'ertop old Pelion, or the skyish head
Of blue Olympus.

Hamlet's entrance here is undeniably dramatic, though it may be performed in countless ways. It's worth noting that he identifies himself as "Hamlet the Dane," claiming both his name and his title.

HAMLET
[Advancing]
What is he whose grief
Bears such an emphasis? Whose phrase of sorrow
Conjures the wandering stars, and makes them stand
Like wonder-wounded hearers? This is I,
Hamlet the Dane.

Presumably the grave is shallow enough that the audience can see Hamlet and Laertes grappling within it. Hamlet's next lines indicate that Laertes is attempting to throttle him, while Hamlet remains composed enough to try to talk him out of it, rather than fighting back.

Leaps into the grave

LAERTES
The devil take thy soul!

[Grappling with him]

HAMLET
Thou pray'st not well.
I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat;
For, though I am not splenitive and rash,
Yet have I something in me dangerous,
Which let thy wiseness fear: hold off thy hand.

CLAUDIUS
Pluck them asunder.

GERTRUDE
Hamlet, Hamlet!

All
Gentlemen –

"Quiet" here means calm, rather than silent. Horatio has joined in the fray to try to calm Hamlet down. Depending on the number of actors available, the scene can become quite chaotic at this point, threatening to turn into a brawl before Hamlet and Laertes are separated.

HORATIO
Good my lord, be quiet.

[The Attendants part them, and they come out of the grave]

HAMLET
Why I will fight with him upon this theme
Until my eyelids will no longer wag.

GERTRUDE
O my son, what theme?

Hamlet's declaration of love here is forceful, though belated.

HAMLET
I loved Ophelia: forty thousand brothers
Could not, with all their quantity of love,
Make up my sum. What wilt thou do for her?

Laertes, who has not spoken for some time, is evidently still enraged, and may be forcibly restrained from attacking Hamlet. Claudius is clearly working to calm Laertes (presumably in the interest of delaying the conflict until the planned fencing bout), while Gertrude may be addressing either Laertes or Hamlet.

Hamlet remains combative, issuing a series of bizarre and exaggerated challenges to Laertes. This may be a sincere challenge, or else a mockery of Laertes' grand gestures.

CLAUDIUS
O, he is mad, Laertes.

GERTRUDE
For love of God, forbear him.

HAMLET
'Swounds, show me what thou'lt do:
Woo't weep? Woo't fight? Woo't fast? Woo't tear thyself?
Woo't drink up eisel? Eat a crocodile?
I'll do't. Dost thou come here to whine?
To outface me with leaping in her grave?
Be buried quick with her, and so will I:
And, if thou prate of mountains, let them throw
Millions of acres on us, till our ground,
Singeing his pate against the burning zone,
Make Ossa like a wart! Nay, an thou'lt mouth,
I'll rant as well as thou.

GERTRUDE
This is mere madness:
And thus awhile the fit will work on him;
Anon, as patient as the female dove,
When that her golden couplets are disclosed,
His silence will sit drooping.

Hamlet seems calmer here, though he may be sincere or mocking. His sincerity here would suggest some kind of madness, as he should be well aware of the wrongs he has done to Laertes. His final lines may be insulting or self-mocking; the meaning is that creatures will act according to their nature, and that even the lowliest animal will have its moment. The choice to make in performance is whether he refers to himself or to Laertes.

Claudius once more resumes his role as arranger and manipulator, consoling Laertes with the revenge-plan.

The "living monument" may mean a lasting monument, perhaps similar to the statues described at the end of Romeo and Juliet. It could also be a reference to Hamlet's imminent death, as a revenge honouring Ophelia.

HAMLET
Hear you, sir;
What is the reason that you use me thus?
I loved you ever: but it is no matter;
Let Hercules himself do what he may,
The cat will mew and dog will have his day. Exit

CLAUDIUS
I pray you, good Horatio, wait upon him.

Exit HORATIO

[Aside to LAERTES]

Strengthen your patience in our last night's speech;
We'll put the matter to the present push.
Good Gertrude, set some watch over your son.
This grave shall have a living monument:
An hour of quiet shortly shall we see;
Till then, in patience our proceeding be.

Exeunt