Although it is not his most famous soliloquy from the play, Hamlet’s ‘’Tis now the very witching time of night’ speech, which brings Act 3 Scene 2 to a close, is notable for the imagery Hamlet uses as he prepares to go and speak to his mother, Gertrude. Indeed, as […]
Hamlet’s ‘What a piece of work is a man’ speech is among the most famous prose speeches from Shakespeare’s play. It has become well-known, and is sometimes used in television and radio adverts; it was also memorably recited by Richard E. Grant’s character Withnail at the end of the British […]
‘Something is rotten in the state of Denmark’ is a famous line from Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, but since Hamlet is positively brimming with famous lines, it doesn’t get as much attention as other famous quotations from the play. Many of us know, and some may use, phrases such as ‘to […]
Ophelia’s ‘O, what a noble mind is here o’erthrown!’ speech occurs in Act 3 Scene 1 of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, just after one of Hamlet’s most famous speeches from the play. What inspires Ophelia’s words, and what are we to make of them? They constitute, along with her famous tragic ‘mad’ […]
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) As Hugh Leonard once said, ‘Hamlet is a terrific play, but there are way too many quotations in it.’ So many lines from Shakespeare’s Hamlet have become famous to people who have never read, studied, or watched the play. As a result, these quotations […]