Act 3

Scene 1: After Rosencrantz and Guildenstern report their failure to find the cause of Hamlet’s madness, Polonius places Ophelia where he and Claudius may secretly observe a meeting between her and Hamlet. Hamelt is at first courteous to Ophelia, but suddenly he turns on her: he denies having loved her, asks where her father is, attacks womankind, and tells her she should enter a nunnery. After Hamlet exists, Claudius decides that Hamlet’s erratic behaviour is not caused by love and announces a plan to send Hamlet on an embassy to England. Polonius persuades Claudius to take no action until Gertrude talks with Hamlet after the play, which is scheduled for that evening.

Scene 2: Hamlet gives direction to the actors and asks Horatio to help him observe Claudius’s reaction to the play. When the court arrive, Hamlet makes bawdy and bitter comments to Ophelia. The traveling actors perform, in dumb show and then with dialogue, a story that includes many elements of Claudius’s alleged seduction of Gertrude and murder of King Hamlet. At the moment that the Player King is murdered in his garden by his nephew, Claudius stops the play and rushes out. Hamlet is exuberant that the Ghost’s word has been proved true. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern return to tell Hamlet that Claudius is furious and that Gertrude wishes to see Hamlet at once in her sitting room. Hamlet promises himself that he will not harm her, though he will “speak daggers.”

Scene 3: Claudius orders Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to take Hamlet to England. Polonius tells Claudius of his plans to spy on Hamlet’s conversation with Gertrude. Left alone, Claudius reveals his remorse for killing his brother, and he tries to pray. Hamlet comes upon him kneeling and draws his sword, but then stops to think that if he kills Claudius at prayer, Claudius will go to heaven. Hamlet decides to kill Claudius when the king is committing a sin so that Claudius will instead go to hell. After Hamlet leaves, Claudius rises, saying that he has been unable to pray.

Scene 4: In Gertrude’s room, Polonius hides behind a tapestry. Hamlet’s entrance so alarms Gertrude that she cries out for help. Polonius echoes her cry, and Hamlet, thinking Polonius to be Claudius, stabs him to death. Hamlet then verbally attacks his mother for marrying Claudius. In the middle of Hamlet’s attack, the Ghost returns to remind Hamlet that his real purpose is to avenge his father’s death. Gertrude cannot see the Ghost and pities Hamlet’s apparent madness. After the Ghost exist, Hamlet urges Gertrude to abandon Claudius’s bed. He then tells her about Claudius’s plan to send him to England and reveals his suspicions that he journey is a plot against him, which he resolves to counter violently. He exits dragging out Polonius’s body.

Questions

After getting chided by her own son, Gertrude says, “if words be made of breath/and breadth of life, I have no life to breath/What thou hast said to me” (III 4.219-221) What was Hamlet’s guilt ridden message to her? Give specific lines as proof.
Hamlet seems to be getting through to Gertrude when the Ghost enters (III 4.117) Why does the Ghost appear at this point? How is his appearance different than his appearances in Act 1? Who saw him then? Who sees him now? What is his message to Hamlet?
1. The ghost appears at this point to just tell Hamlet that he shouldn’t be mad at his mother. He was just serving as reminder that Gertrude isn’t the one who is at fault, Claudius is. He appears right after Hamlet admits the faults of his mother.
2. His appearance is different in this instance compared to his appearances in Act 1 because in this current act he is wearing his regular regal clothing, while in Act 1 he shows up in armor.
  1. People that saw the king then were Hamlet, Heratio, and Marcellus. Now the people that see the ghost is
    
    Hamlet.
3. His message to Hamlet is to ease up on his mother and focus on Claudius.