Act 4 Scene 1

1. Act 4 Scene 1 Alone together, the King and Queen tell each other lies. The King asks Gertrude to ‘translate’ her sobs. She tells Claudius that ‘in [his] brainish apprehension’ Hamlet has killed Polonius. Claudius maintains that ‘this mad young man’ is a danger to everyone and must be shipped off to England next morning. He sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to find Hamlet and recover the body.

2. Act 4 Scenes 2 and 3 These scenes consist of 3 episodes: • R + G discover Hamlet, who has hidden Polonius’s body. He leads them on a chase. • Public opinion is beginning to ferment. Claudius explains that he cannot put Hamlet on trial because he is so popular. R + G bring Hamlet to Claudius. Hamlet taunts Claudius and eventually says where the body is. Claudius tells Hamlet he is being sent to England for his ‘especial safety…with fiery quickness’ but he can hardly keep back telling Hamlet what is waiting for him at the end of the voyage. We sense Hamlet and Claudius are playing a game with each other. Hamlet bids Claudius farewell as his ‘mother’.

3. Act 4 Scenes 2 and 3 These scenes consist of 3 episodes: 3) Alone on stage, Claudius reveals to the audience he is sending Hamlet to his death.

4. Act 4 Scene 4 Hamlet encounters Fortinbras and reflects on the nature of honour. • We meet young Fortinbras, leading his army across Denmark on its way to fight Poland. We learn nothing more about him. • Hamlet asks the Captain of Fortinbras’s army the purpose of their expedition. The Captain tells him they are fighting for a worthless piece of land. The Poles and Norwegians will fight for it, simply to win ‘honour’. Hamlet is disgusted.

5. Act 4 Scene 4 Hamlet encounters Fortinbras and reflects on the nature of honour. 3) Alone, Hamlet considers the action of Fortinbras and compares it with his own. As when he compared himself with the actor (Act 2, Scene 2) the comparison leaves him feeling ashamed. He resolves to have bloody thoughts from now on.

6. Act 4 Scene 5 Polonius dead, Ophelia goes mad and Laertes returns to avenge his father’s death. • We hear of a girl who is ‘distract’ and pitiable. Horatio advises Gertrude, despite her reluctance, to talk to her lest people start to have dangerous thoughts. • Alone for the only time in the play, Gertrude describes her soul as sick with sin and apprehension. • Ophelia comes in, followed by Claudius. She sings confusedly about death and betrayal. Her madness is ‘pretty’ and moving.

7. Act 4 Scene 5 4) The King is anxious. He tells Gertrude the people are uneasy, speculating Polonius’s death; Laertes has returned secretly from France. 5) A messenger describes the ‘impiteous haste’ with which Laertes and his supporters (who are wanting Laertes to be King) are reaching the castle. Laertes burst in, demanding to know how his father died. 6) Coolly and brazenly, Claudius rises to the challenge and promises to give Laertes a full account. Their conversation is interrupted by the second appearance of Ophelia, who comes in with herbs and flowers which she distributes to everyone. She sings a song about the death of a sweetheart and leaves.

8. Act 4, Scene 6 • We learn Hamlet has escaped back to Denmark. The ship carrying Hamlet, R + G has been attacked by pirates! In combat, Hamlet boarded the pirate boat and broke free, leaving R + G to continue their voyage to England without their prisoner. The pirates treat Hamlet well, in return Hamlet will do them a favour. Hamlet asks Horatio to pass on more letters to the King and then to join him.

9. Act 4, Scene 7 • Claudius and Laertes plot Hamlet’s death. • The king has told Laertes about his father’s death. While we listen to Horatio reading the letter, Claudius seems to have put his case to Laertes very effectively and has him eating out of his hand. As he is in the process of describing how he has solved the Hamlet problem, a letter arrives from the Prince saying he is in Denmark and his ‘naked’ and ‘alone’ (tempting Claudius into taking the initiative here.)

10. Act 4, Scene 7 • Claudius and Laertes plot Hamlet’s death. • Claudius speaks of Gertrude’s affection for her son.‘The Queen his mother/Lives almost by his looks’ and as further indication of their growing separation, he deliberately will deceive his wife: ‘even his mother shall uncharge the practice/And call it an accident.’Together, Laertes and Claudius hatch a trecherous plot to kill Hamlet.

11. Act 4, Scene 7 2) The Queen comes in and, in an elaborate set-piece, describes Ophelia’s death. Her account is too sweet, it doesn’t sound like Gertrude talking and what she says she observed raises problem after problem.Her account is too improbable to fit either the suggestion or the narrator. But we have noted already Ophelia’s response to her father’s death and, given Gertrude’s stated loyalty to her son, it could be argued she sanitises Ophelia’s suicide to spare Laertes feelings deliberately and not bring danger to Hamlet. Gertrude deliberately blames everything in her surroundings for her death, rather than the girl herself. This moment of pathos is followed immediately by the King’s blatant lie to his wife: ‘How much I had to do to calm his rage.’ It completes the audience’s alienation from the scheming Claudius and prepares for the pathos of Hamlet’s death by treachery.