Hamlet and Ophelia: A Tragic Encounter at the 'Get thee to a Nunnery' Scene, Study Guides, Projects, Research of English Literature

Download Hamlet and Ophelia: A Tragic Encounter at the 'Get thee to a Nunnery' Scene and more Study Guides, Projects, Research English Literature in PDF only on Docsity! Side 13: Hamlet & Ophelia – Get thee to a nunnery Unable to meet his eyes OPHELIA Good my lord, How does your honour for this many a day? Approaching her; the first ‘well’ is bitter. The second is pained. On the third, he pulls her to him and kisses her in a rush of anger, frustration and longing. She gives in to the kiss for a moment, then steels herself for the final break, pushes him away and turns away from him. HAMLET I humbly thank you; well, well, well. She is adopting the course here that she knows will drive him entirely away, no longer willing to take part in this obscene experiment of her father’s. But it needs to be clear to us that it hurts her like fire to say every damning word. OPHELIA My lord, I have remembrances of yours, That I have longed long to re-deliver; I pray you, now receive them. Coldly, contemptuously HAMLET No, not I; I never gave you aught. Shock, anger. The ultimate betrayal is a denial that it ever happened. OPHELIA My honour'd lord, you know right well you did; And, with them, words of so sweet breath composed As made the things more rich: their perfume lost, Take these again; for to the noble mind Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind. There, my lord. HAMLET Ha, ha! are you honest? OPHELIA My lord? HAMLET Are you fair? OPHELIA What means your lordship? HAMLET That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should admit no discourse to your beauty. Recovering a bit of her old spirit OPHELIA Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than with honesty? HAMLET Ay, truly; for the power of beauty will sooner transform honesty from what it is to a bawd than the force of honesty can translate beauty into his likeness: this was sometime a paradox, but now the time gives it proof. I did love you once. OPHELIA Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so. HAMLET You should not have believed me; for virtue cannot so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it: I loved you not. OPHELIA I was the more deceived.