Hamlet Character Quotes

Angels and ministers of grace, defend us!
Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damned,
Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,
Be thy intents wicked or charitable,
Thou comest in such a questionable shape
That I will speak to thee: I’ll call thee Hamlet,
King, father, royal Dane: O, answer me!
Let me not burst in ignorance, but tell
Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn’d,
Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws
To cast thee up again. What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel
Revisit’st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous, and we fools of nature
So horridly to shake our disposition
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?

– William Shakespeare

Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 4. On the third appearance of the Ghost, a confused Hamlet’s initial response is to pray to the heavenly angels for protection. He conjectures that it could be an evil spirit brandishing hell fire. But the Ghost dressed in full armor reminds him so much of his father, that he starts to trust it. He addresses it as Hamlet, King and father. He demands to know why the Ghost has burst from his father’s grave to terrify their night and shake them with thoughts beyond their understanding. Foreshadowed here is the considerable influence the Ghost will have on Hamlet in later scenes.

O most pernicious woman!
O villain, villain, smiling, damned villain!
My tables, – meet it is I set it down,
That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain:
At least I’m sure it may be so in Denmark.

– William Shakespeare

Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 5. Hamlet is enraged after the Ghost’s revelation that his father was murdered by his own brother Claudius, who took the crown and Gertrude, Hamlet’s mother, as his Queen. He describes his mother as wicked, and Claudius as a smiling villain. Hamlet’s comment of how one can smile and be a villain is a perfect example of how people can be two-faced and hypocritical and hide their true nature from the world.

My lord, as I was sewing in my closet,
Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbraced;
No hat upon his head; his stockings foul’d,
Ungarter’d, and down-gyved to his ancle;
Pale as his shirt; his knees knocking each other;
And with a look so piteous in purport
As if he had been loosed out of hell
To speak of horrors, – he comes before me.

– William Shakespeare

Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 1. Ophelia is frightened when Hamlet suddenly entered her room in a disheveled condition. She doesn’t know what to do and expresses concern about Hamlet’s strange behavior to her father Polonius. Her reliance on Polonius reinforces the idea that she is dependant on male figures and does not have the ability to think for herself. Polonius tells her Hamlet is mad with love.

This is the very ecstasy of love.

– William Shakespeare

Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 1. Polonius to Ophelia, speaking about Hamlet’s crazy love, after he burst into Ophelia’s chamber half dressed and frantic. Polonius says that his daughter’s rejection of Hamlet has left him mad and they must report this to the King. For a man who prides himself on his superior insights and and his clever stratagems, it is an irony that Polonius is immediately taken in by Hamlet’s pretence of madness because of lovesickness.

You are a fishmonger.

– William Shakespeare

Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 2. Hamlet’s response to Polonius’ question, "Do you know me, my lord?" It has been said that fishmonger is slang for pimp, suggesting that Polonius has been willing to sell his daughter’s happiness in exchange for honors from the king. Hamlet is also pretending not to recognize the councilor to the king and feigning madness, allowing him to mock and ridicule Polonius. He is punning by comparing Polonius to a fisherman, since Polonius is trying to fish for answers from Hamlet.
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