Thoughts on Hamlet by Lee Lady (January, 2002)

Here is someone's comment of Hamlet. I thought, it is quite interesting. I would share with your guys.

Hamlet as Comedian:

(Act 2, Scene 2)

Polonius. Do you know me, lord?

Hamlet. Excellent well, you are a fishmonger.

Polonius. Not I, lord.

Hamlet. Then I would you were so honest a man.

Polonius. Honest, lord! H. Ay, sir, to be honest, this world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten thousand.

Polonius. What do you read, lord?

Hamlet. Words, words, words.

Polonius. What is the matter, lord?

Hamlet. Between who?

Polonius. I mean, the matter that you read, lord.

Hamlet. Slanders, sir, for the satirical rogue says that old men have grey beards, that their faces are wrinkled, their eyes purging thick amber and plum-tree gum and that they have a plentiful lack of wit, together with most weak hams; all of which sir, although I most powerfully and potently believe, yet I hold it not honesty to have it thus set down; for you yourself, sir, should be old as I am if, like a crab, you could go backward.

It is a joke Hamlet made, which if told well will get a big laugh from the audience, but at the same time he's talking about a murder he's committed. In contemporary terms, Hamlet's lines here, and in fact much of his humor, is what would be called a "sick joke." In fact, I think that one of the things that fascinates us about Hamlet is the contrast between the way he charms us and enlists our sympathies with his conversation and, on the other hand, the dreadful nature of the things he does. In a contemporary movie, we would rightly regard a character who kills people and then make jokes about it as a psychopath. But the fascinating thing is the way that Shakespeare sets things up so that we see Hamlet as a tragic hero. (by Lee Lady)

Personally, I like this comment. In Hamlet's comic dialogue, there is an irony. What Hamlet is saying is comic, but the feeling behind the comedy is extremely antagonistic. It is the way I think of Hamlet today.