Act 1 Scene 2

HAMLET ACT 1 Scene 2

1. What is odd about Hamlet’s appearance in the opening of scene two?

He is dressed in all black. He is depressed.

2. Explain (give at least two reasons) why Claudius needs to justify his marriage in the opening of scene two.

1.   Because the country can not appear weak for fear of war.

2.   Because he married his brothers woman

3.   Laertes asks the King for leave to do what, specifically?

He wants to go back to school in france.

4.   Explain Hamlet’s insult when he says, “A little more than kin and less than kind.”

He is saying his Uncle/Father is closer related to him because he is not just blood but also related through marriage.

5. Explain Hamlet’s use of pun in the line, “Not so my lord, I am too much in the sun.”

The use of the word sun could be thought of as like son… He doesn’t like being called the son of king Claudius….

5.   In Hamlet’s first soliloquy it is obvious that what troubles him most is?

He is troubled not just that his mother married his uncle but that she did it so fast.

7. What does Hamlet mean by the following lines

“Seems, madam? Nay, it is. I know not ‘seems’.

‘Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,

Nor customary suits of solemn black,

Nor windy suspiration of forc’d breath,

No, nore the fruitful river in the eye,

Nor the dejected havior of the visage,

Together will all forms, moods, shapes of grief,

That can denote me truly. These indeed seem,

For they are actions that a man might play;

But I have that within which passes show,

These but the trappings and the suits of woe.

He is saying that he does not just sad but that the outer look of him is on the inside is well. He is really depressed and not just pretending.

8. What does Hamlet say about the baked meats and the funeral and the wedding.

That it was kept from the funeral and used at the funeral

9. What news does Horatio, Marcellus and Barnardo bring to Hamlet.

His dead father is back as a ghost in full armor.