Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Act 2 Scene 2

On lines 206-208, I thought that it was interesting when Polonius said, “How pregnant sometimes his replies are! A happiness that often madness hits on.” The word pregnant seems to have a hidden significance. Polonius is saying that Hamlet is happy but he is attaining it through madness or not righteous way.

Hamlet said to Polonius that if he walks out of the madness he is in, he would walk “into [his] grave” (205). This is important because at this point, we realize that there is a reason for Hamlet’s madness for Ophelia. He is stating that he is going to die if he returns to the normal “him” and discontinues his plan. His plan might be to revenge for his father’s death, he would be so painful that he would rather be dead himself.

There are two lines in which words are repeated three times. This is strange. In line 191, “words, words, words” and in lines 214-215, “except my life, except my life, except my life,” words are being repeated. Why do they repeat three times? Is there a significant behind this? Hamlet told Polonius that he “cannot take from [him] anything that [he] will not more willingly part” (212-214). It seems to be that the secret plan that is on his mind is more than just to revenge for King Hamlet’s death. It seems that he wants to uphold the relationship he has with Ophelia. It sounds like Hamlet is telling Polonius that he is not going to be able to take his daughter away from Hamlet. How could Hamlet be so confident about this?

On line 184, Hamlet told Polonius not to let Ophelis “walk I’ th’ sun.” The sun is often referred to as the truth. Hamlet is implying that Polonius knows the truth about King Hamlet’s death, but did not say anything about it. He is telling Polonius not to let Ophelia know the truth about her father’s guilt.
Also, Hamlet says that “conception is a blessing” (184). He is telling Polonius that his “daughter may conceive [and so he should look to ‘t” (185). This answers my previous question about the repeating words. I believe that the secret plan is to be able to marry Ophelia because Ophelia is bearing his baby. Could this be true?

1 comment:

Ping L 6 said...

This is one of my notebook entry which I wrote after our discussion in class. Mr. Gallagher, my senior year english teacher, tells us to carefully analyze the reading. The sentence structure, the wordings, etc. are very important to the analysis. By concentrating on these parts of the reading, I am able to analyze the reading and have interesting insights. This is the time when I realize that every line in the reading is important.