Hamlet 3.4 | The Closet Scene

Question 1

3.4 Quick exchanging of lines between Gertrude and Hamlet

Answer 1

Use of stichomythia - hamlet mocking Gertrude, undermining her authority as his mother + queen

Question 2

3.4 “Sit you down” (repeated) / ‘glass’

Answer 2

Imperatives - present hamlet as dominant and aggressive. Hamlet sees Gertrude as deceitful and dishonest - ‘glass’ as a metaphor to show how Hamlet intends to make Gertrude confront her inner sin

Question 3

3.4 ‘Takes the rose’ / ‘blister’ / ‘marriage vows/as false’

Answer 3

Hamlet feels Gertrude has replaced an innocent beautiful love with something corrupt and immoral

‘Blister’ - a mark of a whore

Hamlet presents Gertrude as deceitful - her marriage vows no more sincere than the desperate lies of a gambler

Question 4

3.4 “Words like daggers enter my ears”

Answer 4

Gertrude acknowledges the piercing truth of Hamlet’s words + her own sinful corrupt behaviour (thou turns’t my eyes into my very soul and there I see such black and grained spots)

Question 5

3.4 “Dexterity to incestuous sheets”

Answer 5

Hamlet seems fixated on Gertrude’s sexuality - numerous references throughout this scene and in others - descriptions are graphic, detailed and disturbing