HAMLET ACT II REVIEW
Vocab Quiz Monday
Ambiguous
Auspicious
Contrive‘
Dexterity
Enmity
Impious
Obsequious
Obstinate
Pernicious
Portentous
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Vocab Quiz Monday
That pernicious woman!
Hamlet’s obsequious sorrow.
Act 1 Study Guide
• Any last questions?
Vocabulary
• Draw a negative sign on the left side of your paper and a
positive sign on the right side.
• Then decide where each vocabulary word falls on the
scale of negative to positive connotation.
Lines 173-178
• What plan is formed to test Polonius’s hypothesis that
Hamlet is mad because of rejected love?
• They will spy on him as Ophelia is let “loose” on him.
Why does Hamlet call Polonius a
fishmonger?
“Denmark’s a prison”
• “…for there is nothing either good or bad but thinking
makes it so. To me it is a prison.”
• ‘Oh God, I could be bounded in a nutshell and count
myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad
dreams.” Page 128
Hamlet’s “Reason”
• Page 132- reread his explanation
• How honest is he being?
“O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I”
• Why does Hamlet exclaim such a self-derogatory remark?
Why does Hamlet need proof?
• Is his stalling a bad thing? A sign of weakness?
Who is spying on whom?
• Rosencrantz and Guildenstern?
• Polonius, King, Queen?
• Ophelia?
• Hamlet?
Hamlet’s Character Traits
Do you know who these people are?
• Gertrude?
• Claudius?
• The ambassadors to Norway?
• Hamlet’s former classmates?
• Polonius?
• Laertes?
• Ophelia?
Who said this?
• “This above all, to thine own self be true,/And it must
follow, as the night the day,/ Thou canst not then be false
to any man.”
1
• Oh what a spiritless coward am I!!
2
• Isn’t it unbelievable that this actor can react physically to
someone else’s sorrow, someone else’s cause? His
thoughts matched his actions.
3
• For Hecuba! They don’t even care about each other!
4
• What would his reaction be if he had my cause? My
motivation? He’d take action and make sure that
everybody heard about the grave injustice! He would
astonish eyes and ears!
5
• Yet I am a dull “rascal”, not stirred to action by my
important duty.
6.
• No not even for a king who was robbed of life and power!
Not even for my father, whom I love!
7 and 8
• Does anyone call me names or mock me?!
• Well I deserve to be mocked, pinched, and made fun of! I
cannot summon the courage to act against this injustice!
9
• O Vengeance! Like a coward I need solid evidence.
10
• I have heard that when guilty people are reminded of the
terrible thing they have done (by seeing it acted out in
front of them), they are stirred to feel remorse and to
admit to their misdeeds.
11
• Murder will make itself heard in a miraculous way!
12
• I will have these players play something like the murder of
my father and will observe the king’s reactions. If he
shows ANY guilt, I will take action against him.
13
• It might have been an evil spirit trying to trick me into
damning myself (sending myself to hell).
14
• If I get solid proof, then I will have more evidence than my
father’s spirit’s word. The play is the key to getting proof.