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"brow of woe"
Metaphor
Act 1,
Scene 2
Lines 1-7

An explanation of the “brow of woe” metaphor in Act 1, Scene 2 of myShakespeare’s Hamlet.

[The throne room of Elsinore castle. King Claudius enters with his newly wed Queen, Hamlet's recently widowed mother. They are followed by the king's chief counselor Polonius, Polonius' son Laertes, his daugher Ophelia, and other nobles.]

Claudius 

Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death,
The memory be green, and that it us befitted
To bear our hearts in grief, and our whole kingdom
To be contracted in one brow of woe;
Yet so far has discretion fought with nature
That we with wisest sorrow think on him
Together with remembrance of ourselves.

In this metaphor , the image of the eyebrows pulled together in sadness represents the people of Denmark coming together in a time of grief.