SARAH:  This segment is a good example of one of the most enjoyable elements of Shakespeare’s language — the play on words: the puns, innuendos, hidden satire, the twisting of familiar phrases to give them a double meaning.

RALPH:  And it’s stunning to watch a gifted actor delivering these lines. Usually Shakespeare gives lines like this to a comic character in the play — Falstaff for example in Henry IV, or the porter in Macbeth, or later on in Hamlet the gravediggers.

SARAH: But in this case, the same actor who plays the hero also gets to play the fool. Hamlet has to be comic, tragic, an action hero, a poet — he’s all the parts rolled into one.

RALPH:  You know, Sarah, all this talk about actors reminds me how much this play is actually about acting and the theatre. Soon, we’ll be talking about Hamlet’s next monologue, which is directly inspired by the performance of some actors that Hamlet is watching.  But this theme of the theatre starts even earlier.

SARAH:  That’s an interesting point, Ralph.  So, for example, in Act II, scene 1, when Ophelia describes how Hamlet burst into her chambers, she’s actually having to act out the scene for her father, since he wasn’t there to witness it.  And of course, we’re watching her too, just as he is watching her.

RALPH:  Wow, Sarah, I actually wasn’t thinking of that scene at all.  But yeah, that’s the same theme — we’re seeing theatrical moments, but within the frame of the play.  I was actually thinking about the scene we’ve just been talking about.  Hamlet, of course, is acting crazy in this scene, to throw off Polonius and Claudius.  But Polonius is also acting — he’s pretending that this is just a chance encounter, as if he were just passing by, and as if he had no real agenda in this conversation.

SARAH:  Yes, Ralph, it’s almost as if everyone in the play were an actor.  Think of Claudius — he’s acting the part of a virtuous King, when in fact he’s a murderer.  As Hamlet describes him in Act I, scene 5, “one may smile, and smile, and be a villain.”

RALPH:  Yes, and it gets back to that earlier idea we’ve been discussing, about the difference between how things appear and how they really are.  In Act I, Hamlet had trouble negotiating this distinction — he couldn’t hide his feelings.  He was so obviously in mourning for his father that it upset his mother and Claudius as newlyweds.

SARAH:  Well, now Hamlet seems to be getting the hang of hiding his true self — so much so that I’m afraid that, like Polonius, we aren’t too sure what he’s really thinking at all.

RALPH:  So, now let’s leave you with some questions to think over and discuss.  First, what’s behind Hamlet’s crude jokes about Ophelia? Is he really upset with her, or is he trying to provoke Polonius, who has been meddling in the relationship between Hamlet and Ophelia?

SARAH:  And why is Hamlet wasting his time talking with Polonius, unless he wants Polonius to be able to take some impression back to Claudius? If that’s the goal, and Hamlet still wants Claudius to think he’s crazed with his love for Ophelia, shouldn’t he act more lovesick?

RALPH:  And finally, what’s the point of this extended theme of the theatre and of acting that runs throughout Act II? Who’s acting a part in this play? Who, or what, are they pretending to be, and why?

SARAH:  Poor Ophelia, she’s going to be asked to play a part as well — she’s being set up as a decoy for this conversation with Hamlet, and she’ll be forced to play a role that she really doesn’t want to do…

RALPH:  Well, wait a minute, Sarah.  I agree she’s being set up here — but we really don’t know where she stands on all this.  I mean, maybe she’s had it with Hamlet, maybe she’s happy to help her dad out —

SARAH:  Now, Ralph, it wasn’t too long ago that you were arguing that Ophelia has no choices, she’s socially constrained to be obedient, etcetera.  And now you’re saying she’s free to choose, that she’s happy going along with Polonius’ madcap schemes…

RALPH:  Ok, that was actually a different point, what I was saying…

SARAH:  Oh, that was a different point, of course…