RALPH: Hecuba is Queen of Troy, and wife of Priam, King of Troy. The speech that the actor is performing is from a play about the fall of Troy, where the Greeks ransack the city and kill Priam.

SARAH: The actual bit about Hecuba comes at the end of the players' recital - it describes the Queen as she watches her husband killed by Pyrrus, a Greek warrior. Hecuba's reaction is intense - here are the players' lines: "The instant burst of clamour that she made, Unless things mortal move them not at all, / Would have made milch the burning eyes of heaven / And passion in the gods."

RALPH: So the point is that Hecuba's reaction to seeing her husband's death would have made the gods themselves cry.

SARAH: And what's so fascinating about this is that these original lines are all about performance and audience - if the gods were watching Hecuba, they would have wept.

RALPH: And then Hamlet is watching the actor say this speech, and he's swept up by that performance.

SARAH: And then we're watching Hamlet...

RALPH: It just keeps going and going.

SARAH: But it's also important to notice here that, in this Greek story, everything happens the way that Hamlet wishes things would go with him: unlike Gertrude, Hecuba seems completely destroyed by her husband's death - and, even better yet, the death is public - it's out in the open for everyone to see, and it happens in tragic, but honorable circumstances.

RALPH: There's even a kind of model for Hamlet in the story - Pyrrhus kills Priam swiftly and without any remorse. He's the perfect example of someone who takes swift action, without letting thoughts get in the way.