Introduction

About the lecture

In this module, we think about the historical context for Hamlet, thinking in particular about Shakespeare’s life and career up to 1600, the structure of the play, Shakespeare’s sources, and the intellectual climate in which the play was written.

Note: Text and line numbers are based on the Arden edition of the play. Students using a different version of the play may encounter slight differences in either the text and/or line numbers.

The Seven Soliloquies and Seven Meditations:
S1: “O that this too too solid flesh would melt” (1.2.129-58)
M1: “The King doth wake tonight and take his rouse” (1.4.8-38)
S2: “O all you host of heaven, O earth – what else?” (1.5.92-112)
M2: “I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth” (2.2.259-276)
S3: “O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!” (2.2.485-540)
S4: “To be or not to be – that is the question” (3.1.55-89)
M3: “Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you…” (3.2.1-34)
M4: “Nay, do not think I flatter … In censure of his seeming” (3.2.52-83)
M5: “Why, look you now how unworthy a thing you make of me … you cannot play upon me” (3.2.355-63)
S5: “’Tis now the very witching time of night” (3.2.378-89)
S6: “Now might I do it pat” (3.3.73-96)
S7: “How all occasions do inform against me” (4.4.31-65)
M6: “Alas poor Yorick” (5.1.174-185)
M7: “Not a whit. We defy augury” (5.2.197-202)

About the lecturer

John McRae is Special Professor of Language in Literature Studies and Teaching Associate in the School of English at Nottingham University, and holds Visiting Professorships in China, Malaysia, Spain and the USA. He is co-author of The Routledge History of Literature in English with Ron Carter, and also wrote The Language of Poetry, Literature with a Small 'l' and the first critical edition of Teleny by Oscar Wilde and others.