Act 4; Scene 4

ACT IV

SCENE IV. A plain in Denmark.

Enter Fortinbras and Forces marching. I can’t help but wonder why Fortinbras is here. Is he simply a foil for Hamlet? He is like Hamlet in that his father, the king, is dead and he is ruled over by his uncle, but he is very different from Hamlet. Fortinbras is willing not only to risk his life but the lives of two thousand men to obtain a worthless piece of ground simply because his father once lost it in battle. He has no other reason to want it back.  Hamlet, on the other hand, has a good reason to act against Claudius and both the means and opportunity to do so, but fails to act. Why? Is it because he is worried about his immortal soul, or is he simply a coward? Perhaps because he is not inherently evil, acting in an evil manner goes against his nature. He has to choose to be evil to do something evil or act with ruthlessness, as all kings should be able to do, but it doesn’t come naturally to him. Because he’s too sensitive? Doesn’t he have a killer instinct? Is he too thoughtful and too much in his own head? Of course, it could all be as simple as a learned man of the Renaissance, Hamlet, as opposed to a barbarian, Viking, or Fortinbras. If the Orestia theory is true, that would make Fortinbras Apollo, and he should be worshipped as a god. Like Apollo, he would be the epitome of young manhood.

FORTINBRAS.
Go, Captain, from me greet the Danish king.
Tell him that by his license, Fortinbras
Craves the conveyance of a promis’d march
Over his kingdom. You know the rendezvous.
If that his Majesty would aught with us,
We shall express our duty in his eye;
And let him know so. Claudius is a good politician but he is not a good military leader. No military leader would allow an army of two thousand men to march across their country esp. not one that not a month before was considered a threat.

CAPTAIN.
I will do’t, my lord.

FORTINBRAS.
Go softly on.

[Exeunt all but the Captain.]

Enter Hamlet, Rosencrantz, Guildenstern &c.

HAMLET.
Good sir, whose powers are these?

CAPTAIN.
They are of Norway, sir.

HAMLET.
How purpos’d, sir, I pray you?

CAPTAIN.
Against some part of Poland.

HAMLET.
Who commands them, sir?

CAPTAIN.
The nephew to old Norway, Fortinbras.

HAMLET.
Goes it against the main of Poland, sir,
Or for some frontier?

CAPTAIN.
Truly to speak, and with no addition,
We go to gain a little patch of ground
That hath in it no profit but the name.
To pay five ducats, five, I would not farm it;
Nor will it yield to Norway or the Pole
A ranker rate, should it be sold in fee. We are fighting against Poland not because of the value of what we hope to gain, but just to say that it is ours. The land has no value. It is worthless except that we can say that it is ours in the future. An example of a Pyrrhic victory or a reflection of Hamlet’s useless killing of Polonius, and thus ultimately everyone he cares about, except Horatio, because he chooses revenge over justice. Justice would be if he held a trial for Claudius and let someone not affected by the killing of his father decide Claudius’ fate.

HAMLET.
Why, then the Polack never will defend it.

CAPTAIN.
Yes, it is already garrison’d.

HAMLET.
Two thousand souls and twenty thousand ducats
Will not debate the question of this straw!
This is th’imposthume of much wealth and peace,
That inward breaks, and shows no cause without
Why the man dies. I humbly thank you, sir. A pyrrhic victory because all those men will die for nothing. All of the court at Elsinore will die for nothing too.
God b’ wi’ you, sir.

[Exit.]

ROSENCRANTZ.
Will’t please you go, my lord?

HAMLET.
I’ll be with you straight. Go a little before.

[Exeunt all but Hamlet.]

How all occasions do inform against me, I am damned, so why haven’t I acted? There’s nothing holding me back now. By killing Polonius, I have forfeited my immortal soul, but still I hesitate. Well, no more. He has decided to take on the mantle of a king and be ruthless. Orestes also decided to return to Mycenae and kill Clytemnestra…to take on the mantle of a king.
And spur my dull revenge. What is a man
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more.
Sure he that made us with such large discourse,
Looking before and after, gave us not
That capability and godlike reason
To fust in us unus’d. Now whether it be
Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple Does it matter if my soul is damned? I am merely a beast, and there is no heaven nor hell, but there’s the ghost proving that both exist. A philosophical argument, not a realistic one, if he believes the ghost is real and honest, which he clearly does. He also believes in heaven, or he would have killed Claudius when he found him praying.
Of thinking too precisely on th’event,—
A thought which, quarter’d, hath but one part wisdom
And ever three parts coward,—I do not know
Why yet I live to say this thing’s to do,
Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and means
To do’t. Examples gross as earth exhort me, Why have I not acted? Is it because I’m weak? Am I too pious? He killed my father and turned my mother into a whore so why haven’t I acted? I am ashamed of myself.
Witness this army of such mass and charge,
Led by a delicate and tender prince, Comparing himself to Fortinbras, and finds himself lacking. Fortinbras is not delicate or tender…he is a warrior. Hamlet is tender and delicate.
Whose spirit, with divine ambition puff’d,
Makes mouths at the invisible event,
Exposing what is mortal and unsure
To all that fortune, death, and danger dare,
Even for an eggshell. Rightly to be great
Is not to stir without great argument,
But greatly to find quarrel in a straw
When honour’s at the stake. How stand I then, Berating himself for not avenging both his father and his mother.
That have a father kill’d, a mother stain’d,
Excitements of my reason and my blood,
And let all sleep, while to my shame I see
The imminent death of twenty thousand men
That, for a fantasy and trick of fame,
Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot
Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,
Which is not tomb enough and continent
To hide the slain? O, from this time forth,
My thoughts be bloody or be nothing worth. My life is meaningless unless I make it have meaning and do as I swore to do…avenge my father. He finally realizes that to be a king, one must be cold, calculating, and think strategically. A king must be able to act without morality if need be, because if a king shows weakness of any kind, the knives will come out and someone will stab him in the back, take all that he has, and no one will punish them for it until they die. Then they could repent their actions, be forgiven, and escape punishment.

He exits.