Episode 51 - The Madness Wherein Now He Raves

[Music] The Hamlet podcast, episode 51. Hello and welcome to this exploration of Shakespeare's Hamlet with me your host, Connor Hannity. The last episode ended with Polonius in full flight, holding forth with more words than might seem necessary about Hamlet's behaviour. He's really been stressing the point that he's faithful and honourable to use Claudius' description, presumably to cover up that he's meddling and interfering with what could perhaps be written off as just two young people in love. But what would, true and Claudius, have thought of him if he'd observed this budding relationship with idle sight? God forbid he lose their good opinion. So he continues explaining that, "No, I went round to work, and my young mistress thus I did bespeak. Lord Hamlet is a prince out of thy star. This must not be. And then I preset-scover, that she should lock herself from his resort. Admit no messengers receive no tokens. Which done she took the fruits of my advice, and he, repulsed, a short tale to make, fell into a sadness, then into a fast, then to a watch, then into a weakness, then to a lightness, and then by this declension into the madness wherein now he raids, and all we mourn for." Polonius really is a great man for the precepts. It seems that few moments pass between him and his children, in which he doesn't find a means of sharing a few of his nuggets of wisdom, or what he might call wisdom. Polonius explains to Claudius that he told Ophelia, back in act one, that she was to have nothing to do with Hamlet. Back then his description was, that Hamlet had a larger tether than maybe given to Ophelia. Now Hamlet is a prince out of thine star. In other words, he's out of her orbit, her destiny, or even her social sphere. In other words, despite even Polonius' proximity to power, Ophelia has no chance with Hamlet. This must not be. Polonius reiterates his instructions that she should lock herself away from Hamlet's access to her, resort. Admit no messengers receive no letters or tokens. Ophelia seems to have done so, although in her description it seems that Hamlet had no difficulty getting into her chamber. As prince of the realm, perhaps nobody would have said no to him. Regardless, the plot has to keep moving, and so Hamlet did get through to Ophelia in her closet, in his peculiarly distressed state. She had perhaps taken the fruits of her father's advice, and she does repulse Hamlet, though the father insists. The folio says repulsed, but some editors choose to say "repelled," which would match directly with what Ophelia herself said in the previous scene. Shakespeare then gives a little gag for Polonius, having him preface the rest of his speech, saying, "a short tale to make." Long story short is really not a phrase that we can associate with the senior statesman, as he immediately proves, Hamlet, repulsed or repelled by Ophelia, fell into a madness, then into a fast, then to a watch, then into a weakness, then to a likeness, and by this declension into the madness wherein now he raves, and all we mourn for. So much for brevity being the soul of wit. I always enjoy the idea of Polonius getting rather excited over this description of Hamlet's distress, as he falls further and further down this rabbit hole, before catching himself and realizing that he's getting carried away in front of Hamlet's mother, herself liable to be distressed about all of this, and so he has to relish in with the politically appropriate comment that, of course, everyone mourns for the princess decline. Polonius here is describing Hamlet with all the symptoms of a love-sick romantic. He's fallen first into something like a sadness, then he stops eating in a fast, then he keeps watch, in other words he cannot sleep, and then into a weakness which is unsurprising in one who isn't sleeping or eating, and then to likeness or lightheadedness, again not surprising. Hamlet isn't the first young man in Shakespeare to brood like this, when we first met Romeo, he was comparably forlorn in love, he thinks, with Rosalind, and then in, as you like it, Rosalind has her wonderfully playful description of all the symptoms that a lover should display, which also echo Hamlet's current plight. The doleful lover was obviously a figure that Shakespeare's audiences were conditioned to recognise. Polonius plays on words here when he calls the process a "declension". Obviously there's the continued sense of Hamlet falling or declining through these stages, but declensions and classical grammar are the variant forms of a noun, so Hamlet is displaying the varied forms of distraught lover, and Polonius is showing how clever he thinks he is. Claudius has to wonder though, he asks, "Do you think this?" Perhaps he's asking Polonius if he genuinely thinks that this is what's going on, or, in my opinion more likely, he's asking Hamlet's mother. Gertrude answers tentatively. It may be, very likely. Does Gertrude think it might be something else? She's already tried to explain away Hamlet's sullen behaviour as a reaction to her, or hasty, wedding. It is be handy enough for her if Hamlet's continued strange behaviour could be blamed on someone else. Polonius answers, too, and unsurprisingly, brings it back to Polonius. Have there been such a time like they know that, that I have positively said, 'Tis so' when it proved otherwise. Polonius would really like to know if there's ever been a time when he stated that something was positively the case wherein it proved otherwise. Claudius replies, "Not that I know." The King acknowledges that, "No, this has not been the case." Now, Polonius points to his head and shoulders and says, "Take this from this, if this be otherwise." He's staking his life on this claim, that Claudius take his head from his body if he's proved wrong. A more tepid version might be that he points to his staff of authority and suggests that it be removed from his hand, take this from this, but personally I prefer the more severe threat of decapitation. Having thus upped the stakes, Polonius offers to continue his great slew thing work. If circumstances lead me, I will find where truth is hid, though it were hid indeed within the centre." In other words, if he can get his hands on enough circumstances evidence, he will figure out the truth of this situation even its hidden at the centre of the earth. The centre of the earth was traditionally considered an impossibly difficult place to access, but if he must, Polonius will go there to find the truth of his whole situation. For the actor playing Polonius, there's a lot going on here. His relationship with the king might be on the line, since his daughter and the king's steps on or nephew are at the heart of this whole affair. One hopes that there's also some concern from this father for his daughter's health and happiness. And who knows, perhaps there's even a relationship between Polonius and Hamlet himself. They both spent their lives at court after all, and so presumably there's some kind of a relationship to explore. Conveniently enough, Hamlet is about to re-enter, and we'll start to see what might be going on between these two men in the next episode. Until then, feel free to visit the website, as you know by now it's the hamletpodcast.com You can follow us on Twitter or even leave a review on iTunes if you feel like it. Thank you as always for listening, and I'll speak to you next time.