Hamlet Preparation Quiz

Anna O”Connor

Imagine the staging: Who is implicated in the first line?

What are some associations with the word “unfold?”
Who is the other father/son pair that we learn about in this scene? Why might that be important?
What is the question everyone is arguing about? (See question at the top.) What word/s are
repeated over and over again? Why?

1.2
What is Claudius like? Does he seem like a typical politician? How so/how not? What do you
make of the way he uses language? What do you notice about his use of pronouns?

What’s so strange about this line:

“With mirth in funeral and dirge in marriage”
Mirth usually corresponds with laughter and jolliness. While dirge means quite the opposite. Dirge means
to grief: More specifically in a funeral. The use of language is very conflicting.

How is Hamlet feeling toward Claudius? How do you know?

Toward his mother? What do you make of his famous line: “Frailty, thy name is woman!”
(1.2.146).
How would you describe Hamlet? How would you play him on stage?
Why is Hamlet so offended by the word “seems?”
Where does Hamlet say he sees his father? (Hint: he’s speaking to Horatio.)
Hamlet does not like Claudius. As soon as Claudius proposed marriage to Gertrude. He is filled with rage.
Hamlet is seen with such darkness and depression. Hamlet is mad at the word “seems” Because it
doesn’t seem to happen, It has already happened. Hamlet saw both Gertrude and the uncle quickly get
over Hamlets’ death. Thus made hamlet more frustrated. Hamlet saw his father on outside of the castle
when revealed that the ghost convinces hamlet that he is his dead father. And that Claudius has
murdered him for own individual power. Maybe hamlet is expressing that woman are waker then men.

1.3
What is the dispute about? (See Laertes’s speech to Ophelia.)
What does Laertes think about Hamlet's feelings toward Ophelia?
What does Ophelia think?
How would you describe the way Polonius speaks? (Hint: See lines 74-77.)
Compare this grouping of characters to the one in the scene before.
Laertes find that he believes hamlets feeling towards Ophelia is not one he is concerned with. He find
himself against Ophelia having feelings towards the hamlet. In the book they also bring up of how hamlet
is a much higher standard than Ophelia is which is another reason pointed out of why hamlet cannot
marry Ophelia. Polonius speakes of a concerned farther. Givig advice to his son.

1.5
How would you describe the way the Ghost speaks?
What allusions do you see in the story of the murder?
What does Hamlet decide to do at the end of this scene? Why?
How does Hamlet’s language change?
Hamlet’s language has changed. At the end of act 1 he has decided to kill Claudius in revenge to his
farthers death. He has met the ghost where the ghost is speaking to hamlet, telling him that he needs to
kill Claudius because he is the king and Claudius poured poison n his ear so that he can have the power.
Hamlet feels the need to fulfill this quest as he then shifts his perspective of how hes going to kill
Claudius. The ghost speaks for immoral justice.