Act 1.8
(Polonius and King Hamlet in the king's chamber)
King:
Can you name the date tomorrow as best as you can now reckon?
Polonius:
I make it the month of March in spring, and the day the twenty-second.
King:
You are a man full old enough to have that day in mind
Polonius:
In some way, it was a day like any day. The sun did rise and set. Still there’s a thing about that day that I can scarce forget or ever hope to see. When I think, it is in that sadness comes swiftly over me. I remember what in that day I find, and I hope, most fervently, not to ever see another of its kind.
King:
It's twenty years ago today, how swift the years do pass.
Polonius:
Is it about that day you most truly ask? It was the day the old king did die. It was I who found King Hamlet dead. He was a man in every way, and that's just what we have said. He passed away in an easy death, of that I'm sure he died. Yes that I know, even though although, I'm not a seer of such things, I am most satisfied.
King:
What would deny your satisfaction? Was there something to disturb?
Polonius:
You know the voices of inaction, the tongues that are easy stirred. The rumors fly up to the sky and thus rain down again. They went from his murder by the Danes to some passion in his bed. The rumors came and rumors went, and he was just as dead. He died because his heart gave out. That is what I pledge. No matter how great and strong, the time will come for all of us when such a thing goes on. And it will come quite naturally like the exhaustion of the air; one moment we will hang to life and another not be there.
King:
All slanders then, the rumors spent. The worst of calumny.
Polonius:
That is sure, just what I meant.
King:
His death did set him free.
Polonius:
If you mean that in his age, he found trouble in his mind, between us two and only to you, there was in him a sadness that made him blind to the joys that he had wrought. In fear of loss there was something that he obsessive sought. I know we don't speak ill of kings, but he was at a loss to know one truth from another that was false. He believed the lies that somehow pleased his hearing. He doubted and he hated some of the very ones he had held most near. He even turned his mad wrath on me and called me out a fool and sneered. I had served him faithfully as I now, my lord, serve you, yet he accused me of such heinous crimes, he would scorn me in his view. His hatred turned to anger much, and in that way, he was dangerous. He saw most all around as traitorous instead, in truth, they were all quite virtuous. If I may say, when in anger's sway, he hated much your brother. He feared that he would take his crown, and he swore that he would smother that who was his new born son so late into his life. I never saw a man so filled with madness and angry strife. You dealt well, I know, with him, as gentle as was possible. You saved your brother’s life oft times, you made his future at least probable. Sometime a death may come along and find a time felicitous to softly empty out all of our life's frail chrysalis.
King:
And then we hope the tortured soul is freed to return to peace and good.
Polonius:
That may happen, thus we hope, for the peace we want and should. But they say that such a mind, so deep embedded in his vengeance, its soul will turn to be a ghost and seek revenge of every kind against imagined enemies. They cry to others to avenge and seek the harshest penalties.
King:
I do not know, nor do I care for this “they” who have no name. They say such things and do distain to make substantial what they claim. They always lie as do rumors fly, and make much of accusation. I do declare that I can despair out of my exasperation. We can't believe this talk of ghosts. It taints the life we live. We must find in death a kind of sleep without what such dreams will give. I wish not in death to find my anger as my master. I think such things can only bring some terrifying woe, some soul crushing disaster. Still my father haunts me now, of that I say in kind. But that's a ghost that's self produced, a figment of my mind.
Polonius:
Please be at peace. You have done your best to secure his kingdom and posterity. You brought us all out of his fall and into our great prosperity.
King:
I thank you for those words that calm, and my vision clears once more. I want to think of the man he was which finds a kind of balm against memories so sore. To commemorate that life he lived, you will a spectacle create, but for our family and ourself we want to celebrate in a quiet way that will allow us to pray for his soul's sweet disposition and pray that he has found his peace that his death has, at long last, given. Please have our table set as a feast for only we few three. Our brother and our queen and self are all who will be seen. Let no one enter until we leave, and this on no condition. For anyone who break this oath, he will wish he found perdition rather than my anger spent in that man's direction. We must have peace to think and pray of him in the deepest of reflections.
Polonius:
I hear you and obey, with all, as is my fond desire. All the things that you have asked swiftly will transpire. Night and day are divided thus, into two most equal parts. When in this diurnal flow should you wish for your obsequies to start?
King:
From dusk until the dawn, I'd say, and make the most of darkness' hours. We want no light to sear our sight when we engage in thoughts that tower. We must discover between us three, the truth of our tomorrows and thus resolve the kingdom's fate and at last relieve our sorrows.
(End scene)