WORD LISTS

"The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark" by William Shakespeare, Act 4

Fri Apr 12 17:41:01 EDT 2013
Shakespeare's famous tragedy tells the story of a Danish prince who must decide whether or not to avenge his father's death. Read the full text here.

Here are links to our lists for the play: Act 1, Act 2, Act 3, Act 4, Act 5
convocation
Not where he eats, but where he is eaten. A certain convocation of politic worms are e’en at him. Your worm is your only emperor for diet.
craven
Now whether it be
Bestial oblivion or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on th’ event
(A thought which, quartered, 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.
importunate
She is importunate,
Indeed distract; her mood will needs be pitied.
artless
So full of artless jealousy is guilt,
It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.
inter
When sorrows come, they come not single spies,
But in battalions: first, her father slain;
Next, your son gone, and he most violent author
Of his own just remove; the people muddied,
Thick, and unwholesome in their thoughts and whispers
For good Polonius’ death, and we have done but greenly
In hugger-mugger to inter him.
arraign
Her brother is in secret come from France,
Feeds on his wonder, keeps himself in clouds,
And wants not buzzers to infect his ear
With pestilent speeches of his father’s death,
Wherein necessity, of matter beggared,
Will nothing stick our person to arraign
In ear and ear.
cuckold
That drop of blood that’s calm proclaims me bastard,
Cries “cuckold” to my father, brands the harlot
Even here between the chaste unsmirchèd brow
Of my true mother.
bier
They bore him barefaced on the bier,
Hey non nonny, nonny, hey nonny,
And in his grave rained many a tear.
Fare you well, my dove.
rue
There’s rue for you, and here’s some for me; we may call it herb of grace o’ Sundays.
flaxen
His beard was as white as snow,
All flaxen was his poll.
ostentation
His means of death, his obscure funeral
(No trophy, sword, nor hatchment o’er his bones,
No noble rite nor formal ostentation)
Cry to be heard, as ’twere from heaven to earth,
That I must call ’t in question.
remiss
He, being remiss,
Most generous, and free from all contriving,
Will not peruse the foils, so that with ease,
Or with a little shuffling, you may choose
A sword unbated, and in a pass of practice
Requite him for your father.
requite
He, being remiss,
Most generous, and free from all contriving,
Will not peruse the foils, so that with ease,
Or with a little shuffling, you may choose
A sword unbated, and in a pass of practice
Requite him for your father.
mountebank
I bought an unction of a mountebank
So mortal that, but dip a knife in it,
Where it draws blood no cataplasm so rare,
Collected from all simples that have virtue
Under the moon, can save the thing from death
That is but scratched withal.
endue
Her clothes spread wide,
And mermaid-like awhile they bore her up,
Which time she chanted snatches of old lauds,
As one incapable of her own distress
Or like a creature native and endued
Unto that element.

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