Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 5 Sub Scene 1

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Five

Sub Scene One

Till death do us part or shall it hasten to part sooner?

Gertrude grief for the man whose words were an inspiration to the King. His wisdom listened. The children he leaves behind.

“Not one but two will grief,” Gertrude looked at Hamlet. “What have I done, that thou darest wag thy tongue in noise so rude against me? Or us?”

“Years apart you were from me,” Gertrude sobbed. “I longed to have you with me, but the King says naught. The child is to grow on his journey, I have not seen him dressed by himself. What can a mother or a lady do? But silenced her woes, and when he does return, be doth madness onto him.”

“That can be tolerated with the love of the mother surpassing all those rash behavior but not of this. A killing in my chamber was not to what I wanted, but the love of the son to his mother’s side.”

“Such an act that blurs the grace and blush of modesty, calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose from the fair forehead of an innocent love and sets a blister there, makes marriage vows as false as dicers’ oaths.” Hamlet mocked his mother’s love and even her vows toward the King.

“O, such a deed as from the body of contraction plucks the very soul, and sweet religion makes a rhapsody of words! Heaven’s face does glow o’er this solidity and compound mass with heated visage, as against the doom, is thought-sick at the act.” Hamlet accused her of not keeping faith in herself.

“Ay me, what act that roars so loud and thunders in the index?” Gertrude was asking of her son.

“Look here upon this picture and on this, the counterfeit presentment of two brothers.” Hamlet then approached the portrait of the King. One of the few still left on the castle walls. “See what a grace was seated on this brow, Hyperion’s curls, the front of Jove himself, an eye like Mars’ to threaten and command, aA station like the herald Mercury new-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill.

“A combination and a form indeed where every god did seem to set his seal to give the world assurance of a man.” Hamlet point to the man in the portrait.

“This was your husband. Look you know what follows.” Hamlet bowed to the portrait and then motioned to the nearby chamber where Claudius was resting.

“There is your husband now, like a mildewed ear. Have you your eyes? Could you on this fair mountain leave to feed, and batten on this moor? Ha! Have you your eyes?” Perhaps love was blind most times.

“You cannot call it love, for at your age the heyday in the blood is tame, it’s humble and waits upon the judgment; and what judgment would step from this to this?” At her age, Gertrude was not driven by other urges.

“Sense sure you have, else could you not have motion; but sure that sense is apoplexy (extreme anger); for madness would not err,” Hamlet denies that she was mad but maybe angry at the King thus marrying Claudius.

“Nor sense to ecstasy was ne’er so thrilled, but it reserved some quantity of choice to serve in such a difference. What devil was ’t that thus hath cozened you at Hoodman-blind? Eyes without feeling, feeling without sight, ears without hands or eyes, smelling sans all, or but a sickly part of one true sense Could not so mope. O shame, where is thy blush?” Hamler was to call her a strumpet in other words.

“O Hamlet, speak no more! Thou turnest my eyes into my very soul, And there I see such black and grainèd spots As will not leave their tinct.” Gertrude felt guilt in her but was denied by Hamler as lies.

“Nay, but to live In the rank sweat of an enseamèd bed, Stewed in corruption, honeying and making love over the nasty sty!” An expression that sows bred in the sty despite the stench,

“O, speak to me no more! These words like daggers enter my ears. No more, sweet Hamlet!” Gertrude sobbed her tears out.

“The Emperor is a murderer and a villain.” Hamlet for the first time accuses Claudius. “ A slave that is not twentieth part the tithe of your precedent lord; a vice of kings, a cutpurse of the empire and the rule, that from a shelf the precious diadem stole and put it in his pocket— “

An undeserving protégé or one to claim the kingdom.

It was then the ghost appeared. Long unseen and then to appear before the Mother and Son.

“No more!” Gertrude cried out in pain.

“He cometh back.” Hamlet looked away from her.

Gertrude, saw her son talking to himself, or someone unseen by her. He was preoccupied with the dark wall opposite the window opening. There was usually a candle lighted when the bulb failed but on that day, it was not. She asked for the lighted bulb to be replaced for several weeks, but the servants have not found one for her yet. Things move slower without the command of the King with his commanding voice. Claudius was preoccupied with other matters.

The great Chamberlain was unfortunately dead, and calling on his soul then will be meaningless.

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 4 Sub Scene 1

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Four

Sub Scene One

A Brutus act

Polonius on his dismissal rushed to see the Madam. He entered the personal chamber of the other without any invitation. The personal chamber of the Madam was more like a place to change her clothes and performed her toiletries needs. It was very personal to the madam that trusted female servants were allowed, and not even the King himself, or his successor the Emperor.

Hamlet had been there for a child below the year of five, his presence was tolerable. He had not been there since.

“Polonius, do you have no shame on you now at your older age?” Gertrude was buttoning her blouse after taking a bath, feeling the filth of the play produced by her son. “This is my per chamber.”

Gertrude recalled the anger on Claudius. The Emperor had taken refuge in the main chamber where he shared his sleep with Gertrude, and thus was still fuming with rage at the subtle words during the play.

“Why does he not see me in the eyes, and speak his accusations instead of a play seen by all.” Claudius had spoken to Gertrude. “I have made amends to bring him to my side as son yet he stabs me like …Shylock demand of the heart. God, have I done wrong to take what was mine? I held no ill feelings toward him.”

“Alas, Gertrude. For our sake sort him out. He is…” Claudius clamped his last word.

“Madness, you were too shy. It may be and be hopeful, it was not from your family side.” Gertrude lashed out. “I will speak to him…. Alone and as a mother.”

Then it was arranged.

“I do apologize, Madam. I was in …” Polonius bowed his head. “I was …I came here in your interest,” Polonius said.

“My tete-a-tete, yes? Claudius is upset.” Gertrude recalled that she asked Hamlet to see her there. “Speak your piece, Great Chamberlain.”

“Who knows what you had seen by those hidden holes.” Gertrude knew on the hidden panels in the walls.

“Madam! I can….” Polonius felt disgusted at being accused.

“Speak your mind, and be on your way. Is Hamlet coming or not?” Gertrude was waiting on her request.

“He will come straight. Look you lay home to him.” Polonius found his voice back. “Tell him his pranks have been too broad to bear with and that your Grace hath screened and stood between much heat and him.”

“All mothers ever did, while father frets with their wine.”

“I’ll silence me even here. Pray you, be round with him.” Polonius added. “Right here.”

Polonius took to conceal behind the drapes of the window curtains. Gertrude was to say naught but the steps of Hamler were at the doorway.

“Are you decent, Mother?” Hamlet stood there.

“You are kind, my son,” Gertrude replied. “You may come in. Let me see you once more. You have grown well.”

“Where is Claudius? Has he felt offended?” Hamlet looked around. His right hand is on the dagger at his waist belt.

“Have you forgotten me?” Gertrude looked to Hamlet. A mother’s stare will melt any of her children’s hearts.

“No, by the rood, not so. You are the Madam, your husband’s ‘brother in kinship’ wife, and, would it were not so you are my mother.”

“Nay, then I’ll set those to you that can speak,” Gertrude said to Hamlet.

“Come, come, and sit you down; you shall not budge. You go not till I set you up a glass where you may see the inmost part of you.” Hamlet offered his mother a glass of wine. She took it and sat down by her dressing table.

“What wilt thou do?” Gertrude motioned to the dagger held by Hamlet. “Thou wilt not murder me?”

“Help, ho!” Gertrude cried out in jest but she did sound like she was in trouble. That was echoed by the one behind the curtain.

“Who lurks in the dark?” Hamlet reacted. “How now, a rat? Does he lurk, unlike other emperors? Sincerely, not of him who held deceit in his ascension”

Hamler assumed whoever had remained hidden was Claudius.

“Rats are to be killed on sight or heard.” Hamlet drew the dagger to thurst at whoever was behind the curtain. “Dead for a ducat, dead.”

Polonius felt the dagger thrust into his heart. He fell to his knees, dragging the curtain drapes, while his last words were; “I am slain.”

“Not the rat I was expecting, but a fatter one; mice he has by the litter.” Hamlet saw whom he slain and stepped back while his mother attended to the fallen figure.

“O me, what hast thou has done,” Gertrude rushed toward the dead Great Chamberlain. She sat down to cradle his head. “He held no breath. He is dead.”

“Nay, I know not.” Hamlet reacted to the kill.  “Was it the Emperor?”

Hamlet had wished it was.

“O, what a rash and bloody deed are this!” Gertrude cradled the dead man in her lap.

“A bloody deed—almost as bad, good mother, as killing a king and marry with his brother.” Hamlet held not back his words toward his mother.

“As kill a king?” Gertrude was confused.

“Ay, lady, it was my word,” Hamlet replied and then looked at the dead man. “Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell.”

“I took thee for thy better,” Hamlet said of Polonius as deserving the death he had been given. “Take thy fortune. Thou findest to be too busy is some danger.”

“Too busy? He is the Great Chamberlain. It’s his task to know all and act on it. He was no busybody, but a well-cared old man for Norway.”

“Mother, leave wringing of your hands.” Hamlet reached out his hands to his mother. “Peace, sit you down, and let me wring your heart; for so I shall if it be made of penetrable stuff; if damnèd custom has not brazed it so That it be proof and bulwark against sense.”

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 3 Sub Scene 2

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Three

Sub Scene Two.

Claudius took to the side of the bedding he shared with Gertrude. It was the same frame that he retained of the old King, like the chair he seats as Emperor. He wanted to go onto his knees as if he was in the bedtime prayer but remained standing there with his head bowed.

“O’ God, hear my prayer,” Claudius spoke to God. “I had not done this for a long time. Let me stand for I am unsure of what I am to do.” ”

Claudius then felt the scent of the King then. There were so many items in the castle that was the King’s and he found no heart to archive them or at best, to auction them. Not even the sheets on the bedding, where he had spent himself with the lover of his.

“O, my offense is rank, it smells to heaven; it hath the primal eldest curse upon ’t,” Claudius sighed. “A brother’s murder done. He was a brother to me, we grew from nothing, and yet I am always in his shadow, when I should excel, I remained as so.”

“Pray can I not, though the inclination is as sharp as will. My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent, and, like a man to double business bound, I stand in pause where I shall first begin and both neglect.” Claudius does not deny his reluctance to move on; he was bound by another.

“What if this cursèd hand were thicker than itself with brother’s blood? Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens to wash it white as snow? Whereto serves mercy but to confront the visage of offense?”Claudius regretted his act. It will be the blemish in his soul. He seeks redemption but will redemption be given?

“And what’s in prayer but this twofold force, to be forestallèd ere we come to fall,
Or pardoned being down?” Claudius still searches within himself. “Then I’ll look up. Only you can help me.”

“My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer can serve my turn? Forgive me for my foul murder? That cannot be, since I am still possessed of those effects for which I did the murder: my crown, mine own ambition, and …. my queen.” Claudius finally spoke of the cause of the murder. It was for Gertrude and the wealth there.

A confession was given.

“May one be pardoned and retain the offense? In the corrupted currents of this world,
Offense’s gilded hand may shove by justice, and oft ’tis seen the wicked prize itself
buys out the law.” Such was justice in the world, wealth can push aside any doubts or vice.

“But ’tis not so above: there is no shuffling; there the action lies in his true nature, and we compelled, even to the teeth and forehead of our faults, to give in evidence. What then? What rests?” Claudius knew in his soul, he will not evade the judgment on death.

“Try what repentance can. What can it not? Yet what can it, when one cannot repent?” Claudius mocked repentance as he felt it was not attainable at all. “O wretched state! O bosom black as death! O limèd soul, that, struggling to be free, art more engaged! Help, angels! Make assay.”

Claudius looked to the Angels for their deliverance but none came. His confession was unheard or …unforgiven. He needs to be more …deserving. He needs to be humble in his prayer.

“Bow, stubborn knees and heart with strings of steel be soft as sinews of the newborn babe. All may be well.” Claudius went on his knees. “For this reason, I bow my knees before the Father.” (Ephesians 3:14)

The Emperor had removed his clothes then.

Unseen by the Emperor who in his prayer, Hamlet entered the chamber. He had thought to see his mother there but found the Emperor in prayer on his knees. He paused to look at the figure deep in his prayers.

“Does he pray to God, or on his knees to seek forgiveness from the King?” Hamlet muttered.

“Now might I do it pat, now he is a-praying, and now I’ll do ’t. If I draw the sword. and so he goes to heaven, and so am I revenged? That would be scanned: A villain kills my father, and for that, I, his sole son, do this same villain send to heaven.”

“Why, this is hire and salary, not revenge. He took my father grossly, full of bread, with all his crimes broad blown, as flush as May; and how his audit stands who knows to save heaven. But in our circumstance and course of thought is heavy with him.”

“And am I then revenged to take him in the purging of his soul, when he is fit and seasoned for his passage? No! It’s a more horrid hent.” Hamlet refuses to do it then. He felt that killing will demean his revenge, for to have killed a man while in talks with God, for whatever he was telling God, it was unjust killing to take the other’s life.

“I shall take him when he is drunk asleep, or in his rage, or in …. th’ incestuous pleasure of his bed, at the game, a-swearing, or about some act that has no relish of salvation in ’t— Then trip him, that his heels may kick at heaven, and that his soul may be as damned and black as hell, whereto it goes. I shall not be Macbeth hath murdered sleep.”

“I shall seek my mother in the personal chamber.” Hamlet exits. “When I take my vengeance, I shall sleep better.”

Claudius rose from his prayer form.

“My words fly up, and my thoughts remain below; alike Heaven Hell apart. Words without thoughts never to heaven go.” Claudius decides to take the wine by the table.

“I would give all my fame for a pot of ale and safety” (Henry V: Act 3, Scene 2)

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 3 Sub Scene 1

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Three

Sub Scene One

Emperor Claudius was back in the chamber when he summoned the two friends of Hamlet, and also his apprentices. They appeared before the Emperor.

“My lord, if I  may…” Rosencrantz spoke first but was cut off by the Emperor.

“I like him not, nor stands it safe with us to let his madness range. Therefore prepare yourself, a new commission I will talk with you.” Claudius looked at the duo.

“You will take him to England. I have friends there.” Claudius laid the terms of the task. “The terms of our estate may not endure hazard so near as doth hourly grow out of his brows.”

“We will ourselves provide.” Rosencrantz bowed.

“We deemed the task beyond..” Guildenstern abstained.

“It will be silver and gold I will provide.” Claudius knew the call.

“Most holy and religious fear it is to keep those many many bodies safe that life and feed upon your Majesty the Emperor.” Rosencrantz laid the praise onto the Emperor.

“We will ourselves provide. Most holy and religious fear it is to keep those many many bodies safe that life and feed upon your Majesty.” Guildenstern added.

“The single and peculiar life of the Emperor is bound with all the strength and armor of the mind To keep itself from noyance, but much more that spirit upon whose weal depends and rests the lives of many. The cess of majesty dies not alone, but like a gulf doth draw what’s near it with it, or it is a massy wheel fixed on the summit of the highest mount, to whose huge spokes ten thousand lesser things are mortised and adjoined, which, when it falls, each small annexment, petty consequence, attends the boisterous ruin. Never alone did the king .. I was to say the emperor sigh, but with a general groan.” Rosencrantz went on with praise toward the Emperor.

“Are you finished?” Claudius looked to the one who praised him so much. “Arm you, I pray you, to this speedy voyage, for we will fetter put about this fear, which now goes too free-footed.”

“We will haste us.” Rosencrantz grabbed his pride back then. “Hamlet will be curtailed by us like the last curtain in the play. End of him.”

“So be it.” Claudius dismissed the duo. It was then the Great Chamberlain arrived.

“My lord, the son going to his mother’s closet. Behind the arras, I’ll convey myself to hear the process. I’ll warrant she’ll tax him home; and, as you had said (and wisely was it said), ’Tis meet that some more audience than a mother, since nature makes them partial, should overhear the speech of vantage.”

Polonius saw that Claudius was tired. The play had taken its toll on him. An accusation by the one who is the son, in front of an audience of servants whom he faces every moment; it was more than an embarrassment; it was harassment of the soul.

“Fare you well, my liege. I’ll call upon you ere you go to bed and tell you what I know.” The Great Chamberlian knew the moment to leave was then.

Claudius did not look at the departing elderly man and devoted servant.

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 2 Sub-Scene 10

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Two

Sub Scene Ten

Much ado among friends; love and jilt are the norms.

“I still do, by these pickers and stealers” Hamlet wiggled his last finger in front of Rozencrantz’s face

“My dear lord,’ said Rosencrantz. ‘Why are you so unhappy? You’re only closing the door to help if you don’t tell your friend.”

“Sir, is it because I lack desire? No, the promotion was indecisive.” Hamlet replied.

“How can that be when you have the support of the King himself for your succession in Denmark?’

‘Yes, but no longer, sir, He sits not on it.” Hamlet was distracted by the arrival of some actors holding musical instruments. One of them held a recorder, a woodwind musical instrument like the flute. It is a flute with a whistle mouthpiece, also known as a fipple flute. A recorder can be distinguished from other duct flutes by the presence of a thumb hole for the upper hand and seven finger holes: three for the upper hand and four for the lower. It is the most prominent duct flute in the western classical tradition.

“May I borrow one?” Hamlet asked the player. He took one from a musician.

“Do you remember these, Guildenstern? Perhaps not.” Hamlet showed it to the others. “Do come with me.’

Guildenstern followed him out of the room, along the corridor to the terrace overlooking the huge garden with the setting sun, lending it a shadowed outlook.

“I used to stand here when my mind was younger and the age small.” Hamlet loved the dark blue skies above the gloomy landscape. “I could only reach the top of there, but my sight was on the horizon. I pictured fairies and imps all coming out to play then, and how I wished it was with me then. But it was not, for I am forbidden to go out near dusk. Friends were rare even then.”

Hamlet looked to Guildenstern.

“Why did you turn on me? Was it the money the Emperor was to pay? Or paid? Or the pleasure of doing me in the rear?” Hamlet confronted the other.

“O, my lord, if my duty is too bold, my love is too unmannerly,” Guildenstern replied defensively. “I am the …”

“The manly one with us.” Hamlet voiced out his view. “I do not well understand that. Will you play upon this pipe?”

“My lord, I cannot. Did I do what offended you?” Guildenstern shook his head.

“Musical you were not but eloquent in the speech, you excel,” Hamlet spoke of Guildenstern’s skill.

“Believe me, I cannot. I know no touch of it, my lord.” Guildenstern still trying to ask Hamlet about his outburst.

“It is as easy as lying. Govern these ventages with your fingers and thumb, give it breath with your mouth and it will discourse most eloquent music.” Hamlet continues to push the musical instrument toward Guildenstern.

“But these cannot I command to any utterance of harmony. I do have not the skill.” Guildenstern looked at Hamlet. “Why the hostility, my lord?”

“My lord? Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of me! You would play upon me, you would seem to know my stops, you would pluck out the heart of my mystery, you would sound me from my lowest note to the top of my compass, and there is much music, and excellent voice, in this little organ, yet cannot you make it speak.”

“I don’t understand.” Guildenstern kept on a baffled expression.

“Do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what instrument you will, though you can
fret me, you cannot play upon me.” Hamlet turned to look at the horizon. “Just as they won’t play with me. We were never one of the same.”

Hamlet then saw Polonius approaching them.

“Yes, the boats must be in the port for the Fishmonger has come calling.” Hamlet walked toward Polonius.

“My lord, the Queen would speak with you, and presently,” Polonius announced as if he was addressing the guests in the hall. He was confused to see Hamlet walk past him looking at the skies.

“Oh, how do you fare?” Hamlet greeted the other. “Do you see yonder cloud that’s almost in
the shape of a camel? You do know of the camel?”

“Yes, I do. I read it to Ophelia when she was young.” Polonius moved his sight to the skies. “By th’ Mass, and ’tis like a camel indeed.”

“Methinks it is like a weasel. Nasty creatures, ever sneaking around.” 

“It is backed like a weasel.” Polonius tried to be amused by Hamlet, yet he could make out nothing in the skies, except clouds, or perhaps, like steaks piled on the plate… appetizing.

“Or like a whale” Hamlet ranted on.

“Very like a whale.” What whale? It was more like a herd of gazelle.

“Then I will come to my mother by and by.” Hamlet looked at Polonius as if he was back in his sanity. “Aside.”

“They fool me to the top of my bent.” Loony was the other idea. “I will come by and by.”

“I will say so.” Polonius nodded to Hamlet. He was then feeling hungry, and a steak will suffice.

“By and by” is easily said. Leave me, friends.” Hamlet dismissed all of them. He looked to the last one leaving the door, body with the shadow.

“Alas, I am alone…once more.” Hamlet looked to the skies and it was all dark. “Soon the very witching time of night, When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out. It will be a contagion to this world.”

Hamlet had on him the image of the three witches from Macbeth. They were to him placing the contagion to this world.

“ Now could I drink hot blood as blood is the life?” ( Quote from Bram Stoker ‘Dracula’.) Hamlet laughed to himself. “Witches and the vampire; truly the unpair but of pairing will be a bane to all. My mother and Claudius are of that.”

“Could I of  such bitter business as the day would quake to look on.” Hamlet held back his anger. He did promise the ghost the mother will come to no harm. “Soft, now to my mother. O heart, lose not thy nature; let not ever be like Nero who took his mother to bosom yet bloodied by him on the bosom.”

According to their accounts, his mother Agrippina was a ruthless and ambitious woman who schemed and murdered to get her son on the throne. When it finally paid off, she had no intention of fading into the background. However, five years into his reign, Nero and Agrippina became locked in a brutal power struggle. In Baiae, he plotted the murder of his mother by inviting her as a guest of honor to a sumptuous banquet at his villa. Nero had planned for his mother’s ship to sink, and depending on the writer’s account, Agrippina either died at sea or survived the incident only for Nero to send soldiers to her villa to finish the job.

“Let me be cruel, not unnatural.” Hamlet looked around him and his eyes rested on the dagger on the wall. He retrieved it and unsheathed it.

“I will speak daggers to her, but use none of my tongue and soul in this be hypocrites: How in my words soever she be shent, to give them seals never, my soul, consent.” Hamlet felt his oath to the ghost pained him but he will abide as his soul will never consent to him harming his mother.

“She was yours, Father. As I stand to read the lines, King Lear, on my birth.” Hamlet sheathed the dagger.

“My father compounded with my mother under the Dragon's tail, and my nativity was under Ursa Major, so that it follows, I am rough and lecherous. Tut, I should have been that I am, had the maiden lies star in the firmament twinkled on my bastardizing.”

“An I, my mother? Or am I not?” Hamlet slipped into his indecisiveness. He then lowered his head.

Mother, you will be spared,” Hamlet muttered. “I will abide by my father’s ghost words.”

Was it obedience or defeat in the mind?

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 2 Sub-Scene 9

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Two

Sub Scene Nine

The accusation of the accused

“The fear of death is something that occurs between the ego and the superego, and makes its appearance under two conditions: a reaction to an external danger and as an internal process, as in melancholia,” Hamlet told Horatio when they were the ones only ones in the Hall. Everyone had left; some were astounded, some upset, why can’t they speak English all others; and sadly some were angered by the play. Those included the Lenten Players.

“I guess it’s time to move on again.” The players lament their lack of roots in any location. Such is the plight of the players ever looking for the stage.

“Melancholia? I think the word evades my understanding. “Horatio looked to Hamlet.

“It’s depression. It’s mine. I was with myself; undecisive but not anymore.” Hamlet smiled. “The wounded deer go and weep and let the uninjured heart play because some must watch while others sleep – that’s the way of the world.”

“Wouldn’t that speech, together with a rich costume and two rosettes on my shoes, get me a job as an actor if everything else fails?” Hamlet smiled. “The last avenue to get some food into us; our voice may lend us then if nothing works.”

Well, at least half a share,’ said Horatio. “I can be your page.”

‘A whole one, I,’ said Hamlet. ‘Because you should know by now, my fellow Dane, that this kingdom has lost Jove himself and is now ruled by a peacock that struts like an Emperor…not without clothes, but drab in guilt seen by others.”

“You might have used some rhyming!” Horatio cautioned Hamlet. “Words whispered in these walls.”

“Plain is my accusations now. Oh, good Horatio. I’ll take the ghost’s word for a bet of a thousand pounds. Did you see?’

“My lord.” Horatio nodded.

“When he talked of poisoning?” Hamlet raved on. “I saw everything even in the dim light. As it was when then ghost told me.”

“I need to be celebrated now.” Hamlet ran elatedly to the door and called out.

“Some music! Come, the recorders! If the king doesn’t like the play then he doesn’t like it. Come, some music for I am cheerful now.”

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern appeared and Hamlet grinned at them.

“My good lord,” said Guildenstern. “Can I have a word?”

“Sir, you can have a complete history,” said Hamlet. “Need I remind you of trust among friends? I did stand behind you …No, it was Rosencrantz, while you dally behind me. We had each other’s back then.”

“The Emperor, sir…” Guildenstern begged to be heard.

‘Yes, the one who said he is the Emperor. What about him? Has he died laid like Caesar? Poisoned from the play? Caesar was not.”

“In his chamber, seriously unwell,” Rosencrantz added.

“Drinking his wine to quell his true guilt?” Hamlet chuckled there. “As if drinking may clear our guilt.”

“No, my lord, angry, rather.” Rosencrantz seemingly crafted to sneak in a word or two on the conversation.

“You would be wiser to tell him, I am the doctor; it would perhaps plunge him into a far greater …. Anger I will attest..”

“My good lord,” Guildenstern ay tethers then, “pay attention and don’t change imply more than there was.”

“You act like his true son. Perhaps as respect to the Emperor, and to the son, I will.” Hamlet nodded. “As knave will to their lords. I’m listening, sir. Talk.”

“Your mother is very upset and has sent me to you.”

Hamlet bowed elaborately. ‘You are welcome,’ he said.”Mother never calls on me for all matters that needed our love but scalding on the soul.”

“I am sure she meant well for you,” Guildenstern assured Hamlet.

“As if you knew her. Did you perhaps share her bed and listened to her bedtime tale? I hardly remember mine.”

“No, my lord, this mock courtesy is inappropriate. If you would like to give me a proper answer I will be able to deliver your mother’s message. If not, your dismissal of me and my return will end my business.”

“Sir, I can’t.”

“Can’t what, my lord?” Guildenstern needed the reply to the mother. It was the punishment to be the emissary there, but as always, a message must be replied to.

“Did you not know I am stricken with ….madness? Do you know what is that? I will give you my book to read.” Hamlet looked at Guildenstern. “ It may give you a proper answer.”

“But, sir, whatever answer my mother desires I can give I will give you or, rather, as you’ve said, my mother. So, no more of this, but to the point. My mother, you say …” Hamlet frowns his expression with his right hand cradling his jaw thinking of the reply.

“Then this is what she says: your behavior has amazed and astonished her.” Rosencrantz may be witty at times, and plain dumb like an ass to be admonished by the stud.

‘Oh wonderful son, that can astonish a mother like this! But isn’t there something else that follows this mother’s amazement? Tell me.”

“She wants to talk to you in her chamber before you go to bed.” Guildenstern said. “Here’s a letter from the Emperor for you. Read it later.”

“We will obey even if she were ten times our mother and ….father. Do you have any more business with us?” Guildenstern turned but Rosencrantz lingered.

“My lord,” Rosencrantz said. “You loved me once.”

(The above lines were borrowed lavishly from https://nosweatshakespeare.com/plays/modern-hamlet/act-3-scene-2/. I humbly declared here, and sincerely apologize for it. I had a tiring day of work and reading the original passages did not help much until the above reading assisted me to adapt here. My thanks and salutation.

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 2 Sub-Scene 8

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Two

Sub Scene Eight

Trap the Mouse

“It was called Murder of Gozago, but it's more like a…. trap for the mice; we do have some in the castle. Nasty creatures who sneak on you, and poisoned the meals, not before it take a bite for themselves.” Hamlet paused in his words. “I had it named Mousetrap. You will never know who may sneak in and then…..”

Hamlet reached out with his hands to clap together.

“Oh, bear me not with antics. The narrative on the play please.” Claudius pressed on. The more he distracts Hamlet, perhaps Gertrude could be spared being asked by the …mad son. Rational and reasoning do not augur well in one who’s mad.

“It was madness then to stage the play as it was an image of a murder done in Vienna. Gonzago is the duke’s name, and his wife Baptista. Madness for we never had any of it in the castle.” Hamlet said. “But madness drove me as an actor, to stage it.”

“You shall see anon. ’Tis a knavish piece of work, but what of that? Your Majesty and we that have free souls, it touches us not. Let the galled jade wince; our withers are unwrung” Hamlet saw the entry of the villain then and sat himself down. “The play still runneth.”

“You are menacing, Hamlet,” Ophelia whispered to him. “Playing to the relationship of the King and madam.”

“I am not but….. Or it may be of ours if we had not unfolded new scenes to ours.” Hamlet smiled. “Your scent alludes upon me.”

“You are as good as a chorus, my lord.” Ophelia shook her head. “A naught I have to repeat many times yet you yearn to hear ever again.”

“I could interpret between you and your love”, Hamlet smiled. “If I could see the puppets dallying.”

“You are keen, my lord, you are keen but the strings of love do not dangle between us.”

“It would cost you a groaning to take off mine edge.” Hamlet pleaded for the need that he had not done to her before in the attic. He felt ready to complete the task then.

“Still better or worse …. But I desire no more.” Ophelia turned away.

“So you mistake your husbands.—” Hamlet was cut off by the arrival of the next player. “We shall speak another time.”

“Ah, begin, murderer. pox, leave thy damnable faces and begin. Come, the croaking raven doth bellow for
revenge.” The Mouse sneaks in.

“I am Lucianus. I am the King’s aide. A nephew by bloodline thus I owned a line to the kingdom.” Lucianus appeared by the third player with a half-face mask, showing only the lower half of his face, with the streaking mustache. Claudius had one too.

“Thoughts black, hands apt, drugs fit, and time agreeing Confederate season, else no creature seeing, Thou mixture rank, of midnight weeds collected, With Hecate’s ban thrice blasted, thrice infected,” The player squeaked and displayed the vial in his right hand.

‘Thy natural magic and dire property on wholesome life usurp immediately.” The mouse leans toward the King. “Pours the poison in his ears.

“He poisons him.” Hamlet was all excited. “from the garden for his estate.

”I hold many killers of the weed.” The gardener seated there/ “Poisoned I have not of any here.”

“Hush!” The others hushed him. “You are not any mouse but an old goat.”

“His name’s Gonzago. The story is extant and written in very choice mine. You shall see anon how the murderer gets the love of Gonzago’s wife.” Hamlet called out while pointing his right index finger at random until he stopped at Claudius.

Claudius rises then.

“The Emperor rises” Ophelia observed.

“What, frighted with false fire? A murder perhaps.” Hamlet glared at Claudius.

“Stop it,” Claudius called out.

“How fares my lord?” Gertrude asked while Polonius called for play to be stopped.

“It’s scurrilous to be played at all.”

“Give me some light. Away!” Claudius found himself stumbling among the seated guest. “Make haste, I am to be away.”

“Lights, lights, lights!” The great Chamberlain's voice was heard, and the guests took their leave of the Hall.

All but Hamlet and Horatio exit.

“My lord, you have stirred a hornet’s nest tonight.” Horatio approached Hamlet.

 

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 2 Sub-Scene 7

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Two

Sub Scene Seven

The curtain raises (2)

“Do I owe you a debt, my dear? A long time ago, I think it was.” Hamlet looked at Ophelia and had to tempt her. . He recalled the moment in the attic, young friends nurturing to be lovers then.

“If it ever was, but naught was the debt taken then. If I can recall, you could not prize the debt onto yourself.” Ophelia smites at his failure.

“A misadventure of youth, but we could retake that now,” Hamlet suggested the offering once more. “I am still in my youth but with adventures to myself, I had learned. I can …”

“Halt your thoughts, Hamlet. I have erred then but won’t be lured to impose by you.” Ophelia glared at him. “We took no vow and there shall be none.”

A lustful endeavor was rejected but the scorn on Polonius was anger on listening to the rebuff by the two younger persons. He was soon distracted by the stage play when the player playing the King addressed Queen in these words.

 “What to ourselves in passion we propose, the passion ending, doth the purpose lose. The violence of either grief or joy their enactures with themselves destroy. Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament; grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident. This world is not for aye, nor ’tis not strange that even our loves should with our fortunes change; for ’tis, a question left us yet to prove “

“Whether love leads fortune or else, fortune love.” Hamlet feels as if he can shape his future (“love lead fortune”), but towards the end of the play, Hamlet begins to accept the fact that destiny cannot be avoided (“fortune [leads] love”).  

“Our promises are worthless because nothing in this world is constant, and everything must ultimately submit to Fortune.” Hamlet look from Ophelia towards Gertrude. The latter ignored his stare and immersed herself in the play. Hamlet considers her having broken her marriage vows to his father by marrying Claudius. Thus, she has foregone her vows.

“The great man down, you mark his favorite flies; the poor, advanced, makes friends of enemies. And hitherto doth love on fortune tend, For who not needs shall never lack a friend and who in want a hollow friend doth try Directly seasons him his enemy.”

“Betrayal!” Hamlet called out looking at Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. “Friends or fiend indeed.”

None dares to hush Hamlet for his play.

“But, orderly to end where I began: our wills and fates do so contrary run That our devices still are overthrown; our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own. So think thou wilt no second husband wed,
But die thy thoughts when thy first lord is dead.” The King looked to his Queen.

“Nor Earth to me give food, nor heaven light,” The Queen replied. “Sport and repose lock from me day and night, to desperation turn my trust and hope, an anchor’s cheer in prison be my scope. Each opposite that blanks the face of joy meets what I would have well and it destroys. Both here and hence pursue me lasting strife, if, once a widow, ever I am a wife.”

“She should break it now!” Hamlet looked to the audience for their reaction. He saw some lost to the words, some baffled by the action, and fewer than a few understood the words.

“Alas, they know not naught but the guilt should feel.” Hamlet sighed with a side view of his mother.

“Tis swore. Sweet, leave me here awhile. My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile The tedious day with sleep. Periods of sleep.” The King lay on the stage by his side.

“Sleep rock thy brain, and never come mischance between us twain.” The Player Queen exits. It was the cue for Hamlet to ask his mother.

“Madam, how like you this play?”

“The lady doth protest too much, methinks but I am unappreciative of a play.”

“But you are wedded to an actor, sorry not once but twice in the journey. Surely, you do know the vows taken, and like her will keep her word.” Hamlet played to her words.

“I am of reality. Plays to me are made up of events. I partake not in any.” Gertrude denies her understanding of plays.

“Yet you attract onto actors? Not once but twice. Surely, without an understanding, it will be boring to be attracted.” Hamlet queried. “To be distracted by one and move to another truly misunderstood me.”

“Hamlet, he died and I moved on.” Gertrude took offense to Hamlet. “Should I not?”

“Have you heard the argument? Is there no offense in ’t?” Claudius cut in making the overture that it was more like a marital conversation.

“No, no, they do but jest, poison in jest.” The poison in jest was like a sarcastic remark to hurt, yet not truly the whole of it. “No offense i’ th’ world. Our life is filled with it and acceptance is …. Bearable.”

“What do you call the play?” The King moved the subject and moved it toward Hamlet.

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 2 Sub-Scene 6

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Two

Sub Scene Six

The curtain raises (1)

The Main Player steps up to the stage, dressed in the flashy suit provided by Hamlet. He then took the attention of the audience to the play.

“For us and our tragedy, Here stooping to your clemency, We beg your hearing patiently.” The main player bowed to the audience and then a hush was among them.

“Is this a prologue or the posy of a ring?” Hamlet looked at Ophelia.

“Posy of a ring? I have not any of yours.” Ophelia hammered Hamlet then. “A prologue perhaps but a prologue of us is unneeded. As there was none on a ring, none it will be the tree trunks.”

Writing love commitments was a fave then the carving on the tree trunks.

“You do read aplenty but shallow is your understanding.” Hamlet looked at Ophelia. “The tree stands there longer than most lovers.”

“Understanding you have been …. too brief, my lord. I can’t tell if you ever knew ….love..” Ophelia replied if Hamlet was to talk of them. She understood him no more.

“As the woman’s love?” Hamlet added.

“Or the man who seems to move about with his love.” Ophelia retorted back. “Our facet of love had changed with recent perspective.”

Hamlet for once was unable to reply and then the play began.

The two players took to the stage; one was the King and the other was the Queen.

“Full thirty times hath Phoebus’ cart gone round. Neptune’s salt wash and Tellus’ orbèd ground, And thirty dozen moons with borrowed sheen About the world have times twelve thirties been since love our hearts and Hymen did our hands.” The King spoke.

“You mean he broke her with his hands?’ A servant was asking his friend.

“How would I know? You were not any virgin when we did it.” Whispers of hush went out around.

“Playing to the non-learned was like to the inmates of the zoo,” Polonius muttered to himself. “It’s also like un-regained grounds in a long drought.”

“So many journeys may the sun and moon make us again count o’er ere love be done! But woe is me! You are so sick of late, so far from cheer and your former state, that I distrust you.” The Queen sighed. “Yet, though I distrust, be it discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must for women fear too much, even as they love, and women’s fear and love hold quantity, in neither aught nor extremity.”

“Now what my love is, proof hath made you know, and, as my love is sized, my fear is so: Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear; where little fears grow great, great love grows there.” The Queen looked to the King.

“Is she in love or not?” The voice was stifled by the hush of the others.

“Faith, I must leave thee, love, and shortly too. I feel death in my soul. My operant powers their functions leave to do.” The King clutched his heart as if in pain and his heart yearn for the Queen to live on well.

“And thou shall live in this fair world behind, honored, beloved; and haply one as kind for thy husband shalt thou—” The King looked to his Queen smiling. “Another will find you soon.”

“O, confound the rest! Such love must need be treason in my breast.” The Queen called out. Her heart beats for him only.

“We have taken the vow to be forever till death do us part.” The King smiled. “If death comes, let us part as it should be.”

“Our vows are ours to hold not in our physical life, but in our souls. If there be a second let me be accurst but none shall be until I may have killed the first.” The Queen protested that she will only remarry if only her first was murdered by her.

“That’s wormwood!” Hamlet called out. Wormwood was a known elixir then to purge the digestive tract of worms. To the actors, it was meant to bring forth guilt; as in the play, it was given to the patient in preparation poured into the ear. Murder is most foul indeed.

“The instances that second marriage move; Are base respects of thrift, but none of love. A second time I kill my first when the second kisses me in bed.” The Queen sat on the stage. “I have done badly not only on his death; I have also taken another for the desire. He dies inside of me.”

“I do believe you think what now you speak, but what we do determines oft we break.” The King accepts the Queen of her words with her action. “Purpose is but the slave to memory, of violent birth, but poor validity, which now, the fruit unripe, sticks on the tree but fall unshaken when they mellow be.”

“Often our intentions are strong at first, but as time goes on they weaken, just like an apple sticks to the tree when it is unripe but falls to the ground once it ripens. The promises we make to ourselves in emotional moments lose their power once the emotion passes.” The King looks at the Queen for reality may differ from mere words.

“Love me yes, love me not.” Hamlet felt the need to add his words when he looked at the one he once loved.

“He is onto his madness once more.” Polonius rubbished the man of his love in his words inside his thoughts.  “He is more of a rotten apple even on the tree then.”

“Most necessary ’tis that we forget to pay ourselves what to ourselves is debt.” The King looked to the audience.

“Heed those words. Pay up your debts now!” Sullivan the servant roared.

“Shut him up before we indebt him to the dispensary for good.” Another servant retorted. Sullivan was damned to the pits of silence from then.

 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 2 Sub-Scene 5

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Two

Sub Scene Five

“De play! De play! De Play!” (borrowed from Fantasy Island and replaced with the play instead of a plane.)

The players ran on the stage and not a whimper from them

“Why are the players all moving about on the stage? Is that acting?” A servant asked.

“As we do in the kitchen to each our chore yet you all roar in chorus.” The chef de sous said. “It’s I who does not speak but let my taste assails my tongue.”

“Not the day we caught a rat in your pot.” Another servant cut in.

“Hush there, young Sullivan or it will be your tongue I will dip as part of the sauce.” The chef felt indignified in his work area. “I did tell the Main Chef and he offers me a mousetrap. I to bend down to the menial task degrades my profession.”

The players assembled on the stage and then they raised their right index finger to their lips, to display the silence required.

“It’s a dumb show. I had seen in the market square.” The one who spoke was hushed by the others.

The dumb show raged the stage with fast movements while an actor narrates from the rear. Or none. Mime was an expression of the mind with its witty limbs movements and facial expression. If a picture tells a thousand words, the mime could tell the whole tale without a voice.

“Enter a King and a Queen, very lovingly, the Queen embracing him and he of her.” Two players, expected to be a couple, hugged each other.

 “She kneels and makes a show of protestation unto him. He takes her up and declines his head upon her neck.” The lady had much to complain about or fret about their moods as known to many. Marital woes it was named.

“The King lies him down upon a bank of flowers.” The man ever tired of the consoling takes his rest.

“She, seeing him asleep, leaves him.” House chores aplenty, and he had his session of her mouthful.

But…

“Anon comes in another man, approaches the King.” The actor at rest was unaware.

“The other takes off his crown, and kisses it”, Paying the due respect on the throne beholden. The standing actor then takes something from the tunic and waved it to the audience. It was a vial.

“The one resting was poured the content from the vial. It went into the ears and left there.”

“The King woken from his sleep held his ears and shook his head. The one who did sneaks to the rear.” By then the guests were stunned by the act while the plot unfolds.

“The Queen returned and finds the King dead. His body lain unmoving while she makes passionate action. The poisoner with some three or four come in again, seem to condole with her. The dead body is carried away. The poisoner woos the Queen with gifts. She seems harsh awhile but in the end, accepts his love.”

“The end of the mime.” The player called out. “The real act then begins.”

The players all went to the rear. Ophelia, ever the chaste asked of the Prince.

“What means this, my lord? I have not attended many plays to know it all.” Ophelia asked if they do get the spoilers of the play.

“Dearest me, this alike to ‘miching-mallecho”? Hamlet used his fingers to move on his left knee of Ophelia.

“O’atrt you, Hamlet? It’s rude.” Ophelia brushed the hands off her knee. “We are not like before.”

“I know. It was the feeling then. It means sneaking in mischief. It’s a play expression.” Hamlet whispered. “We shall know by this fellow. The players cannot keep counsel; they’ll tell all.”

“Will you tell all about our past? What does this show mean?” Ophelia asked.

“Ay, or any show that needed to be told. Be not you ashamed to show, I’ll not shame to tell you what it means.”

“You are naught, you are naught. Telling me nothing of nothing if ever there be anything. I’ll mark the play by myself.:

Hamlet smiled at Ophelia.

An intermission was called and the players withdraw to the rear, while one player with the broom steps out.

“Away with the deceits, and now we will tell you what’s it about?”

The audience clapped.

“Does that mean we get singers now?” A servant asked.

“Or do we prance like demons around the fireplace, to bring forth the devil to life?” Another servant roared.

“Sullivan, one more quip, and you get quitted for good.” The Head Chef was annoyed. It went into a stint of murmurings among the servants but Hamlet was in his excellent mode.

“The intermission to the mime and the real play now be performed.” Hamlet declared soon after he stood up. “Do you feel the beat in your heart, perhaps your mind? Does it beat any realism that you may know?”

“What cannot you and I perform upon the unguarded Duncan? What not put upon his spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt Of our great quell?” Hamlet went into his acting mode and quoted from Macbeth Act 1 Scene 7.

“The play shall tell.” Hamlet sat back at Ophelia’s side. 

Hamlet; the Noir Adaption 2023 Act 3 Scene 2 Sub-Scene 4

 Act Three

Act Three Scene Two

Sub Scene Four

The corral soon filled.

The Emperor with the madam arrives with an entourage of guests that also included leading members of the servants. Alas, the notice to the play was considered short in date to plan, and its purpose was … unmeaningful except to amuse the Prince. the one with the affliction to be considered to be mad, and soon to be shipped out to England.

“Let him be amused, and I was told that we held wooden benches for stools? Never the comfort accorded to any guests, but do fill the hall with our own so that they may be amused to a play by the Prince.” The Emperor had told the Great Chamberlain. They came in a long line, doing their cutesy to the Madam before taking their seats.

“I have not been to a play before.” One servant voiced out.

“Do they serve wine there?” The repairman of the steamers asked.

“You can feed on my mammaries if you desire, but tempt not me with your salty squirts there.” The milkmaid replied. “I have done my loosening enough.”

“Bless thee, Maid. I am sure you can still count your sows, while I have lost my feel of which are mine.” The raunchy gardener added. “Too many blooms I have in my beds, I lost count of which their seedlings.” 

“Hush!” The call went out when the benches were filled to the brim with the haunches comfortably used to it.

“How fares our cousin Hamlet?” Claudius having taken his comfy seat on the throne, saw Hamlet approach.

“Cousin?” Hamlet looked to the Emperor. “Narry a son now?”

“I was asking Rosencrantz here. They deemed themselves close to you like siblings.” Claudius motioned to the two apprentices of his seat at the side. “The three of you were close.”

“Excellent, i’ faith, of the chameleon’s dish. I eat the air, promise-crammed. You cannot feed capons so.” Hamlet called them his cousins out. Capon is a chicken castrated to fatten it for slaughter.

“Did he calls us capon? I resent that.” Rosencrantz whispered his displeasure to the Guildenstern. “I am not.”

“I have nothing with this answer, Hamlet. “ Claudius clawed back his words. “It was told to me that the three of you were close. These words are not mine.”

Claudius looked to Polonius for advice but the other had looked away.

“Polonius, you old fool. Your tenure may end soon.” Claudius said to himself.

“No, nor mine now.” Hamlet smiled. He had just slammed the nail into the coffin of the duo who claims to know him. He moved to address Polonius/

“My lord, you played once i’ th’ university, you say?”Hamlet moved the subject matter.

“That did I, my lord, and was accounted a good actor.” Polonius was surprised at the question. “That was a long time ago.”

It was Polonius's amateur venture into the plays and found his true calling was behind the scenes.

“What did you enact?” Hamlet pressed on. He knew of the role told him by Ophelia.

“I did enact Julius Caesar. I was killed i’ th’ Capitol. Brutus killed me.”

“Et tu, Brute! Then fall, Caesar!” Hamlet reads the script known to him. “Liberty! Freedom! Tyranny is dead! Run hence, proclaim, cry it about the streets.”

“Some to the common pulpits, and cry out 'Liberty, freedom, and enfranchisement!'” The Main Player lends his voice to Hamlet.

“Bravo!’ The seated called out.

“Thank you”, Hamlet bowed to the seated guests. He then looked at Polonius.

“It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there.” Hamlet looked at Polonius.

“I ….: Polonius was to tell that he was only good for the supporting role, but Hamlet was on his call to the players.

“Be the players ready?” Hamlet saw the players had retreated to the rear of the stage.

“Ay, my lord. They stay upon your patience.” Rosencrantz trying to win back favors with Hamlet. The Prince ignored him when the mother gestured.

“Come hither, my dear Hamlet, sit by me.”

“No, good mother. Here’s a metal more attractive.” Hamlet took a place near Ophelia. “Lady, shall I lie in your lap?”

“No, my lord. It will be improper.”

“I mean, my head upon your lap? Surely, only my head to rest, and may your father not frown.”

“Ay, my lord.” Ophelia relented on the wishes.

“Do you think I meant country matters?” Hamlet sat by Ophelia’s legs. He spoke of the borders that one may

“I think nothing, my lord.” Ophelia moved to end the conversation but Hamlet was ever insistent.

“That’s a fair thought to lie between maids’ legs.” Hamlet rested his head on her left thigh.

“What is, my lord?” Ophelia moved her legs together.

“Nothing.”

“You are merry, my lord.”

“O God, your only jig-maker. What should a man do but be merry? For look, you may now, how cheerfully my mother looks, and my father died within ’s ….. two moons?”

“Nay, ’tis twice two months, my lord.” Ophelia reminded the Prince.

“So long? Nay, then, let the devil wear black, for I’ll have a suit of sables. O heavens, die two months ago, and not forgotten yet? Then there’s hope a great man’s memory may outlive his life half a year.” A reasonable mourning period if not that full year.  

“But, by ’r Lady, he must build churches, then, or else shall he suffer not thinking on, with the hobby-horse, whose epitaph is “For oh, for oh, the hobby-horse is forgotten.”

The wooden horse was indeed forgotten when the steamers rode the streets, be it four wheels or two. The horse was replaced by metallic contraptions, cleaner for they leave no dung but the pollution above the chimneys was foul. We advanced from feet to hoofs, and from there to wheels,  but with every turn, we caused mother earth to suffocate.

“A rightful right made into a heresy of sorts by another.” Hamlet called out to Polonius. :Nevermind, you need not reply. The play begins now.”