Monday, January 17, 2011

Hamlet [3.4]

My favorite part of Hamlet: Act 3, Scene 4. There is some great dialog in this scene.
He kills Polonius:
"How now? A rat? Dead for a ducat, dead!"
He confronts his mother:
"Have you eyes?" he asks her. She replies that "These words like daggers enter in my ears"
He sees his father's ghost, but his mother does not (which raises the question as to if there really is a ghost, or if it "is the very coinage of [his] brain").
He explains his sanity (or lack there-of):
"I essentially am not in madness, But mad in craft."
And thus begins the RAGE of Hamlet.
Which has led me to think of other characters in literature and film who have been brought to rage, the insane, murderous rage.
Liam Neeson as Bryan Mills in Taken.
Heath Ledger as The Joker in The Dark Knight.
Mattie Ross in True Grit.
Clytie Supten in Absalom, Absalom!
The Butler in The Tell-Tale Heart.
Ammon in the Book of Mormon (Alma). (Sorry, but he did cut off a lot of arms... RAGE).