Hamlet (1948)

Felix Aylmer: Polonius, Lord Chamberlain

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Quotes 

• Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape like a camel?

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : By the mass, and 'tis like a camel indeed.

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : Methinks it's like a weasel.

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : It is backed like a weasel.

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : Or like a whale?

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : Very like a whale.

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : My lord, put your discourse into some frame and start not so wildly from my affair.

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : I am tame sir; pronounce.

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : There, my blessing with thee. And these few precepts in thy memory look thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue nor any unproportioned thought his act. Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar. Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel, but do not dull thy palm with entertainment of each new-hatched, unfledged comrade. Beware an entrance to a quarrel, but being in, bear that the opposed may beware of thee. Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice. Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, but not expressed in fancy. Rich, not gaudy, for the apparel oft proclaims the man. Neither a borrower nor a lender be, for loan oft loses both itself and friend and borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. This, above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : My liege and madam, to expostulate what majesty should be, what duty is, why day is day, night night and time is time were nothing but to waste night, day and time. Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit and tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief. Your noble son is mad.

• Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : My lord, you played once in the university, you say?

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : That did I, my lord, and was accounted a good actor.

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : What did you enact?

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : I did enact Julius Caesar. I was killed in the Capitol. Brutus killed me.

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there.

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : My lord, I have news to tell you. The actors are come hither, my lord.

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : He that plays the king shall be welcome.

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral. Seneca cannot be too heavy nor Plautus too light.

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : My honourable lord... I will most humbly take my leave of you.

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : You cannot, sir, take from me anything that I will more willingly part withal. Except my life. Except my life. Except my life.

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : What might you think, when I had seen this hot love on the wing, if I had looked upon this love with idle sight? What might you think?

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : Do you know me, my lord?

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : Excellent well. You are a fishmonger.

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : Not I, my lord.

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : Then I would you were so honest a man.

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : Honest, my lord?

  Hamlet, Prince of Denmark : Aye, sir. To be honest, as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten thousand.

• Gertrude - The Queen : More matter with less art.

  Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : Madam, I swear I use no art at all.

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : "ln her excellent white bosom, these" et cetera.

• Polonius, Lord Chamberlain : He is mad, 'tis true: 'tis true, 'tis pity; And pity 'tis, 'tis true: a foolish figure; But farewell it.