O+what+a+rogue+and+peasant+slave+am+I!+(2.2.549-607)

The Soliloquy
Now I am alone. O, what a [|rogue] and [|peasant] slave am I! (555) [|Is it not monstrous that this player here,But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,Could force his soul so to his own conceitThat from her working all his visage wann'd,Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspect, (560)A broken voice, and his whole function suitingWith forms to his conceit? and all for nothing!For Hecuba!] What's [|Hecuba] to him, or he to Hecuba, That he should weep for her? What would he do, (565) Had he the motive and the [|cue for passion] That I have? He would drown the stage with tears And cleave the general ear with horrid speech, [|Make mad the guilty] and appal the free, Confound the ignorant, and [|amaze] indeed (570) The very faculties of eyes and ears. Yet I, A dull and [|muddy-mettled] rascal, [|peak], Like [|John-a-dreams], [|unpregnant of my cause], And can say nothing; no, not for a king, Upon whose property and most dear life (575) A damn'd defeat was made. Am I a coward? Who calls me villain? breaks my [|pate] across? Plucks off my beard, and blows it in my face? Tweaks me by the nose? [|gives me the lie i' the throat], As deep as to the lungs? who does me this? (580) Ha! [|'Swounds], I should take it: for it cannot be But I am [|pigeon-liver'd] and lack gall To make oppression bitter, or ere this I should have fatted all the [|region kites] (585) With this slave's offal: bloody, bawdy villain! Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, [|kindless] villain! O, vengeance! Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave, That I, the son of a dear father murder'd, (590) Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell, Must, like a whore, unpack my heart with words, And fall a-cursing, like a very [|drab], A [|scullion]! Fie upon't! foh! About, my brain! I have heard (595) That guilty creatures sitting at a play Have by the very cunning of the scene Been struck so to the soul that presently [|They have proclaim'd their malefactions]; For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak (600) With most miraculous organ. I'll have these players Play something like the murder of my father Before mine uncle: I'll observe his looks; I'll tent him to the quick: if he but [|blench], I know my course. The spirit that I have seen (605) May be the devil: and the devil hath power To assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps Out of my weakness and my melancholy, As he is very potent with such spirits, Abuses me to damn me: I'll have grounds (610) More relative than this: the play 's the thing Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king.

How it reveals Hamlet's Character

 * Once again Hamlet is displaying his lack of confidence. In this soliloquy he is trying to convince himself to murder Claudius, and is berating himself that he has not taken action yet. Despite his obvious desire to seek revenge, he can't seem to overcome the moral consequences of murder. This displays his underlaying sense of virtue. Since he cannot overcome the moral consequences, he devises a plan to prove if his uncle is definitely guilty. Thus he plans to overcome his internal turmoil.


 * " O, what a [|rogue] and [|peasant] slave am I!" - In the very first line of the soliloquy Hamlet lambasts himself.


 * " But I am [|pigeon-liver'd] and lack gall " - Here hamlet display shows that he knows he lacks the decisiveness to go through with his plans.


 * "More relative than this: the play 's the thing | Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king." - The last line shows how Hamlet plans to use the play to determine the king's guilt, and if he should murder him.