Act 4 Notes

Hey everyone, so it's like 11pm and the night before the test! But i suppose i'm just going to post all my act 4 notes that I have so far. Since we've been lacking on updating the blog again. Good LUCK everyone on the test tomorrow and thanks Tanya for those quotes! They were really helpful.
ACT 4 Scene 1/2/3
This is following Hamlet's murder of Polonius in Act 3. At the end of Act 3 Hamlet also leaves Gertrude with a choice to either pick her role as queen or her role as mother. (Basically making her pick sides.) So the start of Act 4 shows her choosing Hamlet over Claudius. Gertrude tells Claudius how crazy Hamlet is and explains to him how Hamlet killed Polonius after mistaking him for a rat. Hamlet is very intent on creating chaos and turmoil in this Act. The story gets more chaotic obviously now that Claudius fully established that he is in fact a usurper. The chaos Hamlet is creating at the moment is not telling anyone where the body of Polonius is. When Rosencrantz and Guildenstern ask him, Hamlet calls them sponges which are low on the evolutionary chain and also spineless/useless.
A significant quotes Hamlet says which sounds crazy, but we know what it really means. "The body is with the king...the king is not with the body." This is just another play on words by Hamlet that uses "king" to mean king hamlet because we as the audience know the real king cannot be a usurper(claudius).
The fox hunt reference means an extremely unfair and onesided hunt. (Horses, guns, and lots of people versus one fox)
******The reasons Claudius will not persecute Hamlet for the murder of Polonius
1. keeping order and becoming VERY desperate to maintain power
2. people love Prince Hamlet
3. He's prince
4. Hamlet knows about the murder and could use that if persecuted
5. obviously Gertrude wouldn't be too thrilled if Claudius had her son executed..

We also talked about why Hamlet calls Claudius mother. It's mainly because he would NEVER call Claudius father. It's very insulting and his bond with Gertrude gives them a collective identity. It's also pretty funny.
Today we mainly reviewed for tomorrow's testttt. It's got 10 quotes that we have to analyze and explain. Know context and significance! Alrighty.
Emily Wallace