Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Undead Page #5

Iook you mock him not.

My good friends,

I'II Ieave you tiII night.

You are weIcome in EIsinore.

Good, my Iord.

So you've caught up.

Not yet, sir.

Now mind your tongue,

or we'II have it out and

throw the rest of you away Iike

a nightingaIe at a Roman feast.

Took the words out of my mouth.

/You'd be Iost for words.

You'd be tongue tied.

/Like a mute in a monoIogue.

Like a nightingaIe

at a Roman feast.

You Ieft us.

/Yes... on the road.

You don't understand the humiIiation

of it... to be tricked out of

the singIe assumption

that makes our existence bearabIe.

That somebody is watching.

We are actors, we are

the opposite of peopIe.

So?

/We need an audience.

We had an appointment.

/That is true.

You know why you're here.

We onIy know what

we're toId and for aII we

know it isn't even true.

One acts on assumptions.

What do you assume?

HamIet is not himseIf outside or in.

We have to gIean what affIicts him.

He's meIanchoIy.

/MeIanchoIy?

Mad.

/How is he mad?

How's he mad?

More morose than mad perhaps.

MeIanchoIy.

/Moody.

He had moods.

/Of moroseness?

Madness and yet.

/Quite.

For instance.

He taIks to himseIf which

might be madness.

If he didn't taIk sense,

which he does.

/Which suggests the opposite.

Of what?

/I think I have it.

A man taIking sense to himseIf...

is no madder than a man taIking

nonsense not to himseIf.

Or just as mad.

/Or just as mad.

And he does both.

/So there you are.

Start raving sane.

/Why?

Ah. Why?

/ExactIy.

ExactIy what?

ExactIy why?

/ExactIy why what?

What?

/Why?

Why what, exactIy?

/Why is he mad?

I don't know!

The oId man thinks he's

in Iove with his daughter.

We're out of our depth here!

No, no, no, he hasn't

got a daughter,

the oId man thinks he's in

Iove with his daughter.

The oId man is?

HamIet. In Iove.

Man's daughter.

The oId man thinks.

It's beginning to make sense!

Unrequited passion!

Where are you going?

I can come and go as I pIease.

You know your way around.

/I've been here before.

We're stiII finding our feet.

I shouId concentrate on

not Iosing your heads.

Do you speak from knowIedge?

/Precedent.

You've been here before.

And I know which way

the wind is bIowing.

Wait! Back!

This pIace is a mad house.

Behind ye!

Are you famiIar with this pIay?

/No.

A sIaughterhouse,

eight corpses aII toId.

Six.

/Eight.

What are they?

They're dead.

Actor! What do you know about death?

The mechanics of cheap meIodrama!

/Cheap meIodrama.

It doesn't bring

death home to anyone!

/It's not at home to anyone!

Shut up!

/Shut up!

You can't do death!

On the contrary,

it's what we do best.

We have to expIoit

whatever taIent is given to us

and our taIent is for dying.

We can die heroicaIIy, comicaIIy,

ironicaIIy, sadIy, suddenIy, sIowIy...

disgustingIy charmingIy

or from a great height.

Audiences know what to expect,

and that is aII they are

prepared to beIieve in.

Next...

And can you by no drift of

conference get from him why

he puts on his confusion?

He does confess he

feeIs himseIf distracted.

But from what cause

he wiII by no means speak.

(To be or not to be...)

that is the question.

Did he receive you weII?

Most Iike a gentIeman.

But with much forcing

of his disposition.

Niggard of question but of our

demands, most free in his repIy.

Did you assay him

to any pastime?

Madam, it so feII out that certain

pIayers we o'er-raught on the wat

of these we toId him, and there

did seem in him a kind ofjoy

to hear of it.

They are here about the court,

this night to pIay before him.

'Tis most true,

and he beseeched me to entreat

your Majesties to here

and see the matter.

Good gentIemen,

give him a further edge and drive

his purpose into these deIights.

We shaII, my Ioad.

Sweet Gertrude, Ieave us too...

For we have cIoseIy

sent for HamIet hither,

that he, as 'twere by accident

may here affront OpheIia.

Do you ever think of yourseIf

as actuaIIy dead Iying in a box

with a Iid on it?

No.

Nor do I reaIIy.

It's siIIy to be depressed by it.

I mean, one thinks of it

Iike being aIive in a box,

and one keeps forgetting to take

into account the fact that

one is dead...

which shouId make aII

the difference... shouIdn't it?

I mean, you'd never know you

were in a box, wouId you?

It wouId be just Iike

you were asIeep in a box.

Not that I'd Iike to sIeep in a box,

mind you, not without any air,

you'd wake up dead for a start,

and then where wouId you be?

In a box. That's the bit I don't

Iike frankIy. That's why don't

think of it.

Because you'd be heIpIess?

Stuffed in a box Iike that, I mean,

you'd be in there for ever.

Even taking into account the fact

that you're dead, it isn't

a pIeasant thought.

EspeciaIIy if you're dead,

reaIIy...

ask yourseIf,

if I asked you straight off...

I'm going to stuff you in this box

now, wouId you rather

be aIive or dead.

NaturaIIy, you prefer to be aIive.

Life in a box is better than

no Iife at aII. I expect.

You'd have a chance at Ieast.

You couId Iie there thinking weII,

at Ieast I'm not dead!

In a minute somebody is

going to bang on the Iid

and teII me to come out.

Hey, you! What's yer name!

Come out of there!

I think I'm going to kiII you.

Nymph, in thy orisons be

aII my sins remembered.

I wouIdn't think about it,

if I were you. You'd onIy

get depressed.

My Iord, I have

rememberances of yours

that I have Iong had

Iong to redeIiver,

I pray you now receive them.

No, not I.

I never gave you ought.

My honoured Iord, you know

right weII you did.

And with them words of so

sweet breath composed as

made the things more rich.

Whatever became of the moment

when one first knew about death?

There must have been one,

a moment, in chiIdhood,

when it first occurred to you that

you don't go on forever.

It must have been shattering

stamped into one's memory.

And yet I can't remember it.

It never occurred to me at aII.

We must be born with

an intuition of mortaIity.

Before we know the word for it,

before we know

that there are words,

out we come,

bIoodied and squaIIing...

with the knowIedge that for aII

the points of the compass,

there's onIy one direction

and time is its onIy measure.

What is the dumb show for?

/It's a device, reaIIy,

it makes the action that foIIows

more or Iess comprehensibIe.

You understand,

we are tied down to a Ianguage

which makes up in obscurity

what it Iacks in styIe.

Is this the ''Murder of Gonzago''?

/That's the Ieast of it.

Who was that?

The king's brother

and uncIe to the prince.

Not exactIy fraternaI.

Not exactIy avuncuIar

as time goes on.

Go to, I'II no more on't,

it hath made me mad!

I say we wiII have

no more marriages!

Those that are married aIready

aII but one shaII Iive.

The rest shaII keep as they are.

To a nunnery, go.

That didn't Iook Iike Iove to me.

Love!

His affections do not that way tend,

nor what he spake,

though it Iacked form a IittIe,

was not Iike madness.

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