Page 277 - Hamlet: The Cambridge Dover Wilson Shakespeare

170 NOTES 2.2.

S.D.* Hamlet... reading a book, etc. Q 2, 1 and Q r
F
all give Ham.'s entry at 1.167 below, where it is needed
for an entry on to the outer-stage. That Sh. himself
intended Ham. here to enter on the inner-stage is I think
shown by Ham.'s first words to Pol., which gain point
only if we suppose 11. 159-67 to have been overheard
by him. v. Introd. pp. lvi-lix. If Sh.'s manuscript
contained a double-entry, it is easy to see how the earlier
one came to be omitted. MSH. pp. 186-87.
disorderly attired Cf. Oph.'s description at 2. I.
75-8, obviously designed to prepare us for this entry,
and Anthony Scoloker, Daiphantus (1604), cited by
J. Q. Adams (Life of Shakespeare, p. 310):
Puts off his clothes, his shirt he only wears,
Much like mad Hamlet—
which gives us the contemporary stage-effect.
160. four hours The 'four' is indefinite; cf. WinU
5. 2. 132 'any time these four hours.'
161. Here in the lobby He indicates, I suggest, the
inner-stage, v. Introd. pp. Ivi—lix.
162. '// loose my daughter to him v. Introd. pp.
/
lvii-lviii and G. 'loose.'
166. assistant for a state Cf. Names of the Characters,
'Polonius,' p. 141.
167. S.D. Q2 'Enter Hamlet.' Fi'Enter Hamlet
reading on a Booke.' Cf. note 1. 159 S.D.
170. O give me leave The regular formula for
politely saying good-bye esp. to social superiors, or
requesting them to go away; cf. 11. 217-20 below and
F
K. John, 1.1. 2 3 o. Led astray by 1, in which the lines
have become disarranged, all mod. edd. make Pol.
speak them to Ham. Cf. MSH. pp. 218-19.
174. fishmonger i.e. fishmonger, bawd. Malone
quotes Barnaby Rich's Irish Hubbub, 'Senex fornicator,
an old fishmonger'; and Dowden, his Herodotus, 1584
(ed. Lang, p. 131) 'Such arrant honest women as are