Top 1200 Hamlet Significant Quotes & Sayings

Explore popular Hamlet Significant quotes.
Last updated on April 14, 2025.
The instructor has to teach history, cosmogony, psychology, ethics, the laws of nations. How can he do it without saying anything favorable or unfavorable about the beliefs of evangelical Christians, Catholics, Socinians, Deists, pantheists, materialists, or fetish worshipers, who all claim equal rights under American institutions? His teaching will indeed be "the play of Hamlet, with the part of Hamlet omitted."
I've seen 'Hamlet' many times, and Hamlet, he was just a hideous neurotic; he never changes. He doubts - all the way to the end, all the way until when he dies, he doubts.
When you are at the right age to play Hamlet you are still to young and immature to play it. It is much later, when you get the life experience and the emotional power, that you understand Hamlet or Macbeth.
It took a while to decide I wanted to do Hamlet. It wasn't that I was daunted - I'd been acting professionally since my mid-20s and had some pretty big Shakespearean roles under my belt by that stage, at 32: Petruchio in 'The Taming of the Shrew,' Edgar in 'King Lear,' Antony, Richard III. But when it came to Hamlet, I hesitated.
Hamlet and Victor Frankenstein are each obsessed with death. Hamlet's whole story is a philosophical preparation for death; Victor's is an intellectual refusal to accept it.
Hamlet: Lady, shall I lie in your lap? Ophelia: No, my lord. Hamlet: DId you think I meant country matters? Ophelia: I think nothing, my lord. Hamlet: That's a fair thought to lie between maids' legs. Ophelia: What is, my lord? Hamlet: Nothing.
It was reading Hamlet that ruined the concept of authenticity for me, not because Hamlet lacked existentialist credentials himself - indeed, as an earlier discontented Dane, he could be said to have laid the ground for Kierkegaard - but because the line 'to thine own self be true' was spoken by that humourless old ninny, Polonius.
Shakespeare without Othello, Lear, Macbeth and Hamlet would be all too much like Hamlet without the prince. — © Brand Blanshard
Shakespeare without Othello, Lear, Macbeth and Hamlet would be all too much like Hamlet without the prince.
Do you see yonder cloud that’s almost in shape of a camel? Polonius: By the mass, and ‘tis like a camel, indeed. Hamlet: Methinks it is like a weasel. Polonius: It is backed like a weasel. Hamlet: Or like a whale? Polonius: Very like a whale.
Meditation is the most significant because it opens the door for all other significant things: love, prayer, God, light, music, poetry.
Humility bids us to take ourselves as we are; we do not have to be cosmically significant to be genuinely significant.
I like drama as well. When I played Hamlet, I got one review that said, "This must surely be the funniest Hamlet in history," but schoolgirls would still cry when he died.
We need to give credence to the nonsexual relationships...the idea of having significant others instead of a significant other.
I like to aim for significance over success because rarely can you be significant and also successful, but many people can be successful and not significant.
You have to get through the Hamlet hoop as a young actor. Your classical qualifications are based on the quality of your Hamlet. And then, as an older actor, you have to get through the Lear hoop. And I'm approaching the Lear hoop.
Most people don't know that I am an accomplished dramatic actor... But I've performed in several Shakespeare productions including Hamlet, except in this version, Hamlet lives in an apartment with two women, and has to pretend he's gay so that the landlord won't evict him.
Hamlet is to Macbeth somewhat as the Ghost is to the Witches. Revenge, or ambition, in its inception may have a lofty, even a majestic countenance, but when it has "coupled hell" and become crime, it grows increasingly foul and sordid. We love and admire Hamlet so much at the beginning that we tend to forget that he is as hot-blooded as the earlier Macbeth when he kills Polonius and the King, cold-blooded as the later Macbeth or Iago when he sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to death.
ROSENCRANTZ My lord, you must tell us where the body is, and go with us to the king. HAMLET The body is with the king, but the king is not with the body. The king is a thing - GUILDENSTERN A thing my lord? HAMLET Of nothing. Bring me to him. Hide fox, and all after!
I always think that we live, spiritually, By what others have given us in the significant hours of our life. These significant hours do not announce themselves as coming, but arrive unexpected.
The problem with the Jude Law "Hamlet" was simply that it wasn't unpredictable, that it was a very down-the-center modern production. You wouldn't go to the theater expecting to see an old-fashioned "Hamlet" where everybody wears an old fashioned costume. You don't get points for putting on a "Hamlet" where everybody dresses in black. I've seen that one several times. But again, it's not that it has to be new, it simply that it has to be different, fresh, that it doesn't bore, that it doesn't make me - I don't feel as I'm watching it that I know where it's going to go.
J.K. Rowling said Bellatrix's role was going to be significant in the last one, when I showed some reluctance in playing a tiny bit part. Up front, they said, 'You're very significant in the last one.' But significant could mean a lot of things. That could just mean a significant plot point. Doesn't necessarily equal big part.
Someone once said that if you sat a million monkeys at a million typewriters for a million years, one of them would eventually type out all of Hamlet by chance. But when we find the text of Hamlet, we don't wonder whether it came from chance and monkeys. Why then does the atheist use that incredibly improbable explanation for the universe? Clearly, because it is his only chance of remaining an atheist. At this point we need a psychological explanation of the atheist rather than a logical explanation of the universe.
I started to realise that it wasn't for me. Perhaps I didn't have to give my Hamlet before I died, that the world might be an OK place without my Hamlet, in fact. — © Eric McCormack
I started to realise that it wasn't for me. Perhaps I didn't have to give my Hamlet before I died, that the world might be an OK place without my Hamlet, in fact.
You don't really audition for Hamlet; Hamlet is one of those roles that a director or producer decides you should do it.
Hamlet 's character is the prevalence of the abstracting and generalizing habit over the practical. He does not want courage, skill, will, or opportunity; but every incident sets him thinking; and it is curious, and at the same time strictly natural, that Hamlet, who all the play seems reason itself, should he impelled, at last, by mere accident to effect his object. I have a smack of Hamlet myself, if I may say so.
I'd not really ever expected to play anything like 'Hamlet.' I hadn't seen myself as a natural Hamlet, whatever a natural Hamlet is, and I quickly realised there is no such thing.
HAMLET [...] we fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots. Your fat king and your lean beggar is but variable service, two dishes, but to one table; that's the end. CLAUDIUS Alas, alas. HAMLET A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm. CLAUDIUS What dost thou mean by this? HAMLET Nothing but to show you how a king may go a progress through the guts of a beggar.
I have an aunt who believed strongly that teaching kids that Shakespeare is 'hard' is wrong, so she handed me 'Hamlet' when I was in kindergarten to see what would happen. What happened was I did a book report on 'Hamlet' and caused quite a lot of trouble!
I became an actress because I discovered the world of the imagination when I was about 14 or so and the concept that you could engage in this amazing world of storytelling. I saw a production of Hamlet, and I didn't know Hamlet died in the end.
The stress on the financial system in the fall of 2007 was significant, but not so significant as to threaten the overall stability of the U.S. economy, although it did lead to the beginning of a recession at the end of 2007.
The tragedy of "Hamlet" is critically considered to be the masterpiece of dramatic poetry; and the tragedy of "Hamlet" is also, according to the testimony of every sort of manager, the play of all others which can invariably be depended on to fill a theater.
I not only loved studying theater, I loved being a theater major. It gave me an excuse to brood, to grow a beard, to wear black 'at' people. I didn't just want to play Hamlet, I wanted to be Hamlet.
My first book, 'To Be or Not To Be,' took 'Hamlet' and converted it to the choose-your-own-path format. It was a great fit for a book where you control what happens - a book as game - because the plot of 'Hamlet' is very game-like: get a mission from a ghost to kill the final boss, kill the final boss, and game over. You win.
'Hamlet' was the first movie I saw. In 1948, my mother said, 'I'm going to take you to see 'Hamlet' with Laurence Olivier.' She was worried about taking me to it because she wasn't sure I was old enough to understand it or to maybe be adversely affected by it, but I got recordings of it and memorized all the soliloquies.
You add one million citizens to the voting rolls in this state, that's a significant, significant difference. You do that nationwide, it's a significant difference.
Humor is probably the most significant characteristics of the human mind. Far more significant than reason. In fact, reason is actually a very cheap commodity.
There is no significant man-made global warming at this time, there has been none in the past and there is no reason to fear any in the future. Efforts to prove the theory that carbon dioxide is a significant 'greenhouse' gas and pollutant causing significant warming or weather effects have failed. There has been no warming over 18 years.
The list of non-democratic regimes that have seen significant reforms since 2001 is long and significant.
The most significant moment will be when we stop referring to the hiring of qualified women (and racial, ethnic and religious minorities) as significant. In other words, when qualified people are hired without regard to race, gender, ethnicity, religious or other differentiating characteristics, that will be the most significant, indeed momentous, event of all.
When looking at any significant work of art, remember that a more significant one probably has had to be sacrificed.
Everything I've taken away from my father has been significant. So, I can't say that any one lesson is the most significant. By being around him, I learned that there is a purpose in life, and that if we are inspired to help people, we should do it.
I felt invisible in my family, and I wanted to be significant like my brothers were significant. I wanted my parents to pay attention, so I went out into the world with that driving me, that grasping, that seeking validation.
I think it is fair to say that it is under a great deal of stress, and if I am asking for significant changes, it is because the world is going through significant changes. — © Mohamed ElBaradei
I think it is fair to say that it is under a great deal of stress, and if I am asking for significant changes, it is because the world is going through significant changes.
Hamlet is a remarkably easy role. Physically it's hard because it tends to be about three hours long and you're talking the whole time. But it's a simple role and it adapts itself very well, because the thing about Hamlet is, we all are Hamlet.
I think Hamlet is a very funny play - Hamlet is riddled with wit.
Hamlet: Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring? Ophelia: 'Tis brief, my lord. Hamlet: As woman's love.
In Shakespeare's world, characters cannot trust their senses. Is the ghost in Hamlet true and truthful, or is it a demon, tempting young Hamlet into murderous sin? Is Juliet dead or merely sleeping? Does Lear really stand at the edge of a great cliff? Or has the Fool deceived him to save his life?
London, a city where creativity and innovation have always flourished, provides a significant home for Starbucks and a significant gateway into Europe.
I have always found that if, while creating an artwork, the artist constantly feels that some accident would occur if he is not careful, then it is a very significant moment and a significant work.
Someday, I expect to see a television version of 'Hamlet' and see Hamlet come on during the intermission and hold up his sword and say 'This is made of the same fine steel as such-and-such razor blades.'
Miss Havisham is an important feminine literary figure in the tradition of Antigone (though it's significant that Antigone is fighting to bury something and Miss Havisham refuses, as it were, to bury the corpse). Like Hamlet, she's focused on what everyone would rather not know or would like to forget, and she seems crazy / stuck as well as bitter, but she's also a perfect prototype of a performance artist. She's intentionally hard to deal with inviting the audience to remain with the violated body, the evidence of violence.
There are no significant bugs in our released software that any significant number of users want fixed.
Actors want to do Shakespeare again and again, or want to do Hamlet. When you hear one guy do Hamlet and another guy do it, it's going to be a whole different experience.
Is not every action of Hamlet induced by a fanatical impulse, which tells him that duty consists in revenge alone? And dose it need superhuman efforts to recognize that revenge never can be duty? I say again that Hamlet thinks much, but that he is by no means wise.
Do you take me for a sponge, my lord? hamlet: Ay, sir; that soaks up the king's countenance, his rewards, his authorities. But such officers do the king best service in the end: he keeps them, like an ape, in the corner of his jaw; first mouthed, to be last swallowed: when he needs what you have gleaned, it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, you shall be dry again. rosencrantz: I understand you not, my lord. hamlet: I am glad of it: a knavish speech sleeps in a foolish ear.
I saw Derek Jacobi play Hamlet when I was 17, and he directed me as Hamlet when I was 27, and I directed him as Claudius in 'Hamlet' when I was 35, and I'm hoping we meet again in some other production of Hamlet before we both toddle off.
When I think of all the Hamlets I've seen, there's been a load of different styles, some marvellous. You like the Hamlet you saw when you were the right age to think you could be Hamlet.
Companies with significant revenue (more than $100 million) have, by definition, significant traction. They have proven out their thesis and can scale up or down as investment capital becomes available.
Twins are under-represented in the media. Hamlet - never twins. Hamlet Twins Of Denmark. King And Queen Lear. It would work. Come on, more twins on television. — © Steven Moffat
Twins are under-represented in the media. Hamlet - never twins. Hamlet Twins Of Denmark. King And Queen Lear. It would work. Come on, more twins on television.
You gave me a significant look, but significant of what?
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