Hamlet then engages Ophelia in a bantering conversation full of sexual innuendoes:Hamlet: Do you think I meant country matters?Ophelia: I think nothing, my lord.Hamlet: That’s a fair thought to lie between maids’ legs (III. ii. lns 115-117).Taken at face value, this conversation seems light and merry, even if it is vulgar. However, in order to wound his mother, Hamlet makes Ophelia “her proxy, treating herlike a harlot, with deliberate and brutal sexual contempt, forcing their dialogue ofinnuendoes to bear the worst constructions” (Nevo 51). Her reactions are cautious anddeferential, suggesting that his changed attitude has her completely dumbfounded. Whenshe remarks that he is “merry” he seems to become mad again stating: “What should aman do but be merry? for, look you, how cheerfully my mother looks, and my father diedwithin ’s two hours” (III, ii. lns 123-125). “Nay”, Ophelia replies, “Tis twice two months”(III, ii. ln 126), provoking Hamlet to a cynical speech on how long a man can hope hisreputation will last after he dies. Ophelia’s remarks cause Hamlet’s jester act to fade andhis melancholy to reappear temporarily. Hamlet is then distracted from this mood by thestart of the play.After the king betrays himself to Hamlet and the court leaves with him, Hamlet andHoratio are left alone. Hamlet assumes the role of the jubilant boy. This is the third timethat Hamlet’s true self appears. Hamlet sings:Why, let the stricken deer go weep,The hart ungalled play;For some must watch, while some must sleep:Thus runs the world away (III, ii. lns 265-268).He could not be more delighted, he jokes with Horatio about joining a theater company. “I’ll take the ghost’s word for a thousand pound” he declares, and calls for the theater’smusicians to play their pipes (III, ii. lns 280-281).Hamlet’s celebration i...
