"William Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark," by Jacqueline Ghodsi THE CHARACTERS (in
order of appearance):
• HAMLET, Prince of Denmark and student of Statistics
• POLONIUS, Hamlet’s tutor
• HOROTIO, friend to Hamlet and fellow student
Scene: The great library of the castle, in which Hamlet does his lessons
Act I
(The day is fair, but the face of Hamlet is clouded. He paces the large room. His tutor, Polonius, is reprimanding Hamlet
regarding the latter’s recent experience. Horatio is seated at the large table at right stage.)
POLONIUS: My Lord, how cans’t thou admit that thou hast seen a ghost! It is but a figment of your imagination!
HAMLET: I beg to differ; I know of a certainty that five-and-seventy in one hundred of us, condemned to the whips and
scorns of time as we are, have gazed upon a spirit of health, or goblin damn’d, be their intents wicked or charitable.
POLONIUS If thou doest insist upon thy wretched vision then let me invest your time; be true to thy work and speak to
me through the reason of the null and alternate hypotheses. (He turns to Horatio.) Did not Hamlet himself say, “What piece
of work is man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculties? Then let not this foolishness persist. Go, Horatio, make a
survey of three-and-sixty and discover what the true proportion be. For my part, I will never succumb to this fantasy, but
deem man to be devoid of all reason should thy proposal of at least five-and-seventy in one hundred hold true.
HORATIO (to Hamlet): What should we do, my Lord?
HAMLET: Go to thy purpose, Horatio.
HORATIO: To what end, my Lord?
HAMLET: That you must teach me. But let me conjure you by the rights of our fellowship, by the consonance of our youth,
but the obligation of our ever-preserved love, be even and direct with me, whether I am right or no.
(Horatio exits, followed by Polonius, leaving Hamlet to ponder alone.)
Act II
(The next day, Hamlet awaits anxiously the presence of his friend, Horatio. Polonius enters and places some books upon the
table just a moment before Horatio enters.)
POLONIUS: So, Horatio, what is it thou didst reveal through thy deliberations?
HORATIO: In a random survey, for which purpose thou thyself sent me forth, I did discover that one-and-forty believe
fervently that the spirits of the dead walk with us. Before my God, I might not this believe, without the sensible and true
avouch of mine own eyes.
POLONIUS: Give thine own thoughts no tongue, Horatio. (Polonius turns to Hamlet.) But look to’t I charge you, my Lord.
Come Horatio, let us go together, for this is not our test. (Horatio and Polonius leave together.)
HAMLET: To reject, or not reject, that is the question: whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of
outrageous statistics, or to take arms against a sea of data, and, by opposing, end them. (Hamlet resignedly attends to his
task.)
(Curtain falls)
