Original: O what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
Modern: Oh, what a worthless coward I am!

Original: Is it not monstrous that this player here,
Modern: Isn’t it crazy that this actor here,

Original: But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Modern: Just pretending in a made-up story,

Original: Could force his soul so to his own conceit
Modern: Could make himself believe so completely

Original: That, from her working, all his visage wann’d,
Modern: That his face turned pale from the emotion,

Original: Tears in his eyes, distraction in’s aspect,
Modern: Tears in his eyes, looking completely upset,

Original: A broken voice, and his whole function suiting
Modern: His voice cracking, and his whole body acting

Original: With forms to his conceit? And all for nothing!
Modern: To match his pretend feelings? And all for nothing!

Original: For Hecuba!
Modern: For Hecuba!

Original: What’s Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,
Modern: What does Hecuba mean to him, or he to her,

Original: That he should weep for her? What would he do,
Modern: That he should cry for her? What would he do

Original: Had he the motive and the cue for passion
Modern: If he had the real reason and trigger for emotion

Original: That I have? He would drown the stage with tears
Modern: That I have? He would flood the stage with tears

Original: And cleave the general ear with horrid speech;
Modern: And split everyone’s ears with terrible words;

Original: Make mad the guilty and appal the free,
Modern: Drive the guilty crazy and horrify the innocent,

Original: Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed
Modern: Confuse those who don’t know, and truly shock

Original: The very faculties of eyes and ears.
Modern: Everyone who sees and hears him.

Original: Yet I,
Modern: But I,

Original: A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak
Modern: A slow and cowardly fool, waste away

Original: Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my cause,
Modern: Like a daydreamer, not motivated by my purpose,

Original: And can say nothing! No, not for a king,
Modern: And can’t do anything! No, not even for a king,

Original: Upon whose property and most dear life
Modern: Whose kingdom and precious life

Original: A damn’d defeat was made. Am I a coward?
Modern: Were destroyed by a terrible defeat. Am I a coward?

Original: Who calls me villain? breaks my pate across?
Modern: Who calls me a villain? Cracks my head open?

Original: Plucks off my beard and blows it in my face?
Modern: Pulls off my beard and blows it in my face?

Original: Tweaks me by th’ nose? gives me the lie i’ th’ throat
Modern: Pinches my nose? Calls me a liar to my face

Original: As deep as to the lungs? Who does me this, ha?
Modern: As boldly as possible? Who does this to me, huh?

Original: ‘Swounds, I should take it! for it cannot be
Modern: By God’s wounds, I should just take it! Because it must be

Original: But I am pigeon-liver’d and lack gall
Modern: That I’m too gentle and lack the anger

Original: To make oppression bitter, or ere this
Modern: To fight back against injustice, or by now

Original: I should have fatted all the region kites
Modern: I should have fed all the local vultures

Original: With this slave’s offal. Bloody bawdy villain!
Modern: With this scoundrel’s guts. Bloody perverted villain!

Original: Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain!
Modern: Merciless, backstabbing, lustful, unnatural villain!

Original: O, vengeance!
Modern: Oh, revenge!

Original: Why, what an ass am I! This is most brave,
Modern: God, what an idiot I am! This is really something,

Original: That I, the son of a dear father murther’d,
Modern: That I, the son of a beloved murdered father,

Original: Prompted to my revenge by heaven and hell,
Modern: Urged to get revenge by heaven and hell,

Original: Must (like a whore) unpack my heart with words
Modern: Must (like a prostitute) empty my heart with words

Original: And fall a-cursing like a very drab,
Modern: And start swearing like a cheap whore,

Original: A scullion!
Modern: A kitchen servant!

Original: Fie upon’t! foh! About, my brain! Hum, I have heard
Modern: Shame on it! Ugh! Think, my brain! Hmm, I have heard

Original: That guilty creatures, sitting at a play,
Modern: That guilty people, watching a play,

Original: Have by the very cunning of the scene
Modern: Have been so affected by the clever acting

Original: Been struck so to the soul that presently
Modern: Been hit so hard in their hearts that immediately

Original: They have proclaim’d their malefactions;
Modern: They have confessed their crimes;

Original: For murther, though it have no tongue, will speak
Modern: Because murder, even though it can’t speak, will reveal itself

Original: With most miraculous organ, I’ll have these Players
Modern: In the most amazing way. I’ll have these actors

Original: Play something like the murther of my father
Modern: Perform something like my father’s murder

Original: Before mine uncle. I’ll observe his looks;
Modern: In front of my uncle. I’ll watch his reactions;

Original: I’ll tent him to the quick. If he but blench,
Modern: I’ll probe him deeply. If he just flinches,

Original: I know my course. The spirit that I have seen
Modern: I’ll know what to do. The ghost that I saw

Original: May be a devil; and the devil hath power
Modern: Might be a devil; and the devil has the power

Original: T’ assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps
Modern: To take on a pleasant appearance; yes, and maybe

Original: Out of my weakness and my melancholy,
Modern: Because of my weakness and my depression,

Original: As he is very potent with such spirits,
Modern: Since he’s very powerful with people in such moods,

Original: Abuses me to damn me. I’ll have grounds
Modern: He’s tricking me to destroy me. I need proof

Original: More relative than this. The play’s the thing
Modern: More solid than this. The play is the way

Original: Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King.
Modern: That I’ll trap the King’s guilty conscience.

In Act II, Scene 2, line 382 and the surrounding passage, Hamlet converses with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern after they have been sent by Claudius and Gertrude to discover the cause of his melancholy. The friends engage in wordplay and banter, with Hamlet eventually extracting from them the admission that they were indeed sent for by the King and Queen. Hamlet then delivers his famous “What a piece of work is a man” speech, describing how he has lost all his mirth and explaining that the earth seems to him a sterile promontory and the sky a foul pestilential congregation of vapors. He reflects on mankind’s noble reason and infinite faculties, yet concludes that man delights not him—nor woman neither, despite Rosencrantz’s jest to the contrary.

Following this discourse, Rosencrantz informs Hamlet that a company of players is on their way to Elsinore. Hamlet shows great interest in this news and discusses the circumstances of these traveling actors, including questions about their reputation and why they are touring rather than remaining in the city. The conversation touches on the theatrical rivalry between adult companies and child actors, and Hamlet expresses enthusiasm about the players’ arrival. He welcomes the players warmly when they enter, greets an old acquaintance among them, and requests that they perform a speech about Priam’s slaughter, which Hamlet begins to recite himself before asking the First Player to continue.

Hamlet tells the story of Prince Hamlet of Denmark, who is visited by the ghost of his recently deceased father. The ghost reveals that he was murdered by Hamlet’s uncle Claudius, who has now married Hamlet’s mother Gertrude and assumed the throne. Commanded by his father’s spirit to seek revenge, Hamlet struggles with doubt, melancholy, and the moral complexity of his task. To investigate the ghost’s claims and plan his revenge, he feigns madness, which creates tension throughout the Danish court.

As Hamlet deliberates, his erratic behavior affects everyone around him, particularly his love interest Ophelia, daughter of the king’s advisor Polonius. To test Claudius’s guilt, Hamlet stages a play mirroring his father’s murder, which confirms the king’s culpability. However, Hamlet’s actions become increasingly destructive—he accidentally kills Polonius while the old man spies on him, and his rejection of Ophelia contributes to her descent into genuine madness and eventual drowning.

The play reaches its climax when Ophelia’s brother Laertes returns to avenge his father’s death. Claudius manipulates Laertes into challenging Hamlet to a duel, secretly poisoning Laertes’s sword and preparing poisoned wine as backup. The final scene erupts in tragedy: during the duel, both Hamlet and Laertes are wounded by the poisoned blade, Gertrude accidentally drinks the poisoned wine, and Hamlet finally kills Claudius. As Hamlet dies, he names Prince Fortinbras of Norway as Denmark’s next ruler, bringing the cycle of revenge and political instability to a close. The play ends with Fortinbras restoring order to the Danish court as bodies are carried off in a funeral march.