The platform · Hamlet, Horatio, Marcellus, Ghost
Just before midnight on the guard platform, Hamlet waits with Horatio and Marcellus while Claudius's drunken celebration booms from the castle below, prompting Hamlet's disgust at Denmark's reputation for drinking. The Ghost appears and beckons him away alone; Horatio warns it may be a demon luring him to the cliff edge and madness, but Hamlet threatens to kill anyone who holds him back and follows it. Marcellus's line as they go after him — "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark" — names the play's central diagnosis.
Enter Hamlet, Horatio and Marcellus.
Hamlet
The air bites shrewdly;
The air has a real bite to it.
it is very cold.
It's very cold.
Horatio
It is a nipping and an eager air.
It's a raw, cutting wind.
Hamlet
What hour now?
What time is it now?
Horatio
I think it lacks of twelve.
Not quite twelve, I think.
Marcellus
No, it is struck.
No, it's already struck.
Horatio
Indeed?
Has it?
I heard it not.
I didn't hear it.
It then draws near the season
Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk.
Then it's getting close to the hour when the spirit usually walks.
A flourish of trumpets, and ordnance shot off within.
Horatio
What does this mean, my lord?
What does that mean, my lord?
Hamlet
The King doth wake tonight and takes his rouse,
Keeps wassail, and the swaggering upspring reels;
And as he drains his draughts of Rhenish down,
The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out
The triumph of his pledge.
The King is up drinking tonight, holding a party, staggering through his wild dances, and every time he knocks back another cup of Rhine wine, the kettledrum and trumpet blare out like that to celebrate his toast.
Horatio
Is it a custom?
Is that a custom here?
Hamlet
Ay marry is’t;
Oh, it certainly is.
And to my mind, though I am native here,
And to the manner born, it is a custom
More honour’d in the breach than the observance.
And in my opinion, even though I was born here and raised to it, it's a custom better broken than kept.
This heavy-headed revel east and west
Makes us traduc’d and tax’d of other nations:
This muddle-headed carousing makes us the target of insults from other countries east and west.
They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase
Soil our addition; and indeed it takes
From our achievements, though perform’d at height,
The pith and marrow of our attribute.
They call us drunkards and stick pig words on our name, and it genuinely subtracts from our achievements — however brilliantly performed — the very core of the credit we deserve.
So oft it chances in particular men
The same thing often happens to individual men.
That for some vicious mole of nature in them,
As in their birth, wherein they are not guilty,
Since nature cannot choose his origin,
By their o’ergrowth of some complexion,
Oft breaking down the pales and forts of reason;
Or by some habit, that too much o’erleavens
The form of plausive manners;—that these men,
Carrying, I say, the stamp of one defect,
Being Nature’s livery or Fortune’s star,—
His virtues else,—be they as pure as grace,
As infinite as man may undergo,
Shall in the general censure take corruption
From that particular fault.
Some single flaw in their nature, whether from birth, which they can't be blamed for, since nobody chooses his own origin; or from some temperament that has grown out of proportion and keeps smashing through the fences and defenses of reason; or from a habit that overworks their otherwise pleasant manners — these men, carrying the stamp of one defect, whether it was nature's uniform or fortune's bad luck, will find that all their other virtues, however pure and however many a man can possess, are ruined in public opinion by that one particular fault.
The dram of evil
Doth all the noble substance of a doubt
To his own scandal.
A tiny drop of evil casts doubt on all the noble substance, and drags it down into disgrace.
Horatio
Look, my lord, it comes!
Look, my lord — here it comes!
Enter Ghost.
Hamlet
Angels and ministers of grace defend us!
Angels and messengers of God protect us!
Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn’d,
Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,
Be thy intents wicked or charitable,
Thou com’st in such a questionable shape
That I will speak to thee.
Whether you're a good spirit or a damned demon, whether you bring air from heaven or fumes from hell, whether your intentions are evil or kind, you come in a shape I can question, so I'm going to speak to you.
I’ll call thee Hamlet,
King, father, royal Dane.
I'll call you Hamlet, King, father, royal Dane
O, answer me!
— oh, answer me!
Let me not burst in ignorance;
Don't let me choke on ignorance.
but tell
Why thy canoniz’d bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn’d,
Hath op’d his ponderous and marble jaws
To cast thee up again!
Tell me why your consecrated bones, laid to rest in death, have burst out of their burial cloths; why the tomb where we saw you quietly sealed has opened its heavy marble jaws to spit you out again.
What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel,
Revisit’st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous, and we fools of nature
So horridly to shake our disposition
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
What can it mean, that you, a dead body, come back in full armor to walk in the moonlight, making the night hideous and shaking us — nature's fools — this horribly with thoughts that go beyond anything our souls can grasp?
Say, why is this?
Say it: why is this happening?
Wherefore?
For what purpose?
What should we do?
What are we supposed to do?
Ghost beckons Hamlet.
Horatio
It beckons you to go away with it,
As if it some impartment did desire
To you alone.
It's beckoning you to go off with it, as though it wants to tell you something privately.
Marcellus
Look with what courteous action
It waves you to a more removed ground.
Look how politely it's waving you toward a more secluded spot.
But do not go with it.
But don't go with it.
Horatio
No, by no means.
No, absolutely not.
Hamlet
It will not speak; then will I follow it.
It won't speak here, so I'll follow it.
Horatio
Do not, my lord.
Don't, my lord.
Hamlet
Why, what should be the fear?
Why, what's there to be afraid of?
I do not set my life at a pin’s fee;
I don't value my life at the price of a pin.
And for my soul, what can it do to that,
Being a thing immortal as itself?
And as for my soul — what can it do to that, which is immortal like itself?
It waves me forth again.
It's waving me on again.
I’ll follow it.
I'll follow it.
Horatio
What if it tempt you toward the flood, my lord,
Or to the dreadful summit of the cliff
That beetles o’er his base into the sea,
And there assume some other horrible form
Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason,
And draw you into madness?
What if it lures you toward the water, my lord, or to that terrifying clifftop that juts out over its own base into the sea — and there takes on some other hideous shape that overthrows the rule of reason in you and drives you mad?
Think of it.
Think about it.
The very place puts toys of desperation,
Without more motive, into every brain
That looks so many fathoms to the sea
And hears it roar beneath.
That place alone puts reckless impulses into any head that looks down so many fathoms to the sea and hears it roaring below, no other cause needed.
Hamlet
It waves me still.
It's still waving me on.
Go on, I’ll follow thee.
Lead on — I'll follow you.
Marcellus
You shall not go, my lord.
You're not going, my lord.
Hamlet
Hold off your hands.
Take your hands off me.
Horatio
Be rul’d;
Listen to us.
you shall not go.
You're not going.
Hamlet
My fate cries out,
And makes each petty artery in this body
As hardy as the Nemean lion’s nerve.
My fate is calling out, and it makes every small vein in this body as tough as the sinews of the Nemean lion.
Ghost beckons.
Hamlet
Still am I call’d.
I'm still being called.
Unhand me, gentlemen.
Let go of me, gentlemen.
Breaking free from them.
Hamlet
By heaven, I’ll make a ghost of him that lets me.
By heaven, I'll turn whoever stops me into a ghost himself.
I say, away!
Get back, I tell you.
Go on, I’ll follow thee.
Lead on — I'll follow you.
Exeunt Ghost and Hamlet.
Horatio
He waxes desperate with imagination.
His imagination is driving him wild.
Marcellus
Let’s follow;
Let's go after him.
’tis not fit thus to obey him.
It's wrong to obey him in this.
Horatio
Have after.
Come on, then.
To what issue will this come?
Where is this going to end?
Marcellus
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Horatio
Heaven will direct it.
Heaven will sort it out.
Marcellus
Nay, let’s follow him.
No — let's follow him.
Exeunt.
Hamlet Act 1, Scene 4 summary
Just before midnight on the guard platform, Hamlet waits with Horatio and Marcellus while Claudius's drunken celebration booms from the castle below, prompting Hamlet's disgust at Denmark's reputation for drinking. The Ghost appears and beckons him away alone; Horatio warns it may be a demon luring him to the cliff edge and madness, but Hamlet threatens to kill anyone who holds him back and follows it. Marcellus's line as they go after him — "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark" — names the play's central diagnosis.
Who appears in this scene
Hamlet, Horatio, Marcellus, Ghost — The platform.
Famous lines in Hamlet Act 1, Scene 4, explained
- “And to my mind, though I am native here, / And to the manner born, it is a custom / More honour’d in the breach than the observance.” (line 16)
- Hamlet means that Denmark's heavy drinking is a tradition better broken than kept — the phrase is now almost always misused to mean a rule that is routinely ignored. He is also being pointed: the noise is Claudius toasting himself, and Hamlet is saying his uncle's habits shame the whole country abroad. "To the manner born" comes from the same sentence and has drifted just as far from its original sense of simply being a local.
- “Angels and ministers of grace defend us!” (line 42)
- Hamlet's instinctive prayer at the sight of the Ghost, and it frames the whole problem he is about to face: he does not know whether this thing comes from heaven or hell. He decides to speak to it anyway, because it takes a shape he can question — an early sign that Hamlet's defining trait is the need to interrogate rather than simply believe. The uncertainty he flags here is exactly what makes him demand proof of Claudius's guilt later, instead of killing him on a ghost's word.
- “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” (line 99)
- Marcellus says it as a soldier's hunch — a dead king walking the walls means the country is diseased somewhere out of sight. It is the play's thesis in seven words: the corruption at the top of Denmark is not a private crime but an infection running through the whole state, and the imagery of rot, ulcers and poison recurs from here to the last act. Notice it is a guard, not a prince, who diagnoses it.
Keep reading
- Act 1, Scene 3 — modern English translation
- Act 1, Scene 5 — modern English translation
- All Hamlet scenes
About this translation: the original text follows the public-domain Project Gutenberg Globe edition; the modern English translation was written in-house for Polytranslator and is reviewed on an ongoing basis (last revised August 2026). Free to print and photocopy for classroom use. Cite as: “Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 4. Polytranslator side-by-side translation, polytranslator.com/shakespeare/hamlet/act-1-scene-4.”
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