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Hamlet Quotes

Quotes From Hamlet

William Shakespeare's Hamlet is a very famous play which was written around 1600 and has been frequently quoted from since then. Below you can find some of the best quotes from Hamlet, sorted by character and with the Act and Scene provided.

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Prince Hamlet Quotes

Laurence Olivier as Prince
Hamlet in the 1948 film
adapatation of Hamlet

Seems, madam! Nay, it is; I know not "seems."
Act 1, Scene 2

O, that this too too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew.
Act 1, Scene 2

How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world.
Act 1, Scene 2

Frailty, thy name is woman!
Act 1, Scene 2

But break, my heart, for I must hold my tongue.
Act 1, Scene 2

I'll speak to it though Hell itself should gape
And bid me hold my peace.
Act 1, Scene 2

But 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.
Act 1, Scene 4

Why, what should be the fear?
I do not set my life at a pin's fee,
And for my soul, what can it do to that,
Being a thing immortal as itself?
Act 1, Scene 4

O most pernicious woman!
O, villain, villain, smiling, damned villain!
My tables, - meet it is I set it down,
That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain.
Act 1, Scene 5

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
Act 1, Scene 5

The time is out of joint; O cursed spite,
That ever I was born to set it right!
Act 1, Scene 5

Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks.
Act 2, Scene 2

I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.
Act 2, Scene 2

There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.
Act 2, Scene 2

O! what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
Act 2, Scene 2

What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,
That he should weep for her?
Act 2, Scene 2

To be, or not to be, - that is the question
Act 3, Scene 1

Let me be cruel, not unnatural;
I will speak daggers to her, but use none.
Act 3, Scene 2

I must be cruel, only to be kind: Thus bad begins and worse remains behind.
Act 3, Scene 4

a knavish speech sleeps in a foolish ear.
Act 3, Scene 4

How all occasions do inform against me,
And spur my dull revenge!
Act 4, Scene 4

O! from this time forth,
My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!
Act 4, Scene 4

I lov'd Ophelia: forty thousand brothers
Could not, with all their quantity of love,
Make up my sum.
Act 5, Scene 1

Let Hercules himself do what he may,
The cat will mew, and dog will have his day.
Act 5, Scene 1

There's a divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will.
Act 5, Scene 2

Polonius Quotes

Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.
Act 1, Scene 3

Neither a borrower nor a lender be:
For loan oft loses both itself and friend.
Act 1, Scene 3

This above all - to thine own self be true;
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Act 1, Scene 3

brevity is the soul of wit
Act 2, Scene 2

Though this be madness, yet there is method in 't.
Act 2, Scene 2

Claudius Quotes

Our sometime sister, now our Queen.
Act 1, Scene 2

O! my offence is rank, it smells to heaven.
Act 3, Scene 3

What if this cursed hand
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood, -
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens
To wash it white as snow?
Act 3, Scene 3

My words fly up, my thoughts remain below;
Words without thoughts never to heaven go.
Act 3, Scene 3

When sorrows come, they come not single spies,
But in battalions.
Act 4, Scene 4

Ophelia Quotes

Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind.
Act 3, Scene 1

O, woe is me
To have seen what I have seen, see what I see!
Act 3, Scene 1

We know what we are, but know not what we may be.
Act 4, Scene 5

Good-night, ladies; good-night, sweet ladies; good-night, good-night.
Act 4, Scene 5

Gertrude Quotes

More matter with less art.
Act 2, Scene 2

The lady doth protest too much, methinks.
Act 3, Scene 2

Be thou assur'd, if words be made of breath,
And breath of life, I have no life to breathe
What thou hast said to me.
Act 3, Scene 4

Horatio Quotes

A countenance more in sorrow than in anger.
Act 1, Scene 2

Now cracks a noble heart. Good-night, sweet prince;
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.
Act 5, Scene 2

Laertes Quotes

Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia,
And therefore I forbid my tears.
Act 4, Scene 7

Lay her i' the earth:
And from her fair and unpolluted flesh
May violets spring!
Act 5, Scene 1

Ghost Quotes

My hour is almost come
When I to sulphrous and tormenting flames
Must render up myself.
Act 1, Scene 5

The serpent that did sting thy father's life
Now wears his crown.
Act 1, Scene 5

Marcellus Quotes

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Act 1, Scene 4

Francisco Quotes

You come most carefully upon your hour.
Act 1, Scene 1

Related Articles

Hamlet Themes - The main themes of the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, including revenge, deception, madness, suicide, immorality and consequences - and their relevance to today.

Hamlet Characters - The main characters of the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, including Hamlet, Claudius, Gertrude, Ophelia, Polonius and Laertes - and the plot summary.

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