Hamlet

Denmark's new king is a murderer, the old king's ghost tells his son, and five acts then pass while the prince decides what to do about it. Shakespeare's longest play holds its place because the hesitation is the subject: grief, doubt, performance and the difficulty of acting on uncertain knowledge. The soliloquies carry that thinking, while Ophelia, Claudius and Polonius are given enough room to complicate the question rather than settle it. Practical notes: • The complete text of Shakespeare's best-known tragedy • Soliloquies among the most quoted lines in English • A revenge plot used to examine doubt and delay • Standard reading on school and university syllabuses Suited to students, theatre readers and anyone assembling a Shakespeare shelf, available from Boipoka.