'Hamlet' quotation practice grids

Here are 15 exercises on quotations in Hamlet. They are designed for pair-work 10-minute sessions in class, but work perfectly well for individuals. You need to know the play well, so these are for revision at a late stage. 

The purpose is to make your mind work hard: retrieving factual details, certainly, about the sequence of the play, individual quotations and so on, but more importantly know making you think and create connections. You don’t need to write on the original sheet itself: just take a piece of paper and jot down your responses. 

Take 10-15 minutes, and when finished find the quotation in context and then fill in any gaps.

Hamlet quotations: all 5 Acts

Quizlet tests for retrieval practice on quotations from Hamlet. Here, the entire play, with quotations jumbled by Act (total of 97).

Think of what should replace 'blank' in each case, then click to see the answer. Now write down (or, better still, discuss with a friend): how could this quotation be used? how is it helpful/interesting? how does it connect with others?

Hamlet quotations, Act V

Quizlet tests for retrieval practice on quotations from Hamlet. Here, Act 5.

Think of what should replace 'blank' in each case, then click to see the answer. Now write down (or, better still, discuss with a friend): how could this quotation be used? how is it helpful/interesting? how does it connect with others?

Hamlet quotations, Act 4

Quizlet tests for retrieval practice on quotations from Hamlet. Here, Act 4.

Think of what should replace 'blank' in each case, then click to see the answer. Now write down (or, better still, discuss with a friend): how could this quotation be used? how is it helpful/interesting? how does it connect with others?

Hamlet quotations, Act 3

Quizlet tests for retrieval practice on quotations from Hamlet. Here, Act 3.

Think of what should replace 'blank' in each case, then click to see the answer. Now write down (or, better still, discuss with a friend): how could this quotation be used? how is it helpful/interesting? how does it connect with others?

Hamlet quotations, Act 2

Quizlet tests for retrieval practice on quotations from Hamlet. Here, Act 2.

Think of what should replace 'blank' in each case, then click to see the answer. Now write down (or, better still, discuss with a friend): how could this quotation be used? how is it helpful/interesting? how does it connect with others? 

Hamlet quotations: Act 1

The first of a series of Quizlet tests for retrieval practice on quotations from Hamlet. Here, Act 1. 

Think of what should replace 'blank' in each case, then click to see the answer. Now write down (or, better still, discuss with a friend): how could this quotation be used? how is it helpful/interesting? how does it connect with others?
 

'Hamlet' resources

This post summarises useful resources for our pupils studying Hamlet as their single text in the Leaving Certificate. [updated May 2017]

1. The whole text of the play: put it on your own computer...
2. A series of 15 video/audio analyses of moments, using the ShowMe app for iPad.
3. The whole text of Hamlet as a Wordle (click on the image for a bigger view). \
4. A recording of the 1993 BBC radio version with Kenneth Branagh.
5. SCC English revision podcasts are here, on 'The first soliloquy','The first scene', and two ones which gather the 10 Characters series (below).
6. 10 Characters in Hamlet: our 5-minute podcasts on 'lesser' characters: Fortinbras, Horatio, Laertes, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, Polonius, Ophelia, The First Player, Osric, The First Gravedigger.
7. An excellent resource: the BBC Archive Hamlet.
8. Miriam Poulton's review of the excellent National Theatre Live production, starring Rory Kinnear.
9. Radio documentary by 'This American Life' called 'Act V' on a prison production of the play.
10. Links to six press reviews of the Kinnear Hamlet.
11. Shakespeare Searched: a 'Google for Shakespeare' - terrific resource for looking up quotations, self-testing and so on.
12. The Ten Best Hamlets.
13. The Hamlet Weblog.
14. Alan Stanford's Hamlet masterclass, on RTE Radio (4 programmes in January 2011).
15. A quotation auto-test (and below; see the first slides for instructions)

'O that this too too solid flesh'

Pupils should check out the soliloquy pages on Firefly, where you can check out many versions of the four main speeches. Here is one of four on the first soliloquy from Hamlet (by Jonathan Slinger of the RSC):

'Hamlet' via NTLive

Tonight, all Fifth Form go to the NTLive showing of Hamlet, featuring Benedict Cumberbatch, at the cinema in Dundrum. Here is the official trailer.

'Hamlet' pre-reading

Here is a simple pre-reading activity for Hamlet, which we are currently starting in Fifth Form: six sentences taken from the first scene, without any context or explanation. Either individually or, better still in class discussion, consider them. Each slide moves on after 5 seconds, so pause each for proper thought/discussion or just use the 'forward' arrow.

Hamlet 15: Act V scene ii - 'the readiness is all'

In the final annotation of interesting moments in Hamlet, Hamlet explains to Horatio his sense of 'readiness'.

This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.

Hamlet 14: Act V scene ii - 'perfect conscience'

Hamlet tells Horatio that the deaths of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are not on his conscience, and that it is 'perfect conscience' to kill Claudius to prevent his 'canker' spreading.

This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.

Hamlet 13: Act V scene i - 'noble dust'

Here, Hamlet comments on how all people, however powerful, eventually are levelled by death and return to 'dust'.



This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.

Hamlet 12: Act 4 scene vii - 'a face without a heart'?

Claudius reveals more of himself in these comments to Laertes. He himself is indeed really a 'painting of a sorrow', a 'face without a heart.'

This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.

Hamlet 11: Act 4 scene v - 'I dare damnation'

Laertes becomes the latest young man in the play to want to revenge his father. The contrast with Hamlet: Laertes 'dares damnation' in his determination to carry out his task.

This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.

Hamlet 10: Act 3 scene iv - the closet scene

Hamlet's frustration at and anger with his mother explode in the closet scene, and he tries to make her see the total difference between her two husbands.

This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.

Hamlet 9: Act 3 scene iii - 'the cess of majesty'

Rosencrantz gives the clearest description in the play of the absolute centrality of the king in a society at this time.

This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.

Hamlet 8 : Act 3 scene ii - 'passion's slave'

Hamlet explains to Horatio why the latter is his best friend, and in the process reveals his sense of himself by contrast, a man who is 'passion's slave'.

This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.

'Hamlet' 7: Act 3 scene i - 'like sweet bells jangled'

Here, Ophelia tells of her distress at Hamlet's extraordinary change, and gives us an insight into the kind of man he was before his father died.

This is a series of fifteen key moments in Hamlet via the iPad app ShowMe. These moments are interesting and important ones, though not the most obvious, and the series avoids such crucial speeches as the soliloquies; for more on those, and much more, go here for our general Hamlet resources.