| | Hamlet Haven: "To Be..." Soliloquy (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-11-07) |
 | | Although the “To be, or not to be” passage “was originally staged as a feigned soliloquy” (14), the closing of the theaters in 1642 broke the “English theatrical tradition” (15). |
 | | Unfortunately, the “erroneous belief that the ‘To be’ soliloquy represented Hamlet’s thoughts and the erroneous belief that soliloquies of all ages typically represented the thoughts of characters became mutually reinforcing” (22). |
 | | As attention to each soliloquy’s context enables “one to see the speech as a part of the action, not apart from it” (23), findings are presented “as they arise simultaneously from the poetics of language and action, which often have various kinds of contextual significance that need to be recognized and understood” (24). |
| www.hamlethaven.com /tobe.html (1291 words) |