W. S. Gilbert.
The "annotations" appended to the text of the burlesque are in parody of the performances of the commentators, who at least are fair game for chaff of this sort, and on whom Poole, in his preface, lavishes some excellent indignation.
Of subsequent burlesques of "Hamlet" there have not been many, but some of them have been really clever and commendable. There was, for instance, Talfourd's, published at Oxford in 1849; there was the "Hamlet à la Mode" of Messrs. G. L. Gordon and G. W. Anson, performed at Liverpool in 1877; there was the "Very Little Hamlet" of Mr. William Yardley, seen at the Gaiety in 1884; and last, but assuredly not least, we have had the "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern" of Mr. Gilbert, which, written originally without thought either of public or of private representation, has been enacted at a benefit matinée during the present year.
In "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern," which is an unpretentious little "skit," covering only some sixteen or seventeen printed pages, Mr. Gilbert supposes that Hamlet is the son (not the step-son) of Claudius. "Rosencrantz is a lover of Ophelia, to whom Hamlet is betrothed, and they lay their heads together to devise a plan by which Hamlet may be put out of the way. Some Court theatricals are in preparation." Now, once upon a time, Claudius had written a tragedy, which was damned, and to which no one is allowed to make reference on pain of death. "Ophelia and Rosencrantz persuade Hamlet to play his father's tragedy before the king and court. Hamlet, who is unaware of the proscription, does so; and he is banished, and Rosencrantz happily united to Ophelia."
In the first act, Rosencrantz, who has never seen Hamlet (apparently, because the former has been abroad), asks Ophelia what the Prince is like, and that gives Mr. Gilbert an opportunity for some characteristic satire. Ophelia says of Hamlet that he is "alike for no two seasons at a time":—
Sometimes he's tall—sometimes he's very short—
Now with black hair—now with a flaxen wig—
Sometimes an English accent—then a French—
Then English with a strong provincial "burr."
Once an American and once a Jew—
But Danish never, take him how you will!
And, strange to say, whate'er his tongue may be,
Whether he's dark or flaxen—English—French—
Though we're in Denmark, A. D. ten—six—two—
He always dresses as King James the First!
Guild. Oh, he is surely mad!
Oph.Well, there again
Opinion is divided. Some men hold
That he's the sanest far of all sane men—
Some that he's really sane, but shamming mad—
Some that he's really mad, but shamming sane—
Some that he will be mad, some that he was—
Some that he couldn't be! But, on the whole
(As far as I can make out what they mean),
The favourite theory's somewhat like this:
Hamlet is idiotically sane
With lucid intervals of lunacy.
In the second act, the Queen, observing that Hamlet is about to soliloquise, urges Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to "prevent this, gentlemen, by any means":—