Below are six quotes each for Laertes and Hamlet pulled from roughly the same areas of the play.
The first two quotations from Laertes show his unselfish love for and desire to protect his younger sister. He delicately points out that Hamlet might break her heart and that she should keep herself safe from any type of teenage rebellion. His advice shows his care for his family, particularly the safety of his sister.
The first two quotations from Hamlet show his profound depression at the death of his father and the quick remarriage of his mother. He is so upset he is considering killing himself, stopping short only because suicide is considered a sin. Here Hamlet is also revealing a respect and love for family and is mourning the loss of both his parents - his father to death and his mother to his uncle.
Hamlet's third quote occurs after his long conversation with his mother concerning his true feelings about her recent remarriage to his uncle, his father's murderer. He finally calms down enough to encourage her to seek a more moral path and to avoid sinning any longer with his uncle.
Laertes' third quote concerns his father's untimely death. He goes straight to the King demanding an answer for this murder. In a way, he attacks his suspicions head on while Hamlet has been avoiding avenging his own father's murder.
Hamlet's and Laertes' fourth quotes concern Ophelia. Laertes is heartbroken to see his sister in a state of lunacy. Later, after her suicide, Laertes in his fifth quote, shows his concern for her soul, demanding she get all the rites of burial. Hamlet's fourth quote is an admission of his love for her. Unlike Laertes, though, he has not been able to be direct about his love, so she likely never knew.
Hamlet's fifth and Laertes' sixth quotes are both apologies and admissions between the two as they duel for the King's pleasure. Hamlet offers his apology for killing Polonius, but uses a metaphor to take some of the responsibility off himself. Laertes directly admits his role in Hamlet's imminent death, and his own as well.
Finally, Hamlet's sixth quote shows the importance he places on his family's reputation. He demands that Horatio remain alive to tell the real story when Fortinbras takes over.
Laertes
1. "Be wary then; best safety lies in fear; / Youth to itself rebels, though none else near" (I, iii)
2. "Then weigh what loss your honor may sustain / If with too credent ear you list his songs / Or lose your heart, or your chaste treasure open / To his unmaster'd importunity." (I, iii)
3. "How came he dead? I'll not be juggled with: / ...Let come what comes; only I'll be revenged / Most thoroughly for my father." (IV,v)
4. "Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia! / Oh heavens! Is't possible a young maid's wits / Should be as mortal as an old man's life?" (IV, v)
5. "Lay her i' th' earth, / And from her fair and unpolluted flesh /May violets spring! I tell thee, churlish priest, / A minist'ring angel shall my sister be / When thou liest howling." (V,i)
6. "It is here, Hamlet: thou art slain; / ...the foul practice / Hath turned itself on me, lo, here i lie, / Never to rise again." (V, ii)
Hamlet
1. "Together with all forms, modes, shapes of grief, / That can denote me truly: these indeed seem, / For they are actions that a man might play: / But I have that within which passeth show; / These but the trappings and the suits of woe." I,ii
2. "Oh that this too, too solid flesh would melt / thaw, and resolve itself into a dew! / Or that the Everlasting had not fix'd / His canon 'gainst self slaughter!" (I,ii)
3. "Oh throw away the lesser part of it, / and live the purer with the other half." (III,iv)
4. "I loved Ophelia: Forty thousand brothers / Could not, with all their quantity of love, /Make up my sum." (V, i)
5. "Give me your pardon sir: I have done you wrong;/ ...Free me so far in your most generous thoughts, / That I have shot mine arrow o'er the house, / And hurt my brother." (V, ii)
6. "But I do prophesy the election lights / On Fortinbras: he has my dying voice; / So tell him, with the occurrents, more and less / Which have solicited." (V, ii)
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