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What happens in Act 1, Scene 3 of Hamlet?
Laertes counsels his sister Ophelia not to fall in love with Hamlet, and their father Polonius agrees. Polonius advises Laertes on how to conduct himself at school and in life more generally.
Read our Summary & Analysis of Act 1, Scenes 3 & 4. (2-minute read)
Which Hamlet characters are the most important in Act 1, Scene 3?
Act 1, Scene 3 of Hamlet is focused on King Claudius’s chief adviser, Polonius, and Polonius’s two children: his daughter, Ophelia, and his son, Laertes.
In the scene, the men of the family—first Laertes and then then Polonius—offer Ophelia advice about Hamlet, who she has been seeing romantically. (The advice is pretty much that she should stay away from him.) The scene suggests that Ophelia and Laertes have a strong and loving sister-brother relationship.
Read an in-depth character analysis of Ophelia. (2-minute read)
Read an in-depth character analysis of Laertes. (2-minute read)
Is Polonius’s speech giving advice his son Laertes meant to be serious or comical?
There are both serious and comic elements in the speech, which reflects Polonius being a complicated character. While he will later be ridiculed by Hamlet as a busy body who gets involved in matters that are none of his business, even Hamlet might have to agree that Polonius has every right to weigh in on welfare of his children. However, the fact that most of the advice he gives Laertes in his most famous speech tries to have it both ways (for instance, “Neither a borrower nor a lender be”) tends to make him sound more wishy-washy than wise.
Read an in-depth character analysis of Polonius. (2-minute read)
