Quartos.

Three passages set a public-domain reading text beside an earlier printing. The quarto columns are EEBO-TCP Phase I transcriptions, CC0. Spelling is not modernized.

The prologue

The 1597 quarto calls them two household friends. The reading text calls them two households, both alike in dignity. Open Prologue in the reading text. Source: EEBO-TCP A12010, STC 22322. Transcription. Oxford Text Archive.

1597 quarto

TVVo houshold Frends alike in dignitie,
(In faire Verona, where we lay our Scene)
From ciuill broyles broke into enmitie,
VVhose ciuill warre makes ciuill hands vncleane.
From forth the fatall loynes of these two foes,
A paire of starre-crost Louers tooke their life:
VVhose misaduentures, piteous ouerthrowes,
(Through the continuing of their Fathers strife,
And death-markt passage of their Parents rage)
Is now the two howres traffique of our Stage.
The which if you with patient eares attend
VVhat here we want wee'l studie to amend.

Reading text

Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life;
Whose misadventur’d piteous overthrows
Doth with their death bury their parents’ strife.
The fearful passage of their death-mark’d love,
And the continuance of their parents’ rage,
Which, but their children’s end, nought could remove,
Is now the two hours’ traffic of our stage;

To be, or not to be

The 1603 quarto prints a different speech from the familiar one in the reading text. Open Act 3, Scene 1 in the reading text. Source: EEBO-TCP A11959, STC 22275. Transcription. Oxford Text Archive.

1603 quarto

To be, or not to be, I there's the point,
To Die, to sleepe, is that all? I all:
No, to sleepe, to dreame, I mary there it goes,
For in that dreame of death, when wee awake,
And borne before an euerlasting Iudge,
From whence no passenger euer retur'nd,
The vndiscouered country, at whose sight
The happy smile, and the accursed damn'd.
But for this, the ioyfull hope of this,
Whol'd beare the scornes and flattery of the world,

Reading text

To be, or not to be, that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die—to sleep,
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to: ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep.
To sleep, perchance to dream—ay, there’s the rub,

Blow, winds

The 1608 quarto prints this speech with different line breaks. Spelling follows that transcription. Open Act 3, Scene 2 in the reading text. Source: EEBO-TCP A11978, STC 22292. Transcription. Oxford Text Archive.

1608 quarto

Blow wind & cracke your cheekes, rage, blow
You caterickes, & Hircanios spout til you haue drencht,
The steeples drown'd the cockes, you sulpherous and
Thought executing fires, vaunt-currers to
Oke-cleauing thunderboults, singe my white head,
And thou all shaking thunder, smite flat
The thicke Rotunditie of the world, cracke natures
Mold, all Gennains spill at once that make
Ingratefull man.

Reading text

Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! Rage! blow!
You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
Till you have drench’d our steeples, drown’d the cocks!
You sulphurous and thought-executing fires,
Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts,
Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder,
Strike flat the thick rotundity o’ the world!
Crack nature’s moulds, all germens spill at once,
That make ingrateful man!