to be or not to be,that is the question.........................?

Question

does anyone understand that statement and where did it come from?

Answer 1

it is from one of William Shakespeare's plays - Hamlet Act 3 Scene 1.
Sorry, I'm not sure what it means as I have never studied it.

Answer 2

Yeah, Hamlet is super-depressed at this point in the play. "Whether tis nobler to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take up arms..." means life is really bad for him and he's been unlucky and he's debating whether it's better to keep on suffering (stay alive) or end the suffering (kill himself) because he doesn't see a way to stay alive and not suffer. Of course, when your dad gets poisioned by your uncle and your girlfriend has schizophrenia, and you probably have schizophrenia, too, then things might look a little bleak. Very poetic and all--I adore Shakespeare, but just because Hamlet is good at discussing suicide in lyrical terms doesn't make it right. Of course, the answer is to stay alive--Hamlet has overblown ideas about retribution and avenging his father's death, which is a suicide mission. So don't avenge him, dude! What's so great about avenging a death if you have to die to do it? Just tell Ghost Dad to leave you the f**k alone and go to Spain or something. Hamlet probably wouldn't be half as suicidal if he weren't in a dank castle in Denmark--he should have gone to a spa or something. Get a massage.

Answer 3

William Shakespeare - To be, or not to be (from Hamlet 3/1)

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;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action. - Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.

Answer 4

as the other answers have explained in great detail its from hamlet...but the point they didn't get to is that Hamlet's indecision is causing a large part of his depression....it should read to sh!t or to get of the pot ...that is the question

Answer 5

to be or not to be that is the question, is taken from a dramatised play called hamlet written by william shakesphere,
its about suscide should he live or not to live,

Answer 6

everyone knows that it's from hamlet..I've learned that monologue..by-heart...and it's damn tough..

Answer 7

it's about suicide
to live or not to live

Answer 8

yeah what she said