A GARVEYARD FORMULA IN HAMLET V.i.115-131.

The article focuses on the traditional motifs about death in the graveyard scene in English drama. According to the author, the question and answer session sequence between Hamlet and the gravedigger is also traditional, though William Shakespeare uses for comic purposes something which is normally treated seriously. The dialogue deals with the identity of the person buried. Epitaphs were sometimes used for blame not praise and satiric potential of this formula is exploited by Selton in his epitaph for John Clark.