14: The Four Groans

Summary

Radiolab Episode 14: "The Four Groans" Summary

Podcast: Radiolab (WNYC Studios)
Episode Air Date: August 13, 2009
Main Guests: Ron Rosenbaum (author, The Shakespeare Wars), Mark Rylance (actor)

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Episode Overview

This deeply evocative episode of Radiolab explores the enigmatic end of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, focusing specifically on Hamlet’s final words: "The rest is silence," and the mysterious "four groans" ("O, O, O, O") that appear immediately afterward in the First Folio. The hosts, accompanied by renowned actor Mark Rylance and author Ron Rosenbaum, unravel the possible meanings and theatrical implications behind this textual oddity.

Radiolab, true to its form, fuses literary investigation with philosophical pondering on death, the limits of language, and the power of performance, channeling Hamlet’s final moments into a meditation on the boundary between life and the ineffable beyond.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

Setting the Scene: Hamlet’s Death (01:09 – 02:41)

• The episode begins with Ron Rosenbaum recounting the chaotic final act of Hamlet: “At the very end, there’s a pile of bodies... People are dying all over the place.” (Ron Rosenbaum, 01:40–02:05)
• Hamlet’s final exchange with Horatio and the iconic last words: "Oh, I die, Horatio... The rest is silence." (02:17–02:29)
• Hosts ponder the apparent finality: “When you die, that’s what happens next. It’s just... Nothing. It’s just silence.” (Host, 02:48–02:56)

The Mystery of the Four O’s (02:56 – 04:21)

• Rosenbaum reveals that in the 1623 First Folio, after “The rest is silence,” Hamlet’s silence is immediately broken by four written groans: "O, O, O, O."
• The hosts question, “They just tack like big dangling donuts onto one of the most lyrical deaths in the English language. So what are they doing there?” (Host, 03:34)
• Most actors ignore these groans, but Mark Rylance chooses to honor them in his performances.

Mark Rylance’s Interpretation (04:21 – 06:57)

• Rylance theorizes that these groans were potentially not Shakespeare’s, but perhaps inserted by an actor or editor. He explains:
  • “I guess I’d done it 300 times, shutting up. So I was into the change...” (Mark Rylance, 04:45–04:52)
  • Rylance discusses Hamlet as a character preoccupied with death, reason, and facing the unknown: “He’s a student at Wittenberg University...[who] encounters a ghost...it’s one of you...not a New Age wanderer...who has this experience.” (Mark Rylance, 05:14–05:41)
  • Hamlet, the rational skeptic, is forced to face supernatural mystery.

What Do the Groans Mean? (06:02 – 07:52)

• The hosts suggest that the four O’s could mark Hamlet’s passage from life to the unknown, perhaps signifying visions, sighs, or encounters with something beyond:
  • “Hamlet’s next step is either into silence where there is nothing...or is there a something waiting...? And does he see that something in a vision? Maybe four visions.” (Host, 06:11–06:32)
• Rylance performs the groans, varying in delivery: sometimes as “dying arias,” other times as silent gazes, or at different tempos.
• He describes these performances: “I felt I was encountering another reality than was immediately apparent to those around me...the ability to say what he saw...died before his ability to witness.” (Mark Rylance, 07:01–07:34)

The Power (and Mystery) of Performance (07:52 – 08:29)

• Rylance reflects on the performance’s impact: “The best deaths would just be when the audience and I were together...We were all kind of together, wanting, I suppose, Hamlet to say. Say something. What can you say? What’s happening to him? Something is happening, but we don’t know what it is. There. He’s gone. He’s gone.” (Mark Rylance, 08:06–08:29)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On theatrical ambiguity:
  • “His ability to put words to what he’s witnessing dies before his ability…to witness.” — Mark Rylance (07:01–07:34)
• The essence of the four O’s:
  • “They could represent a kind of dying aria…A long sigh…I see it coming…Oh, my God, it’s here…It’s about to happen…Oh, that’s it.” — Host & Mark Rylance (06:35–06:54, collaborative performance)
• On the shared experience of witnessing death:
  • “The best deaths would just be when the audience and I were together and we were all…wanting, I suppose, Hamlet to say something. What can you say? What’s happening to him? Something is happening, but we don’t know what it is. There. He’s gone.” — Mark Rylance (08:06–08:29)

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Important Segment Timestamps

• 01:09–02:41: The setup—Hamlet’s death and the meaning of “The rest is silence.”
• 02:56–03:34: Introduction of the First Folio’s “four groans.”
• 04:21–06:02: Mark Rylance on why he includes the O’s and the philosophical/theatrical stakes.
• 06:11–07:52: Interpretations of the four O’s; performing the passage.
• 08:06–08:29: The power and uncertainty at the moment of “ultimate silence.”

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Episode Tone and Language

The episode maintains an inquisitive, reverent tone with moments of playfulness. The hosts blend awe at Shakespeare’s genius with active questioning and open-ended contemplation. Rylance’s contributions are introspective and poetic, inviting listeners to share in the mystery rather than solve it.

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Takeaways

“The Four Groans” delves not just into Shakespearean trivia but into the heart of why we stage, read, and ponder Hamlet—to repeatedly approach the unknowable, groaningly, together. The episode leaves us with no answers, only the resonance of that final, wordless mystery.

Transcript

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[C]

Wait, you're listening.

[B]

Okay.

[D]

All right.

[C]

Okay.

[D]

All right. You're listening to RA Radio Lab.

[E]

Radio Lab from WNYC.

[A]

And NPR.

[C]

Number 14. The four groans. There is a moment in Shakespeare. It is a very, very famous moment when Shakespeare allows his actors to step right up to the edge of death, almost into death itself. It's from Hamlet.

[E]

Yeah, that sounds good.

[C]

Okay, so we'll start. So what's going on in the play at the very end?

[E]

Well, at the very end, there's a pile of bodies.

[C]

This is Ron Rosenbaum. He's the author of a book called the Shakespeare Wars.

[E]

Hamlet and Laertes have fought a duel, And the queen has drawn a draft of Poison the drink.

[C]

Oh, my dear.

[E]

People are dying all over the place.

[C]

And Hamlet, too, he's been cut and fatally poisoned. He falls into the arms of his.

[E]

Of his very best friend, Horatio.

[C]

Oh, I die, Horatio. This is Sir Lawrence Olivier. The potent poison quite o' ercrows my spirit.

[E]

And then finally he says, the rest.

[C]

Is silence. And then Hamlet dies.

[E]

So that's the end of Hamlet. The rest is silence. Those are his last words, which may.

[C]

Be Shakespeare's way of just saying so that you know, when you die, that's what happens next. It's just. Nothing is just silence.

[D]

However.

[E]

Seven years after Shakespeare's death, his collaborators reprinted collected works of Shakespeare. This is called the Folio version. In that version, says Ron after the rest is silence. Hamlet is not silent. What is printed beneath the rest is silence is. Is literally capital O, comma, O, comma, O comma, o. Four O's, four O's.

[C]

Yes, sir. We have an appointment with Mark Ryland. We are from National Public Radio. We wondered, what are these O's? They just tack like big dangling donuts onto one of the most lyrical deaths in the English language. So what are they doing there? Well, most of the actors who perform Hamlet pay no attention to the Foley. They don't do the O's. They do the rest. As silence, they die. And it's done. The green room is down to the left there. But we met a guy who does do the groans. You are he.

[D]

I'm Mark.

[C]

I'm Robert Krulowich.

[A]

Hi.

[C]

This is Jennifer. Umrah.

[D]

Hi, Jeff.

[C]

His name is Mark Rylance.

[D]

Should we go up to my dressing room?

[C]

Yeah, yeah. We met him backstage at the Longacre Theater in New York City. He was starring in a non Shakespeare Broadway show. But he took us up to.

[E]

Wow.

[D]

We're in a Broadway dressing room. Pretty cool.

[C]

A teeny dressing room. And it was there that he began to talk about the groans.

[D]

So the O, O, O, O was added by very careful editors to the folio in 1623.

[C]

Mark said he didn't think that Shakespeare actually wrote those O's. He thinks probably an actor did it. So when you and your director sat down and you're looking at these four O's on the page, why didn't you think to yourself, shut up?

[D]

Because I guess. I guess I'd done it 300 times. Shutting up. So I was into the change into.

[C]

The difference, particularly when he began to just consider the character of Hamlet himself.

[D]

Of all the characters who die in plays, I think we're most intrigued about what Hamlet will make of it.

[C]

Because Ryland says, remember, not only is Hamlet unusually obsessed by death, he went to a school that championed reason over mystery.

[D]

He's a student at Wittenberg University. He's part of that whole Protestant movement to the accurate study of nature. He's moving away from superstition. And bam.

[B]

What?

[D]

He encounters a ghost. I am thy father's spirit. A ghost that not only appears as his father, but sounds like his father.

[C]

If thou didst ever thy dear father love. O God.

[D]

This is for the scientists. I imagine, listening to your program. You have to put yourself in that position. It's one of you. It's not a New Age wanderer or some regular visitor to a psychic who has this experience. So his gaze has been for the whole play, his gaze has been on what is on the other side of our consciousness.

[C]

And when in the end, Helmut finally steps to the edge of the. Of the answer and he utters.

[D]

The rest is silence.

[C]

Here's the choice that actors and directors, when they do Hamlet must make. Hamlet's next step is either into silence where there is nothing, where there's a nothingness forever and ever, or is there a something waiting on the other side? And does he see that something in a vision? Maybe. Four visions.

[D]

Oh. Oh, oh, oh.

[E]

They could represent a kind of dying area.

[D]

Oh.

[E]

A long sigh. I see it coming.

[D]

Oh.

[E]

Oh, my God, it's here. Oh, it's about to happen. Oh, that's it.

[C]

This is an idea you had to inhabit night after night.

[D]

I did, yeah.

[C]

So what did you think you were doing?

[D]

I felt that. I felt I was encountering. I felt I was encountering another reality than was immediately apparent to those around me. And so I felt with Hamlet that he'd moved and was seeing things, was encountering things. But his ability to put words to what he's witnessing dies before his ability.

[C]

To witness the ability to say what he saw that died even though he still had mind enough to see. So some nights, Mark would deliver the.

[D]

O's silently, just looking four times in four different places, maybe.

[C]

Or he might change tempo.

[D]

Oh, oh, oh, oh.

[C]

And some nights he died better deaths.

[D]

The best deaths would just be when the audience and I were together and we were all. We were all kind of together, wanting, I suppose, Hamlet to say. Say something. What can you say? What's happening to him? Something is happening, but we don't know what it is. There. He's gone. He's gone.

[C]

And the rest is silence. Radiolab is funded in part by the Sloan foundation, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the National Science Foundation.

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