It is not, nor it cannot come to good

[nq:1]Following is a line from Hamlet's soliloquy in act 1, scene 2: "It is not, nor it cannot come to good" Shouldn't that be "It is not, nor it can come to good", or even "It is not, nor can it come to good"?[/nq]
I'm afraid the author is retired now so he's unlikely to be willing to make any further amendments.

John Dean
Oxford

FB typed thus:
[nq:1]Following is a line from Hamlet's soliloquy in act 1, scene 2: "It is not, nor it cannot come to good" Shouldn't that be "It is not, nor it can come to good", or even "It is not, nor can it come to good"?[/nq]
You may not have grasped the meaning fully, as this is antiquated English. It translates as:
It has not come to good, and it cannot come to good.

Wh

[nq:1]Furthermore, if Shakespeare wrote it, then it's right by definition -[/nq]
Indeed. Further examples of this phenomenon may be seen in my postings.

Mark Barratt
Budapest

F. Balducci:
[nq:2]Following is a line from Hamlet's soliloquy in act 1, ... be "It is not, nor it can come to good",[/nq]
This is wrong; I think the reason is that in modern English "nor" has to come immediately before the thing that it's negating. "Nor it" would be correct in a construct like "As to the dog, neither I nor it opened the door."
[nq:2]or even "It is not, nor can it come

[nq:1]Following is a line from Hamlet's soliloquy in act 1, scene 2: "It is not, nor it cannot come to good" Shouldn't that be "It is not, nor it can come to good", or even "It is not, nor can it come to good"?[/nq]
Sound comments from everybody else already. But I'll add that Shakespeare wanted the extra syllable here for metrical reasons, as well as wanting "cannot" close to "come". They wer

[nq:1]FB typed thus:[/nq]
[nq:2]Following is a line from Hamlet's soliloquy in act 1, scene 2: "It is not, nor it cannot come to good"[/nq]
[nq:1]You may not have grasped the meaning fully, as this is antiquated English. It translates as: It has not come to good, and it cannot come to good.[/nq]
But he wrote "nor", so I would have expected "nor it can come to good" or, as you put it, "

[nq:1]This is correct modern English, except that "nor can it come to" is a parenthetical construction and in modern usage requires corresponding punctuation at both ends (this could be parentheses, dashes, or commas). So a second comma is needed before "good".[/nq]
Then, you think it means "it is not good, nor can it come to, good", don't you? David paraphrased it as "It has not come to good,

[nq:1]Then, you think it means "it is not good, nor can it come to, good", don't you? David paraphrased it ... not come" ==> "it has not come"), so shouldn't it be "It is not, nor can it, come to good"?[/nq]
"It has not, nor can it, come to good"?
Bye, FB

Nasalization is just a part of life.
(Joey DoWop Dee on it.cultura.linguistica.inglese)

[nq:2]Following is a line from Hamlet's soliloquy in act 1, ... even "It is not, nor can it come to good"?[/nq]
[nq:1]Sound comments from everybody else already. But I'll add that Shakespeare wanted the extra syllable here for metrical reasons, as well as wanting "cannot" close to "come". They were not then as worried as we are by certain double negatives.[/nq]
I see. In fact, I quite got

Okay, I'm going to unsnip some bits here to provide clearer context. As the order is intricate, I'll just say that text quoted with any number of ">"s is F. Balducci, asking originally about a line from Hamlet; "}" is "David", responding to F.'s first posting, and ">" is me (Mark Brader), responding to the same posting and David's response.
[nq:1]This is wrong... This is correct modern E