act 2 scene 2

This story is significant because of the subtext regarding  Pyrrhus, son of Achilles, and his revenge over Priam the King of Troy. Pyrrhus is pretty angry and makes bloody sport of his Priam. Priam's wife, Hecuba, puts on a big display of inconsolable grief for her dead husband. This of course is in stark contrast to Gertrude who jumped into the sheets with Claudius as soon as her husband died. Hamlet likes this contrast.