I actually find the idea of stolen quartos kind of humorous; all I can imagine are the historic versions of today's pirated movies -- a bunch of super sketchy creeps sidling over to actors and whispering, "Aye... you got the play lines?" (I realize that this is probably totally inaccurate both in Shakespeare's and modern times.) Although these versions of Shakespeare's plays may be hilariously inarticulate and unfamiliar, they still served as a good starting point for those who put together more accurate versions of Shakespeare's plays. Plus, it's still nice to compare these quartos to our version (even if just for a laugh or two).
One place where the quarto is different is in Act I, Scene 1 after Horatio first sees the ghost of King Hamlet. Although Horatio claims in the accepted version of Hamlet that the appearance of the ghost is an omen of disasters to come, much like the rising of the dead before Caesar's death, the quarto completely skips it and continues to the return of the ghost. Not only does this rush the pace of the play, but it also destroys the foreshadowing and suspense that this scene created. If a little heavy-handed, this description of the ghost as an omen gives the audience a sense of what is to come later in this tragedy.
Perhaps one of the most obvious changes in the quarto is the fact that Ophelia and Hamlet's iconic "get thee to a nunnery" conversation occurs before Guildenstern and Rosencrantz speak with Hamlet. I'm not completely sure why these two scenes are just completely switched in the quarto; perhaps the actor just forgot which order the scenes were in. However, it makes a lot more sense for the conversation with Ophelia to occur after Guildenstern and Rosencrantz meet Hamlet since their first-person encounter with Hamlet's "madness" would logically lead to Polonius testing out his theory using Ophelia. If they didn't have any clear evidence that Hamlet seemed crazy, it wouldn't really make sense to make Ophelia strike up a conversation with a lovestruck man when Polonius is already so obviously against it.
One place where the quarto is different is in Act I, Scene 1 after Horatio first sees the ghost of King Hamlet. Although Horatio claims in the accepted version of Hamlet that the appearance of the ghost is an omen of disasters to come, much like the rising of the dead before Caesar's death, the quarto completely skips it and continues to the return of the ghost. Not only does this rush the pace of the play, but it also destroys the foreshadowing and suspense that this scene created. If a little heavy-handed, this description of the ghost as an omen gives the audience a sense of what is to come later in this tragedy.
Perhaps one of the most obvious changes in the quarto is the fact that Ophelia and Hamlet's iconic "get thee to a nunnery" conversation occurs before Guildenstern and Rosencrantz speak with Hamlet. I'm not completely sure why these two scenes are just completely switched in the quarto; perhaps the actor just forgot which order the scenes were in. However, it makes a lot more sense for the conversation with Ophelia to occur after Guildenstern and Rosencrantz meet Hamlet since their first-person encounter with Hamlet's "madness" would logically lead to Polonius testing out his theory using Ophelia. If they didn't have any clear evidence that Hamlet seemed crazy, it wouldn't really make sense to make Ophelia strike up a conversation with a lovestruck man when Polonius is already so obviously against it.