‘All argument is a whore and a cuckold’
Thus speaks Thersites in Act 2, Scene 3. The scene opens in the Greek camp, outside Achilles’ tent, and Thersites has just been engaging in a humorous exchange with Achilles and Patroclus about their collective foolishness. Thersites has, as his role requires, been playing the fool for the amusement of his superiors, crafting his words and his argument so that he can conclude that he and all around him are also fools:
Agamemnon is a fool to offer to command Achilles;
Achilles is a fool to be commanded of Agamemnon;
Thersites is a fool to serve such a fool, and
Patroclus is a fool positive.
Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida, Act 2 Scene 3.59–62
This kind of circular word play is common in the mouths of Shakespearean fools, offering a moment of humour and entertainment in between more serious episodes. And yet, Thersites is painfully aware of how crafty words can lead to more than mere entertainment. As the other Greek leaders draw near and Achilles withdraws into his tent, Thersites highlights the very real dangers that lurk behind words:
Here is such patchery, such juggling and
such knavery! All argument92 is a whore and a
cuckold; a good quarrel to draw emulous factions
and bleed to death upon. Now, the dry serpigo93 on
the subject! And war and lechery confound all!
Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida, Act 2 Scene 3.68–72
The famous line: ‘All argument’s a whore and a cuckold’ can be taken as a reference to the central conflict that led to the Trojan War – the breakup of the marriage between a cuckold (Menelaus) and a whore (Helen). It is possible, however, to see the line as commenting on the nature of argument and debate itself. An argument can be a whore – sold when convenient, motivated by a desire for gain and profit. The arguments and appeals made to Achilles by the Greek leaders are whores in this sense – insincere and dissembling, they are made with the sole aim of securing Achilles’ service on the battlefield. An argument can equally be a cuckold – it can be cheated on, gone back on, invalidated. The arguments and promises made by Cressida to Troilus are cuckolds in this sense – made in earnest at the time, but abrogated by later actions. The result of these dangerous arguments is factionalism and blood; and Thersites wishes war, lechery, and the pox on the whole enterprise.
Thersites’ comments come into sharper relief once we consider their timing within the play. They occur just before the arrival of the Greek leaders, who are hoping to persuade Achilles to re-enter the fray. But they also occur just after the Trojan debate scene with which we opened this chapter. Thus, we have just been witness to a lengthy and highly stylized ἀγών – a set-piece scene which showcases rhetoric, discussion, and argument. It would have been all but impossible to hear Thersites’ barbed words in this scene without recalling the verbal jousting in the scene that immediately preceded it.
The Trojan debate scene (Act 2, Scene 2) can indeed be seen as a kind of ἀγών, and the key elements of the Euripidean ἀγών are clearly present here: a pair of opposing speeches, setting out conflicting perspectives on a central question, of comparable length, separated by a few lines of briefer interjections.94 These paired speeches are those given by Hector (lines 8–24) and Troilus (lines 37–50) towards the start of the scene. Their paired nature is evident from their comparable structures, and the way in which Troilus’ speech is designed to mirror and answer Hector’s:
HECTOR:
Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than I
As far as toucheth my particular,
Yet, dread Priam,
There is no lady of more softer bowels,
More spongy to suck in the sense of fear,
More ready to cry out ‘Who knows what follows?’
Than Hector is. The wound of peace is surety,
Surety secure; but modest doubt is called
The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches
To th’ bottom of the worst. Let Helen go.
Since the first sword was drawn about this question,
Every tithe soul, ‘mongst many thousand dismes,
Hath been as dear as Helen – I mean, of ours.
If we have lost so many tenths of ours,
To guard a thing not ours, nor worth to us,
(Had it our name) the value of one ten,
What merit’s in that reason which denies
The yielding of her up?
[13 lines – including an interjection from Helenus]
TROILUS:
You are for dreams and slumbers, brother priest;
You fur your gloves with reason. Here are
your reasons:
You know an enemy intends you harm;
You know a sword employed is perilous,
And reason flies the object of all harm.
Who marvels, then, when Helenus beholds
A Grecian and his sword, if he do set
The very wings of reason to his heels
And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove,
Or like a star disorbed? Nay, if we talk of reason,
Let’s shut our gates and sleep. Manhood and honour
Should have hare hearts, would they but fat their
thoughts
With this crammed reason; reason and respect
Make livers pale and lustihood deject.
Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida, Act 2 Scene 2.8–50
Both speeches begin with an introductory preamble of two and a half lines, before launching into the main body of the argument. Hector uses his speech to claim his own fearlessness and to address his father Priam, while Troilus uses his to address his brother scornfully and to introduce what he considers to be Hector’s motives. Both speeches have two further sections. In Hector’s, the second section takes the form of a very physical description of fear – he speaks of soft and spongy bowels, as well as wounds – and an exhortation to ‘modest doubt’ and wisdom. In his third section, he elaborates on that wisdom, questioning what value has been placed on the lives of each individual who has been sacrificed for the sake of Helen. The rationality of this final section is heightened by the precise language of numbers: the first sword, many thousand dismes (i.e. tens), many tenths, the value of one ten – and completed by an explicit appeal to reason.
The final two sections of Troilus’ speech mirror and invert those of his brother. Matching Hector’s second section on the physicality of fear and picking up from his rational third section, Troilus’ third section offers a calm and reasoned assessment of cause and effect. Three brief statements of knowledge are made about knowledge of combat and the nature of reason. These are followed by four and a half lines of logical consequence – why should we therefore be surprised if men flee from battle? The third section of Troilus’ speech returns to the emotional, advocating the abandonment of reason. The language once more returns to raw physicality of body parts, with hare-hearts, fat, and livers. The mirrored structure of these two speeches binds them together, marking them out as the two key statements in the ἀγών: on the one side, reason dictates that we should give Helen up; on the other side, reason undercuts honour and so we should not give Helen up.95 For the remainder of the scene, interjections are made on both sides, but no new arguments are introduced. On the side of reason stand Hector, Cassandra, and in a brief few lines Priam. On the side against reason stand Troilus, Paris, and, in four short lines, Helenus.
The form of this debate scene deviates somewhat from the scheme of the classical Greek ἀγών, as it involves several speaking characters in addition to the two main opponents. In addition, the remaining discussion following the two key speeches is long and includes further extended speeches by both main characters. That Shakespeare does not adhere to the strict rules of the classical Attic ἀγών should not be surprising. As mentioned above, Shakespeare’s engagement with Greek drama was likely mediated by a number of other texts and translations. But ev
en an indirect encounter with Attic drama would have revealed that the staging of formal debate scenes was a key feature of the genre, and the introduction of the Trojan ἀγών into the Troilus and Cressida may well owe to this influence. We cannot know if Shakespeare had read Euripides’ Troades specifically – although this is certainly possible, given that the play was first published in England in 1575 (albeit in the original Greek).96 We certainly cannot suggest that the ἀγών of the Troades was the precursor for the ἀγών in the Troilus. What we do know, however, is that Shakespeare was influenced by a number of Euripides’ other plays,97 and that the centrality of a war of words to both the Troilus and the Troades is remarkable.
An alternative model for the Shakespeare’s Trojan ἀγών may have come from the Iliad itself. His dramatic staging of an impassioned debate, ostensibly focused around the possession of a woman but actually concerned with the preservation of masculine honour and status, finds an easy parallel in Book 1 of the Iliad, which had been conveniently translated into English by Chapman only a few years before. Indeed, at the start of what he called The First Book of Homer’s Iliads, Chapman offers a brief prologue to explain the plague on the Achaean army under the heading: ‘ARGUMENT’. The main body of the translation then begins below under a second heading: ‘ANOTHER ARGUMENT’. If, as is usually assumed, Shakespeare relied heavily on Chapman in the Troilus and Cressida, it is unsurprising that he conceived of the Trojan War as a tale fundamentally concerned with debate, discussion, and argument.
Where does this leave us with Thersites’ statement: ‘All argument is a cuckold and a whore’? Thersites addresses his comments in this speech to the audience in much the same way as a chorus would have done in Attic tragedy. He is alone on stage at the time, and offers us an opinion, not just on the immediate action of the moment, but also on a broader issue: the state and status of rhetoric as a whole. His remarks have the sense of authorial comment about them – do we have in this short speech a window into the heart of the play? Troilus and Cressida is a play about war. Not war at the point of a sword, but war by the pointed word. Oratory and persuasion are showcased at every turn, formal debates are staged, and the characters frequently reflect on both the power and the limits of words. But while this is a play deeply concerned with debate, it is also a play that is deeply cynical about it. At every turn, words prove false. Promises are not kept; assertions turn out to be untrue; and arguments are empty. For all his lengthy expounding on the virtues of reason, in the Trojan ἀγών Hector eventually caves in and agrees to abandon both rationality and truth in favour of manly honour:
Hector’s opinion
Is this in way of truth; yet ne’ertheless,
My spritely brethren, I propend to you
In resolution to keep Helen still;
For ‘tis a cause that hath no mean dependance
Upon our joint and several dignities.
Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida, Act 2 Scene 2.188–93
Hector had never really been in favour of giving Helen up, and all the debate, discussion and argument had been for nothing. The Trojan ἀγών has been staged in more way than one. As well as a scene staged as part of the play, it is also a scene staged by Hector within the play, a conflict simulated rather than real. Who can blame Thersites for his cynical perspective on the play from the play, uttered just minutes after Hector’s disavowal? As Euripides might well have agreed, all argument is indeed a whore and a cuckold.
1 For Homer on the ancient and modern stage, see the various contributions in Part VII of Efstathiou and Karamanou 2016.
2 The text of the Troades used in this section is from Barlow 1986. Note that Euripides also composed the dramas Andromache, Hecuba, and Helen; this bespeaks a particular authorial interest in the fate of Troy’s women. For recent responses to this play and its extraordinary popularity from the late twentieth century onwards, see Dunn 1996, 101, Goff 2009, 9–13, 78–135 and Lauriola 2015. For earlier responses, see Michelini 1987.
3 On the Troades’ Homeric connections, see principally Croally 1994, 50; Dunn 1996, 113–14; Davidson 1999–2000, 125–28, 2001, Marshall 2011, Torrance 2013, 218–45, Karamanou 2016 and cf. Munteanu 2010–2011, arguing that Euripides deployed epic techniques so as to present tragedy in a different light compared to its epic antecedents. For Euripides’ wider relationship with the Homeric corpus, see Goldhill 1986, 138–67, Segal 1993, Croally 1994, 17–21, Mossman 1995, 20–42 and Torrance 2013, 183–265.
4 See Davidson 2001, 66–68 for a useful summary (‘Euripides is certainly not, in the Troades, going out of his way to draw attention to details of the Homeric texts’, 68).
5 Davidson 2001, 77. Garvie 2001, 58 comments on the remarkable density of significant female protagonists in this tragedy.
6 See further Scodel 1980, Karamanou 2016, and cf. Torrance 2013, 237–40. These three tragedies were accompanied by the satyr play Sisyphus. Dunn 1996, 112–14 well remarks on the unique quality of Euripides’ trilogy, insomuch as that it covers the beginning, middle, and end of the Trojan War.
7 Hall 2010, 270 similarly notes the way that many in antiquity would have encountered the Troades as an ‘independent artwork’.
8 Dué 2006, 148 notes that it is Athens’ two patron deities that are outraged by the Greeks, intensifying the probability of an implied connection between the events of the play and the atrocities committed by the Athenians against the Scionians and the Melians. In the Iliad, however, Poseidon is an enemy of the Trojans; see, e.g., Il. 14.357-59; 20.34; 21.435-60. Dunn 1996, 101–14 argues that the prologue acts as a kind of ending to the Troades, since the play lacks any formal generic markers of closure; cf. Mastronarde 2010, 179–80.
9 Garvie 2001, 56 and pace Goff 2009, 37–38. Kovacs 1997 focuses especially on the gods’ role in the destruction of Trojans and Achaeans alike. In a purposeful bit of archaising, Euripides adopts the Homeric term ‘Achaean’ here and elsewhere in the drama. By the late fifth century BCE, it was commonplace to refer to the Trojan War’s Achaeans using the term ‘Hellenes’; see below p.113, and especially n.24.
10 Hall 2010, 269 expands on the uniquely demanding nature of this role; cf. Easterling 1997, 174–76. Although we cannot be certain of the original staging for the play, Poseidon does refer to Troy as a smouldering ruin in his opening speech (lines 8–9); cf. Lee 1976, ad 8.
11 One notable feature of the Chorus’ opening appearance is their preference for Athens and their professed hatred for Sparta. This confirms that the Troades cannot be read as a straightforward polemic against Athens and its treatment of the Melians in 415; see further Van Erp Taalman Kip 1987. It is also worth remembering that while the Achaeans are criticized collectively in the play, their leaders Agamemnon and Menelaus are Peloponnesian kings. For similar patriotic sentiments expressed elsewhere in Euripides’ works, see Kovacs 1997, 164.
12 Talthybius similarly functions as Agamemnon’s herald in the Iliad; see, e.g., Il. 1.320-21; 4.193; 23.897.
13 Torrance 2013, 229 well notes that Hecuba’s projected enslavement to Odysseus (278), part of the ‘new message’ (καινὸν λόγον) conveyed by Talthybius, does not appear in an earlier source. Perhaps we might detect a Euripidean innovation here? See further discussion in Mossman 1995, 34–36.
14 On the play’s rich portrayal of different women’s voices, see Mossman 2005, 357–62. Euripides’ Cassandra is a clear elaboration of the character referred to in the Iliad and the Odyssey. In the former, she is noted for her special beauty (‘the finest of Priam’s daughters’, Il. 13.365) and for her ‘resembling golden Aphrodite’ ((Il. 24.699), while in the latter, the ghost of Agamemnon refers to Cassandra dying at his side (Od. 11.421-22).
15 Goff 2009, 52 sums up the different scholarly views on Cassandra’s ‘madness’ in this episode.
16 For the generic qualities of ancient Greek wedding songs, see Swift 2010, 245–49.
17 On the thematic significance of marriage in the Troades, see Croally 1994, 84–97
and Mossman 2005, 358.
18 Barlow 1986, ad 460 points out that by evoking the heroic concept νικηφόρος (‘bringing victory’), Cassandra ranks herself with the other leading Trojans, such as Priam and Hector; cf. 353. However, as the discussion below shows, Cassandra in fact outranks herself in the play, since it is she alone that can exact vengeance for the Trojans against Agamemnon.
19 Dué 2006, 145 and cf. Wohl 2015, 46–47.
20 For the irony here, see Barlow 1986, ad 308–40 and Swift 2010, 254–55; (more cautiously) Brillet-Dubois 2015, 173 and Karamanou 2016, 356 and cf. Goff 2009, 51–53, who surveys different scholarly approaches to Cassandra’s song, some interpreting her speech as insane, rather than being ironical. Cassandra utilizes several different metres throughout her sole appearance in the drama; cf. Brillet-Dubois 2015, 271: ‘Cassandra’s appearance in the Trojan Women results in an eclectic generic collage’.
21 As Croally 1994, 125 observes, Aristophanes’ Lysistrata (e.g. lines 508–15) represents another instance in which the destruction of the family was projected as ‘the principal horror of war’ in fifth-century Athens.
22 Poole 1976, 278.
23 Similarly, Poole 1976, 277, Goldhill 1986, 166–67, Barlow 1986, 365ff., Mossman 2005, 359 and Munteanu 2010–11, 140, focusing on the switch of narrative perspective here, and 143: ‘[Cassandra contends] that traditional poetry misplaces fame by giving it to seemingly victorious men’. Croally 1994, 126 agrees that some original audience members might have been swayed by Cassandra’s cogent rhetoric, but suggests that those more comfortable with Athens’ empire would likely have rejected her radical revisions.
24 Brillet-Dubois 2015, 175–76.
25 Easterling 1997, 173. Dunn 1996, 101–14 argues that the prologue acts as a kind of ending to the Troades, since the play lacks any formal generic markers of closure; cf. Mastronarde 2010, 179–80.
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