Shakespeare Monologues for Women
Page 7
Came to me, as I follow’d Henry’s corpse,
When scarce the blood was well wash’d from his hands
Which issued from my other angel husband,
And that dead saint which then I weeping follow’d –
O, when, I say, I look’d on Richard’s face,
This was my wish: ‘Be thou,’ quoth I, ‘accurs’d
For making me, so young, so old a widow;
And, when thou wed’st, let sorrow haunt thy bed,
And be thy wife – if any be so mad –
As miserable by the life of thee
As thou hast made me by my dear lord’s death.’
Lo, ere I can repeat this curse again,
Within so small a time, my woman’s heart
Grossly grew captive to his honey words,
And prov’d the subject of my own soul’s curse,
Which ever since hath kept my eyes from rest;
For never yet one hour in his bed
Did I enjoy the golden dew of sleep
But with his timorous dreams was still awak’d.
Besides, he hates me for my father Warwick,
And will, no doubt, shortly be rid of me.”
(Act 4, scene 1, lines 65-87)
Henry VIII
WHO Katharine of Aragon, Queen and first wife to King Henry VIII.
WHERE A hall in Blackfriars, London, where the court is assembled, June 1529.
WHO ELSE IS THERE Her husband King Henry VIII, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the bishops of Lincoln, Ely, Rochester and St Asalph, Cardinal Wolsey and Cardinal Campeius and many others.
WHAT IS HAPPENING Having failed to persuade the Pope to annul his marriage, King Henry has asked the Archbishop of Canterbury to grant him a divorce. At proceedings in the court, Queen Katharine, from Aragon in Spain and therefore ‘a stranger’, pleads with the King not to reject her after twenty years of marriage.
WHAT TO THINK ABOUT
• This is both a personal and a public speech.
• It is a grand and formal scene with Katharine appearing before all the important figures of church and state.
• She is also appearing before the man who is both her husband and the King.
• Decide how Katharine copes with talking about the intimacies of her marriage in such a setting.
• Katharine talks of the twenty years of her marriage. Bring those years to mind during the speech.
• Katharine had six children of which only Mary survived. She has not borne the King a son and heir. All that child-bearing has had an effect on her and she might she feel she has failed as a wife and queen.
• Katharine will feel lonely as a foreigner in the English court.
WHERE ELSE TO LOOK Hermione (The Winter’s Tale) is another queen defending herself to her husband in a public court.
Queen Katharine
“Sir, I desire you do me right and justice,
And to bestow your pity on me; for
I am a most poor woman, and a stranger,
Born out of your dominions; having here
No judge indifferent, nor no more assurance
Of equal friendship and proceeding. Alas, sir,
In what have I offended you? What cause
Hath my behaviour given to your displeasure,
That thus you should proceed to put me off,
And take your good grace from me? Heaven witness,
I have been to you a true and humble wife,
At all times to your will conformable;
Ever in fear to kindle your dislike,
Yea, subject to your countenance, glad or sorry
As I saw it inclin’d. When was the hour
I ever contradicted your desire?
Or made it not mine too?
Sir, call to mind,
That I have been your wife, in this obedience,
Upward of twenty years, and have been bless’d
With many children by you. If in the course
And process of this time, you can report,
And prove it too, against mine honour aught,
My bond to wedlock, or my love and duty,
Against your sacred person, in God’s name,
Turn me away; and let the foul’st contempt
Shut door upon me, and so give me up
To the sharp’st kind of justice.”
(Act 2, scene 4, lines 11–55, with some cuts)
The Tragedies
Troilus and Cressida
WHO Cressida, a young Trojan woman.
WHERE Troy, the orchard of Cressida’s uncle Pandarus, during the war between the ancient Greeks and the Trojans.
WHO ELSE IS THERE Troilus, with whom she is in love, and Pandarus, Cressida’s uncle.
WHAT IS HAPPENING Troilus and Cressida have been brought together by Cressida’s uncle Pandarus. Troilus asks Cressida why her love was so hard to win. Cressida confesses that her love only ‘seemed’ hard to win. She tells him that she loved him at first sight and ends by asking him to stop her mouth with a kiss.
WHAT TO THINK ABOUT
• Cressida describes the early part of her own speech by saying that she has ‘blabb’d’.
• Decide why Troilus says nothing.
• Notice how broken up with punctuation the speech is, with Cressida constantly interrupting herself.
• This is a very intimate scene but Cressida does not seem to mind if her uncle overhears.
• Picture this Troilus that she is talking to: what he looks like and what she loves about him.
• Decide whether there are moments that are to herself and not directed to him.
• Decide how much she wants him to stop her mouth with a kiss.
WHERE ELSE TO LOOK Also head over heels in love are Juliet (Romeo and Juliet), Portia (The Merchant of Venice) and Helena (All’s Well That Ends Well).
Cressida
“Hard to seem won: but I was won, my lord,
With the first glance that ever – pardon me;
If I confess much, you will play the tyrant.
I love you now, but not till now so much
But I might master it; in faith, I lie.
My thoughts were like unbridled children grown
Too headstrong for their mother. See, we fools,
Why have I blabb’d? Who shall be true to us
When we are so unsecret to ourselves?
But though I lov’d you well, I woo’d you not,
And yet, good faith, I wish’d myself a man;
Or that we women had men’s privilege
Of speaking first. Sweet, bid me hold my tongue,
For in this rapture I shall surely speak
The thing I shall repent. See, see, your silence,
Cunning in dumbness, from my weakness draws
My soul of counsel* from me. Stop my mouth.”
(Act 3, scene 2, lines 125–41)
GLOSSARY
counsel – judgement, good sense (Troilus’s silence is taking away all Cressida’s good sense)
Coriolanus
WHO Volumnia, mother to the valiant warrior Coriolanus.
WHERE Coriolanus’s tent outside Rome, c. 400 BC.
WHO ELSE IS THERE Her son Coriolanus with his partner-in-arms Aufidius and their soldiers, Coriolanus’s wife Virgilia, and his son Martius.
WHAT IS HAPPENING Coriolanus has joined the Volsces and is marching against his own Roman people. As Volumnia is pleading with Coriolanus to make peace, he turns away from her and she disowns him.
WHAT TO THINK ABOUT
• Volumnia has a big audience that includes an army as well as her immediate family.
• It is also an intimate scene between mother and son.
• She tries a number of different approaches to her son in order to get her way; track these in the speech.
• Decide what she feels when Coriolanus turns from her.
• This is a woman who has probably never knelt before anyone until now and so kneeling might
be emotionally and physically very difficult.
WHERE ELSE TO LOOK Other women angered at the political actions of close relatives include Lady Percy (Henry IV) and the Duchess of Gloucester (Henry VI, Part Two).
Volumnia
“Thou know’st, great son,
The end of war’s uncertain. But this certain,
That, if thou conquer Rome, the benefit
Which thou shalt thereby reap is such a name
Whose repetition will be dogg’d with curses;
Whose chronicle thus writ: ‘The man was noble,
But with his last attempt, he wiped it out,
Destroy’d his country, and his name remains
To the ensuing age, abhorr’d.’ Speak to me, son.
Think’st thou it honourable for a noble man
Still to remember wrongs? Daughter, speak you.
He cares not for your weeping. Speak thou, boy,
Perhaps thy childishness will move him more
Than can our reasons. There’s no man in the world
More bound to ’s mother, yet here he lets me prate
Like one i’th’ stocks. Thou hast never in thy life
Show’d thy dear mother any courtesy.
He turns away:
Down, ladies. Let us shame him with our knees.
To his surname Coriolanus ’longs more pride
Than pity to our prayers. Down. An end,
This is the last. So, we will home to Rome,
And die among our neighbours. Nay, behold us,
This boy, that cannot tell what he would have,
But kneels, and holds up hands for fellowship,
Does reason our petition with more strength
Than thou hast to deny’t. Come, let us go.
This fellow had aVolscian to his mother.
His wife is in Corioles, and his child
Like him by chance. Yet give us our dispatch.
I am hush’d until our city be a-fire,
And then I’ll speak a little.”
(Act 5, scene 3, lines 138–83, with some cuts)
Titus Andronicus
WHO Tamora, Queen of the Goths.
WHERE In ancient Rome.
WHO ELSE IS THERE Titus Andronicus with his sons and the Tribunes and Senators of Rome, two of Tamora’s sons, Aaron the Moor and ‘others as many as can be.’
WHAT IS HAPPENING The defeated Queen of the Goths pleads with Titus for the life of her eldest son, whom he has just ordered to be killed.
WHAT TO THINK ABOUT
• This is a big scene as the stage direction from the First Folio indicates, calling for ‘as many as can be’ on stage.
• Tamora has a short public moment to save herself and her son.
• She has to hold and quieten the crowd with her opening three words; she then has to get Titus’s attention by flattery and conceding defeat; and then she has to plead as a mother. All of this is in just three lines.
• Think of her audience and how big a public speech it might be.
• Decide how she sees the effect of her words as she speaks and when and why she thinks to compare Titus to a god.
WHERE ELSE TO LOOK Hermione (The Winter’s Tale) also publicly fights for life.
Tamora
“Stay, Roman brethren, gracious conqueror,
Victorious Titus, rue the tears I shed,
A mother’s tears in passion for her son.
And if thy sons were ever dear to thee,
O, think my son to be as dear to me.
Sufficeth not* that we are brought to Rome
To beautify thy triumphs and return
Captive to thee, and to thy Roman yoke,
But must my sons be slaughter’d in the streets,
For valiant doings in their country’s cause?
O! If to fight for king and commonweal
Were piety in thine, it is in these.
Andronicus, stain not thy tomb with blood.
Wilt thou draw near the nature of the gods?
Draw near them then in being merciful,
Sweet mercy is nobility’s true badge,
Thrice nobleTitus, spare my first-born son.”
(Act 1, scene 1, lines 104–20)
GLOSSARY
Sufficeth not – is it not enough
Titus Andronicus
WHO Tamora, Queen of the Goths.
WHERE A remote part of the forest outside Rome, in ancient times.
WHO ELSE IS THERE Aaron, her secret lover.
WHAT IS HAPPENING Tamora, the scheming Queen of the Goths, has just been married to the Roman Emperor Saturninus. She has a lover in the court, Aaron the Moor. Here she is alone with her lover in a remote spot outside the city walls.
WHAT TO THINK ABOUT
• This is a secret affair in a lonely place. Decide how Tamora might express that in the way she delivers her speech.
• Decide how much time the lovers have and what the chances are of their being caught.
• Decide how much Tamora is in love with Aaron, how much she lusts after him and what it is about him that she finds attractive.
• Play with being seductive in her words, demeanour and actions.
• Think what it says about Tamora’s character that it is traditionally the male lover who invites his female beloved to sit and canoodle with him by a country stream.
WHERE ELSE TO LOOK Erotic desire can also be found with Juliet (Romeo and Juliet) and Cleopatra (Antony and Cleopatra).
Tamora
“My lovely Aaron, wherefore look’st thou sad,
When everything doth make a gleeful boast?
The birds chant melody on every bush,
The snake lies rollèd in the cheerful sun,
The green leaves quiver with the cooling wind,
And make a chequer’d shadow on the ground.
Under their sweet shade, Aaron, let us sit,
And, whilst the babbling echo mocks the hounds,
Replying shrilly to the well-tun’d horns,
As if a double hunt were heard at once,
Let us sit down, and mark their yelping noise.
And, after conflict such as was supposed
The wandering prince and Dido* once enjoy’d,
When with a happy storm they were surprised
And curtain’d with a counsel-keeping cave,
We may, each wreathèd in the other’s arms,
Our pastimes* done, possess a golden slumber,
Whiles hounds and horns, and sweet melodious birds
Be unto us, as is a nurse’s song
Of lullaby, to bring her babe asleep.”
(Act 2, scene 3, lines 10–29)
GLOSSARY
wandering prince and Dido – the shipwrecked Aeneas and the Queen of Carthage
pastimes – sexual pleasures
Romeo and Juliet
WHO The Nurse who has looked after Juliet since the day she was born.
WHERE The Capulet’s house in Verona.
WHO ELSE IS THERE Lady Capulet, Juliet’s mother.
WHAT IS HAPPENING When Lady Capulet mentions Juliet’s age, the Nurse remembers the day she was born even better than her own mother does.
WHAT TO THINK ABOUT
• There are possibilities for a wide range of emotions in this speech including love, nostalgia, remembered grief, happiness and sadness.
• The Nurse has happy memories of bringing up Juliet but talking about them brings up other memories of her own daughter Susan and of her husband, both of whom are now dead.
• She is remembering harvest time. Think of the details of high summer that will infuse her memories.
• Picture her husband and the sound of his voice as she talks about him.
WHERE ELSE TO LOOK Lady Percy (Henry IV, Part Two) remembers a dead husband in a very different situation.
Nurse
“Even or odd, of all days in the year
Come Lammas Eve* at night shall she be fourteen.
> Susan and she, God rest all Christian souls,
Were of an age. Well, Susan is with God,
She was too good for me. But, as I said,
On Lammas Eve at night shall she be fourteen,
That shall she, marry,* I remember it well.
’Tis since the earthquake now eleven years,
And she was wean’d, I never shall forget it,
Of all the days of the year, upon that day.
For I had then laid wormwood to my dug,*
Sitting in the sun under the dove-house wall;
My lord and you were then at Mantua.
Nay, I do bear a brain. But as I said,
When it did taste the wormwood on the nipple
Of my dug and felt it bitter, pretty fool,
To see it tetchy and fall out with the dug!
‘Shake!’ quoth the dove-house,* ’twas no need, I trow,
To bid me trudge.*
And since that time it is eleven years,
For then she could stand alone, nay by the rood
She could have run, and waddled all about.
For even the day before she broke her brow,
And then my husband, God be with his soul,
’A was a merry man, took up the child.
‘Yea,’ quoth he, ‘dost thou fall upon thy face?
Thou wilt fall backward when thou hast more wit,
Wilt thou not, Jule?’ and, by my holy-dam,
The pretty wretch left crying, and said ‘Ay.’
To see now how a jest shall come about!
I warrant, an I should live a thousand years,
I never should forget it. ‘Wilt thou not, Jule?’ quoth he,
And, pretty fool, it stinted* and said ‘Ay.’ ”
(Act 1, scene 3, lines 18–50)
GLOSSARY
Lammas Eve – 31 July, the day before Harvest Festival