Such as our country gossips sing and spin,
Till they almost forget they live. Lie down —
So, that will do. Have I forgot the words?
Faith! they are sadder than I thought they were.
SONG
False friend, wilt thou smile or weep 130
When my life is laid asleep?
Little cares for a smile or a tear,
The clay-cold corpse upon the bier!
Farewell! Heigh-ho!
What is this whispers low?
There is a snake in thy smile, my dear;
And bitter poison within thy tear.
Sweet sleep! were death like to thee,
Or if thou couldst mortal be,
I would close these eyes of pain; 140
When to wake? Never again.
O World! farewell!
Listen to the passing bell!
It say, thou and I must part,
With a light and a heavy heart.
(The scene closes)
SCENE IV. — A Hall of the Prison. Enter CAMILLO and BERNARDO.
CAMILLO
The Pope is stern; not to be moved or bent.
He looked as calm and keen as is the engine
Which tortures and which kills, exempt itself
From aught that it inflicts; a marble form,
A rite, a law, a custom, not a man.
He frowned, as if to frown had been the trick
Of his machinery, on the advocates
Presenting the defences, which he tore
And threw behind, muttering with hoarse, harsh voice —
‘Which among ye defended their old father 10
Killed in his sleep?’ then to another—’Thou
Dost this in virtue of thy place; ‘t is well.’
He turned to me then, looking deprecation,
And said these three words, coldly—’They must die.’
BERNARDO
And yet you left him not?
CAMILLO
I urged him still;
Pleading, as I could guess, the devilish wrong
Which prompted your unnatural parent’s death.
And he replied—’Paolo Santa Croce
Murdered his mother yester evening,
And he is fled. Parricide grows so rife, 20
That soon, for some just cause no doubt, the young
Will strangle us all, dozing in our chairs.
Authority, and power, and hoary hair
Are grown crimes capital. You are my nephew,
You come to ask their pardon; stay a moment;
Here is their sentence; never see me more
Till, to the letter, it be all fulfilled.’
BERNARDO
Oh, God, not so! I did believe indeed
That all you said was but sad preparation
For happy news. Oh, there are words and looks 30
To bend the sternest purpose! Once I knew them,
Now I forget them at my dearest need.
What think you if I seek him out, and bathe
His feet and robe with hot and bitter tears?
Importune him with prayers, vexing his brain
With my perpetual cries, until in rage
He strike me with his pastoral cross, and trample
Upon my prostrate head, so that my blood
May stain the senseless dust on which he treads,
And remorse waken mercy? I will do it! 40
Oh, wait till I return!
[Rushes out.
CAMILLO
Alas, poor boy!
A wreck-devoted seaman thus might pray
To the deaf sea.
Enter LUCRETIA, BEATRICE, and GIACOMO, guarded
BEATRICE
I hardly dare to fear
That thou bring’st other news than a just pardon.
CAMILLO
May God in heaven be less inexorable
To the Pope’s prayers than he has been to mine.
Here is the sentence and the warrant.
BEATRICE (wildly)
Oh,
My God! Can it be possible I have
To die so suddenly? so young to go
Under the obscure, cold, rotting, wormy ground! 50
To be nailed down into a narrow place;
To see no more sweet sunshine; hear no more
Blithe voice of living thing; muse not again
Upon familiar thoughts, sad, yet thus lost!
How fearful! to be nothing! Or to be —
What? Oh, where am I? Let me not go mad!
Sweet Heaven, forgive weak thoughts! If there should be
No God, no Heaven, no Earth in the void world —
The wide, gray, lampless, deep, unpeopled world!
If all things then should be — my father’s spirit, 60
His eye, his voice, his touch surrounding me;
The atmosphere and breath of my dead life!
If sometimes, as a shape more like himself,
Even the form which tortured me on earth,
Masked in gray hairs and wrinkles, he should come,
And wind me in his hellish arms, and fix
His eyes on mine, and drag me down, down, down!
For was he not alone omnipotent
On Earth, and ever present? even though dead,
Does not his spirit live in all that breathe, 70
And work for me and mine still the same ruin,
Scorn, pain, despair? Who ever yet returned
To teach the laws of death’s untrodden realm?
Unjust perhaps as those which drive us now,
Oh, whither, whither?
LUCRETIA
Trust in God’s sweet love,
The tender promises of Christ; ere night,
Think we shall be in Paradise.
BEATRICE
‘T is past!
Whatever comes, my heart shall sink no more.
And yet, I know not why, your words strike chill;
How tedious, false, and cold seem all things! I 80
Have met with much injustice in this world;
No difference has been made by God or man,
Or any power moulding my wretched lot,
‘Twixt good or evil, as regarded me.
I am cut off from the only world I know,
From light, and life, and love, in youth’s sweet prime.
You do well telling me to trust in God;
I hope I do trust in him. In whom else
Can any trust? And yet my heart is cold.
(During the latter speeches GIACOMO has retired conversing
with CAMILLO, who now goes out; GIACOMO advances)
GIACOMO
Know you not, mother — sister, know you not? 90
Bernardo even now is gone to implore
The Pope to grant our pardon.
LUCRETIA
Child, perhaps
It will be granted. We may all then live
To make these woes a tale for distant years.
Oh, what a thought! It gushes to my heart
Like the warm blood.
BEATRICE
Yet both will soon be cold.
Oh, trample out that thought! Worse than despair,
Worse than the bitterness of death, is hope;
It is the only ill which can find place
Upon the giddy, sharp, and narrow hour 100
Tottering beneath us. Plead with the swift frost
That it should spare the eldest flower of spring;
Plead with awakening earthquake, o’er whose couch
Even now a city stands, strong, fair, and free;
Now stench and blackness yawn, like death. Oh, plead
With famine, or wind-walking pestilence,
Blind lightning, or the deaf sea, not with man —
Cruel, cold, formal man; righteous in words,
In deeds a Cain. No, mother, we must die;
Since such is the reward of innocent lives, 110
And whilst our murderers live, and hard, cold men,
Smiling and slow, walk through a world of tears
To death as to life’s sleep; ‘t were just the grave
Were some strange joy for us. Come, obscure Death,
And wind me in thine all-embracing arms!
Like a fond mother hide me in thy bosom,
And rock me to the sleep from which none wake.
Live ye, who live, subject to one another
As we were once, who now —
BERNARDO rushes in
BERNARDO
Oh, horrible! 120
That tears, that looks, that hope poured forth in prayer,
Even till the heart is vacant and despairs,
Should all be vain! The ministers of death
Are waiting round the doors. I thought I saw
Blood on the face of one — what if ‘t were fancy?
Soon the heart’s blood of all I love on earth
Will sprinkle him, and he will wipe it off
As if ‘t were only rain. O life! O world!
Cover me! let me be no more! To see
That perfect mirror of pure innocence 130
Wherein I gazed, and grew happy and good,
Shivered to dust! To see thee, Beatrice,
Who made all lovely thou didst look upon —
Thee, light of life — dead, dark! while I say, sister,
To hear I have no sister; and thou, mother,
Whose love was as a bond to all our loves —
Dead! the sweet bond broken!
Enter CAMILLO and Guards
They come! Let me
Kiss those warm lips before their crimson leaves
Are blighted — white — cold. Say farewell, before
Death chokes that gentle voice! Oh, let me hear 140
You speak!
BEATRICE
Farewell, my tender brother. Think
Of our sad fate with gentleness, as now;
And let mild, pitying thoughts lighten for thee
Thy sorrow’s load. Err not in harsh despair,
But tears and patience. One thing more, my child;
For thine own sake be constant to the love
Thou bearest us; and to the faith that I,
Though wrapped in a strange cloud of crime and shame,
Lived ever holy and unstained. And though
Ill tongues shall wound me, and our common name 150
Be as a mark stamped on thine innocent brow
For men to point at as they pass, do thou
Forbear, and never think a thought unkind
Of those who perhaps love thee in their graves.
So mayest thou die as I do; fear and pain
Being subdued. Farewell! Farewell! Farewell!
BERNARDO
I cannot say farewell!
CAMILLO
O Lady Beatrice!
BEATRICE
Give yourself no unnecessary pain,
My dear Lord Cardinal. Here, mother, tie
My girdle for me, and bind up this hair 160
In any simple knot; ay, that does well.
And yours I see is coming down. How often
Have we done this for one another; now
We shall not do it any more. My Lord,
We are quite ready. Well—’t is very well.
PROMETHEUS UNBOUND
This four-act lyrical drama was first published in 1820 and concerns the Greek mythological figure Prometheus and his suffering at the hands of Zeus. The play is inspired by the classical Prometheia, a trilogy of plays attributed to the Athenian playwright Aeschylus. Shelley’s play narrates Prometheus’ release from captivity, but unlike Aeschylus’ play, there is no reconciliation between Prometheus and Jupiter at the end of the work. Instead, Jupiter is overthrown, allowing Prometheus to be released. Prometheus Unbound is considered to be a closet drama, never intended to be performed on the stage. Nevertheless, the drama offers much suspense, engaging dialogue and other dramatic aspects that would make a theatrical performance entertaining.
Posthumous Portrait of Shelley Writing Prometheus Unbound by Joseph Severn, 1845
CONTENTS
Introductory Note
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
Act I
Act II
Act III
Act IV
The 1820 title page
Introductory Note
AUDISNE HÆC, AMPHIARÆ, SUB TERRAM ABDITE?
Prometheus Unbound best combines the various elements of Shelley’s genius in their most complete expression, and unites harmoniously his lyrically creative power of imagination and his ‘passion for reforming the world.’ It is the fruit of an outburst of poetic energy under the double stimulus of his enthusiastic Greek studies, begun under Peacock’s influence, and of his delight in the beauty of Italy, whither he had removed for health and rest. It marks his full mastery of his powers. It is, not less than Queen Mab and The Revolt of Islam, a poem of the moral perfection of man; and, not less than Alastor and Epipsychidion, a poem of spiritual ideality. He was himself in love with it: ‘a poem of a higher character than anything I have yet attempted and perhaps less an imitation of anything that has gone before it,’ he writes to Ollier; and again, ‘a poem in my best style, whatever that may amount to,... the most perfect of my productions,’ and ‘the best thing I ever wrote;’ and finally he says, ‘Prometheus Unbound, I must tell you, is my favorite poem; I charge you, therefore, especially to pet him and feed him with fine ink and good paper.... I think, if I can judge by its merits, the Prometheus cannot sell beyond twenty copies.’ Nor did he lose his affection for it. Trelawny records him as saying, ‘If that is not durable poetry, tried by the severest test, I do not know what is. It is a lofty subject, not inadequately treated, and should not perish with me.’... ‘My friends say my Prometheus is too wild, ideal, and perplexed with imagery. It may be so. It has no resemblance to the Greek drama. It is original; and cost me severe mental labor. Authors, like mothers, prefer the children who have given them most trouble.’
The drama was begun in the summer-house of his garden at Este about September, 1818, and the first Act had been finished as early as October 8; it was apparently laid aside, and again taken up at Rome in the spring of 1819, where, under the circumstances described in the preface, the second and third Acts were added, and the work, in its first form, was thus completed by April 6. The fourth Act was an afterthought, and was composed at Florence toward the end of the year. The whole was published, with other poems, in the summer of 1820.
The following extracts from Mrs. Shelley’s long and admirable note show the progress of the poem during its composition, the atmosphere of its creation, and its general scheme:
‘The first aspect of Italy enchanted Shelley; it seemed a garden of delight placed beneath a clearer and brighter heaven than any he had lived under before. He wrote long descriptive letters during the first year of his residence in Italy, which, as compositions, are the most beautiful in the world, and show how truly he appreciated and studied the wonders of nature and art in that divine land.
‘The poetical spirit within him speedily revived with all the power and with more than all the beauty of his first attempts. He meditated three subjects as the groundwork for lyrical Dramas. One was the story of Tasso: of this a slight fragment of a song of Tasso remains. The other was one founded on the book of Job, which he never abandoned in idea, but of which no trace remains among his papers. The third was the Prometheus Unbound. The Greek tragedians were now his most familiar companions in his wanderings, and the sublime majesty of Æschylus filled him with wonder and delight. The father of Greek tragedy does not possess the pathos of Sophocles, nor the variety and tenderness of Euripides; the interest on which he founds his dramas is often elevated above human vicissitudes into the mighty passions and throes of gods and demigods — such fascinated the abstract imagination of Shelley.
&n
bsp; ‘We spent a month at Milan, visiting the Lake of Como during that interval. Thence we passed in succession to Pisa, Leghorn, the Baths of Lucca, Venice, Este, Rome, Naples, and back again to Rome, whither we returned early in March, 1819. During all this time Shelley meditated the subject of his drama, and wrote portions of it. Other poems were composed during this interval, and while at the Bogni di Lucca he translated Plato’s Symposium. But though he diversified his studies, his thoughts centred in the Prometheus. At last, when at Rome, during a bright and beautiful spring, he gave up his whole time to the composition. The spot selected for his study was, as he mentions in his preface, the mountainous ruins of the Baths of Caracalla. These are little known to the ordinary visitor at Rome. He describes them in a letter, with that poetry, and delicacy, and truth of description, which rendered his narrated impressions of scenery of unequalled beauty and interest.
‘At first he completed the drama in three acts. It was not till several months after, when at Florence, that he conceived that a fourth act, a sort of hymn of rejoicing in the fulfilment of the prophecies with regard to Prometheus, ought to be added to complete the composition.
‘The prominent feature of Shelley’s theory of the destiny of the human species was, that evil is not inherent in the system of the creation, but an accident that might be expelled. This also forms a portion of Christianity; God made earth and man perfect, till he, by his fall,
‘“Brought death into the world and all our woe.”
Shelley believed that mankind had only to will that there should be no evil, and there would be none. It is not my part in these notes to notice the arguments that have been urged against this opinion, but to mention the fact that he entertained it, and was indeed attached to it with fervent enthusiasm. That man could be so perfectionized as to be able to expel evil from his own nature, and from the greater part of the creation, was the cardinal point of his system. And the subject he loved best to dwell on, was the image of One warring with the Evil Principle, oppressed not only by it, but by all, even the good, who were deluded into considering evil a necessary portion of humanity; a victim full of fortitude and hope, and the spirit of triumph emanating from a reliance in the ultimate omnipotence of good. Such he had depicted in his last poem, when he made Laon the enemy and the victim of tyrants. He now took a more idealized image of the same subject. He followed certain classical authorities in figuring Saturn as the good principle, Jupiter the usurping evil one, and Prometheus as the regenerator, who, unable to bring mankind back to primitive innocence, used knowledge as a weapon to defeat evil, by leading mankind beyond the state wherein they are sinless through ignorance, to that in which they are virtuous through wisdom. Jupiter punished the temerity of the Titan by chaining him to a rock of Caucasus, and causing a vulture to devour his still-renewed heart. There was a prophecy afloat in heaven portending the fall of Jove, the secret of averting which was known only to Prometheus; and the god offered freedom from torture on condition of its being communicated to him. According to the mythological story, this referred to the offspring of Thetis, who was destined to be greater than his father. Prometheus at last bought pardon for his crime of enriching mankind with his gifts, by revealing the prophecy. Hercules killed the vulture and set him free, and Thetis was married to Peleus the father of Achilles.
Percy Bysshe Shelley Page 106