William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition (582 page)
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Authors: William Shakespeare
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Epilogue
Enter Epilogue
EPILOGUE
‘Tis ten to one this play can never please
All that are here. Some come to take their ease,
And sleep an act or two; but those, we fear,
We’ve frighted with our trumpets; so, ’tis clear,
They’ll say ’tis naught. Others to hear the city
Abused extremely, and to cry ‘That’s witty!’—
Which we have not done neither; that, I fear,
All the expected good we’re like to hear
For this play at this time is only in
The merciful construction of good women,
For such a one we showed ’em. If they smile,
And say “Twill do’, I know within a while
All the best men are ours—for ’tis ill hap
If they hold when their ladies bid ’em clap.
All that are here. Some come to take their ease,
And sleep an act or two; but those, we fear,
We’ve frighted with our trumpets; so, ’tis clear,
They’ll say ’tis naught. Others to hear the city
Abused extremely, and to cry ‘That’s witty!’—
Which we have not done neither; that, I fear,
All the expected good we’re like to hear
For this play at this time is only in
The merciful construction of good women,
For such a one we showed ’em. If they smile,
And say “Twill do’, I know within a while
All the best men are ours—for ’tis ill hap
If they hold when their ladies bid ’em clap.
Exit
THE TWO NOBLE KINSMEN
BY JOHN FLETCHER AND WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
WHEN it first appeared in print, in 1634,
The Two Noble Kinsmen
was stated to be ‘by the memorable worthies of their time, Mr John Fletcher, and Mr William Shakespeare’. There is no reason to disbelieve this ascription: many plays of the period were not printed till long after they were acted, and there is other evidence that Shakespeare collaborated with Fletcher (1579―1625). The morris dance in Act 3, Scene 5, contains characters who also appear in Francis Beaumont’s
Masque of the Inner Temple and Gray’s
Inn performed before James I on 20 February 1613. Their dance was a great success with the King; probably the King’s Men—some of whom may have taken part in the masque—decided to exploit its success by incorporating it in a play written soon afterwards, in the last year of Shakespeare’s playwriting life.
The Two Noble Kinsmen
was stated to be ‘by the memorable worthies of their time, Mr John Fletcher, and Mr William Shakespeare’. There is no reason to disbelieve this ascription: many plays of the period were not printed till long after they were acted, and there is other evidence that Shakespeare collaborated with Fletcher (1579―1625). The morris dance in Act 3, Scene 5, contains characters who also appear in Francis Beaumont’s
Masque of the Inner Temple and Gray’s
Inn performed before James I on 20 February 1613. Their dance was a great success with the King; probably the King’s Men—some of whom may have taken part in the masque—decided to exploit its success by incorporating it in a play written soon afterwards, in the last year of Shakespeare’s playwriting life.
The Two Noble Kinsmen,
a tragicomedy of the kind that became popular during the last years of the first decade of the seventeenth century, is based on Chaucer’s
Knight’s Tale,
on which Shakespeare had already drawn for episodes of
A Midsummer Night’s
Dream. It tells a romantic tale of the conflicting claims of love and friendship: the ‘two noble kinsmen’, Palamon and Arcite, are the closest of friends until each falls in love with Emilia, sister-in-law of Theseus, Duke of Athens. Their conflict is finally resolved by a formal combat with Emilia as the prize, in which the loser is to be executed. Arcite wins, and Palamon’s head is on the block as news arrives that Arcite has been thrown from his horse. Dying, Arcite commends Emilia to his friend, and Theseus rounds off the play with a meditation on the paradoxes of fortune.
a tragicomedy of the kind that became popular during the last years of the first decade of the seventeenth century, is based on Chaucer’s
Knight’s Tale,
on which Shakespeare had already drawn for episodes of
A Midsummer Night’s
Dream. It tells a romantic tale of the conflicting claims of love and friendship: the ‘two noble kinsmen’, Palamon and Arcite, are the closest of friends until each falls in love with Emilia, sister-in-law of Theseus, Duke of Athens. Their conflict is finally resolved by a formal combat with Emilia as the prize, in which the loser is to be executed. Arcite wins, and Palamon’s head is on the block as news arrives that Arcite has been thrown from his horse. Dying, Arcite commends Emilia to his friend, and Theseus rounds off the play with a meditation on the paradoxes of fortune.
Studies of style suggest that Shakespeare was primarily responsible for the rhetorically and ritualistically impressive Act 1, for Act 2, Scene 1. Act 3, Scenes 1 and 2; and for most of Act 5 (Scene 4 excepted), which includes emblematically spectacular episodes related to his other late plays. Fletcher appears mainly to have written the scenes showing the rivalry of Palamon and Arcite along with the sub-plots concerned with the Jailer’s daughter’s love for Palamon and the rustics’ entertainment for Theseus.
Though the play was adapted by William Davenant as
The Rivals
(1664), its first known performances since the seventeenth century were at the Old Vic in 1928; it has been played only occasionally since then, but was chosen to open the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon in 1986. Critical interest, too, has been slight; but Shakespeare’s contributions are entirely characteristic of his late style, and Fletcher’s scenes are both touching and funny.
The Rivals
(1664), its first known performances since the seventeenth century were at the Old Vic in 1928; it has been played only occasionally since then, but was chosen to open the Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon in 1986. Critical interest, too, has been slight; but Shakespeare’s contributions are entirely characteristic of his late style, and Fletcher’s scenes are both touching and funny.
THE PERSONS OF THE PLAYPROLOGUETHESEUS, Duke of AthensHIPPOLYTA, Queen of the Amazons, later wife of TheseusEMILIA, her sisterPIRITHOUS, friend of TheseusHymen, god of marriageA BOY, who singsARTESIUS, an Athenian soldierThree QUEENS, widows of kings killed in the siege of ThebesVALERIUS, a ThebanA HERALDWOMAN, attending EmiliaAn Athenian GENTLEMANMESSENGERSSix KNIGHTS, three attending Arcite and three PalamonA SERVANTA JAILER in charge of Theseus’ prisonThe JAILER’S DAUGHTERThe JAILER’S BROTHERThe WOOER of the Jailer’s daughterTwo FRIENDS of the JailerA DOCTORSix COUNTRYMEN, one dressed as a babion, or baboonGerald, a SCHOOLMASTERNELL, a country wenchFour other country wenches: Friz, Madeline, Luce, and Barbara Timothy, a TABOREREPILOGUENymphs, attendants, maids, executioner, guard
Prologue
Flourish. Enter Prologue
Flourish. Enter Prologue
PROLOGUE
New plays and maidenheads are near akin:
Much followed both, for both much money giv’n
If they stand sound and well. And a good play,
Whose modest scenes blush on his marriage day
And shake to lose his honour, is like her
That after holy tie and first night’s stir
Yet still is modesty, and still retains
More of the maid to sight than husband’s pains.
We pray our play may be so, for I am sure
It has a noble breeder and a pure,
A learned, and a poet never went
More famous yet ‘twixt Po and silver Trent.
Chaucer, of all admired, the story gives:
There constant to eternity it lives.
If we let fall the nobleness of this
And the first sound this child hear be a hiss,
How will it shake the bones of that good man,
And make him cry from under ground, ‛O fan
From me the witless chaff of such a writer,
That blasts my bays and my famed works makes
lighter
Than Robin Hood’? This is the fear we bring,
For to say truth, it were an endless thing
And too ambitious to aspire to him,
Weak as we are, and almost breathless swim
In this deep water. Do but you hold out
Your helping hands and we shall tack about
And something do to save us. You shall hear
Scenes, though below his art, may yet appear
Worth two hours’ travail. To his bones, sweet sleep;
Content to you. If this play do not keep
A little dull time from us, we perceive
Our losses fall so thick we must needs leave.
Much followed both, for both much money giv’n
If they stand sound and well. And a good play,
Whose modest scenes blush on his marriage day
And shake to lose his honour, is like her
That after holy tie and first night’s stir
Yet still is modesty, and still retains
More of the maid to sight than husband’s pains.
We pray our play may be so, for I am sure
It has a noble breeder and a pure,
A learned, and a poet never went
More famous yet ‘twixt Po and silver Trent.
Chaucer, of all admired, the story gives:
There constant to eternity it lives.
If we let fall the nobleness of this
And the first sound this child hear be a hiss,
How will it shake the bones of that good man,
And make him cry from under ground, ‛O fan
From me the witless chaff of such a writer,
That blasts my bays and my famed works makes
lighter
Than Robin Hood’? This is the fear we bring,
For to say truth, it were an endless thing
And too ambitious to aspire to him,
Weak as we are, and almost breathless swim
In this deep water. Do but you hold out
Your helping hands and we shall tack about
And something do to save us. You shall hear
Scenes, though below his art, may yet appear
Worth two hours’ travail. To his bones, sweet sleep;
Content to you. If this play do not keep
A little dull time from us, we perceive
Our losses fall so thick we must needs leave.
Flourish. Exit
1.1Music. Enter Hymen with a torch burning, a Boy in a white robe before, singing and strewing flowers. After Hymen, a nymph encompassed in her tresses, bearing a wheaten garland. Then Theseus between two other nymphs with wheaten chaplets on their heads. Then Hippolyta, the bride, led by Pirithous and another holding a garland over her head, her tresses likewise hanging. After her, Emilia holding up her train. Then Artesius ⌈and other attendants
⌉
BOY (sings during procession)
Roses, their sharp spines being gone,
Not royal in their smells alone,
But in their hue;
Maiden pinks, of odour faint,
Daisies smell-less, yet most quaint,
And sweet thyme true;
Primrose, first-born child of Ver,
Merry springtime’s harbinger,
With harebells dim;
Oxlips, in their cradles growing,
Marigolds, on deathbeds blowing,
Lark’s-heels trim;
All dear nature’s children sweet,
Lie fore bride and bridegroom’s feet,He strews
flowers
Blessing their sense.
Not an angel of the air,
Bird melodious, or bird fair,
Is absent hence.
The crow, the sland’rous cuckoo, nor
The boding raven, nor chough hoar,
Nor chatt’ring pie,
May on our bridehouse perch or sing,
Or with them any discord bring,
But from it fly.
Enter three Queens in black, with veils stained, with imperial crowns. The First Queen falls down at the foot of Theseus; the Second falls down at the foot of
Hippolyta;
the Third, before Emilia
Hippolyta;
the Third, before Emilia
FIRST QUEEN (to Theseus)
For pity’s sake and true gentility’s,
Hear and respect me.
Hear and respect me.
SECOND QUEEN (to
Hippolyta)
Hippolyta)
For your mother’s sake, And as you wish your womb may thrive with fair ones,
Hear and respect me.
Hear and respect me.
THIRD QUEEN (to
Emilia
)
Emilia
)
Now for the love of him whom Jove hath marked
The honour of your bed, and for the sake
Of clear virginity, be advocate
For us and our distresses. This good deed
Shall raze you out o’th’ Book of Trespasses
All you are set down there.
The honour of your bed, and for the sake
Of clear virginity, be advocate
For us and our distresses. This good deed
Shall raze you out o’th’ Book of Trespasses
All you are set down there.
THESEUS (to First Queen)
Sad lady, rise.
HIPPOLYTA (to Second Queen) Stand up.
EMILIA (to Third Queen)
No knees to me. What woman I may stead that is distressed
Does bind me to her.
Does bind me to her.
THESEUS (to First Queen)
What’s your request? Deliver you for all.
FIRST QUEEN ⌈
kneeling still
⌉
kneeling still
⌉
We are three queens whose sovereigns fell before
The wrath of cruel Creon; who endured
The beaks of ravens, talons of the kites,
And pecks of crows in the foul fields of Thebes.
He will not suffer us to burn their bones,
To urn their ashes, nor to take th‘offence
Of mortal loathsomeness from the blest eye
Of holy Phoebus, but infects the winds
With stench of our slain lords. O pity, Duke!
Thou purger of the earth, draw thy feared sword
That does good turns to’th’ world; give us the bones
Of our dead kings that we may chapel them;
And of thy boundless goodness take some note
That for our crowned heads we have no roof,
Save this, which is the lion’s and the bear’s,
And vault to everything.
The wrath of cruel Creon; who endured
The beaks of ravens, talons of the kites,
And pecks of crows in the foul fields of Thebes.
He will not suffer us to burn their bones,
To urn their ashes, nor to take th‘offence
Of mortal loathsomeness from the blest eye
Of holy Phoebus, but infects the winds
With stench of our slain lords. O pity, Duke!
Thou purger of the earth, draw thy feared sword
That does good turns to’th’ world; give us the bones
Of our dead kings that we may chapel them;
And of thy boundless goodness take some note
That for our crowned heads we have no roof,
Save this, which is the lion’s and the bear’s,
And vault to everything.
THESEUS
Pray you, kneel not: I was transported with your speech, and suffered
Your knees to wrong themselves. I have heard the
fortunes
Of your dead lords, which gives me such lamenting
As wakes my vengeance and revenge for ’em.
King Capaneus was your lord: the day
That he should marry you—at such a season
As now it is with me—I met your groom
By Mars’s altar. You were that time fair,
Not Juno’s mantle fairer than your tresses,
Nor in more bounty spread her. Your wheaten wreath
Was then nor threshed nor blasted; fortune at you 6
Dimpled her cheek with smiles; Hercules our
kinsman—
Then weaker than your eyes—laid by his club.
He tumbled down upon his Nemean hide
And swore his sinews thawed. O grief and time,
Fearful consumers, you will all devour.
Your knees to wrong themselves. I have heard the
fortunes
Of your dead lords, which gives me such lamenting
As wakes my vengeance and revenge for ’em.
King Capaneus was your lord: the day
That he should marry you—at such a season
As now it is with me—I met your groom
By Mars’s altar. You were that time fair,
Not Juno’s mantle fairer than your tresses,
Nor in more bounty spread her. Your wheaten wreath
Was then nor threshed nor blasted; fortune at you 6
Dimpled her cheek with smiles; Hercules our
kinsman—
Then weaker than your eyes—laid by his club.
He tumbled down upon his Nemean hide
And swore his sinews thawed. O grief and time,
Fearful consumers, you will all devour.
FIRST QUEEN ⌈
kneeling still
⌉
kneeling still
⌉
O, I hope some god, Some god hath put his mercy in your manhood,
Whereto he’ll infuse power and press you forth
Our undertaker.
Whereto he’ll infuse power and press you forth
Our undertaker.
THESEUS
O no knees, none, widow:
⌈
The First Queen
rises
⌉
Unto the helmeted Bellona use them
And pray for me, your soldier. Troubled I am.
And pray for me, your soldier. Troubled I am.
He turns away
SECOND QUEEN ⌈
kneeling still
⌉
kneeling still
⌉
Honoured Hippolyta, Most dreaded Amazonian, that hast slain
The scythe-tusked boar, that with thy arm, as strong
As it is white, wast near to make the male
To thy sex captive, but that this, thy lord—
Born to uphold creation in that honour
First nature styled it in—shrunk thee into
The bound thou wast o‘erflowing, at once subduing
Thy force and thy affection; soldieress,
That equally canst poise sternness with pity,
Whom now I know hast much more power on him
Than ever he had on thee, who ow’st his strength,
And his love too, who is a servant for
The tenor of thy speech; dear glass of ladies,
Bid him that we, whom flaming war doth scorch,
Under the shadow of his sword may cool us.
Require him he advance it o‘er our heads.
Speak’t in a woman’s key, like such a woman
As any of us three. Weep ere you fail.
Lend us a knee:
But touch the ground for us no longer time
Than a dove’s motion when the head’s plucked off.
Tell him, if he i’th’ blood-sized field lay swoll’n,
Showing the sun his teeth, grinning at the moon,
What you would do.
The scythe-tusked boar, that with thy arm, as strong
As it is white, wast near to make the male
To thy sex captive, but that this, thy lord—
Born to uphold creation in that honour
First nature styled it in—shrunk thee into
The bound thou wast o‘erflowing, at once subduing
Thy force and thy affection; soldieress,
That equally canst poise sternness with pity,
Whom now I know hast much more power on him
Than ever he had on thee, who ow’st his strength,
And his love too, who is a servant for
The tenor of thy speech; dear glass of ladies,
Bid him that we, whom flaming war doth scorch,
Under the shadow of his sword may cool us.
Require him he advance it o‘er our heads.
Speak’t in a woman’s key, like such a woman
As any of us three. Weep ere you fail.
Lend us a knee:
But touch the ground for us no longer time
Than a dove’s motion when the head’s plucked off.
Tell him, if he i’th’ blood-sized field lay swoll’n,
Showing the sun his teeth, grinning at the moon,
What you would do.
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