Shakespeare
* * *
IS THIS A DAGGER WHICH
I SEE BEFORE ME?
Edited by
Michael Kerrigan
Contents
Two Gentlemen of Verona
Nay, ’twill be this hour ere I have done weeping
Even as one heat another heat expels
To leave my Julia, shall I be forsworn
How use doth breed a habit in a man!
The Taming of the Shrew
Thus have I politicly begun my reign
Henry VI Part 2
Anjou and Maine are given to the French
Now, York, or never, steel thy fearful thoughts
Henry VI Part 3
The army of the Queen hath got the field
This battle fares like to the morning’s war
Ill blows the wind that profits nobody
Ay, Edward will use women honourably
What! Will the aspiring blood of Lancaster
Titus Andronicus
Now climbeth Tamora Olympus’ top
Henry VI Part 1
My thoughts are whirlèd like a potter’s wheel
Well didst thou, Richard, to suppress thy voice
Richard III
Now is the winter of our discontent
Was ever woman in this humour wooed?
Give me another horse! Bind up my wounds!
Love’s Labour’s Lost
And I, forsooth, in love!
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
How happy some o’er other some can be!
Romeo and Juliet
But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
O Romeo, Romeo! – wherefore art thou Romeo?
Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds
Richard II
I have been studying how I may compare
King John
Mad world! Mad kings! Mad composition!
Henry IV Part 1
I know you all, and will awhile uphold
’Tis not due yet – I would be loath to pay him before his day
For worms, brave Percy. Fare thee well, great heart!
Embowelled? If thou embowel me to-day, I’ll give you
Henry IV Part 2
How many thousands of my poorest subjects
I would you had but the wit; ’twere better than your
Why doth the crown lie there upon his pillow
Much Ado About Nothing
I do much wonder that one man, seeing how much
Henry V
Upon the King! Let us our lives, our souls
O God of battles, steel my soldiers’ hearts
Julius Caesar
It must be by his death; and, for my part
Since Cassius first did whet me against Caesar
O conspiracy
O, pardon me, thou bleeding piece of earth
As You Like It
Hang there, my verse, in witness of my love
Hamlet
O that this too too sullied flesh would melt
O all you host of heaven! O earth! What else?
O what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
To be, or not to be – that is the question
’Tis now the very witching time of night
O, my offence is rank. It smells to heaven
Now might I do it pat, now ’a is a-praying.
How all occasions do inform against me
Twelfth Night
I left no ring with her; what means this lady?
Troilus and Cressida
Peace, you ungracious clamours! Peace, rude sounds!
Words, vows, gifts, tears, and love’s full sacrifice
I am giddy; expectation whirls me round
Measure for Measure
What’s this? What’s this? Is this her fault or mine?
When I would pray and think, I think and pray
He who the sword of heaven will bear
Othello
This fellow’s of exceeding honesty
It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul
All’s Well That Ends Well
O, were that all! I think not on my father
Timon of Athens
Let me look back upon thee. O thou wall
O blessed breeding sun, draw from the earth
King Lear
Thou, Nature, art my goddess; to thy law
I heard myself proclaimed
Yet better thus, and known to be contemned
Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are
Macbeth
The raven himself is hoarse
If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well
Is this a dagger which I see before me
She should have died hereafter
Antony and Cleopatra
I will o’ertake thee, Cleopatra
Pericles, Prince of Tyre
How courtesy would seem to cover sin
Yet cease your ire, you angry stars of heaven!
Coriolanus
O world, thy slippery turns! Friends now fast sworn
The Winter’s Tale
I would there were no age between ten and three-and
Cymbeline
The crickets sing, and man’s o’er-laboured sense
Is there no way for men to be, but women
I see a man’s life is a tedious one
Yes, sir, to Milford Haven. Which is the way?
Most welcome, bondage! For thou art a way
The Tempest
All the infections that the sun sucks up
Here’s neither bush nor shrub to bear off any weather
Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves
Henry VIII
So farewell – to the little good you bear me
The Two Noble Kinsmen
Banished the kingdom? ’Tis a benefit
Why should I love this gentleman? ’Tis odds
I am very cold, and all the stars are out too
Follow Penguin
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Born 1564, Stratford-upon-Avon, England
Died 1616, Stratford-upon-Avon, England
This selection of Shakespeare’s soliloquies has been edited by Michael Kerrigan.
SHAKESPEARE IN PENGUIN CLASSICS
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
All’s Well That Ends Well
Antony and Cleopatra
As You Like It
The Comedy of Errors
Coriolanus
Cymbeline
Four Comedies
Four Histories
Four Tragedies
Hamlet
Henry IV Part 1
Henry IV Part 2
Henry V
Henry VI Part 1
Henry VI Part 2
Henry VI Part 3
Henry VIII
Julius Caesar
King John
King Lear
Love’s Labour’s Lost
Macbeth
Measure for Measure
The Merchant of Venice
The Merry Wives of Windsor
Much Ado About Nothing
Othello
Pericles
Richard II
Richard III
Romeo and Juliet
The Sonnets and A Lover’s Complaint
The Taming of the Shrew
The Tempest
Timon of Athens
Titus Andronicus
Troilus and Cressida
Twelfth Night
The Two Gentlemen of Verona
The Two Noble Kinsmen
The Winter’s Tale
Two Gentlem
en of Verona
[II, iii, 1–30] Off on his travels with his master Proteus, Launce the servant-boy has had to say his fond farewells: all have been gratifyingly sad to see him go except for ‘man’s best friend’:
Nay, ’twill be this hour ere I have done weeping; all the kind of the Launces have this very fault. I have received my proportion, like the prodigious son, and am going with Sir Proteus to the Imperial’s court. I think Crab my dog be the sourest-natured dog that lives. My mother weeping, my father wailing, my sister crying, our maid howling, our cat wringing her hands, and all our house in a great perplexity; yet did not this cruel-hearted cur shed one tear. He is a stone, a very pebble-stone, and has no more pity in him than a dog. A Jew would have wept to have seen our parting. Why, my grandam, having no eyes, look you, wept herself blind at my parting. Nay, I’ll show you the manner of it. This shoe is my father. No, this left shoe is my father. No, no, left shoe is my mother. Nay, that cannot be so neither. Yes, it is so, it is so, it hath the worser sole. This shoe with the hole in it is my mother, and this my father. A vengeance on’t, there ’tis. Now, sir, this staff is my sister; for, look you, she is as white as a lily and as small as a wand. This hat is Nan our maid. I am the dog. No, the dog is himself, and I am the dog. O, the dog is me, and I am myself. Ay, so, so. Now come I to my father: ‘Father, your blessing.’ Now should not the shoe speak a word for weeping. Now should I kiss my father; well, he weeps on. Now come I to my mother. O, that she could speak now like an old woman! Well, I kiss her. Why, there ’tis; here’s my mother’s breath up and down. Now come I to my sister. Mark the moan she makes. Now the dog all this while sheds not a tear, nor speaks a word; but see how I lay the dust with my tears.
[II, iv, 190–212] Previously in love with Julia, but now newly smitten with Silvia, his best friend’s girl, Proteus finds it as hard to comprehend his fickle feelings as he does to justify them:
Even as one heat another heat expels,
Or as one nail by strength drives out another,
So the remembrance of my former love
Is by a newer object quite forgotten.
Is it my mind, or Valentine’s praise,
Her true perfection, or my false transgression,
That makes me reasonless to reason thus?
She is fair; and so is Julia that I love –
That I did love, for now my love is thawed;
Which, like a waxen image ’gainst a fire,
Bears no impression of the thing it was.
Methinks my zeal to Valentine is cold,
And that I love him not as I was wont.
O, but I love his lady too too much,
And that’s the reason I love him so little.
How shall I dote on her with more advice
That thus without advice begin to love her!
’Tis but her picture I have yet beheld,
And that hath dazzlèd my reason’s light;
But when I look on her perfections,
There is no reason but I shall be blind.
If I can check my erring love, I will;
If not, to compass her I’ll use my skill.
[II, vi, 1–38] His dilemma deepening with his passion, Proteus ties himself up into emotional knots, as he seeks to square the demands of love and loyalty:
To leave my Julia, shall I be forsworn;
To love fair Silvia, shall I be forsworn;
To wrong my friend, I shall be much forsworn.
And e’en that power which gave me first my oath
Provokes me to this threefold perjury:
Love bade me swear, and Love bids me forswear.
O sweet-suggesting Love, if thou hast sinn’d,
Teach me, thy tempted subject, to excuse it!
At first I did adore a twinkling star,
But now I worship a celestial sun.
Unheedful vows may heedfully be broken;
And he wants wit that wants resolvèd will
To learn his wit t’exchange the bad for better.
Fie, fie, unreverend tongue, to call her bad
Whose sovereignty so oft thou hast preferred
With twenty thousand soul-confirming oaths!
I cannot leave to love, and yet I do;
But there I leave to love where I should love.
Julia I lose, and Valentine I lose;
If I keep them, I needs must lose myself;
If I lose them, thus find I by their loss:
For Valentine, myself; for Julia, Silvia.
I to myself am dearer than a friend,
For love is still most precious in itself;
And Silvia – witness heaven, that made her fair! –
Shows Julia but a swarthy Ethiope.
I will forget that Julia is alive,
Remembering that my love to her is dead;
And Valentine I’ll hold an enemy,
Aiming at Silvia as a sweeter friend.
I cannot now prove constant to myself
Without some treachery used to Valentine.
[V, iv, 1–12] A loser, it seems, in love, Valentine finds solace in solitude:
How use doth breed a habit in a man!
This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods,
I better brook than flourishing peopled towns.
Here can I sit alone, unseen of any,
And to the nightingale’s complaining notes
Tune my distresses, and record my woes.
O thou that dost inhabit in my breast,
Leave not the mansion so long tenantless,
Lest, growing ruinous, the building fall
Repair me with thy presence, Silvia:
Thou gentle nymph, cherish thy forlorn swain.
The Taming of the Shrew
[IV, i, 174–97] Petruchio unfolds his masterplan for breaking the ungovernable Katherine to his will – he’ll treat the ‘shrew’ as a haggard or hawk and tame her that way:
Thus have I politicly begun my reign,
And ’tis my hope to end successfully.
My falcon now is sharp and passing empty,
And till she stoop she must not be full-gorged,
For then she never looks upon her lure.
Another way I have to man my haggard,
To make her come, and know her keeper’s call,
That is, to watch her, as we watch these kites
That bate and beat and will not be obedient.
She eat no meat to-day, nor none shall eat.
Last night she slept not, nor tonight she shall not.
As with the meat, some undeservèd fault
I’ll find about the making of the bed,
And here I’ll fling the pillow, there the bolster,
This way the coverlet, another way the sheets.
Ay, and amid this hurly I intend
That all is done in reverend care of her.
And, in conclusion, she shall watch all night,
And if she chance to nod I’ll rail and brawl,
And with the clamour keep her still awake.
This is a way to kill a wife with kindness,
And thus I’ll curb her mad and headstrong humour.
He that knows better how to tame a shrew,
Now let him speak –’tis charity to show.
Henry VI Part 2
[I, i, 212–57] His own house outmanoeuvred by that of Lancaster, Richard Plantagenet, Duke of York, can only fume in impotent fury as Henry VI squanders the power and influence of the Crown he believes should by rights be his:
Anjou and Maine are given to the French;
Paris is lost; the state of Normandy
Stands on a tickle point now they are gone.
Suffolk concluded on the articles,
The peers agreed, and Henry was well pleased
To change two dukedoms for a duke’s fair daughter.
I cannot blame them all; what is’t to them?
’Tis thine they give away,
and not their own.
Pirates may make cheap pennyworths of their pillage
And purchase friends and give to courtesans,
Still revelling like lords till all be gone;
While as the silly owner of the goods
Weeps over them, and wrings his hapless hands,
And shakes his head, and trembling stands aloof,
While all is shared and all is borne away,
Ready to starve, and dare not touch his own.
So York must sit and fret and bite his tongue,
While his own lands are bargained for and sold.
Methinks the realms of England, France, and Ireland,
Bear that proportion to my flesh and blood
As did the fatal brand Althaea burnt
Unto the prince’s heart of Calydon.
Anjou and Maine both given unto the French!
Cold news for me; for I had hope of France,
Even as I have of fertile England’s soil.
A day will come when York shall claim his own,
And therefore I will take the Nevils’ parts
And make a show of love to proud Duke Humphrey,
And, when I spy advantage, claim the crown,
For that’s the golden mark I seek to hit.
Nor shall proud Lancaster usurp my right,
Nor hold the sceptre in his childish fist,
Nor wear the diadem upon his head,
Whose church-like humours fits not for a crown.
Then, York, be still awhile, till time do serve;
Watch thou, and wake, when others be asleep,
To pry into the secrets of the state,
Till Henry, surfeiting in joys of love
With his new bride and England’s dear-bought queen,
And Humphrey with the peers be fall’n at jars.
Then will I raise aloft the milk-white rose,
With whose sweet smell the air shall be perfumed,
And in my standard bear the arms of York,
To grapple with the house of Lancaster;
And force perforce I’ll make him yield the crown,
Whose bookish rule hath pulled fair England down.
[III, i, 331–83] Sent to Ireland to put down an insurrection – and, of course, be removed to a safe distance from the English throne – York sees his opportunity at last to turn unhappiness to action. The King is effectively providing him with an army, he reflects, while he himself has other strategies already in hand, including a second uprising – this one a good deal closer to home:
Now, York, or never, steel thy fearful thoughts,