Shakespeare in the time of SARS-CoV2 Coronavirus – Apr 17, 2020

William Shakespeare – fractured cubist face on the cover of Samuel Schoenbaum's book, ‘Shakespeare’s Lives’

For the first time KRG held a session using videoconferencing software to get around the problem of meeting during the SARS-CoV2 coronavirus lockdown. We used the application called Zoom, known to have several security and privacy hazards. Since the free application allows only 40 minutes for a meeting, we had to hold three successive Zoom meetings to get though the material of fourteen readers – a full house record in recent times.

Our experience with Zoom was poor, probably on account of the weak 4G connections on the mobile phones employed by half the readers. Each screen display requires ~2Mbps of bandwidth, and the bandwidth measured with Speedtest.net came to about 13Mbps Upload and 1Mbps download for a typical 4G connection on a mobile phone. This is quite inadequate to support the 12 screens we had; besides, 4G connections are quite unstable, varying in speed, latency, and signal strength. As a result the sound (the most important factor for intelligibility in conferences) was constantly disrupted by scratchy noises and squeaks. If we hold a Zoom conference in future we should squelch the Video except for the one person holding the floor for hiser reading, and similarly for the Audio.

In this time of the SARS-CoV2 coronavirus crisis, Joe mentioned that he chose the play Coriolanus because it does have a glancing image of deaths from the plague. However, Shakespeare did not introduce an actual plague scene in any of his plays. Talitha, ex-member of KRG and Shakespeare enthusiast, was our invited guest from Thiruvananthapuram. In her commentary she gives a more complete review of plagues during Shakespeare’s working life, and the few indirect references there are to them in his plays.

One of the curses in Romeo and Juliet, uttered by Mercutio when he is stabbed fatally by Tybalt in a street fight is memorable:
A plague o' both your houses! 

When Romeo arrives he notices Tybalt and Mercutio are fighting, and tries to break it up; just then Tybalt delivers a fatal stab to Mercutio's chest

More powerful still is the censure Lear casts on his daughter Goneril:
thou art a boil,
A plague-sore, an embossed carbuncle,
In my corrupted blood.
(Act 2 Scene 4)

A cartoonist on Twitter, Mya Lixian Gosling, has provided amusement for readers to show how every tragedy of Shakespeare could have been averted if only people stayed at home and practiced self-isolation:

Shakespeare in a time of Coronavirus cartoon (click to enlarge)

Full Account and Record of the all-Shakespeare KRG session on April 17, 2020

The next KRG session to read Mary Shelley's Frankenstein will be held on May 29.

The readers put their hearts into bringing out the various emotions that Shakespeare embeds in the Sonnets and Plays. Fortunate are those who see the plays acted upon the stage in  a professional production, for it is only then you realise how different is the printed word, and its evocations in the brain of the reader from the total experience of being immersed with the players on stage who give life to the characters Shakespeare invented. The plays were always meant to be staged, not read. How unrivalled was Shakespeare’s experience, for he was not only a dramatist, but an actor, a playhouse owner, a stage producer, a director, and an impresario. Of course, besides being a poet, first.

School children who are forced to appear in examinations about Shakespeare’s plays are left impoverished if they do not see professional productions.

Saras

Kenneth Branagh in Henry V – Once more unto the breach

Henry V, Act 3, scene 1

SCENE I. France. Before Harfleur.

Alarum. Enter KING HENRY, EXETER, BEDFORD, GLOUCESTER, and Soldiers, with scaling-ladders

KING HENRY V

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;

Or close the wall up with our English dead.

In peace there's nothing so becomes a man

As modest stillness and humility:

But when the blast of war blows in our ears,

Then imitate the action of the tiger;

Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,

Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage;

Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;

Let pry through the portage of the head

Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it

As fearfully as doth a galled rock

O'erhang and jutty his confounded base,

Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean.

Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,

Hold hard the breath and bend up every spirit

To his full height. On, on, you noblest English.

Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof!

Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,

Have in these parts from morn till even fought

And sheathed their swords for lack of argument:

Dishonour not your mothers; now attest

That those whom you call'd fathers did beget you.

Be copy now to men of grosser blood,

And teach them how to war. And you, good yeoman,

Whose limbs were made in England, show us here

The mettle of your pasture; let us swear

That you are worth your breeding; which I doubt not;

For there is none of you so mean and base,

That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.

I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,

Straining upon the start. The game's afoot:

Follow your spirit, and upon this charge

Cry 'God for Harry, England, and Saint George!'

KumKum

Sonnet # 102, 50.

Sonnet 50

How heavy do I journey on the way,

When what I seek, my weary travel's end,

Doth teach that ease and that repose to say

'Thus far the miles are measured from thy friend!'

The beast that bears me, tired with my woe,

Plods dully on, to bear that weight in me,

As if by some instinct the wretch did know

His rider loved not speed, being made from thee:

The bloody spur cannot provoke him on

That sometimes anger thrusts into his hide;

Which heavily he answers with a groan,

More sharp to me than spurring to his side;

For that same groan doth put this in my mind;

My grief lies onward and my joy behind.

Sonnet 102

My love is strengthen'd, though more weak in seeming;

I love not less, though less the show appear:

That love is merchandized whose rich esteeming

The owner's tongue doth publish every where.

Our love was new and then but in the spring

When I was wont to greet it with my lays,

As Philomel in summer's front doth sing

And stops her pipe in growth of riper days:

Not that the summer is less pleasant now

Than when her mournful hymns did hush the night,

But that wild music burthens every bough

And sweets grown common lose their dear delight.

Therefore like her I sometime hold my tongue,

Because I would not dull you with my song.

Thommo, Geetha, Arundhaty

Lorenzo and Jessica by Sir James Dromgole Linton c.1910

Merchant of Venice Act III Scene 5

SCENE V. The same. A garden.

Enter LAUNCELOT and JESSICA

LAUNCELOT

Yes, truly; for, look you, the sins of the father

are to be laid upon the children: therefore, I

promise ye, I fear you. I was always plain with

you, and so now I speak my agitation of the matter:

therefore be of good cheer, for truly I think you

are damned. There is but one hope in it that can do

you any good; and that is but a kind of bastard

hope neither.

JESSICA

And what hope is that, I pray thee?

LAUNCELOT

Marry, you may partly hope that your father got you

not, that you are not the Jew's daughter.

JESSICA

That were a kind of bastard hope, indeed: so the

sins of my mother should be visited upon me.

LAUNCELOT

Truly then I fear you are damned both by father and

mother: thus when I shun Scylla, your father, I

fall into Charybdis, your mother: well, you are

gone both ways.

JESSICA

I shall be saved by my husband; he hath made me a

Christian.

LAUNCELOT

Truly, the more to blame he: we were Christians

enow before; e'en as many as could well live, one by

another. This making Christians will raise the

price of hogs: if we grow all to be pork-eaters, we

shall not shortly have a rasher on the coals for money.

Enter LORENZO

JESSICA

I'll tell my husband, Launcelot, what you say: here he comes.

LORENZO

I shall grow jealous of you shortly, Launcelot, if

you thus get my wife into corners.

JESSICA

Nay, you need not fear us, Lorenzo: Launcelot and I

are out. He tells me flatly, there is no mercy for

me in heaven, because I am a Jew's daughter: and he

says, you are no good member of the commonwealth,

for in converting Jews to Christians, you raise the

price of pork.

LORENZO

I shall answer that better to the commonwealth than

you can the getting up of the negro's belly: the

Moor is with child by you, Launcelot.

LAUNCELOT

It is much that the Moor should be more than reason:

but if she be less than an honest woman, she is

indeed more than I took her for.

LORENZO

How every fool can play upon the word! I think the

best grace of wit will shortly turn into silence,

and discourse grow commendable in none only but

parrots. Go in, sirrah; bid them prepare for dinner.

LAUNCELOT

That is done, sir; they have all stomachs.

LORENZO

Goodly Lord, what a wit-snapper are you! then bid

them prepare dinner.

LAUNCELOT

That is done too, sir; only 'cover' is the word.

LORENZO

Will you cover then, sir?

LAUNCELOT

Not so, sir, neither; I know my duty.

LORENZO

Yet more quarrelling with occasion! Wilt thou show

the whole wealth of thy wit in an instant? I pray

tree, understand a plain man in his plain meaning:

go to thy fellows; bid them cover the table, serve

in the meat, and we will come in to dinner.

LAUNCELOT

For the table, sir, it shall be served in; for the

meat, sir, it shall be covered; for your coming in

to dinner, sir, why, let it be as humours and

conceits shall govern.

Exit

LORENZO

O dear discretion, how his words are suited!

The fool hath planted in his memory

An army of good words; and I do know

A many fools, that stand in better place,

Garnish'd like him, that for a tricksy word

Defy the matter. How cheerest thou, Jessica?

And now, good sweet, say thy opinion,

How dost thou like the Lord Bassanio's wife?

JESSICA

Past all expressing. It is very meet

The Lord Bassanio live an upright life;

For, having such a blessing in his lady,

He finds the joys of heaven here on earth;

And if on earth he do not mean it, then

In reason he should never come to heaven

Why, if two gods should play some heavenly match

And on the wager lay two earthly women,

And Portia one, there must be something else

Pawn'd with the other, for the poor rude world

Hath not her fellow.

LORENZO

Even such a husband

Hast thou of me as she is for a wife.

JESSICA

Nay, but ask my opinion too of that.

LORENZO

I will anon: first, let us go to dinner.

JESSICA

Nay, let me praise you while I have a stomach.

LORENZO

No, pray thee, let it serve for table-talk;

' Then, howso'er thou speak'st, 'mong other things

I shall digest it.

JESSICA

Well, I'll set you forth.

Exeunt

COMMENTS:

Merchant of Venice is counted as a comedy –  a dark comedy, perhaps. Everyone knows the storyline.

This scene was chosen because it has exactly the number of characters to suit the cast of three – Geetha, Arun and Thommo. Of course, Arun had to take on a male role, that of Launcelot Gobbo, but that was fitting because in the next scene Portia assumed the guise of a male lawyer representing Antonio.

The scene is a humorous one which may have been introduced by Shakespeare to prepare his audience for the next scene, the serious and most important one in the play, Act IV Scene 1, the court scene famous for Portia's speech –

The quality of mercy is not strained; 

It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven 

Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest; 

It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:

The scene  chosen projects Shylock's daughter Jessica in a favourable light, as an intelligent and fun-loving person, very different from her father who appears at his vengeful worst in the next scene.

Thommo found the reference to the price of pork becoming higher had more Jews converted to Christianity, as humorous and thought-provoking. A week ago he found the price of beef at the Thevara market to be quite a bit higher than pork. He wondered what the prices would have been, if aeons ago the Hindus had stopped eating beef, or if the Muslim population in Kerala had not overtaken the Christian population.

Pamela

Sonnets 129 and 80

Sonnet 80

O, how I faint when I of you do write,

Knowing a better spirit doth use your name,

And in the praise thereof spends all his might,

To make me tongue-tied, speaking of your fame!

But since your worth, wide as the ocean is,

The humble as the proudest sail doth bear,

My saucy bark inferior far to his

On your broad main doth wilfully appear.

Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat,

Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride;

Or being wreck'd, I am a worthless boat,

He of tall building and of goodly pride:

Then if he thrive and I be cast away,

The worst was this; my love was my decay.

Sonnet 129

The expense of spirit in a waste of shame

Is lust in action; and till action, lust

Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame,

Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust,

Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight,

Past reason hunted, and no sooner had

Past reason hated, as a swallow'd bait

On purpose laid to make the taker mad;

Mad in pursuit and in possession so;

Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme;

A bliss in proof, and proved, a very woe;

Before, a joy proposed; behind, a dream.

All this the world well knows; yet none knows well

To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.

Joe  

Volumnia (Vanessa Redgrave) confronts Coriolanus (Ralph Fiennes) in the 2011 film directed by Ralph Fiennes

Volumnia & family plead with Coriolanus on their knees 

Coriolanus, Act V, Scene 3 – Volumnia’s entreaty before her son, Coriolanus to desist from attacking Rome with the Volscians

VOLUMNIA

Nay, go not from us thus.

If it were so that our request did tend

To save the Romans, thereby to destroy

The Volsces whom you serve, you might condemn us,

As poisonous of your honour: no; our suit

Is that you reconcile them: while the Volsces

May say 'This mercy we have show'd;' the Romans,

'This we received;' and each in either side

Give the all-hail to thee and cry 'Be blest

For making up this peace!' 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:

Thou hast affected the fine strains of honour,

To imitate the graces of the gods;

To tear with thunder the wide cheeks o' the air,

And yet to charge thy sulphur with a bolt

That should but rive an oak. Why dost not speak?

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' the stocks. Thou hast never in thy life

Show'd thy dear mother any courtesy,

When she, poor hen, fond of no second brood,

Has cluck'd thee to the wars and safely home,

Loaden with honour. Say my request's unjust,

And spurn me back: but if it be not so,

Thou art not honest; and the gods will plague thee,

That thou restrain'st from me the duty which

To a mother's part belongs. 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 's:

This boy, that cannot tell what he would have

But kneels and holds up bands for fellowship,

Does reason our petition with more strength

Than thou hast to deny 't. Come, let us go:

This fellow had a Volscian to his mother;

His wife is in Corioli 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.

He holds her by the hand, silent

COMMENTS:

The play Coriolanus has two reasons for contemporary interest:

1. The struggle between leaders who want to assert their absolute authority over people, events, and assets of the nation; versus constitutional republics that have elected leaders who derive their authority from the people and must be answerable to them. In this play at one point the people get fed up with the authoritarian protagonist and banish him. One of the reactions to the modern pandemic is for authoritarian leaders to grab power.

2. The language of the play contains images of contagion and diseased bodies, the gravest image of modern times stamped on all the countries of the world since the SARS-CoV2 virus took hold in Jan of 2020.

Coriolanus is about the political struggle between Republicanism and authoritarian rule. Coriolanus is Caius Martius, a Roman general in the early days of the Republic. He is quite proud, and contemptuous of the Plebeians, the ordinary citizens of Rome, and denies them grain because he says they do not deserve it, not having done military service for Rome.  He captures the city of Corioli from the Volscians in one of his battles, and acquires his given name, Coriolanus, endowed on him by the Commander of the Army to celebrate his victory. 

His mother, Voumnia, ambitious for her son like all mothers, suggests he should run for the office of Consul, and trade on his popularity to secure the post. He is liked by most of the senators and only has to court the people, which the proud Coriolanus is loath to do. Ultimately he does go out and canvas for their votes, but not very convincingly. Two of the people’s representatives, Sicinius and another guy, Brutus, object and start a riot to deny him the Consul’s post. The people start an outcry that he should go. But he pre-empts the banishment with this speech:

You common cry of curs! whose breath I hate

As reek o' the rotten fens, whose loves I prize

As the dead carcasses of unburied men

That do corrupt my air, I banish you;

…

thus I turn my back:

There is a world elsewhere.

The phrase ‘dead carcasses of unburied men’ evokes the image of victims of the contagion of the coronavirus.

Coriolanus quits Rome and goes off to the Volscians and they band with him to return and attack Rome. At this point the Senate of Rome sends Volumnia, his mother, accompanied by his wife Virgilia, and little son, as emissaries to make peace and prevent the disastrous pillage of Rome. This is the scene I have chosen, a speech by Volumnia in which she implores her son to leave off attacking Rome and return.

In this play you do not see the language of lyric poetry in which WS excelled – which is there in abundance in another historic tragedy he wrote at the same time, Antony and Cleopatra. Instead, WS reveals that other facet of his language, the persuasive power of rhetorical speech, which in this instance WS affords Volumnia, another of the strong women who populate his plays. 

At the same time, you witness a woman’s ability to play effectively on the sentiments of a man, the wellsprings of whose honour she as mother has intimate knowledge of. That understanding becomes the source of the arguments she uses. 

She begins with a diplomatic argument, that Coriolanus need not abandon his choice to befriend the Volscians, but both can benefit by making peace and being welcomed as benefactors. Then she goes on to suggest what will become of his great name if Coriolanus plunders Rome with the Volscians – he will be ever cursed!

She demands the silent son speak to her, the mother who has lavished care on him. If he does not respond to her just request, the very gods will plague him for spurning a mother’s cry. Then she pays the ultimate obeisance to him. Mother, daughter, and son, kneel to petition him with hands of fellowship outstretched. When he still does not respond, she is thrown on her final device: charging him in a stentorian voice of having not her for mother, but a Volscian; having a second wife in Corioli, and another bastard son …! She threatens now she’ll go and he will see her next only in the flames when he sacks the city of Rome with the Volscians.

At last, the pride of Coriolanus melts and he holds his mother’s hands. Even as he relents, he knows his death by the Volscians is sealed.

Geeta

Cordelia before King Lear

Anthony Sher as King Lear is disillusioned by Cordelia's tepid profession of filial love – so young and so untender?

King Lear Act 1, Scene 1

KING LEAR

Meantime we shall express our darker purpose.

Give me the map there. Know that we have divided

In three our kingdom: and 'tis our fast intent

To shake all cares and business from our age;

Conferring them on younger strengths, while we

Unburthen'd crawl toward death. Our son of Cornwall,

And you, our no less loving son of Albany,

We have this hour a constant will to publish

Our daughters' several dowers, that future strife

May be prevented now. The princes, France and Burgundy,

Great rivals in our youngest daughter's love,

Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn,

And here are to be answer'd. Tell me, my daughters,--

Since now we will divest us both of rule,

Interest of territory, cares of state,--

Which of you shall we say doth love us most?

That we our largest bounty may extend

Where nature doth with merit challenge. Goneril,

Our eldest-born, speak first.

GONERIL

Sir, I love you more than words can wield the matter;

Dearer than eye-sight, space, and liberty;

Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare;

No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honour;

As much as child e'er loved, or father found;

A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable;

Beyond all manner of so much I love you.

CORDELIA

[Aside] What shall Cordelia do?

Love, and be silent.

LEAR

Of all these bounds, even from this line to this,

With shadowy forests and with champains rich'd,

With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads,

We make thee lady: to thine and Albany's issue

Be this perpetual. What says our second daughter,

Our dearest Regan, wife to Cornwall? Speak.

REGAN

Sir, I am made

Of the self-same metal that my sister is,

And prize me at her worth. In my true heart

I find she names my very deed of love;

Only she comes too short: that I profess

Myself an enemy to all other joys,

Which the most precious square of sense possesses;

And find I am alone felicitate

In your dear highness' love.

CORDELIA

[Aside] Then poor Cordelia!

And yet not so; since, I am sure, my love's

More richer than my tongue.

KING LEAR

To thee and thine hereditary ever

Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom;

No less in space, validity, and pleasure,

Than that conferr'd on Goneril. Now, our joy,

Although the last, not least; to whose young love

The vines of France and milk of Burgundy

Strive to be interess'd; what can you say to draw

A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.

CORDELIA

Nothing, my lord.

KING LEAR

Nothing!

CORDELIA

Nothing.

KING LEAR

Nothing will come of nothing: speak again.

CORDELIA

Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave

My heart into my mouth: I love your majesty

According to my bond; nor more nor less.

KING LEAR

How, how, Cordelia! mend your speech a little,

Lest it may mar your fortunes.

CORDELIA

Good my lord,

You have begot me, bred me, loved me: I

Return those duties back as are right fit,

Obey you, love you, and most honour you.

Why have my sisters husbands, if they say

They love you all? Haply, when I shall wed,

That lord whose hand must take my plight shall carry

Half my love with him, half my care and duty:

Sure, I shall never marry like my sisters,

To love my father all.

KING LEAR

But goes thy heart with this?

CORDELIA

Ay, good my lord.

KING LEAR

So young, and so untender?

CORDELIA

So young, my lord, and true.

KING LEAR

Let it be so; thy truth, then, be thy dower:

For, by the sacred radiance of the sun,

The mysteries of Hecate, and the night;

By all the operation of the orbs

From whom we do exist, and cease to be;

Here I disclaim all my paternal care,

Propinquity and property of blood,

And as a stranger to my heart and me

Hold thee, from this, for ever. The barbarous Scythian,

Or he that makes his generation messes

To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom

Be as well neighbour'd, pitied, and relieved,

As thou my sometime daughter.

KENT

Good my liege,--

KING LEAR

Peace, Kent!

Come not between the dragon and his wrath.

I loved her most, and thought to set my rest

On her kind nursery. Hence, and avoid my sight!

So be my grave my peace, as here I give

Her father's heart from her! Call France; who stirs?

Call Burgundy. Cornwall and Albany,

With my two daughters' dowers digest this third:

Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her.

I do invest you jointly with my power,

Pre-eminence, and all the large effects

That troop with majesty. Ourself, by monthly course,

With reservation of an hundred knights,

By you to be sustain'd, shall our abode

Make with you by due turns. Only we still retain

The name, and all the additions to a king;

The sway, revenue, execution of the rest,

Beloved sons, be yours: which to confirm,

This coronet part betwixt you.

Giving the crown

KENT

Royal Lear,

Whom I have ever honour'd as my king,

Loved as my father, as my master follow'd,

As my great patron thought on in my prayers,--

KING LEAR

The bow is bent and drawn, make from the shaft.

KENT

Let it fall rather, though the fork invade

The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly,

When Lear is mad. What wilt thou do, old man?

Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to speak,

When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour's bound,

When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy doom;

And, in thy best consideration, cheque

This hideous rashness: answer my life my judgment,

Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;

Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound

Reverbs no hollowness.

Priya

Twelfth Night Act 2, scene 5, Olivia’s  letter to Malvolio

Twelfth Night Act 2, scene 5, Olivia’s  letter to Malvolio

MALVOLIO

By my life, this is my lady's hand these be her

very C's, her U's and her T's and thus makes she her

great P's. It is, in contempt of question, her hand.

SIR ANDREW

Her C's, her U's and her T's: why that?

MALVOLIO

[Reads] 'To the unknown beloved, this, and my good

wishes:'--her very phrases! By your leave, wax.

Soft! and the impressure her Lucrece, with which she

uses to seal: 'tis my lady. To whom should this be?

FABIAN

This wins him, liver and all.

MALVOLIO

[Reads]

Jove knows I love: But who?

Lips, do not move;

No man must know.

'No man must know.' What follows? the numbers

altered! 'No man must know:' if this should be

thee, Malvolio?

SIR TOBY BELCH

Marry, hang thee, brock!

MALVOLIO

[Reads]

I may command where I adore;

But silence, like a Lucrece knife,

With bloodless stroke my heart doth gore:

M, O, A, I, doth sway my life.

FABIAN

A fustian riddle!

SIR TOBY BELCH

Excellent wench, say I.

MALVOLIO

'M, O, A, I, doth sway my life.' Nay, but first, let

me see, let me see, let me see.

FABIAN

What dish o' poison has she dressed him!

SIR TOBY BELCH

And with what wing the staniel cheques at it!

MALVOLIO

'I may command where I adore.' Why, she may command

me: I serve her; she is my lady. Why, this is

evident to any formal capacity; there is no

obstruction in this: and the end,--what should

that alphabetical position portend? If I could make

that resemble something in me,--Softly! M, O, A,

I,--

SIR TOBY BELCH

O, ay, make up that: he is now at a cold scent.

FABIAN

Sowter will cry upon't for all this, though it be as

rank as a fox.

MALVOLIO

M,--Malvolio; M,--why, that begins my name.

FABIAN

Did not I say he would work it out? the cur is

excellent at faults.

MALVOLIO

M,--but then there is no consonancy in the sequel;

that suffers under probation A should follow but O does.

FABIAN

And O shall end, I hope.

SIR TOBY BELCH

Ay, or I'll cudgel him, and make him cry O!

MALVOLIO

And then I comes behind.

FABIAN

Ay, an you had any eye behind you, you might see

more detraction at your heels than fortunes before

you.

MALVOLIO

M, O, A, I; this simulation is not as the former: and

yet, to crush this a little, it would bow to me, for

every one of these letters are in my name. Soft!

here follows prose.

Reads

'If this fall into thy hand, revolve. In my stars I

am above thee; but be not afraid of greatness: some

are born great, some achieve greatness, and some

have greatness thrust upon 'em. Thy Fates open

their hands; let thy blood and spirit embrace them;

and, to inure thyself to what thou art like to be,

cast thy humble slough and appear fresh. Be

opposite with a kinsman, surly with servants; let

thy tongue tang arguments of state; put thyself into

the trick of singularity: she thus advises thee

that sighs for thee. Remember who commended thy

yellow stockings, and wished to see thee ever

cross-gartered: I say, remember. Go to, thou art

made, if thou desirest to be so; if not, let me see

thee a steward still, the fellow of servants, and

not worthy to touch Fortune's fingers. Farewell.

She that would alter services with thee,

THE FORTUNATE-UNHAPPY.'

Daylight and champaign discovers not more: this is

open. I will be proud, I will read politic authors,

I will baffle Sir Toby, I will wash off gross

acquaintance, I will be point-devise the very man.

I do not now fool myself, to let imagination jade

me; for every reason excites to this, that my lady

loves me. She did commend my yellow stockings of

late, she did praise my leg being cross-gartered;

and in this she manifests herself to my love, and

with a kind of injunction drives me to these habits

of her liking. I thank my stars I am happy. I will

be strange, stout, in yellow stockings, and

cross-gartered, even with the swiftness of putting

on. Jove and my stars be praised! Here is yet a

postscript.

Reads

'Thou canst not choose but know who I am. If thou

entertainest my love, let it appear in thy smiling;

thy smiles become thee well; therefore in my

presence still smile, dear my sweet, I prithee.’

COMMENTS:
Twelfth Night is the last of the comedies before Shakespeare entered the period of his great tragedies. The play was written in 1600 – 1601. It is one of his most popular plays and also the most musical of his comedies. 

The tale is about lovesick Count Orsino of Illyria who pines for Countess Olivia; but his love is unrequited. She is in seven years mourning after the death of her father and brother. There appears Viola, shipwrecked and separated from her twin brother Sebastian. For her safety in an unknown land Viola dresses as a man, calling herself Cesario, and finds employment in the court of Duke Orsino. Impressed by Cesario's ways the Count sends him to woo Lady Olivia on his behalf. Olivia who has been refusing to meet men agrees to meet the new messenger. Upon meeting him she falls in love with Cesario. 

This is the main plot. 

Priya read from the subplot, which takes place in Lady Olivia's household and revolves around her steward Malvolio. Malvolio is a  pompous man who cherishes a secret desire to marry his mistress, Olivia. He believes he is suitable in class and distinction to wed her.

Other characters who live in the household are Olivia's uncle, the fat Sir Toby Belch, his friend, the skinny and crude Sir Andrew Aguecheek, who is also a suitor to Lady Olivia, Fabian a servant, and Maria her maid. The four of them resent Malvolio’s officious ways and plot a practical joke on him.  

Maria writes a letter in the hand of her mistress, addressed to Malvolio  and drops it in the garden in Malvolio’s path. The four plotters then hide behind the bushes and watch what happens when Malvolio reads the cryptic letter that completely foxes and fools him.

He is under the delusion that Lady Olivia is falling in love with him and through the letter is directing him to behave in a certain way: wear yellow cross-gartered stockings, and wear a smile to match his high status. 

The letter has one of the most widely quoted sentences written by Shakespeare: ‘some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em.’

For twenty years after its first staging the play was also called Malvolio and we can guess why. 

The Title
Twelfth Night refers to the twelfth night after Christmas, also referred to as the eve of Epiphany, a day that commemorates the visit of the Magi to baby Jesus and is often celebrated with a temporary setting aside of social conventions and rules. Twelfth Night revels in the overturning of convention and has an air of general merriment. 

Samuel Pepys, an MP, noted in his diary upon seeing the play on the eve of Epiphany in 1663, that Twelfth Night was “acted well, though it be but a silly play, and not related at all to the name or day.” True, Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night makes no mention of the three Magi, but it has plenty of fooling around and partakes in holiday revelries. Feste the Fool, Sir Toby Belch, and Sir Andrew Aguecheek play the role of the customary Lord of Misrule, while Maria may be thought of as the Lady of Misrule.

Kavita

Sonnet 36

Let me confess that we two must be twain,

Although our undivided loves are one:

So shall those blots that do with me remain

Without thy help by me be borne alone.

In our two loves there is but one respect,

Though in our lives a separable spite,

Which though it alter not love's sole effect,

Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight.

I may not evermore acknowledge thee,

Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame,

Nor thou with public kindness honour me,

Unless thou take that honour from thy name:

But do not so; I love thee in such sort

As, thou being mine, mine is thy good report.

Gopa

Sonnet 99

The forward violet thus did I chide:

Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells,

If not from my love's breath? The purple pride

Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells

In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed.

The lily I condemned for thy hand,

And buds of marjoram had stol'n thy hair:

The roses fearfully on thorns did stand,

One blushing shame, another white despair;

A third, nor red nor white, had stol'n of both

And to his robbery had annex'd thy breath;

But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth

A vengeful canker eat him up to death.

More flowers I noted, yet I none could see

But sweet or colour it had stol'n from thee.

Gopa – Voice File of Sonnet 99

COMMENTS:

Sonnet 99 is one of the three exceptions to the usual sonnet scheme of William Shakespeare.

Instead of the 3 quatrains and a rhyming couplet, or an octet and a sestet that comprise most of the sonnets, Sonnet 99 begins with a quintain and follows the rhyme scheme of ABABA CDCD EFEF GG.

Scholars have come up with various theories that try to explain why Shakespeare may have chosen to write a 15 line sonnet, the only one amongst 154 of them. One suggestion is that it is an incomplete sonnet. Another suggestion is that the first line is to be taken as a prelude to the sonnet proper of 14 lines that follow.

Others are of the opinion that it is a “dating sonnet”. That, it is a combination of number of lines (15) and the number of the sonnet (99) and alludes to the year 1599. This was the year when two of Shakespeare’s sonnets, 138 and 144 were published without his permission by William Jaggard.

The theme of this poem is the idea of theft. Some analysts feel that the “sweet thief”of sonnet 99 could have been a hint at Jaggard himself.

The interaction of the poet with flowers, accusing them of stealing the beauty, the essence, the colours and form from his “young lord” and beautifying themselves with the stolen traits is the conceit of this sonnet. It is seen as a continuation of the previous sonnet number 98. To enjoy sonnet 99 one must read it together with sonnet 98.

The violet has stolen the young lord’s sweet breath and therefore it smells so sweet. And also taken the purple colour of his veins to colour it’s own complexion. Likewise, the lily has stolen the white from his delicate white hands. Marjoram has used the texture of the sweet youth’s hair for its own buds; and the red, white, and pink of those shameless roses have stolen from the colours of his face and the sweet perfume of the boy. The roses are cursed to suffer from canker. And yet in spite of all these thefts, the poet says no flower could match the young lord’s beauty or his sweetness.

Devika

Midsummer Night's Dream - Puck (Stanley Tucci) from the 2000 film

‘If we shadows have offended,  Think but this, and all is mended’

Midsummer Night's Dream Act V, Scene 1 Puck's Monologue

PUCK

If we shadows have offended,

Think but this, and all is mended,

That you have but slumber'd here

While these visions did appear.

And this weak and idle theme,

No more yielding but a dream,

Gentles, do not reprehend:

if you pardon, we will mend:

And, as I am an honest Puck,

If we have unearned luck

Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue,

We will make amends ere long;

Else the Puck a liar call;

So, good night unto you all.

Give me your hands, if we be friends,

And Robin shall restore amends.

COMMENTS:

Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream is an entertaining comedy with Puck as the mischievous fairy causing a lot of confusion. Puck is annoying at times, interfering, but also endearing!

At the end of the play he apologises in his own way to the audience saying that if they were offended by the poor performance of the actors. Puck says that this play was no more substantial than a dream! And that the actors would up their performance the next time! At the end of the play Puck asks the audience to clap for them!

The hidden humour that Shakespeare brings out in his comedies is what makes them all the more interesting. 

Shoba

Romeo in Friar Laurence's cell

Romeo and Juliet Act 2, SCENE III. Friar Laurence's cell.

Enter FRIAR LAURENCE, with a basket

FRIAR LAURENCE

The grey-eyed morn smiles on the frowning night,

Chequering the eastern clouds with streaks of light,

And flecked darkness like a drunkard reels

From forth day's path and Titan's fiery wheels:

Now, ere the sun advance his burning eye,

The day to cheer and night's dank dew to dry,

I must up-fill this osier cage of ours

With baleful weeds and precious-juiced flowers.

The earth that's nature's mother is her tomb;

What is her burying grave that is her womb,

And from her womb children of divers kind

We sucking on her natural bosom find,

Many for many virtues excellent,

None but for some and yet all different.

O, mickle is the powerful grace that lies

In herbs, plants, stones, and their true qualities:

For nought so vile that on the earth doth live

But to the earth some special good doth give,

Nor aught so good but strain'd from that fair use

Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse:

Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied;

And vice sometimes by action dignified.

Within the infant rind of this small flower

Poison hath residence and medicine power:

For this, being smelt, with that part cheers each part;

Being tasted, slays all senses with the heart.

Two such opposed kings encamp them still

In man as well as herbs, grace and rude will;

And where the worser is predominant,

Full soon the canker death eats up that plant.

Enter ROMEO

ROMEO

Good morrow, father.

FRIAR LAURENCE

Benedicite!

What early tongue so sweet saluteth me?

Young son, it argues a distemper'd head

So soon to bid good morrow to thy bed:

Care keeps his watch in every old man's eye,

And where care lodges, sleep will never lie;

But where unbruised youth with unstuff'd brain

Doth couch his limbs, there golden sleep doth reign:

Therefore thy earliness doth me assure

Thou art up-roused by some distemperature;

Or if not so, then here I hit it right,

Our Romeo hath not been in bed to-night.

ROMEO

That last is true; the sweeter rest was mine.

FRIAR LAURENCE

God pardon sin! wast thou with Rosaline?

ROMEO

With Rosaline, my ghostly father? no;

I have forgot that name, and that name's woe.

FRIAR LAURENCE

That's my good son: but where hast thou been, then?

ROMEO

I'll tell thee, ere thou ask it me again.

I have been feasting with mine enemy,

Where on a sudden one hath wounded me,

That's by me wounded: both our remedies

Within thy help and holy physic lies:

I bear no hatred, blessed man, for, lo,

My intercession likewise steads my foe.

FRIAR LAURENCE

Be plain, good son, and homely in thy drift;

Riddling confession finds but riddling shrift.

ROMEO

Then plainly know my heart's dear love is set

On the fair daughter of rich Capulet:

As mine on hers, so hers is set on mine;

And all combined, save what thou must combine

By holy marriage: when and where and how

We met, we woo'd and made exchange of vow,

I'll tell thee as we pass; but this I pray,

That thou consent to marry us to-day.

FRIAR LAURENCE

Holy Saint Francis, what a change is here!

Is Rosaline, whom thou didst love so dear,

So soon forsaken? young men's love then lies

Not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes.

Jesu Maria, what a deal of brine

Hath wash'd thy sallow cheeks for Rosaline!

How much salt water thrown away in waste,

To season love, that of it doth not taste!

The sun not yet thy sighs from heaven clears,

Thy old groans ring yet in my ancient ears;

Lo, here upon thy cheek the stain doth sit

Of an old tear that is not wash'd off yet:

If e'er thou wast thyself and these woes thine,

Thou and these woes were all for Rosaline:

And art thou changed? pronounce this sentence then,

Women may fall, when there's no strength in men.

ROMEO

Thou chid'st me oft for loving Rosaline.

FRIAR LAURENCE

For doting, not for loving, pupil mine.

ROMEO

And bad'st me bury love.

FRIAR LAURENCE

Not in a grave,

To lay one in, another out to have.

ROMEO

I pray thee, chide not; she whom I love now

Doth grace for grace and love for love allow;

The other did not so.

FRIAR LAURENCE

O, she knew well

Thy love did read by rote and could not spell.

But come, young waverer, come, go with me,

In one respect I'll thy assistant be;

For this alliance may so happy prove,

To turn your households' rancour to pure love.

ROMEO

O, let us hence; I stand on sudden haste.

FRIAR LAURENCE

Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast.

Zakia

Julius Caesar Act 3, Scene 1 – I do know but one That unassailable holds on his rank, Unshaked of motion

Julius Caesar Act 3, Scene 1

CAESAR

I could be well moved, if I were as you:

If I could pray to move, prayers would move me:

But I am constant as the northern star,

Of whose true-fix'd and resting quality

There is no fellow in the firmament.

The skies are painted with unnumber'd sparks,

They are all fire and every one doth shine,

But there's but one in all doth hold his place:

So in the world; 'tis furnish'd well with men,

And men are flesh and blood, and apprehensive;

Yet in the number I do know but one

That unassailable holds on his rank,

Unshaked of motion: and that I am he,

Let me a little show it, even in this;

That I was constant Cimber should be banish'd,

And constant do remain to keep him so.

COMMENTS:

These lines come from Caesar’s speech in Act 3, Scene 1, just before his assassination. Comparing himself to the North Star, Caesar boasts of his constancy, his commitment to the law, and his refusal to waver under any influence. The North Star is unique in its fixity; being the only star that never changes its position in the sky, it has “no fellow in the firmament.” Thus, Caesar also implies that he is peerless among Romans. Caesar declares that he alone remains “unassailable” among men. There is much irony: having just boasted that he is “unassailable,” Caesar is assailed mortally soon after.

Talitha

Othello arrives to greet Desdemona – O fair warrior!

Othello Act 2, Scene 1

OTHELLO

O my fair warrior!

DESDEMONA

My dear Othello!

OTHELLO

It gives me wonder great as my content

To see you here before me. O my soul's joy!

If after every tempest come such calms,

May the winds blow till they have waken'd death!

And let the labouring bark climb hills of seas

Olympus-high and duck again as low

As hell's from heaven! If it were now to die,

'Twere now to be most happy; for, I fear,

My soul hath her content so absolute

That not another comfort like to this

Succeeds in unknown fate.

DESDEMONA

The heavens forbid

But that our loves and comforts should increase,

Even as our days do grow!

OTHELLO

Amen to that, sweet powers!

I cannot speak enough of this content;

It stops me here; it is too much of joy:

And this, and this, the greatest discords be

Kissing her

That e'er our hearts shall make!

IAGO

[Aside] O, you are well tuned now!

But I'll set down the pegs that make this music,

As honest as I am.

COMMENTS: 

O my fair warrior!  - exclaims Othello,  O my soul's joy! 

Why I like this passage from the tragedy, Othello, is because it is both poignant and prophetic. Othello, the Moor, who is a great general and an asset to the state of Venice, is in love for the first time in his colourful and adventurous life. And his choice has fallen on a girl who, though described as the "gentle" Desdemona, loves him for the dangers  and risks he has taken, which may be why Othello calls her his "fair warrior".

The passage is lyrical and spontaneous in tone, yet marked by artistic contrasts such as tempests and calms, hell and heaven. 

The headstrong and passionate nature of Othello expresses itself in the feeling that it would be great if he could die at this moment, a moment of wonder blended with joy. Desdemona has reached Cyprus before him, and he is amazed and delighted.

Then the sky darkens. His own prophetic soul prompts the misgiving that he cannot expect a greater bliss than this in the uncertain future. And Iago, his jealous ensign, is waiting to echo his fears, fully intending to cause discord between the couple. And the word "honest" used here, underlines the fact that Iago succeeds only because everyone trusts him.

Comments on Shakespeare and the Plague by Talitha

The Black Plague, also called the bubonic plague, was a disease that swept through Europe during Shakespeare's life. This happened after the death of Queen Elizabeth in 1603. Three years later, the plague broke out.

The disease reportedly killed many of Shakespeare's friends, relatives and his three sisters. Even his son, Hamnet, may have succumbed to the plague, although the cause of death was not specified. Hamnet was one of the twin children, Judith being his sister. He died at the age of eleven, and was buried at Stratford.

The plague is mentioned in one of Shakespeare's plays, Romeo and Juliet. ‘A plague on both your houses!’ cries Mercutio, as he dies in a brawl between the families, the houses being the families of the  Montagues and Capulets who were perennially at loggerheads.

Interestingly, in the same play, Friar John says that he was delayed in reaching Mantua with Romeo's letter to Friar Laurence:

Going to find a barefoot brother out,

One of our order, to associate me,

Here in this city visiting the sick,

And finding him, the searchers of the town,

Suspecting that we both were in a house

10Where the infectious pestilence did reign,

Sealed up the doors and would not let us forth.

So that my speed to Mantua there was stayed.

(Act 5, Scene 2)

And this delay was a direct cause of the tragedy. So even while writing Romeo and Juliet, one of his early plays, Shakespeare mentioned the plague both metaphorically and literally.

While the play was written about 1594–96 and first published in an unauthorised quarto in 1597, the mention of the plague must have been a reference to the many outbreaks of the plague which affected Italy in the 16th century. The latest was in 1575, raging in both Verona and Venice for three years.

The mention of the plague in Verona was historically accurate. The searchers mentioned by Friar John were the searchers of the dead. Also known as plague-searchers or simply searchers, these were people, mostly women, hired by parishes in London, England, to examine corpses and determine the cause of people's deaths. In this case, in Verona, however, their grim task seems to have been to prevent infected people from leaving the house.

In England, the Puritans were opposed to the proliferation of playhouses for religious reasons. They felt that the theatre led to looser morals. Sedition was another fear. Playwrights had to be be very careful not to irritate the Royal sensibilities,  especially in the history plays.  

The crowding of spectators in the typical playhouse was thought to be a factor in the  spread of the disease. Hence the privy council insisted on closure of the playhouses in London whenever the number of plague-related deaths went over 30 in a week. The large number of standing viewers, generally the poorer folk, called groundlings, who sometimes pressed right up to the stage, might also have been a reason for the perception of the theatres as hotbeds of infection. By late July, 1606, the playhouses were closed.

However, though the playhouses were shut down, Shakespeare was busy. He wrote three of his famous tragedies during these turbulent times. He produced King Lear, Macbeth and Antony and Cleopatra.