Shakespearean Tragedy Quotes part 1

“Bear Mistress Arden unto Canterbury / Where her sentence is she must be burnt”

arden of faversham, mayor of faversham, scene xviii, sentencing prisoners

“husband, what mean you to get up so early? / summer nights are short, and yet you rise ere day / had I been wake you had not risen so early”

ardern of faversham, alice, scene i, first on stage meeting with arden, challenged for saying Mosby’s name in her sleep

“sweet love, thou know’st that we two, Ovid-like/ have often chid the morning when it gan to peep / and often wished that dark Night’s purblind steeds/ would pull her by the purple mantle back / and cast her in the ocean to her love”

arden of faversham, arden, scene i, first confronting alice for saying mosby’s name in her sleep

“a month? ay me! sweet xxx, come again / within a day or two or else I die”

arden of faversham, alice, scene i, replying to arden saying he is going to London for business

“but did you mark me then how i brake off?” “ay, xxx, and it was cunningly performed”

arden of faversham, alive speaking to mosby, scene i, discussing her feigned grief at arden leaving

“desire of wealth is endless in his mind / and he is greedy-gaping still for gain./ nor cares he though young gentlemen do beg / so he may scrape and hoard up in his pouch”

arden of faversham, scene i, greene, about arden and his acquisition of land from the abbey which was formerly leased to Greene and Reede

“A botcher, and no better at the first / who, by base brokage getting some small stock / crept into service of a nobleman / and by his servile flattery and fawning / is not become the steward of his house / and bravely jets it in his silken gown.”

arden of faversham, scene i, arden, telling franklin about mosby since he fears alice is cheating on him

“…were he by the Lord Protector backed / he should not make me to be pointed at. / I am by birth a gentleman of blood / and that injurious ribalt that attempts / to violate my dear wife’s chastity - / For dear I hold her love, as dear as heaven - / shall on the bed which he thinks to defile / see his dissevered joints and sinews torn / whilst on the planchers pants his weary body / smeared in the channels of his lustful blood”

arden of faversham, scene i, arden, telling Franklin about his suspicions of Mosby’s affair with Alice

“Ere noo he means to take horse and away! / Sweet news is this. Oh, that some airy spirit / would, in the shape and likeness of a horse / Gallop with XXX ‘cross the ocean / and throw him from his back into the waves! / Sweet XXX is the man that hath my heart / and he usurps it, having nought but this -/ That I am tied to him by marriage./ Love is a god, and marriage is but words / and therefore XXX’s title is the best. / Tush! Whether it be or no, he shall be mine / In spite of him, of Hymen, and of rights”

arden of faversham, scene i, alice’s first soliloquy, talking about arden leaving and her plans to be with Mosby in the meantime

“thus feeds the lamb securely on the down / whilst through the thicket of an arbour brake / the hunger-bitten wold o’erpries his haunt / and takes advantage to eat him up”

arden of faversham, scene iii, michael, his soliloquy about reluctantly planning to help black will and shakebag kill arden by unlocking the doors for them - in order to win hand of susan, mosby’s sister

“This night I dreamed that being in a park / A toil was pitched to overthrow the deer / And I upon a little rising hill / Stood whistly watching for the herd’s approach. / Even there, methoughts, a gentle slumber took me,/ And summoned all my parts to sweet repose. / But in the pleasure of this golden rest / An ill-thewed foster had removed the toil, [forester] / And rounded me with that beguiling home [net] / Which late, methought, was pitched to cast the deer. / With that he blew an evil-sounding horn / And at the noise another herdman came / With falchion drawn, and bent it at my breast, / Crying aloud, ‘Thou art the game we seek…”

arden of faversham, scene vi, arden, relating a dream he had the night black will and shakebag were intending to kill him had michael unlocked the doors

“…the forlorn traveller / Whose lips are glued with summer’s parching

heat / Ne’er longed so much to see a running brook / As I to finish XXX’s tragedy. / Seest thou this gore that cleaveth to my face, / From hence ne’er will I wash this bloody stain / Till XXX’s heart be panting in my hand.

arden of faverhsam, scene iii, black will, vowing to greene that he will kill arden for him

“my coming to you was about the plot of ground

Which wrongfully you detain from me.

Although the rent of it be very small,

Yet will it help my wife and children,

Which here I leave in XXXX, God knows,

Needy and bare. For Christ’s sake, let them have

it!”

arden of faversham, scene xiii, reede, pleading with arden about getting to keep his land

“God, I beseech thee, show some miracle

On thee or thine in plaguing thee for this.

That plot of ground which thou detains from me –

I speak it in an agony of spirit –

Be ruinous and fatal unto thee!

Either be butchered by thy dearest friends,

Or else be brought for men to wonder at.

Or thou and thine miscarry in that place,

Or there run mad and end thy cursed days.”

arden of faversham, scene xiii, reede, cursing arden’s refusal to let him keep renting land

“But this above the rest is to be noted:

XXX lay murdered in that plot of ground

Which he by force and violence held from

XXX;

And in the grass his body’s print was seen

Two years and more after the deed was

done.”

arden of faversham, epilogue, franklin

“…mistress, tell her whether I live or die,

I’ll make her more worth than twenty painters can,

For I will rid mine elder brother away,

And then the farm of Bolton is mine own.

Who would not venture upon house and land

When he may have it for a right-down blow?”

arden of faversham, scene i, michael speaking to alice about winning susan’s hand instead of clarke the painter

“What, shall an oath make thee forsake

my love?

As if I have not sworn as much myself,

And given my hand unto him in the church.

Tush, XXX. Oaths is words, and words is

wind,

And wind is mutable. Then I conclude

Tis childishness to stand upon an oath.”

arden of faversham, scene i, alice, telling Mosby he need not keep the oath he made to arden that he would not court alice

“Trust me, you show a noble mind

That rather than you’ll live with him you hate

You’ll venture life and die with him you love.”

arden of faversham, scene i, clarke, talking to alice about her desire to kill arden

“Might I without control / Enjoy him still, then XXX should not

die / But seeing I cannot, therefore let him die”

arden of faversham, scene i, alive, explaining her determination to kill arden

“A: let me meditate upon my Saviour Christ,

Whose blood must save me for the blood I shed.

B: How long shall I live in this hell of grief?

Convey me from the presence of that strumpet.

A: Ah, but for thee I had never been strumpet.

What cannot oaths and protestations do

When men have opportunity to woo?

I was too young to sound thy villainies.”

arden of faversham, scene xviii, alice and mosby arguing with each other

“A. But leaving these vain trifles of men’s souls,
Tell me, what is that Lucifer thy lord?
B: Arch-regent and commander of all spirits.

A: Was not that Lucifer an angel once?

B: Yes A, and most dearly loved of God.

A: How comes it then that he is prince of devils?

B: O, by aspiring pride and insolence
For which God threw him from the face of heaven.

A: And what are you that live with Lucifer?

B: Unhappy spirits that fell with Lucifer
Conspired against our God with Lucifer,
And are for ever damned with Lucifer”

Dr Faustus, scene iii, faustus and mephistophilis, first meeting

“Why this is hell nor am I out of it.

Think’st thou that I, who saw the face of God,

And tasted the eternal joys of heaven,

Am not tormented with ten thousand hells

In being deprived of everlasting bliss!

O XXX, leave these frivolous demands,

Which strike a terror to my fainting soul.”

Dr faustus, scene iii, mephistophilis, first meeting with faustus

“Now is he born of parents base of stock
In Germany, within a town called Rhodes.
At riper years, to Wittenberg he went,
Whereas his kinsmen chiefly brought him up.
So much he profits in divinity
That shortly he was graced with doctor’s name,
Excelling all, and sweetly dispute
In heavenly matters of theology,
Till, swollen with cunning of a self-conceit,
His waxen wings did mount above his reach,
And, melting, heavens conspired his overthrow.
For falling to a devilish exercise
And glutted now with learning’s golden gifts
He surfeits upon cursed necromancy.
Nothing so sweet as magic is to him
Which he prefers before his chiefest bliss.
And this the man that in his study sits.”

dr faustus, prologue, chorus, describing faustus and the plot of the play

“Why, Faustus, hast thou not attained that end?
Is not thy common talk sound aphorisms?
Are not thy bills hung up as monuments,
Whereby whole cities have escaped the plague,
And thousand desperate maladies been eased?
Yet art thou still but Faustus, and a man.
Wouldst thou make men to live eternally,
Or, being dead, raise them to life again,
Then this profession were to be esteemed.
Physic, farewell!”

dr faustus, scene i, faustus first soliloquy, discussing his desire to learn sorcery etc

“I do confess it, Faustus, and rejoice.

'Twas I that, when thou wert i’the way to heaven,

Dammed up thy passage. When thou took'st the book

To view the Scriptures, then I turned the leaves

And led thine eye.

What weep'st thou? 'Tis too late. Despair, farewell.

Fools that will laugh on earth, must weep in hell.”

dr faustus, mephistophilis, scene 18 from ‘b’ version, telling faustus how he tempted him

“Now, XXX, must thou needs be damned?

And canst thou not be saved?

What boots it, then, to think on God or heaven?

Away with such vain fancies and despair.

Despair in God and trust in Belzebub.

Now go not backward, xxx, be resolute.

Why waverest thou? O, something soundeth in mine ear!

‘Abjure this magic, turn to God again’.

Why, he loves thee not.

The god thou servest is thine own appetite

Wherein is fixed the love of Belzebub.

To him I’ll build an altar and a church

And offer lukewarm blood of newborn babes”

dr faustus, faustus, scene V, prior to the good angel vs bad angel debate

“A: Alas poor slave. See how poverty jests in his nakedness. I
know the villain’s out of service and so hungry that I know he
would give his soul to the devil for a shoulder of mutton,
though it were blood raw
B: Not so, neither. I had need to have it well roasted and good
sauce to it if I pay so dear, I can tell you.”

Dr Faustus, Wagner and Robin, scene IV, symbolism of Faustus’ debate with Wagner’s mocking of the clown, demanding the clown serve him etc

“My parents are all dead, and the

devil a penny they have left me, but a small pension, and

that buys me thirty meals a day and ten beavers, a small

trifle to suffice nature. I come of a royal pedigree: my father

was a gammon of bacon, my mother was a hogshead of

claret wine. My godfathers were these; Peter Pickled-herring

and Martin Martlemas-beef. But my godmother, O, she was

an ancient gentlewoman: her name was Margery March-

beer. Now, Faustus, thou hast heard all my progeny, wilt

thou bid me to supper?”

dr faustus, scene VII, gluttony, tempting/threatening faustus as all seven sins are introduced

A: why so thou shalt whether thou dost it or no, for, sirrah, if thou dost not presently bind thyself unto me for seven years, I’ll turn all the live about the into familiars, and make them tear thee in pieces
B: Nay sir, you may yourself a labour, for they are as familiar with me as if they paid for their meat and drink, I can tell you

dr faustus, scene IV, Wagner and Robin/Clown, imagery of consumption and bodily harm, Clown turning down Wagner’s command to serve him

“…and lone ere this I should have slain my self,
Had not sweet pleasure conquered deep despair.
Have not I made blind Homer sing to me,
Of Alexander’s lover, and Oenone’s death,
And hath not he that built the walls of Thebes
With ravishing sound of his melodious harp
Made music with my Mephastophilis,
Why should I dye then, or basely despair?
I am resolved XXX shall never repent.”

dr faustus, scene VII, resolving to not repent

“Was this the face that launched a thousand ships
And burnt the topless Towers of Ilium?
Sweet Helen, come, give me my soul again.
Here will I swell, for heaven be in these lips,
And all is dross that is not Helena”

dr faustus, scene 17, faustus, addressing the spirit of helen which mephistophilis summons

“What piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how

infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and

admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how

like a god: the beauty of the world, the paragon of animals!

And yet to me what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights

not me – not woman neither, though by your smiling you

seem to say so”

hamlet, 2.2, hamlet, responding to and then dismissing the new prevaling renaissance ideology of man at the centre of universe, e.g. da vinci vitruvian man, giovanni a pico’s oration on the ‘dignity of man’ etc

“ Within a month,

Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears

Had left the flushing in her gallèd eyes,

She married . .

It is not, nor it cannot come to good.

But break my heart, for I must hold my tongue”

hamlet, 1.2, hamlet decrying Gertrude’s marriage to claudius

“Seems, madam? Nay, it is. I know not “seems”.

‘Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,

Nor customary suits of solemn black,

Nor windy suspiration of forced breath,

No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,

Nor the dejected haviour of the visage,

Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief,

That can denote me truly. These indeed seem,

For they are actions that a man might play,

But I have that within which passes show –

These but the trappings and the suits of woe”

hamlet, 1.2, hamlet denies that he ‘seems’ sad because that fails to reflect the grief he genuinely feels. ties into core themes about acting, masks and pretense - as well as shows beginning of hamlet being a philosopher

“The chariest maid is prodigal enough

If she unmask her beauty to the moon.”

Hamlet, 1.3, Laertes’ advice to Ophelia, basically telling her to protect her honour, and only unmask herself to other virgins like Diana the mooon

“May one be pardoned and retain th’offense?

In the corrupted currents of this world

Offense’s gilded hand may shove by justice,

And oft ‘tis seen the wicked prize itself

Buys out the law. But ‘tis not so above.

There is no shuffling. There the action lies

In his true nature, and we ourselves compelled

Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults,

To give in evidence . . .

O wretched state! O bosom black as death!

O limèd soul, that struggling to be free

Art more engaged!”

hamlet, 3.3, claudius, praying for penance the first time hamlet attempts to kill him

“Dost thou hear?

Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice,

And could of men distinguish her election,

Sh’hath sealed thee for herself. For thou hast been

As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing,

A man that Fortune’s buffets and rewards

Hast ta’en with equal thanks. And blest are those

Whose blood and judgement are so well commedled

That they are not a pipe for Fortune’s finger

To sound what stop she please.”

GAY. hamlet, 3.2, hamlet addressing Horatio, presenting horatio as ‘stoic ideal’, more roman than dane, also brings in idea of fortune’s wheel as significance. also GAY

“Examples gross as earth exhort me.

Witness this army of such mass and charge,

Led by a delicate and tender prince,

Whose spirit, with divine ambition puffed,

Makes mouths at the invisible event,

Exposing what is mortal and unsure

To all that fortune, death, and danger dare,

Even for an eggshell”

hamlet, 4.4, hamlet’s ‘how all occasions’ soliloquy, again comparing himself to fortinbras as the idea of action and honour, while hamlet fails to do the say

A: I did enact Julius Caesar. I was killed i’th’Capitol. Brutus killed me.

B:It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there.

hamlet, 3.2, polonius and hamlet, central theme of acting, mocking polonius

“Yet I,

A dull and muddy-mettled rascal, peak

Like John-a-dreams, unpregnant of my

cause,

And can say nothing, no, not for a king

Upon whose property and most dear life

A damned defeat was made”

hamlet, 2.2, hamlet’s soliloquy comparing the player to himself

“Too much of water hast thou, poor

XXX,

And therefore I forbid my tears; but yet

It is our trick; nature her custom holds,

Let shame say what it will. When these are

gone,

The woman will be out ...

I have a speech o’ fire that fain would blaze

But that this folly drowns it

hamlet, end of 4.7, laertes mourning ophelia, laertes doesn’t want to show ‘feminine’ emotions, but stick to actions and ‘masculine’ honour

A: O shame, where is thy blush?

Rebellious hell,

If thou canst mutine in a matron's bones,

To flaming youth let virtue be as wax

And melt in her own fire. Proclaim no shame

When the compulsive ardour gives the charge,

Since frost itself as actively doth burn,

And reason panders will.

B: Oh, XXXX speak no more!

Thou turn'st mine eyes into my very soul,

And there I see such black and grainèd spots

As will not leave their tinct. (3.4)

hamlet, 3.4, hamlet chastising gertrude for her actions

“Let it work.

For ’tis the sport to have the enginer

Hoist with his own petard, and’t shall go hard

But I will delve one yard below their mines

And blow them at the moon.”

hamlet, 3.4, hamlet telling gertrude about his plan with the letters to get Rosencratz and Guildenstern killed with their own letters, irony of them being killed by their own plotting

“Not a whit. We defy augury. There is special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, ‘tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all. Since no man of aught he leaves knows, what is’t to leave betimes?* Let be”

hamlet, 5.2, accepting his death if it is to come, rather than heeding any ill warnings, thinking his death may be worth it if it is to come, and if it allows him to fulfill his larger purpose

“O, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown!

The courtier's, scholar's, soldier's, eye, tongue, sword,

Th' expectancy and rose of the fair state,

The glass of fashion and the mould of form,

Th' observ'd of all observers- quite, quite down!

And I, of ladies most deject and wretched,

That suck'd the honey of his music vows,

Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,

Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh;

That unmatch'd form and feature of blown youth

Blasted with ecstasy. O, woe is me

T' have seen what I have seen, see what I see!”

hamlet, 3.1, ophelia’s soliloquy, discussing hamlet’s descent into madness, mourning his loss, following the to be or not to be soliloquy

“Royal lecher: go, grey haired Adultery,

And thou his son, as impious steeped as he:

And thou his bastard true-begot in evil:

And thou his duchess that will do with the devil:

Four ex’llent characters! – O that marrowless age

Would stuff the hollow bones with damned desires,

And ’stead of heat kindle infernal fires

Within the spendthrift veins of a dry duke,

A parched and juiceless luxur. O God! one

That has scarce blood enough to live upon,

And he to riot it like a son and heir?”

revenger’s tragedy, 1.1, vindice, entering lines of the play, holding a skull as he condemns the duke, the duke’s son, the duke’s bastard and the duchess before moving on to mourning his betrothed

“Brother, if he but wink, not brooking the foul object,

Let our two other hands tear up his lids

And make his eyes, like comets, shine through blood.

When the bad bleeds, then is the tragedy good.

. . .

The dukedom wants a head, though yet unknown;

As fast as they peep up, let’s cut ’em down.”

revenger’s tragedy, 3.5, vindice, murder of the duke alongside his brother Hippolito, making the duke watch spurio and the duchess hook up

A. What hast been? Of what profession?

B. A bone-setter.

A. A bone-setter!

B. A bawd, my lord;

One that sets bones together.

A. Notable bluntness!

revenger’s tragedy, 1.3, lussurio and vindice, vindice pretending to be Piato so that Lussurio will hire him to work for him, and then he can undermine Lussurio’s plotting. symbolising ‘sex-death' nexus’, someone who fixes both bones in bodies and relationships ie sex

“Some fathers dread not, gone to bed in wine,

To slide from the mother and cling the daughter-in-law;

Some uncles are adulterous with their nieces,

Brothers with brothers’ wives. Oh, hour of incest!

Any kin now next to the rim o’ the sister

Is man’s meat in these days, and in the morning,

When they are up and dressed and their mask on,

Who can perceive this, save that eternal eye

That sees through flesh and all?”

revenger’s tragedy, 1.3, vindice, first meeting with Lussurio as Piato, attesting to all the sin he has seen in the world, ‘eternal eye’ symbolises God’s omniscience, theme of sin being commonplace and also of vindice as a moral hand for heaven…

“So shall you hear

Of carnal, bloody, and unnatural acts,

Of accidental judgments, casual slaughters,

Of deaths put on by cunning and forced cause,

And, in this upshot, purposes mistook

Fall’n on th’ inventors’ heads.”

hamlet, 5.2, horatio addressing fortinbras as epilogue, core idea of people being killed by their own plotting

Does the silkworm expend her yellow labours

For thee? For thee does she undo herself?

Are lordships sold to maintain ladyships

For the poor benefit of a bewitching minute?

[...]

Does every proud and self-affecting dame

Camphor her face for this, and grieve her maker

In sinful baths of milk, when many an infant starves

For her superfluous outside – all for this?

(3.5.70-85)

revenger’s tragedy, 3.5, vindice, addressing Gloriana’s skull dressed up, belittling women who dress up and wear makeup, potentially even addressing women in the audience, intending to use said skull as the women the duke hired him to find for a clandestine meeting

“How hardly shall that maiden be beset

Whose only fortunes are her constant thoughts;

That has no other child’s-part but her honour,

That keeps her low and empty in estate.

Maids and their honours are like poor beginners:

Were not sin rich there would be fewer sinners.

Why had not virtue a revenue? Well,

I know the cause: ’twould have impoverished hell.”

revenger’s tragedy, 2.1, castiza, soliloquy alone, before her mother demands she give up her chastity to be Lussurio’s mistress, before vindice-as-piato’s visitation. regretting her poor wealth, but valuing her virtue as more than money/even as all she has

“Walk with a hundred acres on their backs –

Fair meadows cut into green foreparts. O,

It was the greatest blessing ever happened to women

When farmers’ sons agreed, and met again,

To wash their hands and come up gentlemen;

The commonwealth has flourished ever since.

Lands that were mete by the rod, that labour’s spared;

Tailors ride down and measure ’em by the yard.

Fair trees, those comely foretops of the field,

Are cut to maintain head-tires: much untold.

All thrives but Chastity; she lies a-cold.”

revenger’s tragedy, 2.1, vindice-as-piato, trying to convince gratiana to convince castiza to sacrifice her chastity and be lussurio’s mistress. lots of sexual innuendos, communicating that wealth is more important than virtue

“O think upon the pleasure of the palace,

Securèd ease and state; the stirring meats,

Ready to move out of the dishes,

That e’en now quicken when they’re eaten;

Banquets abroad by torchlight, music, sports;

Bare-headed vassals that had ne’er the fortune

To keep on their own hats, but let horns wear ’em;

Nine coaches waiting, – hurry, hurry, hurry

revenger’s tragedy, 2.1, vindice-as-piato, trying to convince castiza and gratiana to forsake chastity in favour of being lussurio’s mistress

“What, stiff and cold already?

O pardon me to call you from your names;

’Tis none of your deed. That villain Piato,

Whom you thought now to kill, has murdered him,

And left him thus disguised.”

revenger’s tragedy, 5.1, lussurio, upon discovering that the stabbed man is not piato but the already-dead duke, interesting parallel of vindice killing himself

“Duke, thou did’st do me wrong and by thy act

Adultery is my nature;

Faith, if the truth were known, I was begot

After some gluttonous dinner – some stirring dish

Was my first father, when deep healths went round

And ladies’ cheeks were painted red with wine,

Their tongues as short and nimble as their heels,

Uttering words sweet and thick; and when they rose

Were merrily disposed to fall again.

In such a whispering and withdrawing hour,

When base male bawds kept sentinel at stair-head

Was I stol’n softly; – O, damnation met

The sin of feasts, drunken adultery.

I feel it swell me; my revenge is just;

I was begot in impudent wine and lust….”

revenger’s tragedy, 1.2, spurio, soliloquy in which he decides to start an affair with the duchess in order to get back at his father, theme of symmetry by which people are harmed by the same thing that they use to harm others

“I marked not this before:

A prayer book the pillow to her cheek;

This was her rich confection, and another

Placed in the right hand, with a leaf tucked up,

Pointing to these words:

Melius virtute mori, quam per dedecus vivere.*

True and effectual it is indeed”

revenger’s tragedy, 1.4, antonio telling lords about the death of his wife, who poisoned herself after being raped by Lussurio. women better dead than not chaste, ‘better die virtuous than live dishonoured’, shows stark contrast with men’s behaviour and also significance for castiza

“Mark, thunder! Dost know thy cue, thou big-voiced crier?

Duke’s groans are thunder’s watchwords.”

…

“No power is angry when the lustful die;

When thunder claps, heaven likes the tragedy.”

revenger’s tragedy, vindice, 5.3, vindice as the revengers killing Lussurio and lords, thunder as a heavenly portent and morality symbol, also fourth wall break as he knows his ‘cue’, idea of vindice as tool of morality