HELEN

WOMEN OF TROY
Euripides

In this scene, Helen is defending her actions, and explaining why she ran away from
her husband Menelaus, to live with Paris, a Trojan prince, in Troy.

HELEN: It may be that, how false or true soe'er

Thou deem me, I shall win no word from thee.
So sore thou holdest me thine enemy.
Yet I will take what words I think thy heart
Holdeth of anger: and in even part
Set my wrong and thy wrong, and all that fell.
(Pointing to Hecuba) She cometh first, who bare the seed and well
Of springing sorrow, when to life she brought Paris: and that old
King, who quenched not
Quick in the spark, ere yet he woke to slay,
The fire-brand's image.—
But enough: a day
Came, and this Paris judged beneath the trees
Three Crowns of Life, three diverse Goddesses.
The gift of Pallas was of War, to lead
His East in conquering battles, and make bleed
The hearths of Hellas. Hera held a
Throne-- If majesties he craved--to reign alone
From Phrygia to the last realm of the West.
And Cypris, if he deemed her loveliest,
Beyond all heaven, made dreams about my face
And for her grace gave me.
And, lo! her grace
Was judged the fairest, and she stood above
Those twain.—

Thus was I loved, and thus my love

Hath holpen Hellas.
No fierce Eastern crown
Is o'er your lands, no spear hath cast them down.
O, it was well for Hellas!
But for me
Most ill; caught up and sold across the sea
For this my beauty; yea, dishonoured
For that which else had been about my head
A crown of honour....

Ah, I see thy thought; T

he first plain deed, 'tis that I answer not,
How in the dark out of thy house I fled....
There came the Seed of Fire, this woman's seed;
Came - O, a Goddess great walked with him then—

1
This Alexander, Breaker-down-of-Men,
This Paris, strength-is-with-him; whom thou, whom—
O false and light of heart--thou in thy room
Didst leave, and spreadest sail for Cretan seas, Far, far from me!...
And yet, how strange it is! I
ask not thee; I ask my own sad thought,
What was there in my heart, that I forgot
My home and land and all I loved, to fly
With a strange man?
Surely it was not I,
But Cypris, there!
Lay thou thy rod on her,
And be more high than Zeus and bitterer,
Who o'er all other spirits hath his throne,
But knows her chain must bind him.
My wrong done
Hath its own pardon....
One word yet thou hast,
Methinks, of righteous seeming.
When at last
The earth for Paris oped and all was o'er,
And her strange magic bound my feet no more,
Why kept I still his house, why fled not I
To the Argive ships?...
Ah, how I strove to fly!
The old Gate-Warden could have told thee all,
My husband, and the watchers from the wall;
It was not once they took me, with the rope
Tied, and this body swung in the air, to grope
Its way toward thee, from that dim battlement.
Ah, husband still, how shall thy hand be bent
To slay me? Nay, if
Right be come at last,
What shalt thou bring but comfort for pains past,
And harbour for a woman storm-driven:
A woman borne away by violent men:
And this one birthright of my beauty, this
That might have been my glory, lo, it is
A stamp that God hath burned, of slavery!
Alas! and if thou cravest still to be
As one set above gods, inviolate,
'Tis but a fruitless longing holds thee yet.

2
 ANTIGONE

ANTIGONE
Sophocles

In this scene, Antigone, a princess of Greece, has been condemned to death for
performing burial rites on her brother Polynices, who had been as a traitor by Creon,
the King of Greece. She is standing up to Creon, defending her decision.

ANTIGONE:
So to my grave,
My bridal-bower, my everlasting prison,
I go, to join those many of my kinsmen
Who dwell in the mansions of Persephone,
Last and unhappiest, before my time.
Yet I believe my father will be there
To welcome me, my mother greet me gladly,
And you, my brother, gladly see me come.
Each one of you my hands have laid to rest,
Pouring the due libations on your graves.
It was by this service to your dear body, Polynices,
I earned the punishment which now I suffer,
Though all good people know it was for your honour.
O but I would not have done the forbidden thing
For any husband or for any son.
For why? I could have had another husband
And by him other sons, if one were lost;
But, father and mother lost, where would I get
Another brother? For thus preferring you,
My brother, Creon condemns me and hales me away,
Never a bride, never a mother, unfriended,
Condemned alive to solitary death.
What law of heaven have I transgressed? What god
Can save me now? What help or hope have I,
In whom devotion is deemed sacrilege?
If this is God’s will, I shall learn my lesson
In death; but if my enemies are wrong,
I wish them no worse punishment than mine.

3
 CLYTEMNESTRA

AGAMEMNON
Aeschylus

Ten years previously, Agamemnon set sail to fight the Trojan Wars, and in order to
get wind for his sails, he strapped his daughter to the mast of his ship and offered
her as a sacrifice to the gods. On his return, Clytemnestra sought her revenge for the
death of their daughter, and killed Agamemnon. In this speech, she is defending her
actions.

CLYTEMNESTRA:
Though much to suit the times before was said,
It shames me not the opposite to speak:
For, plotting against foes,--our seeming friends,--
How else contrive with Ruin's wily snare,
Too high to overleap, to fence them round?
To me, not mindless of an ancient feud,
Hath come at last this contest;--late indeed.
The deed achieved, here stand I, where I slew.
So was it wrought (and this I'll not deny),
That he could neither 'scape, nor ward his doom;
Around him, like a fish-encircling net,
This garment's deadly splendour did I cast;--
Him twice I smote, and he, with twofold groan,
His limbs relaxed;--then, prostrate where he lay,
Him with third blow I dowered, votive gift
To nether Hades, saviour of the dead.
Thus as he fell he chafed his soul away;
And gurgling forth the swift death-tide of blood,
He smites me with black drops of gory dew,
Not less exultant than, with heaven-sent joy
The corn-sown land, in birth-hour of the ear.
For this great issue, Argive Senators,
Joy ye, if joy ye can, but I exult.
Nay, o'er the slain were off'rings meet,--with right
Here were they poured,--with emphasis of right.
Such goblets having filled with cursed ills
At home,--himself on his return drains off.
Me thou dost doom to exile,--to endure
The people's hate, their curse deep-muttered,--thou,
Who 'gainst this man of yore hadst naught to urge.
He, all unmoved, as though brute life he quenched,
The while his fleecy pastures teem'd with flocks,
His own child slaughtered,--of my travail throes
To me the dearest,--charm for Thracian blasts.
Him shouldst thou not have chased from land and home
Just guerdon for foul deed? Stern judge thou art
When me thou dost arraign;--but, mark my words, (
Nerved as I am to threat on equal terms,)

4
If with strong hand ye conquer me, then rule;--
But should the god decree the opposite,
Though late, to sober sense shalt thou be schooled.

5
 NURSE

MEDEA
Euripides

The Nurse fulfills a choral role in the play. Here she explains to the audience at the
beginning of the play who Medea is and how she has been betrayed by her husband
Jason. The Nurse obviously knows Medea well, and her fear for how Medea is
reacting, and what she might do in response, helps to create a great sense of
foreboding at the beginning of the play.

NURSE:

6
7
 LADY MACBETH

MACBETH
William Shakespeare

In this scene, Macbeth has come back from trying to kill the king, and decided
against it. Lady Macbeth is persuading her husband to do the deed.

LADY MACBETH:
Was the hope drunk
Wherein you dress'd yourself? hath it slept since?
And wakes it now, to look so green and pale
At what it did so freely? From this time
Such I account thy love. Art thou afeard
To be the same in thine own act and valour
As thou art in desire? Wouldst thou have that
Which thou esteem'st the ornament of life,
And live a coward in thine own esteem,
Letting 'I dare not' wait upon 'I would,'
Like the poor cat i' the adage?
What beast was't, then,
That made you break this enterprise to me?
When you durst do it, then you were a man;
And, to be more than what you were, you would
Be so much more the man. Nor time nor place
Did then adhere, and yet you would make both:
They have made themselves, and that their fitness now
Does unmake you. I have given suck, and know
How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me:
I would, while it was smiling in my face,
Have pluck'd my nipple from his boneless gums,
And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn as you
Have done to this.

We fail!
But screw your courage to the sticking-place,
And we'll not fail. When Duncan is asleep—
Whereto the rather shall his day's hard journey
Soundly invite him—his two chamberlains
Will I with wine and wassail so convince
That memory, the warder of the brain,
Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason
A limbeck only: when in swinish sleep
Their drenched natures lie as in a death,
What cannot you and I perform upon
The unguarded Duncan? what not put upon
His spongy officers, who shall bear the guilt
Of our great quell?

8
 CHORUS

HENRY V
William Shakespeare

The Chorus introduces the story of Henry V, explaining that the audience must work
their own imaginations to be able to picture the full glory of the story the company will
perform

CHORUS:
O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention,
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!
Then should the warlike Harry, like himself,
Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,
Leash'd in like hounds, should famine, sword and fire
Crouch for employment. But pardon, and gentles all,
The flat unraised spirits that have dared
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth
So great an object: can this cockpit hold
The vasty fields of France? or may we cram
Within this wooden O the very casques
That did affright the air at Agincourt?
O, pardon! since a crooked figure may
Attest in little place a million;
And let us, ciphers to this great accompt,
On your imaginary forces work.
Suppose within the girdle of these walls
Are now confined two mighty monarchies,
Whose high upreared and abutting fronts
The perilous narrow ocean parts asunder:
Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts;
Into a thousand parts divide on man,
And make imaginary puissance;
Think when we talk of horses, that you see them
Printing their proud hoofs i' the receiving earth;
For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings,
Carry them here and there; jumping o'er times,
Turning the accomplishment of many years
Into an hour-glass: for the which supply,
Admit me Chorus to this history;
Who prologue-like your humble patience pray,
Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play.
Exit

9
 OPHELIA

HAMLET
William Shakespeare

Ophelia is talking to her father about an upsetting conversation with her fiancée,
Hamlet,Prince of Denmark, who appeared to her disturbed and confused.

OPHELIA:
O my lord, my lord, I have been so affrighted
(Polonius: With what, i’ th’ name of God?)
My lord, as I was sewing in my closet,
Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbrac'd,
No hat upon his head, his stockings foul'd,
Ungart'red, and down-gyved to his ankle;
Pale as his shirt, his knees knocking each other,
And with a look so piteous in purport
As if he had been loosed out of hell
To speak of horrors- he comes before me.
He took me by the wrist and held me hard;
Then goes he to the length of all his arm,
And, with his other hand thus o'er his brow,
He falls to such perusal of my face
As he would draw it. Long stay'd he so.
At last, a little shaking of mine arm,
And thrice his head thus waving up and down,
He rais'd a sigh so piteous and profound
As it did seem to shatter all his bulk
And end his being. That done, he lets me go,
And with his head over his shoulder turn'd
He seem'd to find his way without his eyes,
For out o' doors he went without their help
And to the last bended their light on me.

10
 KATHERINE

THE TAMING OF THE SHREW

William Shakespeare

Katherine has been summoned by her husband Petruchio to explain to the other
women present how important it is to be obedient to your husband. Although she
had a reputation for being a ‘shrew’ (an angry woman, who shouts at and scolds
men), here she does as she has been asked by her husband, to the amazement of
the people in the room.

KATHERINE:
Fie, fie, unknit that threat’ning unkind brow
And dart not scornful glances from those eyes
To wound thy lord, the king, thy governor.
It blots thy beauty as frosts do bite the meads,
Confounds thy fame as whirlwinds shake fair buds,
And in no sense is meet or amiable.
A woman moved is like a fountain troubled,
Muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty,
And while it is so, none so dry or thirsty
Will deign to sip or touch one drop of it.
Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper,
Thy head, thy sovereign; one that cares for thee
And for thy maintenance; commits his body
To painful labour both by sea and land,
To watch the night is storms, the day in cold,
Whilst thou li’st warm at home, secure and safe;
And craves no other tribute at thy hands
But love, fair looks, and true obedience—
Too little payment for so great a debt.
Such duty as the subject owes the prince,
Even such a woman oweth to her husband;
And when she is froward, peevish, sullen, sour,
And not obedient to his honest will,
What is she but a foul contending rebel
And graceless traitor to her loving lord?
I am ashamed that women are so simple
To offer war where they should kneel for peace,
Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway,
When they are bound to serve, love, and obey.
Why are our bodies soft and weak and smooth,
Unapt to toil and trouble in the world,
But that our soft conditions and our hearts
Should well agree with our external parts?
Come come you froward and unable worms

11
 JACK HORNER

THE COUNTRY WIFE

JOHN WYCHERLY

Horner is a fop who loves chasing women. Here he admits that he pretends publicly
to be impotent (not to be able to have sex) so that he can chase as many women as
he likes because men trust him around their wives and women don’t worry about
their reputations.

HORNER:
Thou art an Ass; don't you see already upon the report
and my carriage, this grave Man of business leaves his
Wife in my lodgings, invites me to his house and wife, who
before wou'd not be acquainted with me out of jealousy.

Let me alone, if I can but abuse the Husbands, I'll

soon disabuse the Wives: Stay---I'll reckon you up the advantages,
I am like to have by my Stratagem: First, I shall
be rid of all my old Acquaintances, the most insatiable sorts
of Duns, that invade our Lodgings in a morning: And next,
to the pleasure of making a New Mistriss, is that of being
rid of an old One, and of all old Debts; Love when it comes
to be so, is paid the most unwillingly.

Doctor, thou wilt never make a good Chymist, thou

art so incredulous and impatient;
ask but all the young Fellows
of the Town, if they do not loose more time like Huntsmen,
in starting the game, than in running it down; one
knows not where to find'em. who will, or will not; Women
of Quality are so civil, you can hardly distinguish love from
good breeding, and a Man is often mistaken; but now I can
be sure, she that shews an aversion to me loves the sport,
as those Women that are gone, whom I warrant to be right:
And then the next thing, is your Women of Honour, as you
call'em, are only chary of their reputations, not their Persons,
and 'tis scandal they wou'd avoid, not Men: Now may
I have, by the reputation of an Eunuch, the Priviledges of
One; and be seen in a Ladies Chamber, in a morning as
early as her Husband; kiss Virgins before their Parents, or
Lovers; and may be in short
the Pas par tout of the Town.
Now Doctor.

12
 TONY LUMPKIN

SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER

Oliver Goldsmith

13
14
 MARGERY PINCHWIFE

THE COUNTRY WIFE

JOHN WYCHERLY

Pinchwife is from London, where he thinks women are all engaged in having affairs
with different men and generally behaving badly. Because of this, he decides to
marry Margery, a country girl who he thinks will be more virtuous. As soon as he
marries her though, he starts to worry about protecting her from all the bad
influences of the city. Margery, on the other hand, wants to experience everything
the city has to offer – especially the men.

Mrs. Margery Pinchwife, and Alithea: Mr. Pinchwife peeping behind at the door.

MARGERY:
Pray, Sister, where are the best Fields and Woods,
to walk in in London?

Pray, Sister, tell me why my Husband looks so

grum here in Town? and keeps me up so close, and will not
let me go a walking, nor let me wear my best Gown yesterday?

Jealous, what's that?

How shou'd he be afraid of my loving another

man, when he will not let me see any but himself.
Oh, he carried me yesterday to a Play,
Ay, but we sate amongst ugly People, he wou'd
not let me come near the Gentry, who sate under us, so that
I cou'd not see'em: He told me, none but naughty Women
sate there, whom they tous'd and mous'd; but I wou'd have
ventur'd for all that.

Alith.
But how did you like the Play? /

MARGERY:
Indeed I was aweary of the Play, but I lik'd hugeously
the Actors; they are the goodlyest proper'st Men,
Sister.
Ay, how shou'd I help it, Sister? Pray, Sister,
when my Husband comes in, will you ask leave for me to go a
walking?

He says he won't let me go abroad, for fear of

catching the Pox.

Oh my dear, dear Bud, welcome home; why

dost thou look so fropish, who has nanger'd thee?

15
 LADY WISHFORT

THE WAY OF THE WORLD

William Congreve

Lady Wishfort is a wealthy but mean aunt in the play, who doesn’t want the central
couple in the play to marry because she doesn’t approve of Mirabelle (the main male
love interest). She is withholding Millamant (the main female love interest and her
niece)’s dowry so that they can’t marry. In this scene we see her impatiently waiting
for a visitor, drinking too much and being difficult with her servants.

LADY WISHFORT:
Merciful! No news of Foible yet?

I have no more patience. If I have not fretted myself till I am

pale again, there’s no veracity in me. Fetch me the red—the red, do you
hear, sweetheart? An errant ash colour, as I’m a person. Look you how
this wench stirs! Why dost thou not fetch me a little red? Didst thou
not hear me, Mopus?

Ratafia, fool? No, fool. Not the ratafia, fool—grant me

patience!—I mean the Spanish paper, idiot; complexion, darling. Paint,
paint, paint, dost thou understand that, changeling, dangling thy hands
like bobbins before thee? Why dost thou not stir, puppet? Thou wooden
thing upon wires!

A pox take you both.—Fetch me the cherry brandy then.

I’m as pale and as faint, I look like Mrs. Qualmsick, the curate’s wife,
that’s always breeding. Wench, come, come, wench, what art thou doing?
Sipping? Tasting? Save thee, dost thou not know the bottle?

Enter PEG _with a bottle and china cup_.

A cup, save thee, and what a cup hast thou brought! Dost thou
take me for a fairy, to drink out of an acorn? Why didst thou not bring
thy thimble? Hast thou ne’er a brass thimble clinking in thy pocket with
a bit of nutmeg? I warrant thee. Come, fill, fill. So, again. See who
that is. [_One knocks_.] Set down the bottle first. Here, here, under
the table:—what, wouldst thou go with the bottle in thy hand like a
tapster? As I’m a person, this wench has lived in an inn upon the road,
before she came to me, like Maritornes the Asturian in Don Quixote. No
Foible yet?

Oh, Marwood: let her come in. Come in, good Marwood.

16
 CECILY

THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST

Oscar Wilde

Cecily is a young girl, who lives in the country. Her guardian (Jack Worthing) divides
his time between London and the country. In order to get back up to London
whenever he wants, he has invented an imaginary wicked younger brother called
Ernest, who he says he has to keep going back to rescue from various scrapes. His
London friend, Algernon, has learned about this, and come down to the country
posing as the imaginary Ernest. In this scene, Cecily tells Algernon/Ernest that they
have been engaged for months (even though this is the first time they have met).

CECILY:
[Enter Cecily at the back of the garden. She picks up the can and begins to water the
flowers.] CEC Oh, I merely came back to water the roses. I thought you were with
Uncle Jack.

Oh, is he going to take you for a nice drive? Then have we got to part? It is always
painful to part from people whom one has known for a very brief space of time. The
absence of old friends one can endure with equanimity. But even a momentary
separation from anyone to whom one has just been introduced is almost unbearable.

ALG I hope, Cecily, I shall not offend you if I state quite frankly and openly that you
seem to me to be in every way the visible personification of absolute perfection.

CEC I think your frankness does you great credit, Ernest. If you will allow me I will
copy your remarks into my diary. [Goes over to table and begins writing in diary.]

Oh no. [Puts her hand over it.] You see, it is simply a very young girl’s record of her
own thoughts and impressions, and consequently meant for publication. When it
appears in volume form I hope you will order a copy. But pray, Ernest, don’t stop. I
delight in taking down from dictation. I have reached “absolute perfection.” You can
go on. I am quite ready for more.

Oh, don’t cough, Ernest. When one is dictating one should speak fluently and not
cough. Besides, I don’t know how to spell a cough. [Writes as Algernon speaks.]
I don’t think that you should tell me that you love me wildly, passionately, devotedly,
hopelessly. Hopelessly doesn’t seem to make much sense, does it?

Uncle Jack would be very much annoyed if he knew you were staying on till next
week, at the same hour.

You silly boy! Of course. Why, we have been engaged for the last three months.
ALG For the last three months? CEC Yes, it will be exactly, three months on
Thursday.

17
 Well, ever since dear Uncle Jack first confessed to us that he had a younger brother
who was very wicked and bad, you of course have formed the chief topic of
conversation between myself and Miss Prism. And of course a man who is much
talked about is always very attractive. One feels there must be something in him
after all. I daresay it was foolish of me, but I fell in love with you, Ernest.

On the 14th of February last. Worn out by your entire ignorance of my existence, I
determined to end the matter one way or the other, and after a long struggle with
myself I accepted you under this dear told tree here. The next day I bought this little
ring in your name, and this is the little bangle with the true lovers’ knot I promised
you always to wear.

Yes, you’ve wonderfully good taste, Ernest. It’s the excuse I’ve always given for your
leading such a bad life. And this is the box in which I keep all your dear letters.
[Kneels at table, opens box, and produces letters tied up with blue ribbon.]

You need hardly remind me of that, Ernest. I remember only too well that I was
forced to write your letters for you. I always wrote three times a week, and
sometimes oftener.
CEC Oh, I couldn’t possibly. They would make you far too conceited. [Replaces box.]
The three you wrote me after I had broken off the engagement are so beautiful, and
so badly spelled, that even now I can hardly read them without crying a little.

Of course it was. On the 22nd of last March. You can see the entry if you like.
[Shows diary.] “To-day I broke off my engagement with Ernest. I feel it is better to do
so. The weather still continues charming.”

It would hardly have been a really serious engagement if it hadn’t been broken off at
least once. But I forgave you before the week was out.
You dear romantic boy. [He kisses her, she puts her fingers through his hair.] I hope
your hair curls naturally, does it?

I am so glad. I don’t think I could break it off now that I have actually met you.
Besides, of course, there is the question of your name. You must not laugh at me,
darling, but it had always been a girlish dream of mine to love some one whose
name was Ernest. [Algernon rises, Cecily also.] There is something in that name that
seems to inspire absolute confidence. I pity any poor married woman whose
husband is not called Ernest.
But what name?

[Rising.] I might respect you, Ernest, I might admire your character, but I fear that I
should not be able to give you my undivided attention.

Considering that we have been engaged since February the 14th, and that I only met
you to-day for the first time, I think it is rather hard that you should leave me for so
long a period as half an hour. Couldn’t you make it twenty minutes?. [He kisses her
and rushes down the garden.]

What an impetuous boy he is! I like his hair so much. I must enter his proposal in my
diary.

18
 ELIZA DOOLITTLE

PYGMALION
George Bernard Shaw

Eliza is a street flower seller from Covent Garden in London. Although she comes
from the streets and originally had a strong cockney (London) accent, she has been
living with famous speech and accent specialist Professor Henry Higgins. Through
long struggles, he has taught her how to speak like someone from the highest class,
with an incredibly posh accent. In this scene, she is being presented at a genteel
afternoon tea at Higgins’s mother’s house – it is the first time she has tried to pass
as a posh person amongst other posh people.

LIZA.
The shallow depression in the west of these islands is likely to move slowly in an
easterly direction. There are no indications of any great change in the barometrical
situation.

What is wrong with that, young man? I bet I got it right.

MRS. EYNSFORD HILL. I’m sure I hope

it won’t turn cold. There’s so much influenza
about. It runs right through our whole family
regularly every spring.

LIZA [darkly] My aunt died of influenza: so they said. [in the same tragic tone] But it’s
my belief they done the old woman in.

Y-e-e-e-es, Lord love you! Why should she die of influenza? She come through
diphtheria right enough the year before. I saw her with my own eyes. Fairly blue with
it, she was. They all thought she was dead; but my father he kept ladling gin down
her throat til she came to so sudden that she bit the bowl off the spoon.
[piling up the indictment] What call would a woman with that strength in her have to
die of influenza? What become of her new straw hat that should have come to me?
Somebody pinched it; and what I say is, them as pinched it done her in.

MRS. EYNSFORD HILL. What does doing

her in mean?
HIGGINS [hastily] Oh, that’s the new
small talk. To do a person in means to kill
them.
MRS. EYNSFORD HILL [to Eliza, horrified] You surely don’t believe that your aunt
was killed?

LIZA. Do I not! Them she lived with would have killed her for a hat-pin, let alone a
hat.

MRS. EYNSFORD HILL. But it can’t have

been right for your father to pour spirits down

19
her throat like that. It might have killed her.

LIZA. Not her. Gin was mother’s milk to her. Besides, he’d poured so much down his
own throat that he knew the good of it.
Drank! My word! Something chronic. It never did him no harm what I could see. But
then he did not keep it up regular. [Cheerfully] On the burst, as you might say, from
time to time. And always more agreeable when he had a drop in. When
he was out of work, my mother used to give him fourpence and tell him to go out and
not come back until he’d drunk himself cheerful and loving-like. There’s lots of
women has to make their husbands drunk to make them fit to live with. [Now quite at
her ease] You see, it’s like this. If a man has a bit of a conscience, it always takes
him when he’s sober; and then it makes him low-spirited. A drop of booze just takes
that off and makes him happy. [To Freddy, who is in convulsions of suppressed
laughter] Here! what are you sniggering at?

FREDDY. The new small talk. You do it so

awfully well.

LIZA. If I was doing it proper, what was you laughing at? [To Higgins] Have I said
anything I oughtn’t?

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 GUILDENSTERN

ROSENKRANTZ AND GUILDENSTERN ARE DEAD

Tom Stoppard

Guildenstern, and his friend Rosenkrantz are trapped in a play. The play is
Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and the last line of the play is a messenger announcing to
the Danish court “Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern are dead.” So the idea throughout
the play is that whatever they do, their death at the end is inescapable. They have
many adventures related to the original story in Hamlet and the play is very funny
(and weird) but in this final scene, both characters are faced with their deaths – and
finally disappear off stage.

GUILDENSTERN:
(broken): We've travelled too far, and our momentum has taken over; we move idly
towards eternity, without possibility of reprieve or hope of explanation.

England! That's a dead end. I never believed in it anyway.

I don't believe it - A shore, a harbour, say - and we get off and we stop someone and
say - Where's the king?- And he says, oh, you follow that road there and take the
first left and -( furiously). I don't believe any of it!

And even if we came face to face, what do we say?

What's it all about? -

I don't begin to understand. Who are all these people, what's it got to do with me?
You turn up out of the blue with some cock and bull story
-
ROS (with letter): We have a letter -

GUIL (snatches it, opens it): A letter - yes - that's true. That's something... a letter...
(reads). "As Englandis Denmark's faithful tributary... as love between them like the
palm might flourish, etcetera... that on the knowing of this contents, without delay of
any kind, should those bearers, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, put to sudden
death-" (He double takes. ROS snatches the letter. GUIL snatches it back. ROS
snatches it halfback. They read it again and look up.)

(quietly): Where we went wrong was getting on a boat. We can move, of course,
change direction, rattle about, but our movement is contained within a larger one that
carries us along as inexorably as the wind and current...

Why? Was it all for this? Who are we that so much should converge on our little
deaths? (In anguish to the PLAYER.) Who are we?

PLAYER: You are Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. That's enough.

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 GUIL: No - it is not enough. To be told so little - to such an end - and still, finally, to
be denied an explanation...

PLAYER: In our experience, most things end in death.

GUIL (fear, vengeance, scorn): Your experience?-Actors!

(He snatches a dagger from the PLAYER's belt and holds the point at the
PLAYER's throat: the PLAYER backs and GUIL advances, speaking more quietly.)
I'm talking about death-and you've never experienced that. And you cannot act it.
You die a thousand casual deaths-with none of that intensity which squeezes out
life... and no blood runs cold anywhere. Because even as you die you know that you
will come back in a different hat. But no one gets up after death-there is no applause
there is only silence and some second-hand clothes, and that's - death - (And he
pushes the blade in up to the hilt. The PLAYER stands with huge, terrible eyes,
clutches at the wound as the blade withdraws: he makes small weeping sounds and
falls to his knees, and then right down:) (While he is dying, GUIL, nervous, high,
almost hysterical, wheels on the TRAGEDIANS-) If we have a destiny, then so had
he - and if this is ours, then that was his - and if there are no explanations for us,
then let there be none for him –

(The TRAGEDIANS watch the PLAYER die: they watch with some interest. The
PLAYER finally lies still. A short moment of silence. Then the tragedians start to
applaud with genuine admiration. The PLAYER stands up, brushing himself down.)

PLAYER (He holds his hand out for the dagger. GUIL slowly puts the point of the
dagger on to the PLAYER's hand, and pushes ... the
blade slides back into the handle. The PLAYER smiles, reclaims the dagger.)

GUIL (tired, drained, but stilt an edge of impatience; over the mime):
No... no... not for us, not like that. Dying is not romantic, and death is not a game
which will soon be over... Death is not anything ... death is not... It's the absence of
presence, nothing more ... the endless time of never coming
back ... a gap you can't see, and when the wind blows through it, it makes no
sound...
(The light has gone upstage. Only GUIL and ROS are visible as ROS's; clapping
falters to silence.)
(Small pause.)
That's it, then, is it?
(No answer, he looks out front.)
The sun's going down. Or the earth's coming up, as the fashionable theory has it.
(Small pause.) Not that it makes any difference.
(Pause.)
What was it all about? When did it begin?
(Pause, no answer.)
Couldn't we just stay put? I mean no one is going to come on and drag us off....
They ll just have to wait. We're
still young ... fit... we've got years..(Pause. No answer.)
(A cry.) We've nothing wrong! We didn't harm anyone. Did we?
I can't remember.

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Our names shouted in a certain dawn ... a message ... a summons... there must
have been a moment, at the beginning, where we could have said-no. But somehow
we missed it.
(He looks round and sees he is alone.)
Rosen--?
Guil--?
(He gathers himself.)
Well, we'll know better next time. Now you see me, now you -
(And disappears.)

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 NORA

A DOLL’S HOUSE
Henrik Ibsen

Nora is Torvald’s wife – the story you have read about in the lit class. This is the
final scene, in which, completely disillusioned with her marriage, she decides to
leave her husband and try to go somewhere she can be free to grow up.

NORA:
It gives me great pain, Torvald, for you have always been
so kind to me, but I cannot help it. I do not love you any more.

Yes, absolutely clear and certain. That is the reason why I

will not stay here any longer.

It was tonight, when the wonderful thing did not

happen; then I saw you were not the man I had thought you were.

I have waited so patiently for eight years; for, goodness

knows, I knew very well that wonderful things don't happen every
day. Then this horrible misfortune came upon me; and then I felt
quite certain that the wonderful thing was going to happen at last.
When Krogstad's letter was lying out there, never for a moment
did I imagine that you would consent to accept this man's
conditions. I was so absolutely certain that you would say
to him: Publish the thing to the whole world. And when that was done--

When that was done, I was so absolutely certain, you would

come forward and take everything upon yourself, and say: I am the
guilty one.

Helmer. Nora--!

NORA: You mean that I would never have accepted such a sacrifice
on your part? No, of course not. But what would my assurances have
been worth against yours? That was the wonderful thing which I
hoped for and feared; and it was to prevent that, that I wanted
to kill myself.

Maybe I talk like a heedless child. But you neither think nor talk like the man I
could bind myself to. As soon as your fear was over--and it
was not fear for what threatened me, but for what might happen
to you--when the whole thing was past, as far as you were
concerned it was exactly as if nothing at all had happened.
Exactly as before, I was your little skylark, your doll,
which you would in future treat with doubly gentle care,
because it was so brittle and fragile. (Getting up.)
Torvald--it was then it dawned upon me that for eight

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years I had been living here with a strange man, and had
borne him three children--. Oh, I can't bear to think
of it! I could tear myself into little bits!

As I am now, I am no wife for you.

(She comes back with her cloak and hat and

a small bag which she puts on a chair by the table.)

(putting on her cloak). I cannot spend the night in a

strange man's room.

(Puts the shawl round her.) Goodbye, Torvald. I won't see

the little ones. I know they are in better hands than mine. As
I am now, I can be of no use to them.

Listen, Torvald. I have heard that when a wife deserts her

husband's house, as I am doing now, he is legally freed from all
obligations towards her. In any case, I set you free from all your
obligations. You are not to feel yourself bound in the slightest
way, any more than I shall. There must be perfect freedom on
both sides. See, here is your ring back. Give me mine.

That's right. Now it is all over. I have put the keys here.
The maids know all about everything in the house--better than I do.
Tomorrow, after I have left her, Christine will come here and
pack up my own things that I brought with me from home. I will
have them sent after me.

I know I shall often think of you, the children, and this house.

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