The arden shakespeare co.., p.349
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works, page 349
There are some anomalies and dislocations in the text which have been explained in various ways: some scholars have seen them as evidence of authorial revision, the Arden 2 editor ascribes them to oversights and changes of plan, while the editors of the Oxford Complete Works argue that the play was adapted after Shakespeare’s death, most likely by Thomas Middleton, who may also have had a hand in Macbeth and a larger one in Timon of Athens. The passages affected are the opening of 1.2, where there is a noticeable inconsistency over Mistress Overdone’s knowledge of Claudio’s arrest, and the Duke’s brief soliloquy at 4.1.60-5, which seems to have been transferred from his earlier speech at 3.2.179-82 in order to cover the conversation between Isabella and Mariana.
William Davenant adapted Measure for Measure in 1662 as The Law Against Lovers, a play which also took characters and situations from Much Ado About Nothing. Many people in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries found its subject-matter distasteful and its conclusion arbitrary: Charlotte Lennox, for example, compared Shakespeare’s version with Cinthio’s and roundly condemned the former for altering the story for the worse and introducing ‘low contrivance, absurd intrigue and improbable incidents … in order to bring about three or four weddings instead of one good beheading’ (Shakespeare Illustrated, 1753). Coleridge called it ‘a hateful work’, and twentieth-century attempts to rehabilitate it by interpreting it as a Christian parable (with the Duke as ‘power divine’) have not convinced everyone. It has, however, appealed to modern performers and critics as a play about repressed desire and sexual decadence set, prophetically, in Freud’s city of Vienna, and some powerful productions have emphasized the claustrophobia of its containment within the walls of convent, brothel and prison. In the theatre there is often a degree of suspense as to how Isabella will react to the Duke’s proposal of marriage in the final scene: Shakespeare gives her no verbal response.
The Arden text is based on the 1623 First Folio.
LIST OF ROLES
Vincentio, the DUKE
of Vienna
ANGELO
the Deputy
ESCALUS
an ancient lord
CLAUDIO
a young gentleman
LUCIO
a fantastic
Two other like GENTLEMEN
PROVOST
FRIAR Thomas or FRIAR PETER
JUSTICE
ELBOW
a simple constable
FROTH
a foolish gentleman
POMPEY
servant to Mistress Overdone
ABHORSON
an executioner
BARNARDINE
a dissolute prisoner
Varrius
a gentleman, friend to the Duke
ISABELLA
sister to Claudio
MARIANA
betrothed to Angelo
JULIET
beloved of Claudio
Francisca, a NUN
MISTRESS OVERDONE
a bawd
Lords in attendance, Officers, Servants, Citizens and a Boy
1.1 Enter DUKE, ESCALUS, lords and attendants.
DUKE Escalus.
ESCALUS My lord.
DUKE Of government the properties to unfold
Would seem in me t’affect speech and discourse,
Since I am put to know that your own science
5
Exceeds, in that, the lists of all advice
My strength can give you. Then no more remains
But that, to your sufficiency, as your worth is able,
And let them work. The nature of our people,
Our city’s institutions, and the terms
10
For common justice, y’are as pregnant in
As art and practice hath enriched any
That we remember. There is our commission,
From which we would not have you warp. Call hither,
I say, bid come before us Angelo. Exit an attendant.
15
What figure of us, think you, he will bear?
For you must know, we have with special soul
Elected him our absence to supply;
Lent him our terror, drest him with our love,
And given his deputation all the organs
20
Of our own power. What think you of it?
ESCALUS If any in Vienna be of worth
To undergo such ample grace and honour,
It is Lord Angelo.
Enter ANGELO.
DUKE Look where he comes.
ANGELO Always obedient to your Grace’s will,
25
I come to know your pleasure.
DUKE Angelo:
There is a kind of character in thy life
That to th’observer doth thy history
Fully unfold. Thyself and thy belongings
Are not thine own so proper as to waste
30
Thyself upon thy virtues, they on thee.
Heaven doth with us as we with torches do,
Not light them for themselves; for if our virtues
Did not go forth of us, ’twere all alike
As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touch’d
35
But to fine issues; nor nature never lends
The smallest scruple of her excellence
But, like a thrifty goddess, she determines
Herself the glory of a creditor,
Both thanks and use. But I do bend my speech
40
To one that can my part in him advertise:
Hold therefore, Angelo.
In our remove, be thou at full ourself.
Mortality and mercy in Vienna
Live in thy tongue, and heart. Old Escalus,
45
Though first in question, is thy secondary.
Take thy commission.
ANGELO Now, good my lord,
Let there be some more test made of my metal,
Before so noble and so great a figure
Be stamp’d upon it.
DUKE No more evasion.
50
We have with a leaven’d and prepared choice
Proceeded to you; therefore take your honours.
Our haste from hence is of so quick condition
That it prefers itself, and leaves unquestion’d
Matters of needful value. We shall write to you,
55
As time and our concernings shall importune,
How it goes with us; and do look to know
What doth befall you here. So, fare you well.
To th’hopeful execution do I leave you
Of your commissions.
ANGELO Yet give leave, my lord,
60
That we may bring you something on the way.
DUKE My haste may not admit it;
Nor need you, on mine honour, have to do
With any scruple. Your scope is as mine own,
So to enforce or qualify the laws
65
As to your soul seems good. Give me your hand;
I’ll privily away. I love the people,
But do not like to stage me to their eyes:
Though it do well, I do not relish well
Their loud applause and Aves vehement;
70
Nor do I think the man of safe discretion
That does affect it. Once more, fare you well.
ANGELO The heavens give safety to your purposes!
ESCALUS Lead forth and bring you back in happiness!
DUKE I thank you; fare you well. Exit.
75
ESCALUS I shall desire you, sir, to give me leave
To have free speech with you; and it concerns me
To look into the bottom of my place.
A power I have, but of what strength and nature
I am not yet instructed.
80
ANGELO ’Tis so with me. Let us withdraw together,
And we may soon our satisfaction have
Touching that point.
ESCALUS I’ll wait upon your honour.
Exeunt.
1.2 Enter LUCIO and two other Gentlemen.
LUCIO If the Duke, with the other dukes, come not to
composition with the King of Hungary, why then all
the dukes fall upon the King.
1 GENTLEMAN Heaven grant us its peace, but not the
King of Hungary’s!
5
2 GENTLEMAN Amen.
LUCIO Thou conclud’st like the sanctimonious pirate,
that went to sea with the Ten Commandments, but
scrap’d one out of the table.
2 GENTLEMAN ‘Thou shalt not steal’?
10
LUCIO Ay, that he raz’d.
1 GENTLEMAN Why, ’twas a commandment to command
the captain and all the rest from their functions:
they put forth to steal. There’s not a soldier of us all
that, in the thanksgiving before meat, do relish the
15
petition well that prays for peace.
2 GENTLEMAN I never heard any soldier dislike it.
LUCIO I believe thee; for I think thou never wast where
grace was said.
2 GENTLEMAN No? A dozen times at least.
20
1 GENTLEMAN What, in metre?
LUCIO In any proportion, or in any language.
1 GENTLEMAN I think, or in any religion.
LUCIO Ay, why not? Grace is grace, despite of all
controversy; as for example, thou thyself art a wicked
25
villain, despite of all grace.
1 GENTLEMAN Well, there went but a pair of shears
between us.
LUCIO I grant: as there may between the lists and the
velvet. Thou art the list.
30
1 GENTLEMAN And thou the velvet; thou art good
velvet; thou’rt a three-piled piece, I warrant thee: I
had as lief be a list of an English kersey, as be piled, as
thou art pilled, for a French velvet. Do I speak
feelingly now?
35
LUCIO I think thou dost: and indeed, with most painful
feeling of thy speech. I will, out of thine own
confession, learn to begin thy health; but whilst I live,
forget to drink after thee.
1 GENTLEMAN I think I have done myself wrong, have I
40
not?
2 GENTLEMAN Yes, that thou hast; whether thou art tainted or free.
Enter MISTRESS OVERDONE.
LUCIO Behold, behold, where Madam Mitigation
comes! I have purchased as many diseases under her
45
roof as come to –
2 GENTLEMAN To what, I pray?
LUCIO Judge.
2 GENTLEMAN To three thousand dolours a year.
1 GENTLEMAN Ay, and more.
50
LUCIO A French crown more.
1 GENTLEMAN Thou art always figuring diseases in me;
but thou art full of error; I am sound.
LUCIO Nay, not, as one would say, healthy: but so sound
as things that are hollow; thy bones are hollow;
55
impiety has made a feast of thee.
1 GENTLEMAN How now, which of your hips has the most profound sciatica?
MISTRESS OVERDONE Well, well! There’s one yonder
arrested and carried to prison, was worth five
60
thousand of you all.
2 GENTLEMAN Who’s that, I prithee?
MISTRESS OVERDONE Marry sir, that’s Claudio; Signior Claudio.
1 GENTLEMAN Claudio to prison? ’Tis not so.
65
MISTRESS OVERDONE Nay, but I know ’tis so. I saw him
arrested: saw him carried away: and which is more,
within these three days his head to be chopped off.
LUCIO But, after all this fooling, I would not have it so.
Art thou sure of this?
70
MISTRESS OVERDONE I am too sure of it: and it is for getting Madam Julietta with child.
LUCIO Believe me, this may be: he promised to meet me
two hours since, and he was ever precise in promise-keeping.
75
2 GENTLEMAN Besides, you know, it draws something
near to the speech we had to such a purpose.
1 GENTLEMAN But most of all agreeing with the proclamation.
LUCIO Away! Let’s go learn the truth of it.
80
Exeunt Lucio and Gentlemen.
MISTRESS OVERDONE Thus, what with the war, what
with the sweat, what with the gallows, and what with
poverty, I am custom-shrunk.
Enter POMPEY.
How now? What’s the news with you?
