Titus Andronicus (1592)

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Title Variant: The Most Lamentable Roman Tragedy of Titus Andronicus
by Shakespeare and George Peele, with an added scene (by Thomas Middleton?)
Date variant: 1590-1
Online Critical Edition in Progress - Version 1.b.
Shakespeare Network - https://shakespearenetwork.net/

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Act III, Scene 2

A room in Titus's house. A banquet set out.

Titus Andronicus
So, so; now sit: and look you eat no more
Than will preserve just so much strength in us
As will revenge these bitter woes of ours.
Marcus, unknit that sorrow-wreathen knot:
Thy niece and I, poor creatures, want our hands,
And cannot passionate our tenfold grief
With folded arms. This poor right hand of mine
Is left to tyrannize upon my breast;
Who, when my heart, all mad with misery,
Beats in this hollow prison of my flesh,
Then thus I thump it down.
[To LAVINIA]
Thou map of woe, that thus dost talk in signs!
When thy poor heart beats with outrageous beating,
Thou canst not strike it thus to make it still.
Wound it with sighing, girl, kill it with groans;
Or get some little knife between thy teeth,
And just against thy heart make thou a hole;
That all the tears that thy poor eyes let fall
May run into that sink, and soaking in
Drown the lamenting fool in sea-salt tears.

Marcus Andronicus
Fie, brother, fie! teach her not thus to lay
Such violent hands upon her tender life.

Titus Andronicus
How now! has sorrow made thee dote already?
Why, Marcus, no man should be mad but I.
What violent hands can she lay on her life?
Ah, wherefore dost thou urge the name of hands;
To bid AEneas tell the tale twice o'er,
How Troy was burnt and he made miserable?
O, handle not the theme, to talk of hands,
Lest we remember still that we have none.
Fie, fie, how franticly I square my talk,
As if we should forget we had no hands,
If Marcus did not name the word of hands!
Come, let's fall to; and, gentle girl, eat this:
Here is no drink! Hark, Marcus, what she says;
I can interpret all her martyr'd signs;
She says she drinks no other drink but tears,
Brew'd with her sorrow, mesh'd upon her cheeks:
Speechless complainer, I will learn thy thought;
In thy dumb action will I be as perfect
As begging hermits in their holy prayers:
Thou shalt not sigh, nor hold thy stumps to heaven,
Nor wink, nor nod, nor kneel, nor make a sign,
But I of these will wrest an alphabet
And by still practise learn to know thy meaning.

Young Lucius
Good grandsire, leave these bitter deep laments:
Make my aunt merry with some pleasing tale.

Marcus Andronicus
Alas, the tender boy, in passion moved,
Doth weep to see his grandsire's heaviness.

Titus Andronicus
Peace, tender sapling; thou art made of tears,
And tears will quickly melt thy life away.
[MARCUS strikes the dish with a knife]
What dost thou strike at, Marcus, with thy knife?

Marcus Andronicus
At that that I have kill'd, my lord; a fly.

Titus Andronicus
Out on thee, murderer! thou kill'st my heart;
Mine eyes are cloy'd with view of tyranny:
A deed of death done on the innocent
Becomes not Titus' brother: get thee gone:
I see thou art not for my company.

Marcus Andronicus
Alas, my lord, I have but kill'd a fly.

Titus Andronicus
But how, if that fly had a father and mother?
How would he hang his slender gilded wings,
And buzz lamenting doings in the air!
Poor harmless fly,
That, with his pretty buzzing melody,
Came here to make us merry! and thou hast
kill'd him.

Marcus Andronicus
Pardon me, sir; it was a black ill-favor'd fly,
Like to the empress' Moor; therefore I kill'd him.

Titus Andronicus
O, O, O,
Then pardon me for reprehending thee,
For thou hast done a charitable deed.
Give me thy knife, I will insult on him;
Flattering myself, as if it were the Moor
Come hither purposely to poison me.--
There's for thyself, and that's for Tamora.
Ah, sirrah!
Yet, I think, we are not brought so low,
But that between us we can kill a fly
That comes in likeness of a coal-black Moor.

Marcus Andronicus
Alas, poor man! grief has so wrought on him,
He takes false shadows for true substances.

Titus Andronicus
Come, take away. Lavinia, go with me:
I'll to thy closet; and go read with thee
Sad stories chanced in the times of old.
Come, boy, and go with me: thy sight is young,
And thou shalt read when mine begin to dazzle.

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Titus Andronicus (1592)

Act III, Scene 2

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