Tuesday, July 18, 2017

But hear you, hear you!



-Pandarus



Troilus And Cressida                      Act V, Scene x, Line 32



Yes, that’s right; scene ten. I don’t think we’ve had a scene ten previously, but we have one now. And this is the very last scene in Troilus And Cressida. The Trojan hero Hector’s been killed and this scene talks a little about that and then is just a play wrap up. The last part of this scene is a bit of an epilogue, though it’s not delineated as such. I read it this morning. And then I read the scene summary in my PlayShakespeare app. And then I thought, holy cow, how’d they get that out of that? Since it’s pretty short, I’m going to give you a shot at it. Remember, this is the Trojan war and the Trojan hero, Hector, has just been killed. And now the Troilus, another Trojan, is talking about the death of Hector, and finally Pandarus, another Trojan, comes in to have the final say. Here’s the link, all 57 lines of it. C’mon, you can do it. It’s only 57 lines.






Now here’s the PlayShakespeare.com scene summary:

The Trojans too, learn of Hector’s death. Enraged, Troilus swears revenge, Pandarus tries to speak to him, but Troilus pushes him aside as a pimp. Left alone, Pandarus tries to comfort himself, but merely ends up wishing his venereal disease on the audience.



Say what? Venereal disease? I don’t know about you, but I missed a lot of that. Maybe I should go and listen to it. Or maybe read it again.
I'm not sure if I gave you the pitch on Fagles's Iliad translation before, but no matter. It's a really good translation. In here you'll learn all about Hector and Achilles and the others. But I'm not sure Troilus is in the Iliad or not. Guess you'll have to read it to find out.

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