Mojo, The Bard, & Me

 

Today’s Totally Random Line(s)

               

                  O, sir, pardon me!

 

-Eros

Antony and Cleopatra                     Act IV, Scene xiv, Line 80

Antony just asked Eros to kill him, and this is Eros’s reply. This pardon me is not like what we say when we’re trying to push by someone. This pardon me is like what the convict says to the governor when he’s about to be executed. Eros wants to be pardoned from the task of killing his commander. Since Antony refuses to pardon him, Eros kills himself to get out of having to kill Antony. Crazy stuff!

I guess Antony, and also Cleopatra, decided that they had a choice about living or dying and chose the latter. I guess everyone has a choice about ending it, whereas none of us has a choice about it not ending when it’s about to end without our say so. Most people, no matter how old or young, don’t want to die. Eros, on the other hand, chose dying over ending the life of Antony. So, did he do that out of love for Antony? Or, if he had really loved Antony should he have killed him?

This end-of-life stuff that Will is dealing with here, with both Antony and Cleopatra choosing to end their own lives, is heady stuff. And it’s germane to our time of the world. This very week Jimmy Carter is in the news for his decision to go home to die. Sure, he’s a lot older than Antony, but who’s to say that age is the determinant in who gets to make this choice.

Like I said, heady stuff.  

See that group of lions in the background? Well, they're feasting on a cape buffalo. You can see a little of the buffalo; it's black and pink. Now, do you want to bet that this buffalo was not planning on dying this day. I'm pretty sure he wasn't. But there he is. And if he knew this was going to be his fate (as Antony knew what lay in store for him) would the buffalo have chosen death at his own hands? I guess I'm giving a little bit too much credit to the thought process of a cape buffalo, but you get the idea of what I'm talking about. ]