Famed be thy tutor, and thy parts of nature

Thrice-famed, beyond all erudition:

Ulysses

Troilus and Cressida                                       Act II, scene iii   Line 169

Bottom line: I have no idea what this line is about. And I don’t know what to do with it. I know a little about The Iliad, upon which this part of the story is based, but I do not know this play.

So I tried listening to this scene just now and I fell asleep before I got to today’s Totally Random line. OH boy, now what do I do. Well, I can tell you that erudition refers to intelligence. Does that help? Probably not.

Famed be your teacher, and your parts of nature should be triple framed, beyond all intelligence. Okay, but what’s his parts of nature? What’s that mean? Wow, I’m lost on this one.

Okay, so this is a section of one shelf of my bookcases. You can see the Iliad there (which I haven't worked my way through yet, though I have read The Odyssey next to it), and that black book eleven books over to the right is Latin and Greek Etymology, which is the textbook from the course of that name that I took in 1976. The shelf right above this shelf is my Will shelf. But none of this is helping me today. Of today's Totally Random line I can say: I haven't enough erudition, and I'm stuck.

I do not know, my lord, what I should think.

Ophelia

 

Hamlet                                 Act I, scene iii     Line 104

Here we have Ophelia. Another tragic figure in Will’s long, long list of tragic figures. She’s talking to her father, Polonius. It’s early on in the play, and she’s explaining to him that she’s not sure what to make of Hamlet’s ‘tenders of affection’ that he has made to her. Of course Polonius tells her what any good father would tell her, to stay the heck away from Hamlet, he’s nuts. And from what we’ve seen of Hamlet so far I think it might be good advice.

Irrespective of her father’s advice though, I think it’s easy to see that Ophelia’s comment is indicative of the major theme of Hamlet, and that is indecision. At least I think that’s what the major theme is. But I can’t say that I’m absolutely sure about that.

Now that I think about it, I have to admit that without the ‘my lord’ part in the middle of today’s Totally Random line a person like me could use this line constantly. ‘I do not know what I should think.’ In fact, this is my response to about half of what I see, hear, and experience on a daily basis. Or maybe it’s more than half, maybe it’s eighty percent. Or maybe it’s ten percent. Maybe it’s ninety percent. I surely don’t know. In fact, I do not know what I should think.

Confusion. Or is it indecision?

Till Noon! Till night, my lord; and all night too.

Regan

 King Lear                                     Act II, scene ii    Line 136

Well I've been having a bit of a hard time keeping up with the daily posts. I'm going to try to make a point of doing better going forward. In the meantime...

This is a line from lovely Regan, one of the two horrible daughters of Lear. It just occurred to me that there’s the two evil daughters and the one good daughter, just like in Cinderella with the two evil step-sisters. But I guess that’s just coincidence.

Anyway, yes, this is Regan and she's talking about Lear’s man, Kent. Lord Cornwall (who, if I’m not mistaken, is Regan’s husband) has just put Kent in the stocks and said that he’s going to stay there until noon. To which Regan replies, ‘Noon schmatz! Leave him there all night!’ This is the same woman who gouges out Gloucester's eyes later in the play and then says 'Let him smell his way to Dover!' No, honest, she actually says that. So today's line is just a little bit of a warm-up for this lady. She is such a sweetheart! Gloucester is in this scene too, and he tries to say something about showing some restraint, but that’s not gonna happen here. Poor Gloucester is constantly trying to do good, and all he gets for his troubles is to be blind and smelling his way to Dover. Well, it is a tragedy, isn’t it?

I had a drawing commissioned for this post. I really like it when someone else does a drawing for something you're writing about because it's always a bit different than anything that you would have pictured yourself, and it's neat to see a different perspective. I especially like the use of purple here. And Regan looks quite a bit younger than I would have pictured her.

Look, the world’s comforter, with weary gait,

His day’s hot task hath ended in the west;

Narrator

Venus and Adonis                                                           Line 530

This is a pretty cool line. He’s talking about the sun. The world’s comforter is the sun. The sun’s got a weary gait (well he travels a long way, doesn’t he?). And the sun’s hot task ends in the west. All he’s saying is that the day is over. But this sounds so much cooler than ‘the day is over,’ or ‘the sun has set’. Don’t you agree? ‘Look, the world’s comforter, with weary gait, his day’s hot task hath ended in the west.’ There’s really no need to go into context, or explain why Adonis is saying this in the poem. We can simply enjoy this line. And you can certainly use it next time you need to say to someone that the day is drawing to a close.

Imagine that you’re working out in the yard on a summer’s late day or early evening and you notice that the sun is going down. You turn to the person with you – friend, spouse, kid, whatever- and you say ‘Look, the world’s comforter, with weary gait, his day’s hot task hath ended in the west.’ And then point towards the setting sun as you say it. Oh my goodness wouldn’t that be great. The person with you will either look at you like you’re nuts, or they’ll look at you and appreciate the heck out of what you just said. Hopefully the latter.

Look, the world's comforter, with weary gait, his day's hot task hath ended in the west.

‘Tis positive ‘gainst all exceptions, lords,

That our superfluous lackeys and our peasants,--

Who in unnecessary action swarm

About our squares of battle,-- were enow

To purge this field of such a hilding foe.

The Constable of France              

 

King Henry The Fifth                     Act IV, scene ii  Line 28

Okay, first off; 'enow' means enough, and 'hilding' means good for nothing, worthless. So knowing that you can see that this is a pretty interesting couple of lines. This is the Frenchies looking down on the battlefield of the battle that is about to take place. They are commenting on what a sorry bunch the English are and how the French are going to so easily kick the English butts. Now of course this is the battle of Agincourt, a pretty famous battle. And in that battle the French are the ones who get their butts kicked. And not just a little. They get spanked very severely. This Agincourt thing is to the Brits what Bunker Hill, or Iwo Jima or one of those deals is to us; very famous. Even though it happened over 500 years ago.

So the Constable of France is saying that the French lackeys and peasants would be enough to beat the Brits. Actually, not just any old lackey or peasant, but the superfluous ones. Now, did any Frenchman in the lead up to Agincourt actually say anything like this? Well we don’t really know the answer to that. But we do know that Will loved to write drama and the he was marvelously gifted at it. And because of that he gets to make some stuff up occasionally.

I was looking high and low for a picture for today's line (and I have to tell you- finding a decent picture for these posts is really the most time consuming part of the task), and lo and behold, I was lucky enough to come across this re-enactment of the Battle of Agincourt! I think these are the Brits that the Constable was looking down on when he made his overconfident comment. I'm not sure what he was thinking because I think they look like a fairly formidable bunch, especially the guy leading the charge with the helmet and green visor. Although I have to wonder about that guy in the upper right hand corner with the monkey on his head. I'm not sure what's up with that.

What touches us ourself, shall be last served.

Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar                     Act III, scene i    Line 8

So this is Act III, scene I, the famous scene where Caesar gets killed and utters his famous ‘Et tu, Brute?’ (followed much less famously by his last three words 'Then fall Caesar!' There, now you've got a great little bit of trivia.) But that’s about seventy lines down the road. At this point he’s talking to some people outside, in a few minutes he’ll be heading inside to get slain. Just the same, I can’t help but wonder if today's line is a reference, a little bit of foreshadowing if you will, to the bunch of knives that are very shortly going to be touching ‘ourself’.

What do you think?

This is what was last served to me tonight. Actually, it was served by me. Well, by me and to me. It's the last thing I ate this evening. But I think Julius was talking about something else when he talked about 'last served.'

Lay hands on the villain: I believe a' means to cozen somebody in this city under my countenance.

 

Pedant

The Taming of the Shrew                 Act V, scene I                Line 35

So here is yet another post about hands; new hands this time. ‘Lay hands on the villain.’

The previous two days’ lines were about hands, although the word ‘hands’ never appeared in either one. And now, in a way to confirm and solidify the hands subject, we have a line with that very word and thought as part of it. No, I can’t say I understand all of the discussion of the importance of hands that Othello and Desdemona were having. This one, though, is a bit simpler. Lay hands on him – Grab this guy! He’s gonna do some mischief and get me blamed for it!

So let’s recapitulate. Two days ago we had a scene from Titus Andronicus and they were sitting there having a meal and Titus spent a bit of time talking about himself lacking one of his hands and his daughter lacking both of her hands. Then yesterday we had Othello talking drawing conclusions about his wife based on feeling how soft and moist her hand was. And now tonight we have the Pendant talking about getting his hands on someone. All about the hand. The first one about a very literal lack of hands, the second one drawing conclusions based on a literal hand, and the third one a bit more figurative.

Lots and lots of hands.

Here's a guy who wishes he had some real hands and not just a couple of candles at the end of his arms.