Today’s Totally Random Lines

 

I swear to thee, by Cupid’s strongest bow,

By his best arrow with the golden head,

By the simplicity of Venus’ doves,

By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves,

And by that fire which burn’d the Carthage queen,

When the false Troyan under sail was seen:

By all the vows that ever men have broke,

In number more than ever women spoke;--

In that same place thou hast appointed me,

To-morrow truly will I meet with thee.

Hermia

A Midsummer Night’s Dream       Act I, Scene i, Line 198

Well then - At first blush it might appear that Hermia is making quite a big deal out of promising to meet with Lysander tomorrow. But it’s a bit more than that. Lysander has proposed that they meet tomorrow in order to run off and get married. That’s what Hermia is agreeing to do. So that’s a pretty big deal and makes all this promising and swearing to be a bit more appropriate.

But wouldn’t it be fun to use this whole thing to tell someone that you agree to a meeting tomorrow. I’m talking about an everyday meeting.

Don
So Pete, I’d like to sit down with you to discuss the tax implications of this deal. Do you think we could meet tomorrow sometime in the afternoon?

Pete
I swear to thee, Don, by Cupid’s strongest bow…
…Tomorrow truly I will meet with thee.
And give him all ten lines of it.

Of course, that would require setting all ten lines to memory. I used to be really good at that, but I’m not sure I’ve still got that in me. Still, this is only ten lines, so maybe I should give it a try.

Oh yeah, that’s a great idea. What else could you possibly do that would be a better use of your time than spend it memorizing ten lines of Shakespeare.

Jesus, this guy is a piece of work.

I heard that!

 

Today’s Totally Random Lines

 

A thousand times the worse, to want thy light.—

Romeo

Romeo and Juliet           Act II, Scene i, Line 198

  

Juliet

A thousand times good night!

Romeo

A thousand times the worse to want thy light.—

Love goes toward love, as schoolboys from their books;

But love from love, toward school with heavy looks.

There, that’s just a little context for Today’s Totally Random Line. So, do you know what scene this is? That’s right, it’s the very famous, O Romeo. Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo? balcony scene; perhaps the most well-known of any of Will’s scenes. If you asked one hundred random people to give you just one line from Shakespeare, that O Romeo line would probably be the answer you’d get more than any other.

But that line is at the beginning of the scene, and our line for today is nearer the end. They’re saying good night, but it will take a while for them to get through their good nights. There are lots of people who are like this with their good-byes. They can take forever. These two don’t take forever, but it does go on for a while. 

I listened to this scene in its entirety this morning. It’s only eleven minutes long. It’s all about how much they love each other. I’m sorry if I’m being cynical, but I couldn’t help think, as I listened to this scene, that these two just met in the previous scene where they spoke a total of eighteen lines to each other. Now, in today’s scene they’re pledging everlasting love and talking about marriage. Ummm....

This is a shot of our front door taken from the outside. Patrice has been keeping tabs on this spiderette (I'm assuming it's female) for a while now. The white and light brown blur to the left of it, on the other side of the thick black line, is Mojo, inside, in his bed. Since the spiderette is on the outside looking in, I've revised today's roles and given the lines to her. You'll notice I gave Mojo an extra syllable, but just for today. So it's not Romeo and Juliet, but rather...

  Mojeo and Spiderette.

 

A thousand times I stare in every night.--

But always from the out to in I look;

I'm stuck here like a bug, I'm such a schnook. 

 

Today’s Totally Random Lines

 

Madame, yond young fellow swears he will speak with you.

 

Malvolio

Twelfth Night         Act I, Scene v, Line 138

 

Malvolio is a bit of a straight man in this comedy. He is the head servant in Olivia’s house. Olivia is the madame that he is addressing. The young fellow he refers to is Viola, who is disguised as a young man for most of this play. The name she is using is Cesario, but the script throughout refers to her as Viola.

Olivia and Viola are two of the main characters in this play and I’m constantly confusing those two names because they are similar and sort of inversions of each other. If I were ever to discuss this play and someone mentioned Olivia or Viola, I would have to ask which one they were talking about. Of course, no one I know has any interest in Shakespeare other than my brother-in-law Richard, and he lives in Phoenix. So, it’s not very often, if ever, that I have to ask for this clarification.

Isn’t that lucky?

Yessiree, lucky. That's the exact word I was thinking of. Lucky for him he lives in Pheonix, so he doesn't have to listen to this guy ramble on, and on, and...

 

Today’s Totally Random Lines

 

                No, my good lord;

Nor wish’d to hold my peace

Lucio

Measure For Measure     Act V, Scene i, Line 79

 

Lucio is listed in the cast of characters as a fantastic. I looked that up in my Shakespeare glossary… that is, I tried to look it up, but found nothing. So what is Lucio? He is, for the most part, comic relief in this play. He has a small role to play as the go-between for Isabella and her brother, Claudio, but mostly he just makes funny (sometimes not so funny) comments. 

In today's case the duke is questioning Isabella, and Lucio throws in his two cents. The duke then says to Lucio, You were not bid to speak, and Lucio responds with Today’s Line: No, but I wasn’t asked to keep quiet either. It’s kind of a wise-ass retort which could get a laugh I suppose, if delivered properly.

What on earth is Mojo staring so intently at? 

Is there some comic relief to be had?

Not exactly; 

it's Bird.

 

 

Today’s Totally Random Lines

 

Whilst I was big in clamour, came there a man,

Who, having seen me in my worst estate,

Shunn’d my abhorr’d society; but then, finding

Who ‘twas that so endured, with his strong arms

He fasten’d on my neck, and bellow’d out

As he’ld burst heaven; threw him on my father;

Told the most piteous tale of Lear and him

That ever ear received: which in recounting

His grief grew puissant, and the strings of life

Began to crack: twice then the trumpets sounded, 

And there I left him tranced.

 

Edgar

King Lear                 Act V, Scene iii, Line 212

 

I know I gave you a lot of lines yesterday, but I’m afraid that today’s line was in the middle of a pretty long sentence. So, yup, you got the whole thing. But don’t worry, I’m going to help you with it. Just know that you’re in for a bit of reading today.

I guess I’ve got to catch you up a bit as to where we are. Oh my, this is the second to last page of the play. So I guess I need to give a brief account of the whole story.

 

The whole thing?

 

Okay, maybe I can skip ahead a bit. 

So remember, in the first scene Edgar and Edmund..

  

First scene!? What happened to skipping ahead?

 

Okay…well…then...

On never mind.

 

Today’s Totally Random Lines

 

And, gentle friends,

Let’s kill him boldly, but not wrathfully;

Let’s carve him as a dish fit for the gods,

Not hew him as a carcass fit for hounds:

And let our hearts, as subtle masters do,

Stir up their servants to an act of rage,

And after seem to chide ‘em. This shall make

Our purpose necessary, and not  envious:

Which so appearing to the common eyes,

We shall be call’d purgers, not murderers.

And for Mark Antony, think not of him;

For he can do no more than Caesar’s arm

When Caesar’s head is cut off.  

 

Brutus

Julius Caesar           Act II, Scene i, Line 175

 

Okay, we’ve got some really good material to work with this morning. It’s the meeting of Brutus, Cassius and the others to discuss the assassination of Caesar. They’ve all decided that Caesar must indeed be killed, and now Caius Cassius has suggested that Mark Antony, Caesar’s most ardent follower, should be killed as well. Today’s Lines are part of Brutus’s twenty-line response to Caius.

The first part of this is Brutus talking about how to go about killing Caesar, and the last part is about not needing to kill Mark Antony. And there’s a bunch of good stuff here.

First off, next time someone mentions a dish fit for the gods, you can tell them that this is a reference to the dead body of Caesar. That’ll frost ‘em.

Secondly, considering that Mark Antony will become emperor in Caesar’s place, hunting down Brutus and his followers, I’m thinking that Brutus’s assessment of Mark Antony may have been a little off. And to be clear, Brutus and his followers are indeed considered purgers until Antony gets involved. Once that guy gets the crowd riled up, Brutus and his boys quickly become viewed as murderers, and it’s all downhill from there. Yes, Caius Cassius was right, and Brutus missed the boat on the Mark Antony question. You win some, you lose some.

Mojo knows a good couple of lines when he sees them. He wanted to make sure today's post was just right, so he helped me out with a little bit of editing.

Thanks buddy!

 Today’s Totally Random Lines

 

Here’s Mistress Quickly, sir, to speak with you.

 

Bardolf

The Merry Wives of Windsor          Act III, Scene v, Line 19

 

Well this is a pretty unassuming line, isn’t it? Shall we work with it? There’s usually something we can come up with to talk about. Let’s see.

We’ve got three principals here: Bardolf the speaker, Falstaff who’s being addressed, and Mistress Quickly the subject of the line.

Hmmm. Yah, some days it’s a little hard to come up with anything to say about these Totally Random Lines.

Got anything Mojo?

You're not sleeping. I can see your eyes are open.

Oh well. I guess we got nothin'.