5 Pages for research paper.
Associated Course Learning Outcomes:
Students will write and communicate at a college level in various modes, media, and/or rhetorical contexts.
Students will demonstrate an ability to comprehend, analyze, & interpret texts in various modes, genres, media, and/or contexts.
Students will evaluate and synthesize information to support ideas and perspectives.
Students will analyze creative works from multiple international cultures in relation to the historical, sociocultural, aesthetic, or personal contexts in which those works emerge.
Assignment Overview:
You will demonstrate your ability to come up with an idea related to our subject (labyrinths and labyrinth narratives) and then support that idea by either writing a paper or creating an artefact that involves demonstrating your “ability to comprehend, analyze, and interpret texts in various modes, genres, media, and/or contexts.”
Your writting can be creative or more traditional (such as a paper), but in either case you will need to demonstrate your knowledge and your ability to apply that knowledge. For instance:
If you are a musician, you could compose or record a piece of music related to our readings/subject. The relationship could be tied to one or more of the narratives and/or sub themes, but it could also be structural. There are examples out there if you do a little research.
If you like to write creatively, you could retell a story, create a new story with various themes. You could write a poem. Again, your connection could be narrative and can play with symbols and themes, but you could also play with structure and algorithms in the manner of the OULIPO (workshop for potential literature).
If you are artistic you could create visual/sculptural artwork.
If you are a game developer or CS major, you can create a level in a game or something similar.
Engineering students can build or design something, keeping in mind what you’ve learned from our readings: think about paths, dead ends, entrances, exits, challenges, puzzles, etc. Make sure you connect your choices with our readings.
I won’t be grading you on artistic talent (although it will be appreciated). You will be evaluated on knowledge, ideas, application. If you are asking yourself: Is my writing/idea “rigorous” enough, ask yourself how it fits with the course objectives. And, of course, please feel free to run it by me and get my input.
I attach the reading.
The labyrinth of initiation
the underworld, and the sacred grove
read before class on June 12-17
The Aeneid by Virgil, Ch. 6 p. 2
translated by H.R. Fairclough
The Divine Comedy by Dante Aligheri p. 23
Inferno, cantos 1–6, 12, 34; Paradisio, canto 33
translated by Courtney Langdon
Fire and Ice by Robert Frost p. 56
we will work with these texts during class on June 17
East Coker p.57
Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot
The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis p.60
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 1
The Aeneid, by Virgil, Ch. 6
[1] Thus he cries weeping, and gives his fleet the reins, and at last glides up to
the shores of Euboean Cumae. They turn the prows seaward, then with the grip
of anchors’ teeth made fast the ships, and the round keels fringe the beach.
In hot haste the youthful band leaps forth on the Hesperian shore; some seek
the seeds of flame hidden in veins of flint, some despoil the woods, the thick
coverts of game, and point to new-found streams. But loyal Aeneas seeks the
heights, where Apollo sits enthroned, and a vast cavern hard by, hidden haunt
of the dread Sibyl, into whom the Delian seer breathes a mighty mind and soul,
revealing the future. Now they pass under the grove of Trivia and the roof of
gold.
[14] Daedalus, it is said, when fleeing from Minos’ realm, dared on swift wings
to trust himself to the sky; on his unwonted way he floated forth towards the
cold North, and at last stood lightly poised above the Chalcidian hill. Here first
restored to earth, he dedicated to thee, Phoebus, the orange of his wings and
built a vast temple. On the doors is the death of Androgeos; then the children
of Cecrops, bidden, alas, to pay as yearly tribute seven living sons; there stands
the urn, the lots now drawn. Opposite, rising from the sea, the Cretan land
faces this; here is the cruel love of the bull, Pasiphaë craftily mated, and the
mongrel breed of the Minotaur, a hybrid offspring, record of a monstrous love;
there that house of toil, a maze inextricable; but Daedalus pitying the princess’s
great love, himself unwound the deceptive tangle of the palace, guiding blind
feet with the thread. You, too, Icarus, would have large share in such a work, did
grief permit: twice had he essayed to fashion your fall in gold; twice sank the
father’s hands. Ay, and all the tale throughout would their eyes have scanned,
but now came Achates from his errand, and with him the priestess of Phoebus
and Trivia, Deiphobe, daughter of Glaucus, who addressed the king: “Not sights
like these does this hour demand! Now it were better to sacrifice seven bullocks
from the unbroken herd, and as many ewes fitly chosen.” Having thus addressed
Aeneas – and not slow are the men to do her sacred bidding – the priestess
calls the Teucrians into the lofty fane.
[42] The huge side of the Euboean rock is hew into a cavern, into which lead a
hundred wide mouths, a hundred gateways, from which rush as many voices,
the answers of the Sibyl. They had come to the threshold, when the maiden
cries: “Tis time to ask the oracles; the god, lo! the god!” As thus she spoke be-
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 2
fore the doors, suddenly not countenance nor colour was the same, nor stayed
her tresses braided; but her bosom heaves, her heart swells with wild frenzy,
and she is taller to behold, nor has her voice a mortal ring, since now she feels
the nearer breath of deity. “Are you slow to vow and to pray?” she cries. “Are
you slow, Trojan Aeneas? For till then the mighty mouths of the awestruck
house will not gape open.” So she spoke and was mute. A chill shudder ran
through the Teucrians’ sturdy frames, and their king pours forth prayers from his
inmost heart: “Phoebus, who never failed to pity Troy’s sore agony, who guid-
ed the Dardan shaft and hand of Paris against the body of Aeacus’ son, under
your guidance did I enter so many seas, skirting mighty lands, the far remote
Massylian tribes, and fields the Syrtes fringe; now at last is Italy’s ever reced-
ing shore within our grasp; thus far only may Troy’s fortune have followed us!
You, too, many now fitly spare the race of Pergamus, you gods and goddesses
all, to whom Troy and Dardania’s great glory were an offence. And you, most
holy prophetess, who foreknow the future, grant – I ask no realm unpledged by
my fate – that the Teucrians may rest in Latium, with the wandering gods and
storm-tossed powers of Troy. Then to Phoebus and Trivia will I set up a tem-
ple of solid marble, and festal days in Phoebus’ name. You also a stately shrine
awaits in our realm; for here I will place your oracles and mystic utterances,
told to my people, and ordain chosen men, O gracious one. Only trust not your
verses to leaves, lest they fly in disorder, the sport of rushing winds; chant them
yourself, I pray.” His lips ceased speaking.
[77] But the prophetess, not yet brooking the sway of Phoebus, storms wildly
in the cavern, if so she may shake the mighty god from her breast; so much the
more he tires her raving mouth, tames her wild heart, and moulds her by con-
straint. And now the hundred mighty mouths of the house have opened of their
own will, and bring through the air the seer’s reply: “O you that have at length
survived the great perils of the sea – yet by land more grievous woes lie in
wait – into the realm of Lavinium the sons of Dardanus shall come, relieve your
heart of this care. Yet they shall not also rejoice in their coming. Wars, grim wars
I see, and the Tiber foaming with streams of blood. You will not lack a Simois,
nor a Xanthus, nor a Doric camp. Even now in Latium a new Achilles has been
born, himself a goddess’s son; nor shall Juno anywhere fail to dog the Trojans,
while you, a suppliant in your need, what races, what cities of Italy will you not
implore! The cause of all this Trojan woe is again an alien bride, again a foreign
marriage! . . . Yield not to ills, but go forth all the bolder to face them as far as
your destiny will allow! The road to safety, little though you think it, shall first
issue from a Grecian city.”
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 3
[98] In these words the Cumaean Sibyl chants from the shrine her dread enig-
mas and booms from the cavern, wrapping truth in darkness – so does Apollo
shake his reins as she rages, and ply the goad beneath her breast. As soon as
the frenzy ceased and the raving lips were hushed, Aeneas the hero begins:
“For me no form of toils arises, O maiden, strange or unlooked for; all this have
I foreseen and debated in my mind. On thing I pray: since here is the famed
gate of the nether king, and the gloomy marsh from Acheron’s overflow, be it
granted me to pass into my dear father’s sight and presence; show the way and
open the hallowed portals! Amid flames and a thousand pursuing spears, I res-
cued him on these shoulders, and brought him safe from the enemy’s midst.
He, the partner of my journey, endured with me all the seas and all the men-
ace of ocean and sky, weak as he was, beyond the strength and portion of age.
He is was who prayed and charged me humbly to seek you and draw near to
your threshold. Pity both son and sire, I beseech you, gracious one; for you
are all-powerful, and not in vain did Hecate make you mistress in the groves of
Avernus. If Orpheus availed to summon his wife’s shade, strong in his Thracian
lyre and tuneful strings; if Pollux, dying in turn, ransomed his brother and so
many times comes and goes his way – why speak of Theseus, why of Hercules
the mighty – I, too, have descent from Jove most high!”
[124] In such words he prayed and clasped the altar, when thus the prophet-
ess began to speak: “Sprung from blood of gods, son of Trojan Anchises, easy is
the descent to Avernus: night and day the door of gloomy Dis stands open; but
to recall one’s steps and pass out to the upper air, this is the task, this the toil!
Some few, whom kindly Jupiter has loved, or shining worth uplifted to heaven,
sons of the gods, have availed. In all the mid-space lie woods, and Cocytus girds
it, gliding with murky folds. But if such love is in your heart – if such a yearn-
ing, twice to swim the Stygian lake, twice to see black Tartarus – and if you are
pleased to give rein to the mad endeavour, hear what must first be done. There
lurks in a shady tree a bough, golden leaf and pliant stem, held consecrate to
nether Juno [Proserpine]; this all the grove hides, and shadows veil in the dim
valleys. But it is not given to pass beneath earth’s hidden places, before some-
one has plucked from the tree the golden-tressed fruitage. This has beautiful
Proserpine ordained to be borne to her as her own gift. When the first is torn
away, a second fails not, golden too, and the spray bears leaf of the selfsame
ore. Search then with eyes aloft and, when found, duly pluck it with your hand;
for of itself will it follow you, freely and with ease, if Fate be calling you; else
with no force will you avail to win it or rend it with hard steel. Moreover, there
lies the dead body of your friend – ah, you know it not! – and defiles all the
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 4
fleet with death, while you seek counsel and hover on our threshold. Bear him
first to his own place and hide him in the tomb. Lead black cattle; be these your
first peace offerings. Only so will you survey the Stygian groves and realms the
living may not tread.” She spoke, and with closed lips was silent.
[156] With sad countenance and downcast eyes, Aeneas wends his way, quit-
ting the cavern, and ponders in his mind the dark issues. At his side goes loyal
Achates, and plants his steps under a like load of care. Much varied discourse
were they weaving, each with each – of what dead comrade spoke the sooth-
sayer, of what body for burial? And as they came, they see on the dry beach
Misenus, cut off by untimely death – Misenus, son of Aeolus, surpassed by
none in stirring men with his bugle’s blare, and in kindling with his clang the god
of war. He had been great Hector’s comrade, at Hector’s side he braved the
fray, glorious for clarion and spear alike; but when Achilles, victorious, stripped
his chief of life, the valiant hero came into the fellowship of Dardan Aeneas,
following no meaner standard. Yet on that day, while by chance he made the
seas ring with his hollow shell – madman – and with his blare calls the gods to
contest, jealous Triton, if the tale can win belief, caught and plunged him in the
foaming waves amid the rocks. So, with loud lament, all were mourning round
him, good Aeneas foremost. Then, weeping, they quickly carry out the Sibyl’s
commands, and toil to pile up trees fro the altar of his tomb and rear it to the
sky. They pass into the forest primeval, the deep lairs of beasts; down drop the
pitchy pines, and the ilex rings to the stroke of the axe; ashen logs and splinter-
ing oak are cleft with wedges, and from the mountains they roll down huge ash
trees.
[183] No less Aeneas, first amid such toils, cheers his comrades and girds on
like weapons. And alone he ponders with his own sad heart, gazing on the
boundless forest, and, as it chanced, thus prays: “O if now that golden bough
would show itself to us on the tree in the deep wood! For all things truly – ah,
too truly – did the seer say of you, Misenus.” Scarce had he said these words
when under his very eyes twin doves, as it chanced, came flying from the sky
and lit on the green grass. Then the great hero knew them for his mother’s
birds, and prays with joy: “Be my guides, if any way there be, and through the
air steer a course into the grove, where the rich bough overshades the fruit-
ful ground! And you, goddess-mother, fail not my dark hour!” So speaking,
he checked his steps, marking what signs they bring, where they direct their
course. As eyes could keep them within sight; then, when they came to the
jaws of noisome Avernus, they swiftly rise and, dropping through the unclouded
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 5
air, perch side by side on their chosen goal – a tree, through whose branches
flashed the contrasting glimmer of gold. As in winter’s cold, amid the woods, the
mistletoe, sown of an alien tree, is wont to bloom with strange leafage, and with
yellow fruit embrace the shapely stems: such was the vision of the leafy gold
on the shadowy ilex, so rustled the foil in the gentle breeze. Forthwith Aeneas
plucks it and greedily breaks off the clinging bough, and carries it beneath the
roof of the prophetic Sibyl.
[212] No less meanwhile on the beach the Teucrians were weeping for Misenus
and paying the last dues to the thankless dust. And first they raise a huge pyre,
rich with pitchy pine and oaken logs. Its sides they entwine with somber foliage,
set in front funereal cypresses, and adorn it above with gleaming arms. Some
heat water, setting cauldrons bubbling on the flames, and wash and anoint the
cold body. Loud is the wailing; then, their weeping done, they lay his limbs upon
the couch, and over them cast purple robes, the familiar dress. Some shoul-
dered the heavy bier – sad ministry – and in ancestral fashion, with averted
eyes, held the torch below. The gifts were piled up in the blaze – frankincense,
viands, and bowls of flowing oil. After the ashes fell in and the flame died away,
they washed with wine the remnant of thirsty dust, and Corynaeus, gather-
ing the bones, hid them in a brazen urn. He, too, with pure water thrice encir-
cled his comrades and cleansed them, sprinkling light dew from a fruitful olive
bough, and spoke the words of farewell. But loyal Aeneas heaps over him a
massive tomb, with the soldier’s own arms, his oar and trumpet, beneath a lofty
hill, which now from him is called Misenus, and keeps from age to age an ever
living name.
[236] This done, he fulfils with haste the Sibyl’s behest. A deep cave there was,
yawning wide and vast, of jagged rock, and sheltered by dark lake and wood-
land gloom, over which no flying creatures could safely wing their way; such a
vapour from those black jaws was wafted to the vaulted sky whence the Greeks
spoke of Avernus, the Birdless Place. Here first the priestess set in line four
dark-backed heifers, and pours wine upon their brows; then, plucking the top-
most bristles from between the horns, lays them on the sacred fire for first of-
fering, calling aloud on Hecate, supreme both in Heaven and in Hell. Others set
knives to the throat and catch the warm blood in bowls. Aeneas himself slays
with the sword a black-fleeced lamb to the mother [Night] of the Eumenides
and her great sister [Earth], and to you, Proserpine, a barren heifer. Then for the
Stygian king he inaugurates an altar by night, and lays upon the flames whole
carcasses of bulls, pouring fat oil over the blazing entrails. But just before the
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 6
rays and dawning of the early sun the ground rumbled underfoot, the wood-
ed ridges began to quiver, and through the gloom dogs seemed to howl as the
goddess [Hecate] drew nigh. “Away! away! you that are uninitiated!” shrieks the
seer, “withdraw from all the grove! And you, rush on the road and unsheathe
your sword! Now, Aeneas, is the hour for courage, now for a dauntless heart!”
So much she said, and plunged madly into the opened cave; he, with fearless
steps, keeps pace with his advancing guide.
[264] You gods, who hold the domain of spirits! You voiceless shades! You,
Chaos, and you, Phlegethon, you broad, hushed tracts of night! Suffer me to
tell what I have heard; suffer me of your grace to unfold secrets buried in the
depths and darkness of the earth!
[268] On they went dimly, beneath the lonely night amid the gloom, through
the empty halls of Dis and his phantom realm, even as under the niggard light of
a fitful moon lies a path in the forest, when Jupiter has buried the sky in shade,
and black Night has stolen from the world her hues. Just before the entrance,
even within the very jaws of Hell, Grief and avenging Cares have set their bed;
there pale Diseases dwell, sad Age, and Fear, and Hunger, temptress to sin, and
loathly Want, shapes terrible to view; and Death and Distress; next, Death’s
own brother Sleep, and the soul’s Guilty Joys, and, on the threshold opposite,
the death-dealing War, and the Furies’ iron cells, and maddening Strife, her
snaky locks entwined with bloody ribbons.
[282] In the midst an elm, shadowy and vast, spreads her boughs and aged
arms, the whome which, men say, false Dreams hold, clinging under every leaf.
And many monstrous forms besides of various beasts are stalled at the doors,
Centaurs and double-shaped Scyllas, and he hundredfold Briareus, and the
beast of Lerna, hissing horribly, and the Chimaera armed with flame, Gorgons
and Harpies, and the shape of the three-bodied shade [Geryon]. Here on a sud-
den, in trembling terror, Aeneas grasps his sword, and turns the naked edge
against their coming; and did not his wise companion warn him that these were
but faint, bodiless lives, flitting under a hollow semblance of form, he would
rush upon them and vainly cleave shadows with steel.
[295] From here a road leads to the waters of Tartarean Acheron. Here, thick
with mire and of fathomless flood, a whirlpool seethes and belches into Cocy-
tus all its sand. A grim ferry man guards these waters and streams, terrible in
his squalor – Charon, on whose chin lies a mass of unkempt hoary hair; his eyes
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 7
are staring orbs of flame; his squalid garb hangs by a knot from his shoulders.
Unaided, he poles the boat, tends the sails, and in his murky craft convoys the
dead – now aged, but a god’s old age is hardy and green. Hither rushed all the
throng, streaming to the banks; mothers and men and bodies of high-souled
heroes, their life now done, boys and unwedded girls, and sons placed on the
pyre before their fathers’ eyes; thick as the leaves of the forest that at autumn’s
first frost drop and fall, and thick as the birds that from the seething deep flock
shoreward, when the chill of the year drives them overseas and sends them into
sunny lands. They stood, pleading to be the first ferried across, and stretched
out hands in yearning for the farther shore. But the surly boatman takes now
these, now those, while others he thrusts away, back from the brink.
[317] Then aroused and amazed by the disorder, Aeneas cries: “Tell me, maiden,
what means the crowding to the river? What seek the spirits? By what rule do
these leave the banks, and those sweep the lurid stream with oars?” To him thus
briefly spoke the aged priestess: “Anchises’ son, true offspring of gods, you are
looking at the deep pools of Cocytus and the Stygian marsh, by whose power
the gods fear to swear falsely. All this crowd that you see is helpless and grav-
eless; yonder ferryman is Charon; those whom the flood carries are the bur-
ied. He may not carry them over the dreadful banks and hoarse-voiced waters
until their bones have found a resting place. A hundred years they roam and
flit about these shores; then only are they admitted and revisit the longed-for
pools.” Anchises’ son paused and stayed his steps, pondering much, and pitying
in his heart their unjust lost. There he espies, doleful and reft of death’s hon-
our, Leucaspis and Orontes, captain of the Lycian fleet, whom, while voyaging
together from Troy over windy waters, the South Wind overwhelmed, engulfing
alike ship and sailors.
[337] Lo! there passed the helmsman, Palinurus, who of late, on the Libyan
voyage, while he marked the stars, had fallen from the stern, flung forth in
the midst of the waves. Him, when at last amid the deep gloom he knew the
sorrowful form, he first accosts thus: “What god, Palinurus, tore you from us
and plunged you beneath the open ocean? O tell me! For Apollo, never before
found false, with this one answer tricked my soul, for he foretold that you would
escape the sea and reach Ausonia’s shores. Is this how he keeps his promise?”
But he answered: “Neither did tripod of Phoebus fail you, my captain, Anchis-
es’ son, nor did a god plunge me in the deep. For by chance the helm to which
I clung, steering our course, was violently torn from me, and as I fell headlong, I
dragged it down with me. By the rough seas I sear that not for myself did I feel
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 8
such fear as for your ship, lest, stripped of its gear and deprived of its helmsman,
it might fail amid such surging waves. Three stormy nights over the measureless
seas the South Wind drove me wildly on the water; scarce on the fourth dawn,
aloft on the crest of a wave, I sighted Italy. Little by little I swam shoreward, and
even now was grasping at safety, but as, weighted by dripping garb, I caught
with bent fingers at the rugged cliff-spurs, the barbarous folk assailed me with
the sword, in ignorance deeming me a prize. Now the wave holds me, and the
winds toss me on the beach. Oh, by heaven’s sweet light and air, I beseech you,
by your father, by the rising hope of Iulus, snatch me from these woes, uncon-
quered one! Either case earth on me, for that you can, by seeking again the ha-
ven of Velia; or if there be a way, if your goddess-mother shows you one – for
not without divine favour, I believe, are you trying to sail these great streams
and the Stygian mere – give your hand to one so unhappy, and take me with
you across the waves, that at last in death I may find a quiet resting place!”
[372] So had he spoken, and the soothsayer thus began: “Whence, Palinurus,
comes this wild longing of yours? Are you, unburied, to look upon the Stygian
waters and the Furies” stern river, and unbidden draw near the bank? Cease to
dream that heaven’s decrees may be turned aside by prayer. But hear and re-
member my words, to solace your hard lot; for the neighbouring people, in their
cities far and wide, shall be driven by celestial portents to appease your dust,
and shall build a tomb, and to the tomb pay solemn offerings; and for ever the
place shall bear the name of Palinurus.” By these words his cares are dispelled
and for a little space grief is driven from his anguished heart; the land rejoiced in
the name.
[384] So they pursue the journey begun, and draw near to the river. But when,
even from the Stygian wave, the boatman saw them passing through the silent
wood and turning their feet towards the bank, he first, unhailed, accosts and
rebukes them: “Whoever you are who come to our river in arms, tell me, even
from there, why you come, and check your step. This is the land of Shadows, of
Sleep and drowsy Night; living bodies I may not carry in the Stygian boat. And
in truth it brought me no joy that I took Heracles on his journey over the lake,
or Theseus and Pirithoüs, though sons of gods and invincible in valour. The one
by force sought to drag into chains, even from the monarch’s throne, the ward-
er of Tartarus, and tore him off trembling; these essayed to carry off our queen
from the chamber of Dis.” In answer the Amphyrsian soothsayer spoke briefly:
“No such trickery is here; be not troubled; our weapons offer no force; the huge
doorkeeper may from his cave with endless howl affright the bloodless shades;
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Proserpine may in purity keep within her uncle’s threshold. Trojan Aeneas, fa-
mous for piety and arms, descends to his father, to the lowest shades of Erebus.
If the picture of such piety in no wise moves you, yet know this bough” – and
she shows the bough, hidden in her robe. At this his swelling breast subsides
from its anger. No more is said; but he, marveling at the dread gift, the fate-
ful wand so long unseen, turns his blue barge and nears the shore. Then oth-
er souls that sat on the long thwarts he routs out, and clears the gangways; at
once he takes aboard giant Aeneas. The seamy craft groaned under the weight,
and through its chinks took in marshy flood. At last, across the water, he lands
seer and soldier unharmed on the ugly mire and grey sedge.
[417] These realms huge Cerberus makes ring with his triple-throated baying,
his monstrous bulk crouching in a cavern opposite. To him, seeing the snakes
now bristling on his necks, the seer flung a morsel drowsy with honey and
drugged meal. He, opening his triple throat in ravenous hunger, catches it when
thrown and, with monstrous frame relaxed, sinks to earth and stretches his bulk
over all the den. The warder buried in sleep, Aeneas wins the entrance, and
swiftly leaves the bank of that stream whence none return.
[426] At once are heard voices and wailing sore – the souls of infants weep-
ing, whom, on the very threshold of the sweet life they shared not, torn from
the breast, the black day swept off and plunged in bitter death. Near them
were those on false charge condemned to die. Yet not without lot, not without
a judge, are these places given: Minos, presiding, shakes the urn; he it is who
calls a conclave of the silent, and learns men’s lives and misdeeds. The region
thereafter is held by those sad souls who in innocence wrought their own death
and, loathing the light, flung away their lives. How gladly now, in the air above,
would they bear both want and harsh distress! Fate withstands; the unlovely
mere with its dreary water enchains them and Styx imprisons with his ninefold
circles.
[440] Not far from here, outspread on every side, are shown the Mourning
Fields; such is the name they bear. Here those whom stern Love has con-
sumed with cruel wasting are hidden in walks withdrawn, embowered in a
myrtle grove; even in death the pangs leave them not. In this region he sees
Phaedra and Procris, and sad Eriphyle, pointing to the wounds her cruel son
had dealt, and Evadne and Pasiphaë. With them goes Laodamia, and Caene-
us, once a youth, now a woman, and again turned back by Fate into her form
of old. Among them, with wound still fresh, Phoenician Dido was wandering in
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the great forest, and soon as the Trojan hero stood near and knew her, a dim
form amid the shadows – even as, in the early month, one sees or fancies he
has seen the moon rise amid the clouds – he shed tears, and spoke to her in
tender love: “Unhappy Dido! Was the tale true then that came to me, that you
were dead and had sought your doom with the sword? Was I, alas! the cause
of your death? By the stars I swear, by the world above, and whatever is sa-
cred in the grave below, unwillingly, queen, I parted from your shores. But the
gods’ decrees, which now constrain me to pass through these shades, through
lands squalid and forsaken, and through abysmal night, drove me with their be-
hests; nor could I deem my going thence would bring on you distress so deep.
Stay your step and withdraw not from our view. Whom do you flee? This is the
last word Fate suffers me to say to you.” With these words amid springing tears
Aeneas strove to soothe the wrath of the fiery, fierce-eyed queen. She, turn-
ing away, kept her looks fixed on the ground and no more changes her counte-
nance as he essays to speak than if she were set in hard flint or Marpesian rock.
At length she flung herself away and, still his foe, fled back to the shady grove,
where Sychaeus, her lord of former days, responds to her sorrows and gives her
love for love. Yet none the less, stricken by her unjust doom, Aeneas attends her
with tears afar and pities her as she goes.
[477] Thence he toils along the way that offered itself. And now they gained
the farthest fields [the neutral region, neither Elysium nor Tartarus], where
the renowned in war dwell apart. Here Tydeus meets him; here Parthenopae-
us, famed in arms, and the pale shade of Adrastus; here, much wept on earth
above and fallen in war, the Dardan chiefs; whom as he beheld, all in long array,
he moaned – Glaucus and Medon and Thersilochus, the three sons of Anten-
or, and Polyboetes, priest of Ceres, and Idaeus, still keeping his chariot, still his
arms. Round about, on right and left, stand the souls in throngs. To have seen
him once is not enough; they delight to linger, to pace beside him, and to learn
the causes of his coming. But the Danaan princes and Agamemnon’s battalions,
soon as they saw the man and his arms flashing amid the glom, trembled with
mighty fear; some turn to flee, as of old they sought the ships; some raise a
shout – faintly; the cry essayed mocks their gaping mouths.
[494] And here he sees Deiphobus, son of Priam, his whole frame mangled and
his face cruelly torn – his face and either hand – his ears wrenched from de-
spoiled temples, and his nostrils lopped by a shameful wound. Scarce, indeed,
did he know the quivering form that tried to hide its awful punishment; then,
with familiar accents, unhailed, he accosts him: “Deiphobus, strong in battle,
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 11
scion of Teucer’s high lineage, who chose to exact so cruel a penalty! Who had
power to deal thus with you? Rumour told me that on that last night, weary
with endless slaughter of Pelasgians, you had fallen upon a heap of mingled car-
nage. Then I myself set up a cenotaph upon the Rhoetean shore, and with loud
cry called thrice upon your spirit. Your name and arms guard the place; you, my
friend, I could not see, nor bury, as I departed, in your native land.” To this the
son of Priam: “Nothing, my friend, have you left undone; all dues you have paid
to Deiphobus and the dead man’s shade. But me my own fate and the Laconi-
an woman’s [Helen’s] death-dealing crime overwhelmed in these woes. It was
she who left these memorials! For how we spent that last night amid deluding
joys, you know; and all too well must you remember! When the fateful horse
leapt over the heights of Troy, and brought armed infantry to weight its womb,
she feigned a solemn dance and around the city led the Phrygian wives, shriek-
ing in their Bacchic rites; she herself in the midst held a mighty torch and called
the Danaans from the castle-height. Care-worn and sunk in slumber, I was then
inside our ill-starred bridal chamber, sleep weighing upon me as I lay – sweet
and deep, very image of death’s peace. Meanwhile, this peerless wife takes ev-
ery weapon from the house – even from under my head she had withdrawn
my trusty sword; into the house she calls Menelaus and flings wide the door,
hoping, I doubt not, that her lover would find this a great boon, and so the fame
of old misdeeds might be blotted out. Why prolong the story? They burst into
my chambers; with them comes their fellow counsellor of sin, the son of Aeolus
[Ulysses]. O gods, with like penalties repay the Greeks, if with pious lips I pray
for vengeance! But come, tell in turn what chance has brought you here, alive.
Have you come here driven by your ocean-wanderings, or at Heaven’s com-
mand? Or what doom compels you to visit these sad, sunless dwellings, this
land of disorder?”
[535] During this interchange of talk, Dawn, with roseate car, had now crossed
mid-heaven in her skyey course, and perchance in such wise they would have
spent all the allotted time, but the Sibyl beside him gave warning with brief
words: “Night is coming, Aeneas; we waste the hours in weeping. Here is the
place, where the road parts: there to the right, as it runs under the walls of
great Dis, is our way to Elysium, but the left wreaks the punishment of the
wicked, and send them on to pitiless Tartarus.” In reply Deiphobus said: “Be not
angry, great priestess; I will go my way; I will make the count complete and re-
turn to the darkness. Go, you who are our glory, go; enjoy a happier fate!” Thus
much he said and, as he spoke, turned his steps.
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[548] Suddenly Aeneas looks back, and under a cliff on the left sees a broad
castle, girt with triple wall and encircled with a rushing flood of torrent flames –
Tartarean Phlegethon, that rolls along thundering rocks. In front stands a huge
gate, and pillars of solid adamant, that no might of man, nay, not even the sons
of heaven, could uproot in war; there stands an iron tower, soaring high, and
Tisiphone, sitting girt with bloody pall, keeps sleepless watch over the portal
night and day. From it are heard groans, the sound of the savage lash, the clank
of iron and the dragging of chains. Aeneas stopped, and terrified drank in the
tumult. “What forms of crime are these? Say, O maiden! With what penalties
are they scourged? What is this vast wailing on the wind?” Then the seer thus
began to speak: “Famed chieftain of the Teucrians, no pure soul may tread the
accursed threshold; but when Hecate set me over the groves of Avernus, she
taught me the gods’ penalties and guided me through all. Cretan Rhadamanthus
holds here his iron sway; he chastises, and hears the tale of guilt, exacting con-
fession of crimes, whenever in the world above any man, rejoicing in vain deceit,
has put off atonement for sin until death’s late hour. Straightway avenging Tisi-
phone, girt with the lash, leaps on the guilty to scourge them, and with left hand
brandishing her grim snakes, calls on her savage sister band. Then at last, grat-
ing on harsh, jarring hinge, the infernal gates open. Do you see what sentry [Ti-
siphone] sits in the doorway? what shape guards the threshold? The monstrous
Hydra, still fiercer, with her fifty black gaping throats, dwells within. Then Tarta-
rus itself yawns sheer down, stretching into the gloom twice as far as is the up-
ward view of the sky toward heavenly Olympus. Here the ancient sons of Earth,
the Titan’s brood, hurled down by the thunderbolt, writhe in lowest abyss. Here,
too I saw the twin sons of Aloeus, giant in stature, whose hands tried to tear
down high Heaven and thrust down Jove from his realm above. Salmoneus, too,
I saw, who paid cruel penalty while aping Jove’s fires and the thunders of Olym-
pus. Borne by four horses and brandishing a torch, he rode triumphant through
the Greek peoples and his city in the heart of Elis, claiming as his own the hom-
age of deity. Madman, to mimic the storm clouds and inimitable thunder with
brass and the tramp of horn-footed horses! But the Father Almighty amid thick
clouds launched his bolt – no firebrands he, nor pitch-pines’ smoky glare – and
drove him headlong with furious whirlwind. Likewise one might see Tityos,
nursling of Earth the mother of all. Over nine full acres his body is stretched,
and a monstrous vulture with crooked beak gnaws at his deathless liver and
vitals fruitful of anguish; deep within the breast he lodges and gropes for his
feast; nor is any respite given to the filaments that grow anew. Why tell of the
Lapiths, Ixion and Pirithoüs, and of him [Tantalus] over whom hangs a black crag
that seems ready to slip and fall at any moment? High festal couches gleam
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 13
with backs of gold, and before their eyes is spread a banquet in royal splendour.
Reclining hard by, the eldest Fury stays their hands from touch of the table,
springing forth with uplifted torch and thunderous cries.
[608] “Here were they who in lifetime hated their brethren, or smote a sire, and
entangled a client in wrong; or who brooded in solitude over wealth they had
won, nor set aside a portion for their kin – the largest number this; who were
slain for adultery; or who followed the standard of treason, and feared not to
break allegiance with their lords – all these, immured, await their doom. Seek
not to learn that doom, or what form of crime, or fate, overwhelmed them!
Some roll a huge stone, or hang outstretched on spokes of wheels; hapless The-
seus sits and evermore shall sit, and Phlegyas, most unblest, gives warning to
all and with loud voice bears witness amid the gloom: ‘Be warned; learn ye to
be just and not to slight the gods!’ This one sold his country for gold, and fas-
tened on her a tyrant lord; he made and unmade laws for a bribe. This forced
his daughter’s bed and a marriage forbidden. All dared a monstrous sin, and
what they dared attained. Nay, had I a hundred tongues, a hundred mouths, and
voice of iron, I could not sum up all the forms of crime, or rehearse all the tale
of torments.”
[628] So spoke the aged priestess of Phoebus; then adds: “But come now, has-
ten your step and fulfil the task in hand. Let us hasten. I descry the ramparts
reared by Cyclopean forges and the gates with fronting arch, where they bid us
lay the appointed gifts.” She ended, and, advancing side by side along the dusky
way, they haste over the mid-space and draw near the doors. Aeneas wins the
entrance, sprinkles his body with fresh water, and plants the bough full on the
threshold.
[637] This at length performed and the task of the goddess fulfilled, they came
to a land of joy, the pleasant lawns and happy seats of the Blissful Groves. Here
an ampler ether clothes the meads with roseate light, and they know their own
sun, and stars of their own. Some disport their limbs on the grassy wrestling
ground, vie in sports, and grapple on the yellow sand; some tread the rhythm of
a dance and chant songs. There, too, the long-robed Thracian priest [Orpheus]
matches their measures with the seven clear notes, striking the lyre now with
his fingers, now with is ivory quill. Here is Teucer’s ancient line, family most fair,
high-souled heroes born in happier years – Ilus and Assaracus and Dardanus,
Troy’s founder. From afar he marvels at their phantom arms and chariots. Their
lances stand fixed in the ground, and their unyoked steeds browse freely over
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 14
the plain. The same pride in chariot and arms that was theirs in life, the same
care in keeping sleek steeds, attends them now that they are hidden beneath
the earth. Others he sees, to right and left, feasting on the sward, and chant-
ing in chorus a joyous paean within a fragrant laurel grove, from where the full
flood of the Eridanus rolls upward through the forest.
[660] Here is the band of those who suffered wounds, fighting for their coun-
try; those who in lifetime were priests and pure, good bards, whose songs were
meet for Phoebus; or they who ennobled life by arts discovered and they who
by service have won remembrance among men – the brows of all bound with
headbands white as snow. These, as they streamed round, the Sibyl thus ad-
dressed, Musaeus before all; for he is centre of that vast throng that gazes up
to him, as with shoulders high he towers aloft: “Say, happy souls, and you, best
of bards, what land, what place holds Anchises? For his sake are we come, and
have sailed across the great rivers of Erebus.” And to her the hero thus made
brief reply: “None has a fixed home. We dwell in shady groves, and live on cush-
ioned riverbanks and in meadows fresh with streams. But if the wish in your
heart so inclines, surmount this ridge, and soon I will set you on an easy path.”
He spoke and stepped on before, and from above points out the shining fields.
Then they leave the mountaintops.
[679] But deep in a green vale father Anchises was surveying with earnest
thought the imprisoned souls that were to pass to the light above and, as it
chanced, was counting over the full number of his people and beloved children,
their fates and fortunes, their works and ways. And as he saw Aeneas coming
towards him over the sward, he eagerly stretched forth both hands, while tears
streamed from his eyes and a cry fell from his lips: “Have you come at last, and
has the duty that your father expected vanquished the toilsome way? Is it given
me to see your face, my son, and hear and utter familiar tones? Even so I mused
and deemed the hour would come, counting the days, nor has my yearning
failed me. Over what lands, what wide seas have you journeyed to my welcome!
What dangers have beset you, my son! How I feared the realm of Libya might
work you harm!” But he answered: “Your shade, father, your sad shade, meet-
ing me repeatedly, drove me to seek these portals. My ships ride the Tuscan
sea. Grant me to clasp your hand, grant me, father, and withdraw not from my
embrace!” So he spoke, his face wet with flooding tears. Thrice there he strove
to throw his arms about his neck; thrice the form, vainly clasped, fled from his
hands, even as light winds, and most like a winged dream.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 15
[703] Meanwhile, in a retired vale, Aeneas sees a sequestered grove and rus-
tling forest thickets, and the river Lethe drifting past those peaceful homes.
About it hovered peoples and tribes unnumbered; even as when, in the mead-
ows, in cloudless summertime, bees light on many-hued blossoms and stream
round lustrous lilies and all the fields murmur with the humming. Aeneas is star-
tled by the sudden sight and, knowing not, asks the cause – what is that river
yonder, and who are the men thronging the banks in such a host? Then said
father Anchises: “Spirits they are, to whom second bodies are owed by Fate, and
at the water of Lethe’s stream they drink the soothing draught and long forget-
fulness. These in truth I have long yearned to tell and show you to your face,
yea, to count this, my children’s seed, that so you may rejoice with me the more
at finding Italy.” “But, father, must we think that any souls pass aloft from here
to the world above and return a second time to bodily fetters? What mad long-
ing for life possesses their sorry hearts?” “I will surely tell you, my son, and keep
you not in doubt,” Anchises replies and reveals each truth in order.
[724] “First, know that heaven and earth and the watery plains the moon’s
bright sphere and Titan’s star, a spirit within sustains; in all the limbs mind
moves the mass and mingles with the mighty frame. Thence springs the races
of man and beast, the life of winged creatures, and the monsters that ocean
bears beneath his marble surface. Fiery is the vigour and divine the source of
those seeds of life, so far as harmful bodies clog them not, or earthly limbs and
frames born but to die. Hence their fears and desires, their griefs and joys; nor
do they discern the heavenly light, penned as they are in the gloom of their dark
dungeon. Still more! When life’s last ray has fled, the wretches are not entire-
ly freed from all evil and all the plagues of the body; and it needs must be that
many a taint, long ingrained, should in wondrous wise become deeply rooted
in their being. Therefore are they schooled with punishments, and pay penance
for bygone sins. Some are hung stretched out to the empty winds; from others
the stain of guilt is washed away under swirling floods or burned out by fire till
length of days, when time’s cycle is complete, has removed the inbred taint and
leaves unsoiled the ethereal sense and pure flame of spirit: each of us under-
goes his own purgatory. Then we are sent to spacious Elysium, a few of us to
possess the blissful fields. All these that you see, when they have rolled time’s
wheel through a thousand years, the god summons in vast throng to Lethe’s riv-
er, so that, their memories effaced, they may once more revisit the vault above
and conceive the desire of return to the body.”
[752] Anchises paused, and drew his son and with him the Sibyl into the heart
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 16
of the assembly and buzzing throng, then chose a mound whence he might
scan face to face the whole of the long procession and note their faces as they
came.
[756] “Now then, the glory henceforth to attend the Trojan race, what children
of Italian stock are held in store by fate, glorious souls waiting to inherit our
name, this shall I reveal in speech and inform you of your destiny. The youth
you see leaning on an untipped spear holds by lot of life the most immediate
place: he first shall rise into the upper air with Italian blood in his veins, Silvius
of Alban name, last-born of your children, whom late in your old age your wife
Lavinia shall rear in the woodlands, a king and father of kings, with whom our
race shall hold sway in Alba Longa. He next is Procas, pride of the Trojan nation,
then Capys and Numitor and he who will resurrect you by his name, Aeneas
Silvius, no less eminent in goodness and in arms, if ever he come to reign over
Alba. What fine young men are these! Mark the strength they display and the
civic oak that shades their brows! These to your honour will build Nomentum
and Gabii and Fidena’s town; these shall crown hills with Collatia’s towers, and
Pometii, the Fort of Inuus, Bola and Cora: one day to be famous names, these
now are nameless places. Further, a son of Mars shall keep his grandsire com-
pany, Romulus, whom his mother Ilia shall bear of Assaracus’ stock. Do you see
how twin plumes stand upright on his head and how the Father of the gods
stamps him with divine majesty? Lo, under his auspices, my son, shall that glo-
rious Rome extend her empire to earth’s ends, her ambitions to the skies, and
shall embrace seven hills with a single city’s wall, blessed in a brood of heroes;
even as the Berecyntian mother [Cybele], turret-crowned, rides in her chariot
through Phrygian towns, happy in a progeny of gods, clasping a hundred grand-
sons, all denizens of heaven, all tenants of the celestial heights.
[788] “Turn hither now your two-eyed gaze, and behold this nation, the Romans
that are yours. Here is Caesar and all the seed of Iulus destined to pass under
heaven’s spacious sphere. And this in truth is he whom you so often hear prom-
ised you, Augustus Caesar, son of a god, who will again establish a golden age in
Latium amid fields once ruled by Saturn; he will advance his empire beyond the
Garamants and Indians to a land which lies beyond our stars, beyond the path
of year and sun, where sky-bearing Atlas wheels on his shoulders the blazing
star-studded sphere. Against his coming both Caspian realms and the Maeotic
land even now shudder at the oracles of their gods, and the mouths of seven-
fold Nile quiver in alarm. Not even Hercules traversed so much of earth’s ex-
tent, though he pierced the stag of brazen foot, quieted the woods of Eryman-
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 17
thus, and made Lerna tremble at his bow; nor he either, who guides his car with
vine-leaf reins, triumphant Bacchus, driving his tigers down from Nysa’s lofty
peaks. And do we still hesitate to make known our worth by exploits or shrink in
fear from settling on Western soil?
[808] “but who is he apart, crowned with sprays of live, offering sacrifice? Ah, I
recognize the hoary hair and beard of that king of Rome [Numa] who will make
the infant city secure on a basis of laws, called from the needy land of low-
ly Cures to sovereign might. Him shall Tullus next succeed, the breaker of his
country’s peace, who will rouse to war an inactive folk and armies long unused
to triumphs. Hard on his heels follows over-boastful Ancus, who even now en-
joys too much the breeze by popular favour. Would you also see the Tarquin
kings, the proud spirit of Brutus the Avenger, and the fasces regained? He first
shall receive a consul’s power and the cruel axes, and when his sons would stir
up revolt, the father will hale them to execution in fair freedom’s name, unhap-
py man, however later ages will extol that deed; yet shall a patriot’s love prevail
and unquenched third for fame.
[824] “Now behold over there the Decii and the Drusi, Torquatus of the cruel
axe, and Camillus bringing the standards home! But they whom you see, re-
splendent in matching arms, souls now in harmony and as long as they are im-
prisoned in night, alas, if once they attain the light of life, what mutual strife,
what battles and bloodshed will they cause, the bride’s father swooping from
Alpine ramparts and Monoeus’ fort, her husband confronting him with forc-
es from the East! Steel not your hearts, my sons, to such wicked war nor vent
violent valour on the vitals of your land. And you who draw your lineage from
heaven, be you the first to show mercy; cast the sword from your hand, child of
my blood! . . .
[836] “He yonder [Lucius Mummius], triumphant over Corinth, shall drive a vic-
tor’s chariot to the lofty Capitol, famed for Achaeans he has slain. Yon other
[Luxius Aemilius Paullus] shall uproot Argos, Agamemnon’s Mycenae, and even
an heir of Aeacus, seed of mighty Achilles: he will avenge his Trojan sires and
Minerva’s polluted shrine. Who, lordly Cato, could leave you unsung, of you,
Cossus; who the Gracchan race or the Scipios twain, two thunderbolts of war
and the ruin of Carthage, or Favricius, in penury a prince, or you, Serranus, sow-
ing seed in the soil? Whither, O Fabii, do ye hurry me all breathless? You re he,
the mightest [Quinus Fabius Maximus], who could, s no one else, through inac-
tion preserve our state. Others, I doubt not, shall with softer mould beast out
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 18
the breathing bronze, coax from the marble features to life, plead cases with
greater eloquence and with a pointer trace heaven’s motions and predict the
risings of the stars: you, Roman, be sure to rule the world (be these your arts),
to crown peace with justice, to spare the vanquished and to crush the proud.”
[854] Thus Father Anchises, and as they marvel, adds: “Behold how Marcellus
advances, graced with the spoils of the chief he slew, and towers triumphant
over all! When the Roman state is reeling under a brutal shock, he will steady
it, will ride down Carthaginians and the insurgent Gaul, and offer up to Father
Quirinus a third set of spoils.”
[860] At this Aeneas said – for by his side he saw a youth of passing beauty in
resplendent arms, but with joyless mien and eyes downcast: “Who, father, is he
that thus attends the warrior on his way? Is it his son, or some other of his prog-
eny’s heroic line? What a stir among his entourage! What majesty is his! But
death’s dark shadow flickers mournfully about his head.”
[867] Then, as his tears well up, Father Anchises begins: “My son, seek not to
taste the bitter grief of your people; only a glimpse of him will fate give earth
nor suffer him to stay long. Too powerful, O gods above, you deemed the Ro-
man people, had these gifts of yours been lasting. What sobbing of the brave
will the famed Field waft to Mars’ mighty city! What a cortege will you behold,
Father Tiber, as you glide past the new-build tomb! No youth of Trojan stock will
ever raise his Latin ancestry so high in hope nor the land of Romulus ever boast
of any son like this. Alas for his goodness, alas for his chivalrous honour and his
sword arm unconquerable in the fight! In arms none would have faced him un-
scathed, marched he on foot against his foe or dug with spurs the flanks of his
foaming steed. Child of a nation’s sorrow, could you but shatter the cruel barri-
er of fate! You are to be Marcellus. Grant me scatter in handfuls lilies of purple
blossom, to heap at least these gifts on my descendant’s shade and perform an
unavailing duty.” Thus they wander at large over the whole region in the wide
airy plain, taking note of all. After Anchises had led his son over every scene,
kindling his soul, with longing for the glory that was to be, he then tells of the
wars that the hero next must wage, the Laurentine peoples and Latinus’ town,
and how is to face or flee each peril.
[893] Two gates of Sleep there are, whereof the one, they say, is horn and of-
fers a ready exit to true shades, the other shining with the sheen of polished
ivory, but delusive dreams issue upward through it from the world below. Thith-
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 19
er Anchises, discoursing thus, escorts his son and with him the Sibyl, and sends
them forth by the ivory gate: Aeneas speeds his way to the ships and rejoins his
comrades; then straight along the shore he sails for Caieta’s haven. The anchor
is cast from the prow; the sterns stand ranged on the shore.
********
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 20
The Divine Comedy by Dante Aligheri
Inferno, cantos 1–6, 12, 34; Paradisio, canto 33
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 21
NFERNO
I
Introduction to the Divine Comedy
The Wood and the Mountain
When half way through the journey of our life
I found that I was in a gloomy wood,
because the path which led aright was lost.
And ah, how hard it is to say just what
this wild and rough and stubborn woodland was,
the very thought of which renews my fear!
So bitter ’t is, that death is little worse;
but of the good to treat which there I found,
I ’ll speak of what I else discovered there.
I cannot well say how I entered it,
so full of slumber was I at the moment
when I forsook the pathway of the truth;
but after I had reached a mountain’s foot,
where that vale ended which had pierced my heart
with fear, I looked on high,
and saw its shoulders
mantled already with that planet’s rays
which leadeth one aright o’er every path.
Then quieted a little was the fear,
which in the lake-depths of my heart had lasted
throughout the night I passed so piteously.[[5]]
And even as he who, from the deep emerged
with sorely troubled breath upon the shore,
turns round, and gazes at the dangerous water;
even so my mind, which still was fleeing on,
turned back to look again upon the pass
which ne’er permitted any one to live.
When I had somewhat eased my weary body,
o’er the lone slope I so resumed my way,
that e’er the lower was my steady foot.
Then lo, not far from where the ascent began,
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 22
Dante and Virgil in the Gloomy WoodThe Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 23
a Leopard which, exceeding light and swift,
was covered over with a spotted hide,
and from my presence did not move away;
nay, rather, she so hindered my advance,
that more than once I turned me to go back.
Some time had now from early morn elapsed,
and with those very stars the sun was rising
that in his escort were, when Love Divine
in the beginning moved those beauteous things;
I therefore had as cause for hoping well
of that wild beast with gaily mottled skin,
the hour of daytime and the year’s sweet season;
but not so, that I should not fear the sight,
which next appeared before me, of a Lion,
— against me this one seemed to be advancing
with head erect and with such raging hunger,
that even the air seemed terrified thereby —
[[7]]
and of a she-Wolf, which with every lust
seemed in her leanness laden, and had caused
many ere now to lead unhappy lives.
The latter so oppressed me with the fear
that issued from her aspect, that I lost
the hope I had of winning to the top.
And such as he is, who is glad to gain,
and who, when times arrive that make him lose,
weeps and is saddened in his every thought;
such did that peaceless animal make me,
which, ’gainst me coming, pushed me, step by step,
back to the place where silent is the sun.
While toward the lowland I was falling fast,
the sight of one was offered to mine eyes,
who seemed, through long continued silence, weak.
When him in that vast wilderness I saw,
“Have pity on me,” I cried out to him,
“whate’er thou be, or shade, or very man!”
“Not man,” he answered, “I was once a man;
and both my parents were of Lombardy,
and Mantuans with respect to fatherland.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 24
’Neath Julius was I born, though somewhat late,
and under good Augustus’ rule I lived
in Rome, in days of false and lying gods.
I was a poet, and of that just man,
Anchises’ son, I sang, who came from Troy
after proud Ilion had been consumed.
[[9]]
But thou, to such sore trouble why return?
Why climbst thou not the Mountain of Delight,
which is of every joy the source and cause?”
“Art thou that Virgil, then, that fountain-head
which poureth forth so broad a stream of speech?”
I answered him with shame upon my brow.
“O light and glory of the other poets,
let the long study, and the ardent love
which made me con thy book, avail me now.
Thou art my teacher and authority;
thou only art the one from whom I took
the lovely manner which hath done me honor.
Behold the beast on whose account I turned;
from her protect me, O thou famous Sage,
for she makes both my veins and pulses tremble!”
“A different course from this must thou pursue,”
he answered, when he saw me shedding tears,
“if from this wilderness thou wouldst escape;
for this wild beast, on whose account thou criest,
alloweth none to pass along her way,
but hinders him so greatly, that she kills;
and is by nature so malign and guilty,
that never doth she sate her greedy lust,
but after food is hungrier than before.
Many are the animals with which she mates,
and still more will there be, until the Hound
shall come, and bring her to a painful death.
[[11]]
He shall not feed on either land or wealth,
but wisdom, love and power shall be his food,
and ’tween two Feltros shall his birth take place.
Of that low Italy he ’ll be the savior,
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 25
for which the maid Camilla died of wounds,
with Turnus, Nisus and Eurỳalus.
And he shall drive her out of every town,
till he have put her back again in Hell,
from which the earliest envy sent her forth.
I therefore think and judge it best for thee
to follow me; and I shall be thy guide,
and lead thee hence through an eternal place,
where thou shalt hear the shrieks of hopelessness
of those tormented spirits of old times,
each one of whom bewails the second death;
then those shalt thou behold who, though in fire,
contented are, because they hope to come,
whene’er it be, unto the blessèd folk;
to whom, thereafter, if thou wouldst ascend,
there ’ll be for that a worthier soul than I.
With her at my departure I shall leave thee,
because the Emperor who rules up there,
since I was not obedient to His law,
wills none shall come into His town through me.
He rules as emperor everywhere, and there
as king; there is His town and lofty throne.
O happy he whom He thereto elects!”
[[13]]
And I to him: “O Poet, I beseech thee,
even by the God it was not thine to know,
so may I from this ill and worse escape,
conduct me thither where thou saidst just now,
that I may see Saint Peter’s Gate, and those
whom thou describest as so whelmed with woe.”
He then moved on, and I behind him kept.
[[15]]
INFERNO
II
Introduction to the Inferno | The Mission of Virgil
Daylight was going, and the dusky air
was now releasing from their weary toil
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 26
all living things on earth; and I alone
was making ready to sustain the war
both of the road and of the sympathy,
which my unerring memory will relate.
O Muses, O high Genius, help me now!
O Memory, that wrotest what I saw,
herewith shall thy nobility appear!
I then began: “Consider, Poet, thou
that guidest me, if strong my virtue be,
or e’er thou trust me to the arduous course.
Thou sayest that the sire of Silvio entered,
when still corruptible, the immortal world,
and that while in his body he was there.
Hence, that to him the Opponent of all ill
was courteous, considering the great result
that was to come from him, both who, and what,
seems not unfitting to a thoughtful man;
for he of fostering Rome and of her sway
in the Empyrean Heaven was chosen as sire;
[[17]]
and both of these, if one would tell the truth,
were foreordained unto the holy place,
where greatest Peter’s follower hath his seat.
While on this quest, for which thou giv’st him praise,
he heard the things which of his victory
the causes were, and of the Papal Robe.
The Chosen Vessel went there afterward,
to bring thence confirmation in the faith,
through which one enters on salvation’s path.
But why should I go there, or who concedes it?
I ’m not Aeneas, nor yet Paul am I;
me worthy of this, nor I nor others deem.
If, therefore, I consent to come, I fear
lest foolish be my coming; thou art wise,
and canst much better judge than I can talk.”
And such as he who unwills what he willed,
and changes so his purpose through new thoughts,
that what he had begun he wholly leaves;
such on that gloomy slope did I become;
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 27
for, as I thought it over, I gave up
the enterprise so hastily commenced.
“If I have rightly understood thy words,”
replied the shade of that Great-hearted man,
“thy soul is hurt by shameful cowardice,
which many times so sorely hinders one,
that from an honored enterprise it turns him,
as seeing falsely doth a shying beast.
[[19]]
In order that thou rid thee of this fear,
I ’ll tell thee why I came, and what I heard
the first time I was grieved on thy account.
Among the intermediate souls I was,
when me a Lady called, so beautiful
and happy, that I begged her to command.
Her eyes were shining brighter than a star,
when sweetly and softly she began to say,
as with an angel’s voice she spoke to me:
‘O courteous Mantuan spirit, thou whose fame
is still enduring in the world above,
and will endure as long as lasts the world,
a friend of mine, but not a friend of Fortune,
is on his journey o’er the lonely slope
obstructed so, that he hath turned through fear;
and, from what I have heard of him in Heaven,
I fear lest he may now have strayed so far,
that I have risen too late to give him help.
Bestir thee, then, and with thy finished speech,
and with whatever his escape may need,
assist him so that I may be consoled.
I, who now have thee go, am Beatrice;
thence come I, whither I would fain return;
’t was love that moved me, love that makes me speak.
When in the presence of my Lord again,
often shall I commend thee unto Him.’
Thereat she ceased to speak, and I began:
[[21]]
‘O Lady of virtue, thou through whom alone
the human race excels all things contained
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 28
within the heaven that hath the smallest circles,
thy bidding pleases me so much, that late
I ’d be, hadst thou already been obeyed;
thou needst but to disclose to me thy will.
But tell me why thou dost not mind descending
into this center from that ample place,
whither thou art so eager to return.’
‘Since thou wouldst know thereof so inwardly,
I ’ll tell thee briefly,’ she replied to me,
‘why I am not afraid to enter here.
Of those things only should one be afraid,
that have the power of doing injury;
not of the rest, for they should not be feared.
I, of His mercy, am so made by God,
that me your wretchedness doth not affect,
nor any flame of yonder fire molest.
There is a Gentle Lady up in Heaven,
who grieves so at this check, whereto I send thee,
that broken is stern judgment there above.
She called Lucìa in her prayer, and said:
‘Now hath thy faithful servant need of thee,
and I, too, recommend him to thy care.’
Lucìa, hostile to all cruelty,
set forth thereat, and came unto the place,
where I with ancient Rachel had my seat.
[[23]]
‘Why, Beatrice,’ she said, ‘true Praise of God,
dost thou not succour him who loved thee so,
that for thy sake he left the common herd?
Dost thou not hear the anguish of his cry?
see’st not the death that fights him on the flood,
o’er which the sea availeth not to boast?
Ne’er were there any in the world so swift
to seek their profit and avoid their loss,
as I, after such words as these were uttered,
descended hither from my blessèd seat,
confiding in that noble speech of thine,
which honors thee and whosoe’er has heard it.’
Then, after she had spoken to me thus,
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 29
weeping she turned her shining eyes away;
which made me hasten all the more to come;
and, even as she wished, I came to thee,
and led thee from the presence of the beast,
which robbed thee of the fair Mount’s short approach.
What is it, then? Why, why dost thou hold back?
Why dost thou lodge such baseness in thy heart,
and wherefore free and daring art thou not,
since three so blessèd Ladies care for thee
within the court of Heaven, and my words, too,
give thee the promise of so much that’s good?”
As little flowers by the chill of night
bowed down and closed, when brightened by the sun,
stand all erect and open on their stems;
[[25]]
so likewise with my wearied strength did I;
and such good daring coursed into my heart,
that I began as one who had been freed:
“O piteous she who hastened to my help,
and courteous thou, that didst at once obey
the words of truth that she addressed to thee!
Thou hast with such desire disposed my heart
toward going on, by reason of thy words,
that to my first intention I ’ve returned.
Go on now, since we two have but one will;
thou Leader, and thou Lord, and Teacher thou!”
I thus addressed him; then, when he had moved,
I entered on the wild and arduous course.[[27]]
INFERNO III
The Gate and Vestibule of Hell. Cowards and Neutrals. Acheron
Through me one goes into the town of woe,
through me one goes into eternal pain,
through me among the people that are lost.
Justice inspired my high exalted Maker;
I was created by the Might divine,
the highest Wisdom and the primal Love.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 30
Before me there was naught created, save
eternal things, and I eternal last;
all hope abandon, ye that enter here!
These words of gloomy color I beheld
inscribed upon the summit of a gate;
whence I: “Their meaning, Teacher, troubles me.”
And he to me, like one aware, replied:
“All fearfulness must here be left behind;
all forms of cowardice must here be dead.
We ’ve reached the place where, as I said to thee,
thou ’lt see the sad folk who have lost the Good
which is the object of the intellect.”
Then, after he had placed his hand in mine
with cheerful face, whence I was comforted,
he led me in among the hidden things.
[[29]]
There sighs and wails and piercing cries of woe
reverberated through the starless air;
hence I, at first, shed tears of sympathy.
Strange languages, and frightful forms of speech,
words caused by pain, accents of anger, voices
both loud and faint, and smiting hands withal,
a mighty tumult made, which sweeps around
forever in that timelessly dark air,
as sand is wont, whene’er a whirlwind blows.
And I, whose head was girt about with horror,
said: “Teacher, what is this I hear? What folk
is this, that seems so overwhelmed with woe?”
And he to me: “This wretched kind of life
the miserable spirits lead of those
who lived with neither infamy nor praise.
Commingled are they with that worthless choir
of Angels who did not rebel, nor yet
were true to God, but sided with themselves.
The heavens, in order not to be less fair,
expelled them; nor doth nether Hell receive them,
because the bad would get some glory thence.”
And I: “What is it, Teacher, grieves them so,
it causes them so loudly to lament?”
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 31
“I ’ll tell thee very briefly,” he replied.
“These have no hope of death, and so low down
is this unseeing life of theirs, that envious
they are of every other destiny.
[[31]]
The world allows no fame of them to live;
Mercy and Justice hold them in contempt.
Let us not talk of them; but look, and pass!”
And I, who gazed intently, saw a flag,
which, whirling, moved so swiftly that to me
contemptuous it appeared of all repose;
and after it there came so long a line
of people, that I never would have thought
that death so great a number had undone.
When some I ’d recognized, I saw and knew
the shade of him who through his cowardice
the great Refusal made. I understood
immediately, and was assured that this
the band of cowards was, who both to God
displeasing are, and to His enemies.
These wretched souls, who never were alive,
were naked, and were sorely spurred to action
by means of wasps and hornets that were there.
The latter streaked their faces with their blood,
which, after it had mingled with their tears,
was at their feet sucked up by loathsome worms.
When I had given myself to peering further,
people I saw upon a great stream’s bank;
I therefore said: “Now, Teacher, grant to me
that I may know who these are, and what law
makes them appear so eager to cross over,
as in this dim light I perceive they are.”
[[33]]
And he to me: “These things will be made clear
to thee, as soon as on the dismal strand
of Acheron we shall have stayed our steps.”
Thereat, with shame-suffused and downcast eyes,
and fearing lest my talking might annoy him,
up to the river I abstained from speech.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 32
Behold then, coming toward us in a boat,
an agèd man, all white with ancient hair,
who shouted: “Woe to you, ye souls depraved!
Give up all hope of ever seeing Heaven!
I come to take you to the other shore,
into eternal darkness, heat and cold.
And thou that yonder art, a living soul,
withdraw thee from those fellows that are dead.”
But when he saw that I did not withdraw,
he said: “By other roads and other ferries
shalt thou attain a shore to pass across,
not here; a lighter boat must carry thee.”
To him my Leader: “Charon, be not vexed;
thus is it yonder willed, where there is power
to do whate’er is willed; so ask no more!”
Thereat were quieted the woolly cheeks
of that old boatman of the murky swamp,
who round about his eyes had wheels of flame.
Those spirits, though, who nude and weary were,
their color changed, and gnashed their teeth together,
as soon as they had heard the cruel words.
[[35]]
They kept blaspheming God, and their own parents,
the human species, and the place, and time,
and seed of their conception and their birth.
Then each and all of them drew on together,
weeping aloud, to that accursèd shore
which waits for every man that fears not God.
Charon, the demon, with his ember eyes
makes beckoning signs to them, collects them all,
and with his oar beats whoso takes his ease.
Even as in autumn leaves detach themselves,
now one and now another, till their branch
sees all its stripped off clothing on the ground;
so, one by one, the evil seed of Adam
cast themselves down that river-bank at signals,
as doth a bird to its recalling lure.
Thus o’er the dusky waves they wend their way;
and ere they land upon the other side,
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 33
another crowd collects again on this.
“My son,” the courteous Teacher said to me,
“all those that perish in the wrath of God
from every country come together here;
and eager are to pass across the stream,
because Justice Divine so spurs them on,
that what was fear is turned into desire.
A good soul never goes across from hence;
if Charon, therefore, findeth fault with thee,
well canst thou now know what his words imply.”
[[37]]
The darkling plain, when this was ended, quaked
so greatly, that the memory of my terror
bathes me even now with sweat.
The tear-stained ground
gave forth a wind, whence flashed vermilion light
which in me overcame all consciousness;
and down I fell like one whom sleep o’ertakes.
[[39]]
INFERNO IV
The First Circle. The BorderlandUnbaptized Worthies. Illustrious Pagans
A heavy thunder-clap broke the deep sleep
within my head, so that I roused myself,
as would a person who is waked by force;
and standing up erect, my rested eyes
I moved around, and with a steady gaze
I looked about to know where I might be.
Truth is I found myself upon the verge
of pain’s abysmal valley, which collects
the thunder-roll of everlasting woes.
So dark it was, so deep and full of mist,
that, howsoe’er I gazed into its depths,
nothing at all did I discern therein.
“Into this blind world let us now descend!”
the Poet, who was death-like pale, began,
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 34
“I will be first, and thou shalt second be.”
And I, who of his color was aware,
said: “How am I to come, if thou take fright,
who ’rt wont to be my comfort when afraid?”
“The anguish of the people here below,”
he said to me, “brings out upon my face
the sympathy which thou dost take for fear.
[[41]]
Since our long journey drives us, let us go!”
Thus he set forth, and thus he had me enter
the first of circles girding the abyss.
Therein, as far as one could judge by list’ning,
there was no lamentation, saving sighs
which caused a trembling in the eternal air;
and this came from the grief devoid of torture
felt by the throngs, which many were and great,
of infants and of women and of men.
To me then my good Teacher: “Dost not ask
what spirits these are whom thou seest here?
Now I would have thee know, ere thou go further,
that these sinned not; and though they merits have,
’t is not enough, for they did not have baptism,
the gateway of the creed believed by thee;
and if before Christianity they lived,
they did not with due worship honor God;
and one of such as these am I myself.
For such defects, and for no other guilt,
we ’re lost, and only hurt to this extent,
that, in desire, we live deprived of hope.”
Great sorrow filled my heart on hearing this,
because I knew of people of great worth,
who in that Borderland suspended were.
“Tell me, my Teacher, tell me, thou my Lord,”
I then began, through wishing to be sure
about the faith which conquers every error;
[[43]]
“came any ever, by his own deserts,
or by another’s, hence, who then was blest?”
And he, who understood my covert speech,
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 35
replied: “To this condition I was come
but newly, when I saw a Mighty One
come here, crowned with the sign of victory.
From hence He drew the earliest parent’s shade,
and that of his son, Abel, that of Noah,
and Moses the law-giver and obedient;
Abram the patriarch, and David king,
Israel, with both his father and his sons,
and Rachel, too, for whom he did so much,
and many others; and He made them blest;
and I would have thee know that, earlier
than these, there were no human spirits saved.”
Because he talked we ceased not moving on,
but all the while were passing through the wood,
the wood, I mean, of thickly crowded shades.
Nor far this side of where I fell asleep
had we yet gone, when I beheld a fire,
which overcame a hemisphere of gloom.
Somewhat away from it we were as yet,
but not so far, but I could dimly see
that honorable people held that place.
“O thou that honorest both art and science,
who are these people that such honor have,
that it divides them from the others’ life?”
[[45]]
And he to me: “The honorable fame,
which speaks of them in thy live world above,
in Heaven wins grace, which thus advances them.”
And hereupon a voice was heard by me:
“Do honor to the loftiest of poets!
his shade, which had departed, now returns.”
And when the voice had ceased and was at rest,
four mighty shades I saw approaching us;
their looks were neither sorrowful nor glad.
My kindly Teacher then began to say:
“Look at the one who comes with sword in hand
before the three, as if their lord he were.
Homer he is, the sovreign poet; Horace,
the satirist, the one that cometh next;
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 36
the third is Ovid, Lucan is the last.
Since each of them in common shares with me
the title which the voice of one proclaimed,
they do me honor, and therein do well.”
Thus gathered I beheld the fair assembly
of those the masters of the loftiest song,
which soareth like an eagle o’er the rest.
Then, having talked among themselves awhile,
they turned around to me with signs of greeting;
and, when he noticed this, my Teacher smiled.
And even greater honor still they did me,
for one of their own company they made me,
so that amid such wisdom I was sixth.
[[47]]
Thus on we went as far as to the light,
talking of things whereof is silence here
becoming, even as speech was, where we spoke.
We reached a noble Castle’s foot, seven times
encircled by high walls, and all around
defended by a lovely little stream.
This last we crossed as if dry land it were;
through seven gates with these sages I went in,
and to a meadow of fresh grass we came.
There people were with slow and serious eyes,
and, in their looks, of great authority;
they spoke but seldom and with gentle voice.
We therefore to one side of it drew back
into an open place so luminous
and high, that each and all could be perceived.
There on the green enamel opposite
were shown to me the spirits of the great,
for seeing whom I glory in myself.
I saw Electra with companions many,
of whom I knew both Hector and Aeneas,
and Caesar armed, with shining falcon eyes.
I saw Camilla with Penthesilea
upon the other side, and King Latinus,
who with Lavinia, his own daughter, sat.
I saw that Brutus who drove Tarquin out,
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 37
Lucretia, Julia, Martia and Cornelia,
and, all alone, I saw the Saladin.
[[49]]
Then, having raised my brows a little higher,
the Teacher I beheld of those that know,
seated amid a philosophic group.
They all look up to him, all honor him;
there Socrates and Plato I beheld,
who nearer than the rest are at his side;
Democritus, who thinks the world chance-born,
Diogenes, Anaxagoras and Thales,
Empedocles, Heraclitus, and Zeno;
of qualities I saw the good collector,
Dioscorides I mean; Orpheus I saw,
Tully and Livy, and moral Seneca;
Euclid, the geometer, and Ptolemy,
Hippocrates, Avicenna, Galen,
Averrhoès, who made the famous comment.
I cannot speak of all of them in full,
because my long theme drives me on so fast,
that oft my words fall short of what I did.
The sixfold band now dwindles down to two;
my wise Guide leads me by a different path
out of the calm into the trembling air;
and to a place I come, where naught gives light.
[[51]]
INFERNO V
The Second Circle. Sexual Intemperance
The Lascivious and Adulterers
Thus from the first of circles I went down
into the second, which surrounds less space,
and all the greater pain, which goads to wailing.
There Minos stands in horrid guise, and snarls;
inside the entrance he examines sins,
judges, and, as he girds himself, commits.
I mean that when an ill-born soul appears
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 38
before him, it confesses itself wholly;
and thereupon that Connoisseur of sins
perceives what place in Hell belongs to it,
and girds him with his tail as many times,
as are the grades he wishes it sent down.
Before him there are always many standing;
they go to judgment, each one in his turn;
they speak and hear, and then are downward hurled.
“O thou that comest to the inn of woe,”
said Minos, giving up, on seeing me,
the execution of so great a charge,
“see how thou enter, and in whom thou put
thy trust; let not the gate-way’s width deceive thee!”
To him my Leader: “Why dost thou, too, cry?
[[53]]
Hinder thou not his fate-ordained advance;
thus is it yonder willed, where there is power
to do whate’er is willed; so ask no more!”
And now the woeful sounds of actual pain
begin to break upon mine ears; I now
am come to where much wailing smiteth me.
I reached a region silent of all light,
which bellows as the sea doth in a storm,
if lashed and beaten by opposing winds.
The infernal hurricane, which never stops,
carries the spirits onward with its sweep,
and, as it whirls and smites them, gives them pain.
Whene’er they come before the shattered rock,
there lamentations, moans and shrieks are heard;
there, cursing, they blaspheme the Power Divine.
I understood that to this kind of pain
are doomed those carnal sinners, who subject
their reason to their sensual appetite.
And as their wings bear starlings on their way,
when days are cold, in full and wide-spread flocks;
so doth that blast the evil spirits bear;
this way and that, and up and down it leads them;
nor only doth no hope of rest, but none
of lesser suffering, ever comfort them.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 39
And even as cranes move on and sing their lays,
forming the while a long line in the air;
thus saw I coming, uttering cries of pain,
[[55]]
shades borne along upon the aforesaid storm;
I therefore said: “Who, Teacher, are the people
the gloomy air so cruelly chastises?”
“The first of those of whom thou wouldst have news,”
the latter thereupon said unto me,
“was empress over lands of many tongues.
To sexual vice so wholly was she given,
that lust she rendered lawful in her laws,
thus to remove the blame she had incurred.
Semiramis she is, of whom one reads
that she gave suck to Ninus, and became
his wife; she held the land the Soldan rules.
The next is she who killed herself through love,
and to Sichaeus’ ashes broke her faith;
the lustful Cleopatra follows her.
See Helen, for whose sake so long a time
of guilt rolled by, and great Achilles see,
who fought with love when at the end of life.
Paris and Tristan see;” and then he showed me,
and pointed out by name, a thousand shades
and more, whom love had from our life cut off.
When I had heard my Leader speak the names
of ladies and their knights of olden times,
pity o’ercame me, and I almost swooned.
“Poet,” I then began, “I ’d gladly talk
with those two yonder who together go,
and seem to be so light upon the wind.”
[[57]]
“Thou ’lt see thy chance when nearer us they are;”
said he, “beseech them then by that same love
which leadeth them along, and they will come.”
Soon as the wind toward us had bent their course.
I cried: “O toil-worn souls, come speak with us,
so be it that One Else forbid it not!”
As doves, when called by their desire, come flying
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 40
with raised and steady pinions through the air
to their sweet nest, borne on by their own will;
so from the band where Dido is they issued,
advancing through the noisome air toward us,
so strong with love the tone of my appeal.
“O thou benign and gracious living creature,
that goest through the gloomy purple air
to visit us, who stained the world blood-red;
if friendly were the universal King,
for thy peace would we pray to Him, since pity
thou showest for this wretched woe of ours.
Of whatsoever it may please you hear
and speak, we will both hear and speak with you,
while yet, as now it is, the wind is hushed.
The town where I was born sits on the shore,
whither the Po descends to be at peace
together with the streams that follow him.
Love, which soon seizes on a well-born heart,
seized him for that fair body’s sake, whereof
I was deprived; and still the way offends me.
[[59]]
Love, which absolves from loving none that ’s loved,
seized me so strongly for his love of me,
that, as thou see’st, it doth not leave me yet.
Love to a death in common led us on;
Cain’s ice awaiteth him who quenched our life.”
These words were wafted down to us from them.
When I had heard those sorely troubled souls,
I bowed my head, and long I held it low,
until the Poet said: “What thinkest thou?”
When I made answer I began: “Alas!
how many tender thoughts and what desire
induced these souls to take the woeful step!”
I then turned back to them again and spoke,
and I began: “Thine agonies, Francesca,
cause me to weep with grief and sympathy.
But tell me: at the time of tender sighs,
whereby and how did Love concede to you
that ye should know each other’s veiled desires?”
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 41
And she to me: “There is no greater pain
than to remember happy days in days
of misery; and this thy Leader knows.
But if to know the first root of our love
so yearning a desire possesses thee,
I ’ll do as one who weepeth while he speaks.
One day, for pastime merely, we were reading
of Launcelot, and how love o’erpowered him;
alone we were, and free from all misgiving.
[[61]]
Oft did that reading cause our eyes to meet,
and often take the color from our faces;
and yet one passage only overcame us.
When we had read of how the longed-for smile
was kissed by such a lover, this one here,
who nevermore shall be divided from me,
trembling all over, kissed me on my mouth.
A Gallehault the book, and he who wrote it!
No further in it did we read that day.”
While one was saying this, the other spirit
so sorely wept, that out of sympathy
I swooned away as though about to die,
and fell as falls a body that is dead.
[[63]]
INFERNO VI
The Third Circle. Intemperance in Food
Gluttons
On my return to consciousness, which closed
before the kindred couple’s piteous case,
which utterly confounded me with grief,
new torments all around me I behold,
and new tormented ones, where’er I move,
where’er I turn, and wheresoe’er I gaze.
In the third circle am I, that of rain
eternal, cursèd, cold and burdensome;
its measure and quality are never new.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 42
Coarse hail, and snow, and dirty-colored water
through the dark air are ever pouring down;
and foully smells the ground receiving them.
A wild beast, Cerberus, uncouth and cruel,
is barking with three throats, as would a dog,
over the people that are there submerged.
Red eyes he hath, a dark and greasy beard,
a belly big, and talons on his hands;
he claws the spirits, flays and quarters them.
The rainfall causes them to howl like dogs;
with one side they make shelter for the other;
oft do the poor profaners turn about.
[[65]]
When Cerberus, the mighty worm, perceived us,
his mouths he opened, showing us his fangs;
nor had he any limb that he kept still.
My Leader then stretched out his opened palms,
and took some earth, and with his fists well filled,
he threw it down into the greedy throats.
And like a dog that, barking, yearns for food,
and, when he comes to bite it, is appeased,
since only to devour it doth he strain
and fight; even such became those filthy faces
of demon Cerberus, who, thundering, stuns
the spirits so, that they would fain be deaf.
Over the shades the heavy rain beats down
we then were passing, as our feet we set
upon their unreal bodies which seem real.
They each and all were lying on the ground,
excepting one, which rose and sat upright,
when it perceived us pass in front of it.
“O thou that through this Hell art being led,”
it said to me, “recall me, if thou canst;
for thou, before I unmade was, wast made.”
And I to it: “The anguish thou art in
perchance withdraws thee from my memory so,
it doth not seem that thee I ever saw.
But tell me who thou art, that in so painful
a place art set, and to such punishment,
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that none, though greater, so repulsive is.”
[[67]]
And he to me: “Thy town, which is so full
of envy that the bag o’erflows already,
owned me when I was in the peaceful life.
Ciacco, you townsmen used to call me then;
for my injurious fault of gluttony
I ’m broken, as thou seest, by the rain;
nor yet am I, sad soul, the only one,
for all these here are subject, for like fault,
unto like pain.” Thereat he spoke no more.
“Thy trouble, Ciacco,” I replied to him,
“so burdens me that it invites my tears;
but tell me, if thou canst, to what will come
the citizens of our divided town;
if any one therein is just; and tell me
the reason why such discord hath assailed her.”
And he to me then: “After struggling long
they ’ll come to bloodshed, and the boorish party
will drive the other out with much offence.
Then, afterward, the latter needs must fall
within three suns, and the other party rise,
by help of one who now is ‘on the fence.’
A long time will it hold its forehead up,
keeping the other under grievous weights,
howe’er it weep therefor, and be ashamed.
Two men are just, but are not heeded there;
the three sparks that have set men’s hearts on fire,
are overweening pride, envy and greed.”
[[69]]
Herewith he closed his tear-inspiring speech.
And I to him: “I ’d have thee teach me still,
and grant the favor of some further talk.
Farinàta and Tegghiàio, who so worthy were,
Jàcopo Rusticùcci, Arrigo and Mosca,
and the others who were set on doing good,
tell me where these are, and let me know of them;
for great desire constraineth me to learn
if Heaven now sweeten, or Hell poison them.”
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And he: “Among the blackest souls are these;
a different fault weighs toward the bottom each;
if thou descend so far, thou mayst behold them.
But when in the sweet world thou art again,
recall me, prithee, unto others’ minds;
I tell no more, nor further answer thee.”
His fixed eyes thereupon he turned askance;
a while he looked at me, then bowed his head,
and fell therewith among the other blind.
Then said my Leader: “He ’ll not wake again
on this side of the angel-trumpet’s sound.
What time the hostile Podestà shall come,
each soul will find again its dismal tomb,
each will take on again its flesh and shape,
and hear what through eternity resounds.”
We thus passed through with slowly moving steps
the filthy mixture of the shades and rain,
talking a little of the future life;
[[71]]
because of which I said: “These torments, Teacher,
after the Final Sentence will they grow,
or less become, or burn the same as now.”
And he to me: “Return thou to thy science,
which holdeth that the more a thing is perfect,
so much the more it feels of weal or woe.
Although this cursèd folk shall nevermore
arrive at true perfection, it expects
to be more perfect after, than before.”
As in a circle, round that road we went,
speaking at greater length than I repeat,
and came unto a place where one descends;
there found we Plutus, the great enemy.
INFERNO XII
The Seventh Circle. The First Ring. Violence against one’s Fellow Man. Murderers and Spoilers.
Phlegethon
The place, where to descend the bank we came,
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was Alp-like, and, through what was also there,
such that all eyes would be repelled by it.
As is that downfall on the hither side
of Trent, which sidewise smote the Àdige,
through earthquake or through failure of support;
since from the mountain’s summit, whence it moved
down to the plain, the rock is shattered so,
that it would yield a path for one above;
even such was the descent of that ravine;
and on the border of the broken bank
was stretched at length the Infamy of Crete,
who in the seeming heifer was conceived;
and when he saw us there he bit himself,
like one whom inward anger overcomes.
In his direction then my Sage cried out:
“Dost thou, perhaps, think Athens’ duke is here,
who gave thee death when in the world above?
Begone, thou beast! for this man cometh not
taught by thy sister, but is going by,
in order to behold your punishments.”
[[129]]
As doth a bull, who from his leash breaks free
the moment he receives the mortal blow,
and cannot walk, but plunges here and there;
so doing I beheld the Minotaur;
and he, aware, cried out: “Run to the pass!
’t is well that, while he rages, thou descend.”
Thereat we made our way adown that heap
of fallen rocks, which often ’neath my feet
were moved, because of their unwonted load.
I went along in thought; and he: “Perchance
thou thinkest of this landslide, which is guarded
by that beast’s anger which I quenched just now.
Now I would have thee know that, when down here
to nether Hell I came, that other time,
this mass of rock had not yet fallen down.
But certainly, if I remember well,
not long ere He arrived, who carried off
from Dis the highest circle’s mighty prey,
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on every side the deep and foul abyss
so trembled that I thought the universe
had felt the love, whereby, as some believe,
the world to Chaos hath been oft reduced;
and at that moment this old mass of rock
was thus, both here and elsewhere, overthrown.
But turn thine eyes down yonder now; for lo,
the stream of blood is drawing near to us,
wherein boils who by violence harms others.”[[131]] . . .
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Dante and Virgil meet the MinotaurThe Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 48
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 49
INFERNO XXXIV
The Ninth Circle. Treachery. Cocytus
Traitors to their Benefactors. Lucifer
. . . Raising mine eyes, I thought that I should still
see Lucifer the same as when I left him;
but I beheld him with his legs held up.
And thereupon, if I became perplexed,
let those dull people think, who do not see
what kind of point that was which I had passed.
“Stand up” my Teacher said, “upon thy feet!
the way is long and difficult the road,
and now to middle-tierce the sun returns.”
It was no palace hallway where we were,
but just a natural passage under ground,
which had a wretched floor and lack of light.
“Before I tear myself from this abyss,
Teacher,” said I on rising, “talk to me
a little, and correct my wrong ideas.[[395]]
Where is the ice? And how is this one fixed
thus upside down? And in so short a time
how hath the sun from evening crossed to morn?”
Then he to me: “Thou thinkest thou art still
beyond the center where I seized the hair
of that bad Worm who perforates the world.
While I was going down, thou wast beyond it;
but when I turned, thou then didst pass the point
to which all weights are drawn on every side;
thou now art come beneath the hemisphere
opposed to that the great dry land o’ercovers,
and ’neath whose zenith was destroyed the Man,
who without sinfulness was born and died;
thy feet thou hast upon the little sphere,
which forms the other surface of Judecca.
’T is morning here, whenever evening there;
and he who made our ladder with his hair,
is still fixed fast, ev’n as he was before.
He fell on this side out of Heaven; whereat,
the land, which hitherto was spread out here,
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through fear of him made of the sea a veil,
and came into our hemisphere; perhaps
to flee from him, what is on this side seen
left the place empty here, and upward rushed.”
There is a place down there, as far removed
from Beelzebub, as e’er his tomb extends,
not known by sight, but by a brooklet’s sound,[[397]]
which flows down through a hole there in the rock,
gnawed in it by the water’s spiral course,
which slightly slopes. My Leader then, and I,
in order to regain the world of light,
entered upon that dark and hidden path;
and, without caring for repose, went up,
he going on ahead, and I behind,
till through a rounded opening I beheld
some of the lovely things the sky contains;
thence we came out, and saw again the stars.
PARADISO XXXIII
The Empyrean. GOD. St. Bernard’s Prayer to Mary
The Vision of God. Ultimate Salvation
“O Virgin Mother, Daughter of thy Son,
humbler and loftier than any creature,
eternal counsel’s predetermined goal,
thou art the one that such nobility
didst lend to human nature, that its Maker
scorned not to make Himself what He had made.
Within thy womb rekindled was the Love,
through whose warm influence in the eternal Peace
this Flower hath blossomed thus. Here unto us
thou art a noonday torch of Charity;
and down below ’mong mortal men, thou art
a living fount of Hope. Lady, so great
thou art, and hast such worth, that one who longs
for Grace, and unto thee hath not recourse,
wingless would wish to have his longing fly.
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Not only doth thy Kindliness give help
to him that asketh it, but many times
it freely runs ahead of his request.
In thee is Mercy, Pity is in thee,
in thee Magnificence, and all there is
of Goodness in a creature meets in thee.[[387]]
Now doth this man, who from the lowest drain
of the Universe hath one by one beheld,
as far as here, the forms of spirit-life,
beseech thee, of thy grace, for so much strength
that with his eyes he may uplift himself
toward Ultimate Salvation higher still.
And I, who never for mine own sight burned
more than I do for his, offer thee all
my prayers, and pray that they be not too poor,
that thou with thy prayers so dissolve each cloud
of his mortality, that unto him
the Highest Pleasure may unfold Itself.
And furthermore, I pray to thee, O Queen,
who canst whate’er thou wilt, that, after such
a sight, thou keep all his affections sound.
His human promptings let thy care defeat;
see with how many blest ones Beatrice
is clasping for my prayers her hands to thee!”
The eyes belovèd and revered by God,
intent on him who prayed, revealed to us
how grateful unto her are earnest prayers.
Thence they addressed them to the Eternal Light,
wherein it may not be believed the eye
of any creature finds so clear a way.
And I, who to the End of all desires
was drawing near, within me, as I ought,
brought to its goal the ardor of desire.
[[389]]
Bernard was smiling, and was making signs
for me to look on high; but, as he wished,
I was already of mine own accord;
because my sight, as purer it became,
was penetrating more and more the radiance
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of that High Light, which of Itself is true.
From this time onward greater was my sight
than is our speech, which yields to such a vision,
and memory also yields to such excess.
And such as he, who seeth in a dream,
and after it, the imprinted feeling stays,
while all the rest returns not to his mind;
even such am I; for almost wholly fades
my vision, yet the sweetness which was born
of it is dripping still into my heart.
Even thus the snow is in the sun dissolved;
even thus the Sibyl’s oracles, inscribed
on flying leaves, were lost adown the wind.
O Light Supreme, that dost uplift Thyself
so far from mortal thought, relend my mind
a little of what Thou didst seem to be,
and cause my tongue to be so powerful,
that of Thy Glory it may leave at least
a spark unto the people still to come;
for to my mem’ry if it but a while
return, and speak a little in these lines,
more of Thy Victory will be conceived.
[[391]]
I think the keenness of the living Ray
which I endured would have confounded me,
if from it I had turned away mine eyes.
And I recall that I, because of this,
the bolder was to bear it, till I made
my vision one with Value Infinite.
O the abundant Grace, whereby I dared
to pierce the Light Eternal with my gaze,
until I had therein exhausted sight!
I saw that far within its depths there lies,
by Love together in one volume bound,
that which in leaves lies scattered through the world;
substance and accident, and modes thereof,
fused, as it were, in such a way, that that,
whereof I speak, is but One Simple Light.
This union’s general form I think I saw,
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since, saying so, I feel that I the more
rejoice. Of more forgetfulness for me
one moment is, than centuries twenty-five
are for the enterprise which once caused Neptune
to wonder at the shadow Argo cast.
My mind, thus wholly in suspense, was gazing
steadfast and motionless, and all intent,
and, gazing, grew enkindled more and more.
Such in that Light doth one at last become,
that one can never possibly consent
to turn therefrom for any other sight;
[[393]]
because the Good, which is the will’s real object,
is therein wholly gathered, and, outside,
that is defective which is perfect there.
Ev’n as to what I do remember, mine
will now be shorter than an infant’s speech,
who at the breast still bathes his tongue. ’T was not
that there was other than a simple semblance
within the Living Light wherein I gazed,
which always is what It hath been before;
but through my sight, which in me, as I looked,
was gathering strength, because I changed, one sole
appearance underwent a change for me.
Within the Lofty Light’s profound and clear
subsistence there appeared to me three Rings,
of threefold color and of one content;
and one, as Rainbow is by Rainbow, seemed
reflected by the other, while the third
seemed like a Fire breathed equally from both.
Oh, how, to my conception, short and weak
is speech! And this, to what I saw, is such,
that it is not enough to call it small.
O Light Eternal, that alone dost dwell
within Thyself, alone dost understand
Thyself, and love and smile upon Thyself,
Self-understanding and Self-understood!
That Circle which appeared to be conceived
within Thyself as a Reflected Light,
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ParadiseThe Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 55
Fire and Ice by Robert Frost
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
********
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EAST COKER
(No. 2 of ‘Four Quartets’)
I
In my beginning is my end. In succession
Houses rise and fall, crumble, are extended,
Are removed, destroyed, restored, or in their place
Is an open field, or a factory, or a by-pass.
Old stone to new building, old timber to new fires,
Old fires to ashes, and ashes to the earth
Which is already flesh, fur and faeces,
Bone of man and beast, cornstalk and leaf.
Houses live and die: there is a time for building
And a time for living and for generation
And a time for the wind to break the loosened pane
And to shake the wainscot where the field-mouse trots
And to shake the tattered arras woven with a silent motto.
In my beginning is my end. Now the light falls
Across the open field, leaving the deep lane
Shuttered with branches, dark in the afternoon,
Where you lean against a bank while a van passes,
And the deep lane insists on the direction
Into the village, in the electric heat
Hypnotised. In a warm haze the sultry light
Is absorbed, not refracted, by grey stone.
The dahlias sleep in the empty silence.
Wait for the early owl.
In that open field
If you do not come too close, if you do not come too close,
On a summer midnight, you can hear the music
Of the weak pipe and the little drum
And see them dancing around the bonfire
The association of man and woman
In daunsinge, signifying matrimonie—
A dignified and commodiois sacrament.
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Two and two, necessarye coniunction,
Holding eche other by the hand or the arm
Whiche betokeneth concorde. Round and round the fire
Leaping through the flames, or joined in circles,
Rustically solemn or in rustic laughter
Lifting heavy feet in clumsy shoes,
Earth feet, loam feet, lifted in country mirth
Mirth of those long since under earth
Nourishing the corn. Keeping time,
Keeping the rhythm in their dancing
As in their living in the living seasons
The time of the seasons and the constellations
The time of milking and the time of harvest
The time of the coupling of man and woman
And that of beasts. Feet rising and falling.
Eating and drinking. Dung and death.
Dawn points, and another day
Prepares for heat and silence. Out at sea the dawn wind
Wrinkles and slides. I am here
Or there, or elsewhere. In my beginning.
II
What is the late November doing
With the disturbance of the spring
And creatures of the summer heat,
And snowdrops writhing under feet
And hollyhocks that aim too high
Red into grey and tumble down
Late roses filled with early snow?
Thunder rolled by the rolling stars
Simulates triumphal cars
Deployed in constellated wars
Scorpion fights against the Sun
Until the Sun and Moon go down
Comets weep and Leonids fly
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Hunt the heavens and the plains
Whirled in a vortex that shall bring
The world to that destructive fire
Which burns before the ice-cap reigns.
That was a way of putting it—not very satisfactory:
A periphrastic study in a worn-out poetical fashion,
Leaving one still with the intolerable wrestle
With words and meanings. The poetry does not matter.
It was not (to start again) what one had expected.
What was to be the value of the long looked forward to,
Long hoped for calm, the autumnal serenity
And the wisdom of age? Had they deceived us
Or deceived themselves, the quiet-voiced elders,
Bequeathing us merely a receipt for deceit?
The serenity only a deliberate hebetude,
The wisdom only the knowledge of dead secrets
Useless in the darkness into which they peered
Or from which they turned their eyes. There is, it seems to us,
At best, only a limited value
In the knowledge derived from experience.
The knowledge imposes a pattern, and falsifies,
For the pattern is new in every moment
And every moment is a new and shocking
Valuation of all we have been. We are only undeceived
Of that which, deceiving, could no longer harm.
In the middle, not only in the middle of the way
But all the way, in a dark wood, in a bramble,
On the edge of a grimpen, where is no secure foothold,
And menaced by monsters, fancy lights,
Risking enchantment. Do not let me hear
Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly,
Their fear of fear and frenzy, their fear of possession,
Of belonging to another, or to others, or to God.
The only wisdom we can hope to acquire
Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.
The houses are all gone under the sea.
The dancers are all gone under the hill.
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The Magician’s Nephew
Chapter one: the wrong door
This is a story about something that happened long ago when your grandfather
was a child. It is a very important story because it shows how all the comings
and goings between our own world and the land of Narnia first began.
In those days Mr Sherlock Holmes was still living in Baker Street and the Bas-
tables were looking for treasure in the Lewisham Road. In those days, if you
were a boy you had to wear a stiff Eton collar every day, and schools were usu-
ally nastier than now. But meals were nicer; and as for sweets, I won’t tell you
how cheap and good they were, because it would only make your mouth water
in vain. And in those days there lived in London a girl called Polly Plummer.
She lived in one of a long row of houses which were all joined together. One
morning she was out in the back garden when a boy scrambled up from the gar-
den next door and put his face over the wall. Polly was very surprised because
up till now there had never been any children in that house, but only Mr Ketter-
ley and Miss Ketterley, a brother and sister, old bachelor and old maid, living to-
gether. So she looked up, full of curiosity. The face of the strange boy was very
grubby. It could hardly have been grubbier if he had first rubbed his hands in the
earth, and then had a good cry, and then dried his face with his hands. As a mat-
ter of fact, this was very nearly what he had been doing.
“Hullo,” said Polly.
“Hullo,” said the boy. “What’s your name?”
“Polly,” said Polly. “What’s yours?”
“Digory,” said the boy.
“I say, what a funny name!” said Polly.
“It isn’t half so funny as Polly,” said Digory.
“Yes it is,” said Polly.
“No, it isn’t,” said Digory.
“At any rate I do wash my face,” said Polly, “Which is what you need to do; es-
pecially after -” and then she stopped. She had been going to say “After you’ve
been blubbing,” but she thought that wouldn’t be polite.
“Alright, I have then,” said Digory in a much louder voice, like a boy who was so miser-
able that he didn’t care who knew he had been crying. “And so would you,” he went
on, “if you’d lived all your life in the country and had a pony, and a river at the bottom
of the garden, and then been brought to live in a beastly Hole like this.”
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“London isn’t a Hole,” said Polly indignantly. But the boy was too wound up to
take any notice of her, and he went on “And if your father was away in India –
and you had to come and live with an Aunt and an Uncle who’s mad (who would
like that?) – and if the reason was that they were looking after your Mother – and
if your Mother was ill and was going to – going to – die.”
Then his face went the wrong sort of shape as it does if you’re trying to keep
back your tears.
“I didn’t know. I’m sorry,” said Polly humbly. And then, because she hardly knew
what to say, and also to turn Digory’s mind to cheerful subjects, she asked:
“Is Mr Ketterley really mad?”
“Well either he’s mad,” said Digory, “or there’s some other mystery. He has a
study on the top floor and Aunt Letty says I must never go up there. Well, that
looks fishy to begin with. And then there’s another thing. Whenever he tries to
say anything to me at meal times – he never even tries to talk to her – she al-
ways shuts him up. She says, “Don’t worry the boy, Andrew” or “I’m sure Digory
doesn’t want to hear about that” or else “Now, Digory, wouldn’t you like to go
out and play in the garden?”
“What sort of things does he try to say?”
“I don’t know. He never gets far enough. But there’s more than that. One night
– it was last night in fact – as I was going past the foot of the attic-stairs on my
way to bed (and I don’t much care for going past them either) I’m sure I heard a
yell.” “Perhaps he keeps a mad wife shut up there.”
“Yes, I’ve thought of that.”
“Or perhaps he’s a coiner.”
“Or he might have been a pirate, like the man at the beginning of Treasure Island,
and be always hiding from his old shipmates.”
“How exciting!” said Polly, “I never knew your house was so interesting.”
“You may think it interesting,” said Digory. “But you wouldn’t like it if you had to
sleep there. How would you like to lie awake listening for Uncle Andrew’s step
to come creeping along the passage to your room? And he has such awful eyes.”
That was how Polly and Digory got to know one another: and as it was just the
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beginning of the summer holidays and neither of them was going to the sea that
year, they met nearly every day. Their adventures began chiefly because it was
one of the wettest and coldest summers there had been for years. That drove
them to do indoor things: you might say, indoor exploration. It is wonderful how
much exploring you can do with a stump of candle in a big house, or in a row of
houses. Polly had discovered long ago that if you opened a certain little door in
the box-room attic of her house you would find the cistern and a dark place be-
hind it which you could get into by a little careful climbing. The dark place was
like a long tunnel with brick wall on one side and sloping roof on the other. In
the roof there were little chunks of light between the slates. There was no floor
in this tunnel: you had to step from rafter to rafter, and between them there
was only plaster. If you stepped on this you would find yourself falling through
the ceiling of the room below. Polly had used the bit of the tunnel just beside
the cistern as a smugglers’ cave. She had brought up bits of old packing cases
and the seats of broken kitchen chairs, and things of that sort, and spread them
across from rafter to rafter so as to make a bit of floor. Here she kept a cash-box
containing various treasures, and a story she was writing and usually a few ap-
ples. She had often drunk a quiet bottle of ginger-beer in there: the old bottles
made it look more like a smugglers’ cave.
Digory quite liked the cave (she wouldn’t let him see the story) but he was more
interested in exploring. “Look here,” he said. “How long does this tunnel go on
for? I mean, does it stop where your house ends?”
“No,” said Polly. “The walls don’t go out to the roof. It goes on. I don’t know how
far.”
“Then we could get the length of the whole row of houses.”
“So we could,” said Polly, “And oh, I say!”
“What?”
“We could get into the other houses.”
“Yes, and get taken up for burglars! No thanks.”
“Don’t be so jolly clever. I was thinking of the house beyond yours.” , “What
about it?”
“Why, it’s the empty one. Daddy says it’s always been empty since we came
here.” “I suppose we ought to have a look at it then,” said Digory. He was a good
deal more excited than you’d have thought from the way he spoke. For of course
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he was thinking, just as you would have been, of all the reasons why the house
might have been empty so long. So was Polly. Neither of them said the word
“haunted”. And both felt that once the thing had been suggested, it would be
feeble not to do it.
“Shall we go and try it now?” said Digory.
“Alright,” said Polly.
“Don’t if you’d rather not,” said Digory.
“I’m game if you are,” said she.
“How are we to know we’re in the next house but one?” They decided they
would have to go out into the boxroom and walk across it taking steps as long
as the steps from one rafter to the next. That would give them an idea of how
many rafters went to a room. Then they would allow about four more for the
passage between the two attics in Polly’s house, and then the same number for
the maid’s bedroom as for the box-room. That would give them the length of
the house. When they had done that distance twice they would be at the end of
Digory’s house; any door they came to after that would let them into an attic of
the empty house.
“But I don’t expect it’s really empty at all,” said Digory.
“What do you expect?”
“I expect someone lives there in secret, only coming in and out at night, with a
dark lantern. We shall probably discover a gang of desperate criminals and get
a reward. It’s all rot to say a house would be empty all those years unless there
was some mystery.”
“Daddy thought it must be the drains,” said Polly.
“Pooh! Grown-ups are always thinking of uninteresting explanations,” said Digo-
ry. Now that they were talking by daylight in the attic instead of by candlelight in
the Smugglers’ Cave it seemed much less likely that the empty house would be
haunted.
When they had measured the attic they had to get a pencil and do a sum. They
both got different answers to it at first, and even when they agreed I am not
sure they got it right. They were in a hurry to start on the exploration.
“We mustn’t make a sound,” said Polly as they climbed in again behind the cis-
tern. Because it was such an important occasion they took a candle each (Polly
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had a good store of them in her cave).
It was very dark and dusty and draughty and they stepped from rafter to rafter
without a word except when they whispered to one another, “We’re opposite
your attic now” or “this must be halfway through our house”. And neither of
them stumbled and the candles didn’t go out, and at last they came where they
could see a little door in the brick wall on their right. There was no bolt or handle
on this side of it, of course, for the door had been made for getting in, not for
getting out; but there was a catch (as there often is on the inside of a cupboard
door) which they felt sure they would be able to turn.
“Shall I?” said Digory.
“I’m game if you are,” said Polly, just as she had said before. Both felt that it was
becoming very serious, but neither would draw back. Digory pushed round the
catch with some difficultly. The door swung open and the sudden daylight made
them blink. Then, with a great shock, they saw that they were looking, not into
a deserted attic, but into a furnished room. But it seemed empty enough. It was
dead silent. Polly’s curiosity got the better of her. She blew out her candle and
stepped out into the strange room, making no more noise than a mouse.
It was shaped, of course, like an attic, but furnished as a sitting-room. Every bit
of the walls was lined with shelves and every bit of the shelves was full of books.
A fire was burning in the grate (you remember that it was a very cold wet sum-
mer that year) and in front of the fire-place with its back towards them was a
high-backed armchair. Between the chair and Polly, and filling most of the mid-
dle of the room, was a big table piled with all sorts of things: printed books, and
books of the sort you write in, and ink bottles and pens and sealing-wax and
a microscope. But what she noticed first was a bright red wooden tray with a
number of rings on it. They were in pairs – a yellow one and a green one togeth-
er, then a little space, and then another yellow one and another green one.
They were no bigger than ordinary rings, and no one could help noticing them
because they were so bright. They were the most beautiful shiny little things you
can imagine. If Polly had been a very little younger she would have wanted to
put one in her mouth.
The room was so quiet that you noticed the ticking of the clock at once. And
yet, as she now found, it was not absolutely quiet either. There was a faint – a
very, very faint – humming sound. If Hoovers had been invented in those days
Polly would have thought it was the sound of a Hoover being worked a long way
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off—several rooms away and several floors below. But it was a nicer sound than
that, a more musical tone: only so faint that you could hardly hear it. “It’s alright;
there’s no one here,” said Polly over her shoulder to Digory. She was speaking
above a whisper now. And Digory came out, blinking and looking extremely dirty
—as indeed Polly was too.
“This is no good,” he said. “It’s not an empty house at all. We’d better bunk be-
fore anyone comes.”
“What do you think those are?” said Polly, pointing at the coloured rings.’
“Oh come on,” said Digory. “The sooner–”
He never finished what he was going to say for at that moment something hap-
pened. The high-backed chair in front of the fire moved suddenly and there rose
up out of it—like a pantomime demon coming up out of a trapdoor the alarming
form of Uncle Andrew. They were not in the empty house at all; they were in
Digory’s house and in the forbidden study! Both children said “O-o-oh” and real-
ized their terrible mistake. They felt they ought to have known all along that they
hadn’t gone nearly far enough.
Uncle Andrew was tall and very thin. He had a long clean-shaven face with a
sharply-pointed nose and extremely bright eyes and a great tousled mop of grey
hair.
Digory was quite speechless, for Uncle Andrew looked a thousand times more
alarming than he had ever looked before. Polly was not so frightened yet; but
she soon was. For the very first thing Uncle Andrew did was to walk across
to the door of the room, shut it, and turn the key in the lock. Then he turned
round, fixed the children with his bright eyes, and smiled, showing all his teeth.
“There!” he said. “Now my fool of a sister can’t get at you!”
It was dreadfully unlike anything a grown-up would be expected to do. Polly’s
heart came into her mouth, and she and Digory started backing towards the
little door they had come in by. Uncle Andrew was too quick for them. He got
behind them and shut that door too and stood in front of it. Then he rubbed his
hands and made his knuckles crack. He had very long, beautifully white, fingers.
“I am delighted to see you,” he said. “Two children are just what I wanted.”
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“Please, Mr Ketterley,” said Polly. “It’s nearly my dinner time and I’ve got to go
home. Will you let us out, please?”
“Not just yet,” said Uncle Andrew. “This is too good an opportunity to miss. I
wanted two children. You see, I’m in the middle of a great experiment. I’ve tried
it on a guinea-pig and it seemed to work. But then a guinea-pig can’t tell you
anything. And you can’t explain to it how to come back.”
“Look here, Uncle Andrew,” said Digory, “it really is dinner time and they’ll be
looking for us in a moment. You must let us out.”
“Must?” said Uncle Andrew.
Digory and Polly glanced at one another. They dared not say anything, but the
glances meant “Isn’t this dreadful?” and “We must humour him.”
“If you let us go for our dinner now,” said Polly, “we could come back after din-
ner.” “Ah, but how do I know that you would?” said Uncle Andrew with a cunning
smile. Then he seemed to change his mind.
“Well, well,” he said, “if you really must go, I suppose you must. I can’t expect
two youngsters like you to find it much fun talking to an old buffer like me.” He
sighed and went on. “You’ve no idea how lonely I sometimes am. But no matter.
Go to your dinner. But I must give you a present before you go. It’s not every
day that I see a little girl in my dingy old study; especially, if I may say so, such a
very attractive young lady as yourself.”
Polly began to think he might not really be mad after all.
“Wouldn’t you like a ring, my dear?” said Uncle Andrew to Polly.
“Do you mean one of those yellow or green ones?” said Polly. “How lovely!”
“Not a green one,” said Uncle Andrew. “I’m afraid I can’t give the green ones
away. But I’d be delighted to give you any of the yellow ones: with my love.
Come and try one on.”
Polly had now quite got over her fright and felt sure that the old gentleman was
not mad; and there was certainly something strangely attractive about those
bright rings. She moved over to the tray.
“Why! I declare,” she said. “That humming noise gets louder here. It’s almost as if
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the rings were making it.”
“What a funny fancy, my dear,” said Uncle Andrew with a laugh. It sounded a
very natural laugh, but Digory had seen an eager, almost a greedy, look on his
face. “Polly! Don’t be a fool!” he shouted. “Don’t touch them.”
It was too late. Exactly as he spoke, Polly’s hand went out to touch one of the
rings. And immediately, without a flash or a noise or a warning of any sort, there
was no Polly. Digory and his Uncle were alone in the room.
Chapter two: digory and his uncle
It was so sudden, and so horribly unlike anything that had ever happened to
Digory even in a nightmare, that he let out a scream. Instantly Uncle Andrew’s
hand was over his mouth. “None of that!” he hissed in Digory’s ear. “If you start
making a noise your Mother’ll hear it. And you know what a fright might do to
her.”
As Digory said afterwards, the horrible meanness of getting at a chap in that
way, almost made him sick. But of course he didn’t scream again.
“That’s better,” said Uncle Andrew. “Perhaps you couldn’t help it. It is a shock
when you first see someone vanish. Why, it gave even me a turn when the guin-
ea-pig did it the other night.”
“Was that when you yelled?” asked Digory.
“Oh, you heard that, did you? I hope you haven’t been spying on me?”
“No, I haven’t,” said Digory indignantly. “But what’s happened to Polly?”
“Congratulate me, my dear boy,” said Uncle Andrew, rubbing his hands. “My ex-
periment has succeeded. The little girl’s gone – vanished – right out of the world.”
“What have you done to her?”
“Sent her to – well – to another place.”
“What do you mean?” asked Digory.
Uncle Andrew sat down and said, “Well, I’ll tell you all about it. Have you ever
heard of old Mrs Lefay?”
“Wasn’t she a great-aunt or something?” said Digory.
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“Not exactly,” said Uncle Andrew. “She was my godmother. That’s her, there, on
the wall.”
Digory looked and saw a faded photograph: it showed the face of an old woman
in a bonnet. And he could now remember that he had once seen a photo of the
same face in an old drawer, at home, in the country. He had asked his Mother
who it was and Mother had not seemed to want to talk about the subject much.
It was not at all a nice face, Digory thought, though of course with those early
photographs one could never really tell.
“Was there – wasn’t there – something wrong about her, Uncle Andrew?” he
asked. “Well,” said Uncle Andrew with a chuckle, “it depends what you call
wrong. People are so narrow-minded. She certainly got very queer in later life.
Did very unwise things. That was why they shut her up.”
“In an asylum, do you mean?”
“Oh no, no, no,” said Uncle Andrew in a shocked voice. “Nothing of that sort.
Only in prison.”
“I say!” said Digory. “What had she done?”
“Ah, poor woman,” said Uncle Andrew. “She had been very unwise. There were
a good many different things. We needn’t go into all that. She was always very
kind to me.”
“But look here, what has all this got to do with Polly? I do wish you’d—”
“All in good time, my boy,” said Uncle Andrew. “They let old Mrs Lefay out before
he died and I was one of the very few people whom she would allow to see her
in her last illness. She had got to dislike ordinary, ignorant people, you under-
stand. I do myself. But she and I were interested in the same sort of things. It
was only a few days before her death that she told me to go to an old bureau in
her house and open a secret drawer and bring her a little box that I would find
there. The moment I picked up that box I could tell by the pricking in my fingers
that I held some great secret in my hands. She gave it me and made me promise
that as soon as she was dead I would burn it, unopened, with certain ceremo-
nies. That promise I did not keep.”
“Well, then, it was jolly rotten of you,” said Digory.
“Rotten?” said Uncle Andrew with a puzzled look.
“Oh, I see. You mean that little boys ought to keep their promises. Very true:
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most right and proper, I’m sure, and I’m very glad you have been taught to do
it. But of course you must understand that rules of that sort, however excel-
lent they may be for little boys – and servants – and women – and even people
in general, can’t possibly be expected to apply to profound students and great
thinkers and sages. No, Digory. Men like me, who possess hidden wisdom, are
freed from common rules just as we are cut off from common pleasures. Ours,
my boy, is a high and lonely destiny.”
As he said this he sighed and looked so grave and noble and mysterious that for
a second Digory really thought he was saying something rather fine. But then he
remembered the ugly look he had seen on his Uncle’s face the moment before
Polly had vanished: and all at once he saw through Uncle Andrew’s grand words.
“All it means,” he said to himself, “Is that he thinks he can do anything he likes to
get anything he wants.”
“Of course,” said Uncle Andrew, “I didn’t dare to open the box for a long time,
for I knew it might contain something highly dangerous. For my godmother
was a very remarkable woman. The truth is, she was one of the last mortals in
this country who had fairy blood in her. (She said there had been two others in
her time. One was a duchess and the other was a charwoman.) In fact, Digory,
you are now talking to the last man (possibly) who really had a fairy godmother.
There! That’ll be something for you to remember when you are an old man your-
self.”
“I bet she was a bad fairy,” thought Digory; and added out loud. “But what about
Polly?”
“How you do harp on that!” said Uncle Andrew. “As if that was what mattered!
My first task was of course to study the box itself. It was very ancient. And I
knew enough even then to know that it wasn’t Greek, or Old Egyptian, or Bab-
ylonian, or Hittite, or Chinese. It was older than any of those nations. Ah—that
was a great day when I at last found out the truth. The box was Atlantean; it
came from the lost island of Atlantis. That meant it was centuries older than any
of the stone-age things they dig up in Europe. And it wasn’t a rough, crude thing
like them either. For in the very dawn of time Atlantis was already a great city
with palaces and temples and learned men.”
He paused for a moment as if he expected Digory to say something. But Digory
was disliking his Uncle more every minute, so he said nothing.
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“Meanwhile,” continued Uncle Andrew, “I was learning a good deal in other ways
(it wouldn’t be proper to explain them to a child) about Magic in general. That
meant that I came to have a fair idea what sort of things might be in the box. By
various tests I narrowed down the possibilities. I had to get to know some—well,
some devilish queer people, and go through some very disagreeable experienc-
es. That was what turned my head grey. One doesn’t become a magician for
nothing. My health broke down in the end. But I got better. And at last I actually
knew.”
Although there was not really the least chance of anyone overhearing them, he
leaned forward and almost whispered as he said: “The Atlantean box contained
something that had been brought from another world when our world was only
just beginning.”
“What?” asked Digory, who was now interested in spite of himself.
“Only dust,” said Uncle Andrew. “Fine, dry dust. Nothing much to look at. Not
much to show for a lifetime of toil, you might say. Ah, but when I looked at that
dust (I took jolly good care not to touch it) and thought that every grain had
once been in another world—I don’t mean another planet, you know; they’re
part of our world and you could get to them if you went far enough—but a really
Other World—another Nature another universe—somewhere you would nev-
er reach even if you travelled through the space of this universe for ever and
ever—a world that could be reached only by Magic—well!” Here Uncle Andrew
rubbed his hands till his knuckles cracked like fireworks.
“I knew,” he went on, “that if only you could get it into the right form, that dust
would draw you back to the place it had come from. But the difficulty was to get
it into the right form. My earlier experiments were all failures. I tried them on
guinea-pigs. Some of them only died. Some exploded like little bombs—”
“It was a jolly cruel thing to do,” said Digory who had once had a guinea-pig of
his own.
“How you do keep getting off the point!” said Uncle Andrew. “That’s what the
creatures were for. I’d bought them myself. Let me see—where was I? Ah yes. At
last I succeeded in making the rings: the yellow rings. But now a new difficulty
arose. I was pretty sure, now, that a yellow ring would send any creature that
touched it into the Other Pace. But what would be the good of that if I couldn’t
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get them back to tell me what they had found there?”
“And what about them?” said Digory. “A nice mess they’d be in if they couldn’t
get back!”
“You will keep on looking at everything from the wrong point of view,” said Un-
cle Andrew with a look of impatience. “Can’t you understand that the thing is a
great experiment? The whole point of sending anyone into the Other Place is
that I want to find out what it’s like.”
“Well why didn’t you go yourself then?”
Digory had hardly ever seen anyone so surprised and offended as his Uncle did
at this simple question. “Me? Me?” he exclaimed. “The boy must be mad! A man
at my time of life, and in my state of health, to risk the shock and the dangers of
being flung suddenly into a different universe? I never heard anything so prepos-
terous in my life! Do you realize what you’re saying? Think what Another World
means – you might meet anything anything.”
“And I suppose you’ve sent Polly into it then,” said Digory. His cheeks were flam-
ing with anger now. “And all I can say,” he added, “even if you are my Uncle—is
that you’ve behaved like a coward, sending a girl to a place you’re afraid to go to
yourself.”
“Silence, sir!” said Uncle Andrew, bringing his hand down on the table. “I will not
be talked to like that by a little, dirty, schoolboy. You don’t understand. I am the
great scholar, the magician, the adept, who is doing the experiment. Of course
I need subjects to do it on. Bless my soul, you’ll be telling me next that I ought
to have asked the guinea-pigs’ permission before I used them! No great wisdom
can be reached without sacrifice. But the idea of my going myself is ridiculous.
It’s like asking a general to fight as a common soldier. Supposing I got killed, what
would become of my life’s work?”
“Oh, do stop jawing,” said Digory. “Are you going to bring Polly back?”
“I was going to tell you, when you so rudely interrupted me,” said Uncle Andrew,
“that I did at last find out a way of doing the return journey. The green rings
draw you back.”
“But Polly hasn’t got a green ring.”
“No “ said Uncle Andrew with a cruel smile.
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“Then she can’t get back,” shouted Digory. “And it’s exactly the same as if you’d
murdered her.
“She can get back,” said Uncle Andrew, “if someone else will go after her, wear-
ing a yellow ring himself and taking two green rings, one to bring himself back
and one to bring her back.”
And now of course Digory saw the trap in which he was caught: and he stared
at Uncle Andrew, saying nothing, with his mouth wide open. His cheeks had
gone very pale.
“I hope,” said Uncle Andrew presently in a very high and mighty voice, just as if
he were a perfect Uncle who had given one a handsome tip and some good ad-
vice, “I hope, Digory, you are not given to showing the white feather. I should be
very sorry to think that anyone of our family had not enough honour and chival-
ry to go to the aid of—er—a lady in distress.”
“Oh shut up!” said Digory. “If you had any honour and all that, you’d be going
yourself. But I know you won’t. Alright. I see I’ve got to go. But you are a beast.
I suppose you planned the whole thing, so that she’d go without knowing it and
then I’d have to go after her.”
“Of course,” said Uncle Andrew with his hateful smile.
“Very well. I’ll go. But there’s one thing I jolly well mean to say first. I didn’t be-
lieve in Magic till today. I see now it’s real. Well if it is, I suppose all the old fairy
tales are more or less true. And you’re simply a wicked, cruel magician like the
ones in the stories. Well, I’ve never read a story in which people of that sort
weren’t paid out in the end, and I bet you will be. And serve you right.”
Of all the things Digory had said this was the first that really went home. Un-
cle Andrew started and there came over his face a look of such horror that,
beast though he was, you could almost feel sorry for him. But a second later he
smoothed it all away and said with a rather forced laugh, “Well, well, I suppose
that is a natural thing for a child to think—brought up among women, as you
have been. Old wives’ tales, eh? I don’t think you need worry about my danger,
Digory. Wouldn’t it be better to worry about the danger of your little friend?
She’s been gone some time. If there are any dangers Over There—well, it would
be a pity to arrive a moment too late.”
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“A lot you care,” said Digory fiercely. “But I’m sick of this jaw. What have I got to
do?”
“You really must learn to control that temper of yours, my boy,” said Uncle An-
drew coolly. “Otherwise you’ll grow up like your Aunt Letty. Now. Attend to me.”
He got up, put on a pair of gloves, and walked over to the tray that contained
the rings. “They only work,” he said, “if they’re actually touching your skin. Wear-
ing gloves, I can pick them up—like this—and nothing happens. If you carried one
in your pocket nothing would happen: but of course you’d have to be careful
not to put your hand in your pocket and touch it by accident. The moment you
touch a yellow ring, you vanish out of this world. When you are in the Other
Place I expect—of course this hasn’t been tested yet, but I expect—that the mo-
ment you touch a green ring you vanish out of that world and—I expect—reap-
pear in this. Now. I take these two greens and drop them into your right-hand
pocket. Remember very carefully which pocket the greens are in. G for green
and R for right. G.R. you see: which are the first two letters of green. One for
you and one for the little girl. And now you pick up a yellow one for yourself. I
should put it on on your finger—if I were you. There’ll be less chance of dropping
it.”
Digory had almost picked up the yellow ring when he suddenly checked himself.
“Look here,” he said. “What about Mother? Supposing she asks where I am?”
“The sooner you go, the sooner you’ll be back,” said Uncle Andrew cheerfully.
“But you don’t really know whether I can get back.”
Uncle Andrew shrugged his shoulders, walked across to the door, unlocked it,
threw it open, and said: “Oh very’ well then. Just as you please. Go down and
have your dinner. Leave the little girl to be eaten by wild animals or drowned or
starved in Otherworld or lost there for good, if that’s what you prefer. It’s all one
to me. Perhaps before tea time you’d better drop in on Mrs Plummer and explain
that she’ll never see her daughter again; because you were afraid to put on a
ring.”
“By gum,” said Digory, “don’t I just wish I was big enough to punch your head!”
Then he buttoned up his coat, took a deep breath, and picked up the ring. And
he thought then, as he always thought afterwards too, that he could not decent-
ly have done anything else.
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Chapter three : The wood between the worlds
Uncle Andrew and his study vanished instantly. Then, for a moment, everything
became muddled. The next thing Digory knew was that there was a soft green
light coming down on him from above, and darkness below. He didn’t seem to
be standing on anything, or sitting, or lying. Nothing appeared to be touching
him. “I believe I’m in water,” said Digory. “Or under water.” This frightened him
for a second, but almost at once he could feel that he was rushing upwards.
Then his head suddenly came out into the air and, he found himself scrambling
ashore, out on to smooth grassy ground at the edge of a pool.
As he rose to his feet he noticed that he was neither dripping nor panting for
breath as anyone would expect after being under water. His clothes were per-
fectly dry. He was standing by the edge of a small pool – not more than ten feet
from side to side in a wood. The trees grew close together and were so leafy
that he could get no glimpse of the sky. All the light was green light that came
through the leaves: but there must have been a very strong sun overhead, for
this green daylight was bright and warm. It was the quietest wood you could
possibly imagine. There were no birds, no insects, no animals, and no wind. You
could almost feel the trees growing. The pool he had just got out of was not
the only pool. There were dozens of others – a pool every few yards as far as
his eyes could reach. You could almost feel the trees drinking the water up with
their roots. This wood was very much alive. When he tried to describe it after-
wards Digory always said, “It was a rich place: as rich as plumcake.”
The strangest thing was that, almost before he had looked about him, Digo-
ry had half forgotten how he had come there. At any rate, he was certainly not
thinking about Polly, or Uncle Andrew, or even his Mother. He was not in the
least frightened, or excited, or curious. If anyone had asked him “Where did you
come from?” he would probably have said, “I’ve always been here.” That was
what it felt like – as if one had always been in that place and never been bored
although nothing had ever happened. As he said long afterwards, “It’s not the
sort of place where things happen. The trees go on growing, that’s all.”
After Digory had looked at the wood for a long time he noticed that there was a
girl lying on her back at the foot of a tree a few yards away. Her eyes were near-
ly shut but not quite, as if she were just between sleeping and waking. So he
looked at her for a long time and said nothing. And at last she opened her eyes
and looked at him for a long time and she also said nothing. Then she spoke, in a
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 74
dreamy, contented sort of voice.
“I think I’ve seen you before,” she said.
“I rather think so too,” said Digory. “Have you been here long?”
“Oh, always,” said the girl. “At least – I don’t know a very long time.”
“So have I,” said Digory.
“No you haven’t, said she. “I’ve just seen you come up out of that pool.”
“Yes, I suppose I did,” said Digory with a puzzled air, “I’d forgotten.” Then for quite
a long time neither said any more.
“Look here,” said the girl presently, “I wonder did we ever really meet before? I
had a sort of idea – a sort of picture in my head – of a boy and a girl, like us – liv-
ing somewhere quite different – and doing all sorts of things. Perhaps it was only
a dream.”
“I’ve had that same dream, I think,” said Digory. “About a boy and a girl, living
next door – and something about crawling among rafters. I remember the girl
had a dirty face.”
“Aren’t you getting it mixed? In my dream it was the boy who had the dirty face.”
“I can’t remember the boy’s face,” said Digory: and then added, “Hullo! What’s
that?” “Why! it’s a guinea-pig,” said the girl. And it was – a fat guinea-pig, nosing
about in he grass. But round the middle of the guinea-pig there ran a tape, and,
tied on to it by the tape, was a bright yellow ring.
“Look! look,” cried Digory, “The ring! And look! You’ve got one on your finger.
And so have I.”
The girl now sat up, really interested at last. They stared very hard at one an-
other, trying to remember. And then, at exactly the same moment, she shouted
out “Mr Ketterley” and he shouted out “Uncle Andrew”, and they knew who they
were and began to remember the whole story. After a few minutes hard talking
they had got it straight. Digory explained how beastly Uncle Andrew had been.
“What do we do now?” said Polly. “Take the guinea-pig and go home?”
“There’s no hurry,” said Digory with a huge yawn.
“I think there is,” said Polly. “This place is too quiet. It’s so – so dreamy. You’re
almost asleep. If we once give in to it we shall just lie down and drowse for ever
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 75
and ever.”
“It’s very nice here,” said Digory.
“Yes, it is,” said Polly.
“But we’ve got to get back.” She stood up and began to go cautiously towards
the guinea-pig. But then she changed her mind.
“We might as well leave the guinea-pig,” she said. “It’s perfectly happy here, and
your uncle will only do something horrid to it if we take it home.”
“I bet he would,” answered Digory. “Look at the way he’s treated us. By the way,
how do we get home?”
“Go back into the pool, I expect.”
They came and stood together at the edge looking down into the smooth water.
It was full of the reflection of the green, leafy branches; they made it look very
deep.
“We haven’t any bathing things,” said Polly.
“We shan’t need them, silly,” said Digory. “We’re going in with our clothes on.
Don’t you remember it didn’t wet us on the way up?”
“Can you swim?”
“A bit. Can you?”
“Well – not much.”
“I don’t think we shall need to swim,” said Digory “We want to go down, don’t
we?”
Neither of them much liked the idea of jumping into that pool, but neither said
so to the other. They took hands and said “One—Two—Three—Go” and jumped.
There was a great splash and of course they closed their eyes. But when they
opened them again they found they were still standing, hand in hand, in the
green wood, and hardly up to their ankles in water. The pool was apparently only
a couple of inches deep. They splashed back on to the dry ground.
“What on earth’s gone wrong?” said Polly in a frightened voice; but not quite so
frightened as you might expect, because it is hard to feel really frightened in that
wood. The place is too peaceful.
“Oh! I know,” said Digory, “Of course it won’t work. We’re still wearing our yel-
low rings. They’re for the outward journey, you know. The green ones take you
home. We must change rings. Have you got pockets? Good. Put your yellow ring
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 76
in your left. I’ve got two greens. Here’s one for you.”
They put on their green rings and came back to the pool. But before they tried
another jump Digory gave a long “O-ooh!”
“What’s the matter?” said Polly.
“I’ve just had a really wonderful idea,” said Digory. “What are all the other pools?”
“How do you mean?”
“Why, if awe can get back to our own world by jumping into this pool, mightn’t
we get somewhere else by jumping into one of the others? Supposing there was
a world at the bottom of every pool.”
“But I thought we were already in your Uncle Andrew’s Other World or Other
Place or whatever he called it. Didn’t you say -”
“Oh bother Uncle Andrew,” interrupted Digory. “I don’t believe he knows any-
thing about it. He never had the pluck to come here himself. He only talked of
one Other World. But suppose there were dozens?”
“You mean, this wood might be only one of them?”
“No, I don’t believe this wood is a world at all. I think it’s just a sort of in-be-
tween place.”
Polly looked puzzled. “Don’t you see?” said Digory. “No, do listen. Think of our
tunnel under the slates at home. It isn’t a room in any of the houses. In a way, it
isn’t really part of any of the houses. But once you’re in the tunnel you can go
along it and come into any of the houses in the row. Mightn’t this wood be the
same? – a place that isn’t in any of the worlds, but once you’ve found that place
you can get into them all.”
“Well, even if you can—” began Polly, but Digory went on as if he hadn’t heard
her. “And of course that explains everything,” he said. “That’s why it is so quiet
and sleepy here. Nothing ever happens here. Like at home. It’s in the houses
that people talk, and do things, and have meals. Nothing goes on in the inbe-
tween places, behind the walls and above the ceilings and under the floor, or
in our own tunnel. But when you come out of our tunnel you may find yourself
in any house. I think we can get out of this place into jolly well Anywhere! We
don’t need to jump back into the same pool we came up by. Or not just yet.”
“The Wood between the Worlds,” said Polly dreamily. “It sounds rather nice.”
“Come on,” said Digory. “Which pool shall we try?”
“Look here,” said Polly, “I’m not going to try any new pool till we’ve made sure
that we can get back by the old one. We’re not even sure if it’ll work yet.”
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 77
“Yes,” said Digory. “And get caught by Uncle Andrew and have our rings taken
away before we’ve had any fun. No thanks.”
“Couldn’t we just go part of the way down into our own pool,” said Polly. “Just
to see if it works. Then if it does, we’ll change rings and come up again before
we’re really back in Mr Ketterley’s study.”
“Can we go part of the way down?
“Well, it took time coming up. I suppose it’ll take a little time going back.”
Digory made rather a fuss about agreeing to this, but he had to in the end be-
cause Polly absolutely refused to do any exploring in new worlds until she had
made sure about getting back to the old one. She was quite as brave as he
about some dangers (wasps, for instance) but she was not so interested in find-
ing out things nobody had ever heard of before; for Digory was the sort of per-
son who wants to know everything, and when he grew up he became the fa-
mous Professor Kirke who comes into other books.
After a good deal of arguing they agreed to put on their green rings (“Green for
safety,” said Digory, “so you can’t help remembering which is which”) and hold
hands and jump. But as soon as they seemed to be getting back to Uncle An-
drew’s study, or even to their own world, Polly was to shout “Change” and they
would slip off their greens and put on their yellows. Digory wanted to be the
one who shouted “Change” but Polly wouldn’t agree.
They put on the green rings, took hands, and once more shouted “One—Two
—Three—Go”. This time it worked. It is very hard to tell you what it felt like, for
everything happened so quickly. At first there were bright lights moving about
in a black sky; Digory always thinks these were stars and even swears that he
saw Jupiter quite close -close enough to see its moon. But almost at once there
were rows and rows of roofs and chimney pots about them, and they could see
St Paul’s and knew they were looking at London. But you could see through the
walls of all the houses. Then they could see Uncle Andrew, very vague and shad-
owy, but getting clearer and more solid-looking all the time, just as if he were
coming into focus. But before he became quite real Polly shouted “Change”, and
they did change, and our world faded away like a dream, and the green light
above grew stronger and stronger, till their heads came out of the pool and they
scrambled ashore. And there was the wood all about them, as green and bright
and still as ever. The whole thing had taken less than a minute.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 78
“There!” said Digory. “That’s alright. Now for the adventure. Any pool will do.
Come on. Let’s try that one.”
“Stop!” said Polly- “Aren’t we going to mark this pool?”
They stared at each other and turned quite white as they realized the dreadful
thing that Digory had just been going to do. For there were any number of pools
in the wood, and the pools were all alike and the trees were all alike, so that if
they had once left behind the pool that led to our own world without making
some sort of landmark, the chances would have been a hundred to one against
their ever finding it again.
Digory’s hand was shaking as he opened his penknife and cut out a long strip of
turf on the bank of the pool. The soil (which smelled nice) was of a rich reddish
brown and showed up well against the green. “It’s a good thing one of us has
some sense,” said Polly.
“Well don’t keep on gassing about it,” said Digory. “Come along, I want to see
what’s in one of the other pools.” And Polly gave him a pretty sharp answer and
he said something even nastier in reply. The quarrel lasted for several minutes
but it would be dull to write it all down. Let us skip on to the moment at which
they stood with beating hearts and rather scared faces on the edge of the un-
known pool with their yellow rings on and held hands and once more said “One
—Two—Three—Go!”
Splash! Once again it hadn’t worked. This pool, too, appeared to be only a pud-
dle. Instead of reaching a new world they only got their feet wet and splashed
their legs for the second time that morning (if it was a morning: it seems to be
always the same time in the Wood between the Worlds).
“Blast and botheration!” exclaimed Digory. “What’s gone wrong now? We’ve put
our yellow rings on all right. He said yellow for the outward journey.”
Now the truth was that Uncle Andrew, who knew nothing about the Wood be-
tween the Worlds, had quite a wrong idea about the rings. The yellow ones
weren’t “outward” rings and the green ones weren’t “homeward” rings; at least,
not in the way he thought. The stuff of which both were made had all come
from the wood. The stuff in the yellow rings had the power of drawing you into
the wood; it was stuff that wanted to get back to its own place, the in-between
place. But the stuff in the green rings is stuff that is trying to get out of its own
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 79
place: so that a green ring would take you out of the wood into a world. Uncle
Andrew, you see, was working with things he did not really understand; most
magicians are. Of course Digory did not realize the truth quite clearly either, or
not till later. But when they had talked it over, they decided to try their green
rings on the new pool, just to see what happened.
“I’m game if you are,” said Polly. But she really said this because, in her heart of
hearts, she now felt sure that neither kind of ring was going to work at all in the
new pool, and so there was nothing worse to be afraid of than another splash. I
am not quite sure that Digory had not the same feeling. At any rate, when they
had both put on their greens and come back to the edge of the water, and taken
hands again, they were certainly a good deal more cheerful and less solemn than
they had been the first time.
“One—Two—Three—Go!” said Digory. And they jumped.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove and the Under/After World p. 80
The Watery Maze
Les Miserables Volume 5 Book III : Mud but the Soul p. 2
by Victor Hugo
Armilla from Invisible Cities p. 8
by Italo Calvino
Les Miserables Volume 5 Book III : Mud but the Soul
by Victor Hugo
It was in the sewers of Paris that Jean Valjean found himself.
Still another resemblance between Paris and the sea. As in the ocean, the diver
may disappear there.
The transition was an unheard-of one. In the very heart of the city, Jean Valjean
had escaped from the city, and, in the twinkling of an eye, in the time required
to lift the cover and to replace it, he had passed from broad daylight to com-
plete obscurity, from midday to midnight, from tumult to silence, from the whirl-
wind of thunders to the stagnation of the tomb, and, by a vicissitude far more
tremendous even than that of the Rue Polonceau, from the most extreme peril
to the most absolute obscurity.
An abrupt fall into a cavern; a disappearance into the secret trap-door of Par-
is; to quit that street where death was on every side, for that sort of sepulchre
where there was life, was a strange instant. He remained for several seconds as
though bewildered; listening, stupefied. The waste-trap of safety had sudden-
ly yawned beneath him. Celestial goodness had, in a manner, captured him by
treachery. Adorable ambuscades of providence!
Only, the wounded man did not stir, and Jean Valjean did not know whether
that which he was carrying in that grave was a living being or a dead corpse.
His first sensation was one of blindness. All of a sudden, he could see nothing.
It seemed to him too, that, in one instant, he had become deaf. He no longer
heard anything. The frantic storm of murder which had been let loose a few
feet above his head did not reach him, thanks to the thickness of the earth
which separated him from it, as we have said, otherwise than faintly and in-
distinctly, and like a rumbling, in the depths. He felt that the ground was solid
under his feet; that was all; but that was enough. He extended one arm and
then the other, touched the walls on both sides, and perceived that the pas-
sage was narrow; he slipped, and thus perceived that the pavement was wet.
He cautiously put forward one foot, fearing a hole, a sink, some gulf; he discov-
ered that the paving continued. A gust of fetidness informed him of the place in
which he stood.
After the lapse of a few minutes, he was no longer blind. A little light fell
through the man-hole through which he had descended, and his eyes became
accustomed to this cavern. He began to distinguish something. The passage in
which he had burrowed—no other word can better express the situation—was
walled in behind him. It was one of those blind alleys, which the special jargon
terms branches. In front of him there was another wall, a wall like night. The
light of the air-hole died out ten or twelve paces from the point where Jean Val-
jean stood, and barely cast a wan pallor on a few metres of the damp walls of
the sewer. Beyond, the opaqueness was massive; to penetrate thither seemed
horrible, an entrance into it appeared like an engulfment. A man could, however,
plunge into that wall of fog and it was necessary so to do. Haste was even req-
uisite. It occurred to Jean Valjean that the grating which he had caught sight of
under the flag-stones might also catch the eye of the soldiery, and that every-
thing hung upon this chance. They also might descend into that well and search
it. There was not a minute to be lost. He had deposited Marius on the ground,
he picked him up again,—that is the real word for it,—placed him on his shoul-
ders once more, and set out. He plunged resolutely into the gloom.
The truth is, that they were less safe than Jean Valjean fancied. Perils of an-
other sort and no less serious were awaiting them, perchance. After the light-
ning-charged whirlwind of the combat, the cavern of miasmas and traps; after
chaos, the sewer. Jean Valjean had fallen from one circle of hell into another.
When he had advanced fifty paces, he was obliged to halt. A problem presented
itself. The passage terminated in another gut which he encountered across his
path. There two ways presented themselves. Which should he take? Ought he
to turn to the left or to the right? How was he to find his bearings in that black
labyrinth? This labyrinth, to which we have already called the reader’s attention,
has a clue, which is its slope. To follow to the slope is to arrive at the river.
This Jean Valjean instantly comprehended.
He said to himself that he was probably in the sewer des Halles; that if he were
to choose the path to the left and follow the slope, he would arrive, in less than
a quarter of an hour, at some mouth on the Seine between the Pont au Change
and the Pont-Neuf, that is to say, he would make his appearance in broad day-
light on the most densely peopled spot in Paris. Perhaps he would come out
on some man-hole at the intersection of streets. Amazement of the passers-by
at beholding two bleeding men emerge from the earth at their feet. Arrival of
the police, a call to arms of the neighboring post of guards. Thus they would be
seized before they had even got out. It would be better to plunge into that lab-
yrinth, to confide themselves to that black gloom, and to trust to Providence for
the outcome.
He ascended the incline, and turned to the right.
When he had turned the angle of the gallery, the distant glimmer of an air-hole
disappeared, the curtain of obscurity fell upon him once more, and he became
blind again. Nevertheless, he advanced as rapidly as possible. Marius’ two arms
were passed round his neck, and the former’s feet dragged behind him. He
held both these arms with one hand, and groped along the wall with the oth-
er. Marius’ cheek touched his, and clung there, bleeding. He felt a warm stream
which came from Marius trickling down upon him and making its way under his
clothes. But a humid warmth near his ear, which the mouth of the wounded
man touched, indicated respiration, and consequently, life. The passage along
which Jean Valjean was now proceeding was not so narrow as the first. Jean
Valjean walked through it with considerable difficulty. The rain of the preceding
day had not, as yet, entirely run off, and it created a little torrent in the centre
of the bottom, and he was forced to hug the wall in order not to have his feet in
the water.
Thus he proceeded in the gloom. He resembled the beings of the night groping
in the invisible and lost beneath the earth in veins of shadow.
Still, little by little, whether it was that the distant air-holes emitted a little wa-
vering light in this opaque gloom, or whether his eyes had become accustomed
to the obscurity, some vague vision returned to him, and he began once more
to gain a confused idea, now of the wall which he touched, now of the vault be-
neath which he was passing. The pupil dilates in the dark, and the soul dilates in
misfortune and ends by finding God there.
It was not easy to direct his course.
The line of the sewer re-echoes, so to speak, the line of the streets which lie
above it. There were then in Paris two thousand two hundred streets. Let the
reader imagine himself beneath that forest of gloomy branches which is called
the sewer. The system of sewers existing at that epoch, placed end to end,
would have given a length of eleven leagues. We have said above, that the ac-
tual network, thanks to the special activity of the last thirty years, was no less
than sixty leagues in extent.
Jean Valjean began by committing a blunder. He thought that he was be-
neath the Rue Saint-Denis, and it was a pity that it was not so. Under the Rue
Saint-Denis there is an old stone sewer which dates from Louis XIII. and which
runs straight to the collecting sewer, called the Grand Sewer, with but a single
elbow, on the right, on the elevation of the ancient Cour des Miracles, and a
single branch, the Saint-Martin sewer, whose four arms describe a cross. But
the gut of the Petite-Truanderie the entrance to which was in the vicinity of
the Corinthe wine-shop has never communicated with the sewer of the Rue
Saint-Denis; it ended at the Montmartre sewer, and it was in this that Jean Val-
jean was entangled. There opportunities of losing oneself abound. The Mont-
martre sewer is one of the most labyrinthine of the ancient network. Fortunate-
ly, Jean Valjean had left behind him the sewer of the markets whose geometrical
plan presents the appearance of a multitude of parrots’ roosts piled on top of
each other; but he had before him more than one embarrassing encounter and
more than one street corner—for they are streets—presenting itself in the gloom
like an interrogation point; first, on his left, the vast sewer of the Plâtrière, a sort
of Chinese puzzle, thrusting out and entangling its chaos of Ts and Zs under the
Post-Office and under the rotunda of the Wheat Market, as far as the Seine,
where it terminates in a Y; secondly, on his right, the curving corridor of the Rue
du Cadran with its three teeth, which are also blind courts; thirdly, on his left,
the branch of the Mail, complicated, almost at its inception, with a sort of fork,
and proceeding from zig-zag to zig-zag until it ends in the grand crypt of the
outlet of the Louvre, truncated and ramified in every direction; and lastly, the
blind alley of a passage of the Rue des Jeûneurs, without counting little ducts
here and there, before reaching the belt sewer, which alone could conduct him
to some issue sufficiently distant to be safe.
Had Jean Valjean had any idea of all that we have here pointed out, he would
speedily have perceived, merely by feeling the wall, that he was not in the sub-
terranean gallery of the Rue Saint-Denis. Instead of the ancient stone, instead
of the antique architecture, haughty and royal even in the sewer, with pave-
ment and string courses of granite and mortar costing eight hundred livres the
fathom, he would have felt under his hand contemporary cheapness, economi-
cal expedients, porous stone filled with mortar on a concrete foundation, which
costs two hundred francs the metre, and the bourgeoise masonry known as à
petits matériaux—small stuff; but of all this he knew nothing.
He advanced with anxiety, but with calmness, seeing nothing, knowing nothing,
buried in chance, that is to say, engulfed in providence.
By degrees, we will admit, a certain horror seized upon him. The gloom which
enveloped him penetrated his spirit. He walked in an enigma. This aqueduct of
the sewer is formidable; it interlaces in a dizzy fashion. It is a melancholy thing
to be caught in this Paris of shadows. Jean Valjean was obliged to find and even
to invent his route without seeing it. In this unknown, every step that he risked
might be his last. How was he to get out? should he find an issue? should he
find it in time? would that colossal subterranean sponge with its stone cavi-
ties, allow itself to be penetrated and pierced? should he there encounter some
unexpected knot in the darkness? should he arrive at the inextricable and the
impassable? would Marius die there of hemorrhage and he of hunger? should
they end by both getting lost, and by furnishing two skeletons in a nook of that
night? He did not know. He put all these questions to himself without replying
to them. The intestines of Paris form a precipice. Like the prophet, he was in the
belly of the monster.
All at once, he had a surprise. At the most unforeseen moment, and without
having ceased to walk in a straight line, he perceived that he was no longer as-
cending; the water of the rivulet was beating against his heels, instead of meet-
ing him at his toes. The sewer was now descending. Why? Was he about to
arrive suddenly at the Seine? This danger was a great one, but the peril of re-
treating was still greater. He continued to advance.
It was not towards the Seine that he was proceeding. The ridge which the soil
of Paris forms on its right bank empties one of its watersheds into the Seine
and the other into the Grand Sewer. The crest of this ridge which determines
the division of the waters describes a very capricious line. The culminating
point, which is the point of separation of the currents, is in the Sainte-Avoye
sewer, beyond the Rue Michel-le-Comte, in the sewer of the Louvre, near the
boulevards, and in the Montmartre sewer, near the Halles. It was this culminat-
ing point that Jean Valjean had reached. He was directing his course towards
the belt sewer; he was on the right path. But he did not know it.
Every time that he encountered a branch, he felt of its angles, and if he found
that the opening which presented itself was smaller than the passage in which
he was, he did not enter but continued his route, rightly judging that every nar-
rower way must needs terminate in a blind alley, and could only lead him fur-
ther from his goal, that is to say, the outlet. Thus he avoided the quadruple trap
which was set for him in the darkness by the four labyrinths which we have just
enumerated.
At a certain moment, he perceived that he was emerging from beneath the Par-
is which was petrified by the uprising, where the barricades had suppressed
circulation, and that he was entering beneath the living and normal Paris. Over-
head he suddenly heard a noise as of thunder, distant but continuous. It was
the rumbling of vehicles.
He had been walking for about half an hour, at least according to the calcula-
tion which he made in his own mind, and he had not yet thought of rest; he had
merely changed the hand with which he was holding Marius. The darkness was
more profound than ever, but its very depth reassured him.
All at once, he saw his shadow in front of him. It was outlined on a faint, almost
indistinct reddish glow, which vaguely empurpled the flooring vault underfoot,
and the vault overhead, and gilded to his right and to his left the two viscous
walls of the passage. Stupefied, he turned round.
Behind him, in the portion of the passage which he had just passed through,
at a distance which appeared to him immense, piercing the dense obscurity,
flamed a sort of horrible star which had the air of surveying him.
It was the gloomy star of the police which was rising in the sewer.
In the rear of that star eight or ten forms were moving about in a confused way,
black, upright, indistinct, horrible.
Armilla from Invisible Cities
by Italo Calvino
Whether Armilla is like this because it is unfinished or because it has been de-
molished, whether the cause is some enchantment or only a whim, I do not
know. The fact remains that it has no walls, no ceilings, no doors: it has nothing
that makes it seem a city, eept the water pipes that rise vertically where the
houses should be and spread out horizontally where the doors should be: a for-
est of pipes that end in taps, showers, spouts, overBows. Against the sky a
lavabo’s white stands out, or a bathtub, or some other porcelain, like late fruit
still hanging from the boughs. You would think the plumbers had finished their
job and gone away before the bricklayers arrived; or else their hydraulic sys-
tems, indestructible, had survived a catastrophe, an earthquake, or the corro-
sion of termites.
Abandoned before or after it was inhabited, Armilla cannot be called desert-
ed. At any hour, raising your eyes among the pipes, you are likely to glimpse a
young woman, or many young women, slender, not tall of stature, luxuriating in
the bathtubs or arching their backs under the showers suspended in the void,
washing or drying or perfuming themselves, or combing their long hair at a mir-
ror. In the sun, the threads of water fanning from the showers glisten, the jets
of the taps, the spurts, the splashes, the sponges’ suds.
I have come to this explanation: the streams of water channeled in the pipes of
Armilla have remained in the possession of nymphs and naiads. Accustomed
to traveling along underground veins, they found it easy to enter into the new
aquatic realm, to burst from multiple fountains, to find new mirrors,
new games, new ways of enjoying the water. Their invasion may have driven
out the human beings, or Armilla may have been built by humans as a votive
offering to win the favor of the nymphs, offended at the misuse of the waters.
In any case, now they seem content, these maidens: in the morning you hear
them singing.
I I .tS1 i
J N THE PERIOD of the shortest, sleepy winter days,
I- caught on both sides, from morning and from evening, in
furred, crepuscular edgings, as the town branched its way
deeper and deeper into the labyrinths of the winter nights, to
be called back and shaken to its senses by only a fleeting dawn
– my father was already lost, sold, pledged to the other
sphere.
His face and head had become luxuriantly and wildly
overgrown in those days with a covering of grey hair, sprouting
irregularly in bunches, bristles and long brushes, which
protruded from his warts, his eyebrows and his nostrils and
lent to his physiognomy the appearance of a pugnacious old
fox.
His senses of smell and hearing were inordinately sharp-
86 Bruno Schulz The Cinnamon Shops 87
ened, and it showed in the agitations of his tense, silent
features that he remained, through the mediation of those
senses, in continual contact with an invisible world of dark
nooks, mouse holes, musty empty spaces beneath the floor,
and chimney ducts.
All the scratching and noisy nocturnal knocking, all the
secret, creaking life of the floor, found in him an unfailing and
vigilant observer, a spy and a co-conspirator. Beyond the point
of no return, he was absorbed by that sphere, inaccessible to
us, which he made no attempt to explain to us. Often, when
the antics of the invisible sphere grew too absurd, he could
only flick his fingers and laugh quietly to himself. At such
times, by a glance, he would confer with our cat, also initiated
into that world, which raised its cold, cynical face etched with
stripes and narrowed in boredom and indifference its slanting
chinks of eyes.
During dinner, he might put aside his knife and fork in the
middle of the meal and rise with a feline motion, his napkin
tied under his chin. He crept on toe-pads to an adjacent door,
an empty room, and peeked with the greatest circumspection
through the keyhole. Then he returned to the table as if
ashamed, a sheepish smile emerging through purrs and
indistinct mutters, which pertained only to the inner
monologue in which he was engrossed.
In order to provide him with some distraction, and to tear
him away from his morbid investigations, Mother took him for
evening walks, to which he acceded silently and without
resistance, albeit half-heartedly, absent minded, distracted and
miles away. Once, we even went to the theatre.
We found ourselves again at last in that great, dimly lit and
dirty hall, all sleepy human hubbub and chaotic commotion.
But once we had pushed through the human throng, the
gigantic, pale sky-blue curtain loomed before us like the sky of
another firmament. Great, pink-painted masks with puffed
out cheeks undulated on its enormous canvas expanse. That
artificial sky spread wide, flowed down and athwart, swelling
with an enormous gulp of pathos and broad gestures, the
atmosphere of that world, artificial and full of radiance, which
had been erected there, on the clattering scaffolding of the
stage. A shudder flowing through the great countenance of
that sky, a breath of the enormous canvas which made the
masks bulge and come to life, betrayed the illusoriness of that
firmament, gave rise to that tremor of reality which we, in our
metaphysical moments, sense as a glimmer of the mysterious.
The masks fluttered their red eyelids; their coloured lips
voicelessly whispered something; and I knew that the moment
was at hand when the secret tensions would reach their
zenith, when the brimming sky of the curtain would really
part and float away to reveal stupendous and enchanting
things.
But it was a moment I was not destined to savour; for
Father, meanwhile, had begun to display certain signs of
anxiety. He grasped at his pockets and finally announced that
he had forgotten his wallet, together with his money and
important documents. After a brief consultation with Mother,
during which Adela’s honesty was subjected to hasty,
comprehensive appraisal, it was proposed to me that I return
home in search of the wallet. Mother judged that there still
88 Bruno Schulz The Cinnamon Shops 89
remained plenty of time until the commencement of the
performance, and that, given my nimbleness, I could easily be
back in time.
I went out into a winter’s night coloured by the illumination
of the sky. It was one of those bright nights in which the astral
firmament is so immense and branched, almost fallen apart,
broken into pieces and divided into a labyrinth of separate
heavens, abundant enough to be shared among whole months
of winter nights, to overlay with its silvered and painted globes
all of their nocturnal phenomena, adventures, scandals and
carnivals.
It is unpardonable recklessness to send a young boy out on
such a night on an important and urgent mission; for in its
half-light the streets will grow tangled and multifarious, each
exchanged for another. Deep inside the town there open up,
so to speak, double streets, doppelganger streets, mendacious
and delusive streets. One’s imagination, enchanted and
misled, produces false maps of the ostensibly long-known and
familiar town where those streets have their places and their
names, whilst the night, in its inexhaustible fecundity, can
find nothing better to do than to produce continually new and
fictitious configurations. Such temptations of winter nights
usually begin innocently, with the intention of taking a
shortcut, of chancing some unaccustomed or swifter alley.
The enticing arrangements of an intersection arise, of
convoluted progress along some untried cross street. But this
time it began differently.
Having gone a few steps, I realised I had left my overcoat
behind. I was on the point of turning back, but on reflection
this seemed a needless waste of time; for the night was not
cold at all. Quite the reverse, it was veined with streams of a
strange warmth, the wafts of some false spring. The snow
dwindled into white strands, an innocent, sweet fleece
scented with violets, and into those very strands the sky began
to thaw, where the moon showed itself twice, three times over,
demonstrating by this multiplicity all of its phases and
positions.
The sky had lain bare that day the interior of its
construction, as if in numerous anatomical preparations,
displaying spirals and veins of light, sections of the night’s
turquoise solids, the plasma of its expanses and the tissue of its
nocturnal reveries.
On such a night, one was unlikely to walk along Podwale, or
any of the other dark streets which form the reverse side, the
lining, as it were, of the four sides of the market square,
without recalling that, occasionally in that late season, one or
two of those curious and so alluring shops would still be open,
which slipped one’s mind on ordinary days. I called them the
cinnamon shops, in honour of that dark hue of the wainscoting
with which they were panelled.
Those truly noble businesses, open late into the night, had
always been the object of my most fervid dreams. Their dimly
lit, dark and solemn interiors exuded a rich, deep aroma of
paints, lacquer and incense, a fragrance of remote countries
and rare materials. There, one might find Bengal lights, magic
caskets, the stamps of long vanished countries, Chinese decals,
indigo, colophony from Malabar, the eggs of exotic insects,
parrots, toucans, live salamanders and basilisks, mandrake
90 Bruno Schulz
roots, mechanical toys from Nuremberg, homunculi in tiny
pots, microscopes and telescopes, and above all, rare and
peculiar books, old volumes full of astonishing illustrations
and intoxicating stories.
I remember those merchants, old and dignified, who served
their clients in discreet silence and were full of wisdom and
understanding of their most secret wishes. But most of all,
there was a certain bookshop there, where once I saw a
number of rare and forbidden editions, the publications of
secret lodges, lifting the veil from tormenting and intoxicating
mysteries.
So seldom did an opportunity arise to visit those shops –
and with, moreover, some small but adequate amount of
money in one’s pocket – that I could not forgo this
opportunity now, pressing as may be the mission entrusted to
our zeal. By my reckoning, I would have to proceed along a
certain side street, passing two or three corners, in order to
reach the street of the nocturnal shops. This would lead me
away from my objective, but I could make good the delay if I
returned by way of Zupy Solne.
Lent wings by my desire to visit the cinnamon shops, I
turned into a street that I knew – flying more than walking,
anxious not to go astray. Thus I passed by three or four cross
streets, but the street I sought was not along any of those.
What is more, the configuration of the streets no longer
corresponded to the image of them in my mind’s eye. No trace
of the shops. I walked along a street whose houses had no
entrances; only windows shut tight and blinded by a gleam of
the moon. The correct street must lead along the other side of
The Cinnamon Shops 91
those houses, I thought to myself, where their entrances are. I
anxiously quickened my step, beginning deep down to
relinquish any hope of visiting the shops; merely with the
intention of emerging swiftly from there into a region of town
that I knew. I approached an exit, uneasy about where it might
bring me out this time, and entered a broad, sparsely built-up
highway, very long and straight, and at once a blast from its
expanse swept over me. Here, alongside the street or deep
within gardens, stood picturesque villas, the decorative
buildings of the wealthy; parks and the walls of orchards were
visible in the gaps between them. At a distance the vista was
reminiscent of ulica Leszniañska in its lower and seldom
visited regions. The moonlight was pale and bright as day,
unravelling into a thousand strands, silver flakes in the sky,
and only the parks and gardens loomed black in that silver
landscape.
Scrutinising one of the buildings more closely, I concluded
that before me stood the rear and hitherto unseen side of the
gymnasium school. I went directly up to the entrance, which
to my surprise was unlocked, the hallway lighted, and entered
to find myself on the red carpet of a corridor. I was hoping to
steal unnoticed through the building and leave by the front
gate, thus taking a magnificent shortcut.
Then it dawned on me that, at that late hour, one of
Professor Arendt’s elective lessons must still be taking place,
which he conducted late into the night in his classroom, and to
which we flocked in wintertime, burning with the noble
enthusiasm for drawing exercises that our outstanding teacher
inspired in us.
92 Bruno Schulz
Our little group of students would be all but lost in that
great, dark room, the shadows of our heads growing enormous
and fragmented on the walls, cast by two small candles
burning in the necks of bottles. In truth, not many of us used
those hours for drawing, and the professor did not stipulate
too exacting demands. One or two of us had brought pillows
from home and now settled down on the benches for a light
nap. Only the most studious sat under a solitary candle,
drawing something or other in the golden circle of its radiance.
Growing bored, holding sleepy conversations, we usually
had to wait a long time for the professor to arrive. At last his
study door opened and he entered, a small man with a
beautiful beard, all esoteric smiles, discreet concealments and
an air of mystery. He quickly closed the study door behind
him, through which, for the brief instant it had stood open, a
throng of plaster shades had huddled together beyond his
head, classical fragments, mournful Niobids, DanaIds and
Tantalids, a whole sad and barren Olympus withering
throughout the years in that museum of plaster figures. That
room was filled even in the daytime with a cloudy haze,
overflowing sleepily with plaster dreams, empty looks, fading
profiles and musings receding into nothingness. We often
liked to eavesdrop at that door, on the sighing, whispering
silence of that rubble, crumbling amid cobwebs, that twilight
of the gods, decomposing in boredom and monotony.
The professor strolled, solemn and dignified, along the bare
benches where we made our drawings, dispersed in small
groups in the grey gleams of the winter night. It grew hushed
and sleepy. Here and there, my colleagues were settling down
The Cinnamon Shops 93
to sleep. The candles slowly burned out in their bottles. The
professor was engrossed in a deep glass case full of old
volumes, antiquated illustrations, etchings and prints. Making
esoteric gestures, he showed us old lithographs of evening
landscapes, dense nocturnal forests and the avenues of winter
parks, looming black on white, moonlit roads.
Time passed unnoticed amid our sleepy conversations,
running unevenly, seeming to tie knots in the flowing of the
hours, swallowing away to who knows where whole stretches
of their duration. Imperceptibly, without transference, we
rediscovered our group already making its way home along a
lane white with snow and edged with a dry, black thicket of
bushes. We walked along that shaggy edge of the darkness,
brushing against the bearskin of the bushes, which cracked
under our feet in the bright, moonless night, the false, milky
daylight long after midnight. The diffuse whiteness of that
light, drizzling with snow, the pallid air and milky space, was
like the grey paper of an etching, where strokes and hatching
of compact brushwood were tangled in deep black. The night,
deep into the early hours, now replicated that series of
nocturnes, Professor Arendt’s nocturnal etchings, and carried
further his imaginings.
In that park’s black forestation, its shaggy fleece of
brushwood, its mass of brittle twigs, were found niches and
nests, places of the deepest, downiest darkness, full of
embroilment, secret gestures and incoherent conversations in
finger language. It was hushed and warm in those nests, where
we sat in our shaggy coats on the soft, summery snow, gorging
ourselves on the nuts with which the hazel bushes were
94 Bruno Schulz
replete in that springtime winter. Martens, weasels and
ichneumons silently wound their way through the brushwood,
furry, sniffing little animals stinking of sheepskin, elongated,
on short little paws. We suspected that among them were
specimens from the school cabinet, which albeit disem-
bowelled and moulting, had heard in their empty innards on
that white night the voice of an old instinct, a mating call, and
had returned to their lair for a brief, illusory lifespan.
But the phosphorescence of the spring snow slowly grew
cloudy and died away, and the thick, black murk before
daybreak set in. Some of us fell asleep in the warm snow,
whilst others scrabbled in the dense thicket for the entrances
to their houses. They groped their way into those dark
interiors, into the dreams of their parents and siblings, falling
into a continuance of the deep snoring they had tracked down
on their dawdling ways.
Those nocturnal assemblies were full of mysterious charm
for me, and I could not forgo the opportunity now to peek into
the art room for a moment, resolving to spare only a few
minutes for the visit. But as I ascended a flight of cedar
backstairs, filled with ringing echoes, I realised I was now in
some hitherto unseen, unknown part of the building.
Not the slightest sound disturbed the solemn silence here.
The corridors were more spacious on this wing, lined with
plush carpet and abounding in finery. Small, dimly glowing
lamps shone at the corners. Turning one such corner, I found
myself in an even wider corridor, bedecked in palatial
sumptuousness, where one of the walls was open through
wide, glazed arches onto the interior of an apartment. Before
‘The Cinnamon Shops 95
my eyes a long enfilade of rooms began, receding into the
depths and furnished with dazzling magnificence. My eye was
drawn along its lane of tussore-silk hangings and gilded
mirrors, expensive furniture and crystal chandeliers, far into
the downy pulp of those extravagant interiors, full of coloured
whirling, shimmering arabesques, winding garlands and
budding flowers. The profound silence of those empty
parlours was inhabited only in the secret looks that the mirrors
exchanged, and a panic of arabesques which ran aloft in
friezes along the walls and were lost in the stucco-work of the
white ceilings.
I stood in admiration and awe before that sumptuousness. I
suspected that my nocturnal escapade had led me
unexpectedly to the headmaster’s wing and before his private
apartment. I stood transfixed with curiosity, my heart
pounding, ready to take flight at the slightest noise; for how, if
discovered, could I justify this, my nocturnal espionage, my
audacious snooping? The headmaster’s little daughter might
be sitting, unobserved and silent, in one of the deep, plush
armchairs and suddenly raise her eyes to me from behind her
book – her black, sibylline and calm eyes whose look none of
us could hold. But it would be cowardice, I decided, to
withdraw in mid-course, without having fulfilled my
objective. Besides, absolute silence reigned everywhere in
those interiors, filled with sumptuousness and illumined by
the dimmed light of the indeterminate hour. Through the
arches of the corridor, at the far end of a great parlour, I could
see a large glazed door which led onto a terrace. It was so quiet
all around that I mustered my courage. There did not seem to
96 Bruno Schulz The Cinnamon Shops 97
be too great a risk involved in descending the few stairs to
floor level and, in a few bounds, crossing the vast, expensive
carpet to the terrace, from where I could easily reach a street I
knew.
I did so, and as soon as I had stepped down onto the parquet
floor of that parlour, beneath the huge palms that stood in
vases there, shooting up as high as the arabesques of the
ceiling, I noticed that I had, in fact, reached neutral ground;
for the parlour had no front wall whatsoever. It was a kind of
loggia, connecting by two or three steps to the town square, an
offshoot, as it were, of that square, where a few items of
furniture were arranged on the pavement. I ran down the few
stone steps and was once more in the street.
The constellations were standing precipitously on their
heads. The stars had all turned over onto their other sides in
their sleep, while the moon, buried in an eiderdown of little
clouds, which it illumined with its invisible presence,
appeared to have an endless road still before it. Absorbed by
its convoluted celestial procedures, it spared not a thought for
daybreak.
A few worn out and rickety droshkies loomed black in the
street like crippled, dozing crabs or cockroaches. A coachman
leaned out from his high seat. He had a small, red and good
natured face. “Shall we go, young sir?” he asked. The coach
shook in all the joints and ligatures of its many-limbed body
and moved off on its light wheels.
But who on such a night will entrust himself to the whims
of an irresponsible droshky driver? Amid the clattering of the
spokes and the rumbling of the box and roof, I tried to make
my destination known to him. Heedless and indulgent, he
shook his head at everything I said. Humming a tune to
himself, he drove by a circuitous route through the town.
A group of droshky drivers stood before a taproom; they
waved to him amiably. He cheerfully made some reply and
threw the reins onto my knees, not even drawing the carriage
to a halt. He got down from his seat and went to join the group
of his colleagues. The horse, a wise old droshky horse, looked
around nonchalantly and continued on his way at a steady,
droshky trot. This horse, as a matter of fact, filled me with
confidence; he seemed to be smarter than the coachman. But I
didn’t know how to steer him; I had to submit to his will. We
set off along a suburban street enclosed on both sides by
gardens. Those gardens, the further they extended, slowly
98 Bruno Schulz The Cinnamon Shops 99
gave way to parks of many trees, and they to forests.
I shall never forget that luminous drive on the brightest of
winter nights. The coloured map of the heavens had
expanded into a vast cupola, where fantastic lands, oceans and
seas towered, etched in lines of starry whirlpools and currents,
luminous lines of celestial geography. The air became easy to
breathe and was lit up like a silver gas. It held a scent of
violets. From under the snow, woolly like white karakul furs,
tremulous anemones began to appear, a spark of moonlight in
each delicate chalice. The entire forest was illumined as if by
a thousand lights, stars that the Decçmber firmament was
plentifully shedding. The air breathed with some secret
spring, the inexpressible purity of snow and violets. We
entered hilly terrain and the lines of the hills, shagged with
the bare twigs of trees, rose like blissful sighs into the sky. I
caught a glimpse on those exultant hillsides of whole groups of
wanderers, gathering up amid moss and bushes the fallen and
snow-dampened stars. The road grew steeper. The horse
skidded and struggled to pull the carriage, all of its ligatures
screeching. I was elated. My breast imbibed that delightful
spring air, the freshness of the stars and the snow. A bank of
snowy white foam built up higher and higher before the
horse’s breast, and the horse arduously dug a passage through
its pure, fresh mass. At last we came to a standstill and I
stepped down from the droshky. He was breathing heavily, his
head bowed. I held his head to my breast. Tears glistened in
his great, black eyes. Then I noticed a round, black wound on
his belly. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I whispered in tears. “My
dear, it is for you,” he said, suddenly becoming very small, like
a little horse made of wood. I left him. I felt strangely light and
happy. I pondered whether I ought to wait for the local train,
the little, narrow-gauge train that stopped there, or return to
town on foot. I set off walking along a steep serpentine in the
depths of the forest, going at first with light, flexible steps, and
then, gathering momentum, at an ambling, euphoric run
which soon became a ride, like skiing. I found I could adjust
my speed at will and steer the ride with nimble turns of my
body.
I curbed my triumphal run on reaching the edge of town,
modifying it to a sensible, leisurely pace. The moon was still
high; the sky’s transformations were unending, the metamor-
phoses of its multitudinous vaults in ever more masterfully
described configurations. The sky had opened up that night,
like a silver astrolabe, its bewitching internal mechanism,
exhibiting in endless cycles the gilded mathematics of its cogs
and wheels.
In the market square, I came across people out taking
strolls. Enchanted by the spectacle of that night, their faces
were all turned heavenward and silvered by the magic of the
sky. All concern over the wallet had left me; caught up in his
eccentricities, Father had surely forgotten by now that he had
ever lost it. I didn’t care about Mother.
On such a night, unique in a year, propitious thoughts
come, inspirations, prophetic touches of the divine finger. I
was about to head for home, filled with ideas and inspiration,
when my school friends sidetracked me, carrying books under
their arms. They had set off for school too early, awoken by
the brightness of that night that did not want to end.
100 Bruno Schulz
We set off walking in a group, along a steeply descending
street where a breeze of violets blew, uncertain whether it was
still the night’s magic that silvered the snow, or whether, at
last, the dawn was rising…
LII kw. £i si :ox4li 11
J N THE BOTTOM DRAWER of his fathomless desk, my
.1 father kept an old and beautiful map of our town.
It was a whole in-folio volume of parchment sheets, bound
at one time with linen strips, which formed an enormous wall
map in the style of a panorama in bird’s-eye perspective.
Hung on the wall, it unfolded almost to the full length of
the room, and opened a wide vista onto the whole valley of the
Tymienica – a ribbon of pale gold wending its tortuous way
– onto a whole lakeland of widely scattered marshes and
ponds, folding forelands that drew away to the south,
sporadically at first and then in ever more gathering layers, a
chessboard of curved hills, smaller and paler the further they
sank into the golden and smoky mist of the horizon. Out of
that sagging distance of the periphery, our town came into
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MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
ACT I
SCENE I. Athens. The palace of
THESEUS
.
Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, PHILOSTRATE, and Attendants
THESEUS
Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
Draws on apace; four happy days bring in
Another moon: but, O, methinks, how slow
This old moon wanes! she lingers my desires,
Like to a step-dame or a dowager
Long withering out a young man’s revenue.
HIPPOLYTA
Four days will quickly steep themselves in night;
Four nights will quickly dream away the time;
And then the moon, like to a silver bow
New-bent in heaven, shall behold the night
Of our solemnities.
THESEUS
Go, Philostrate,
Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments;
Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth;
Turn melancholy forth to funerals;
The pale companion is not for our pomp.
Exit
PHILOSTRATE
Hippolyta, I woo’d thee with my sword,
And won thy love, doing thee injuries;
But I will wed thee in another key,
With pomp, with triumph and with revelling.
Enter EGEUS, HERMIA, LYSANDER, and
DEMETRIUS
EGEUS
Happy be Theseus, our renowned duke!
THESEUS
Thanks, good Egeus: what’s the news with thee?
EGEUS
Full of vexation come I, with complaint
Against my child, my daughter Hermia.
Stand forth, Demetrius. My noble lord,
This man hath my consent to marry her.
Stand forth, Lysander: and my gracious duke,
This man hath bewitch’d the bosom of my child;
Thou, thou, Lysander, thou hast given her rhymes,
And interchanged love-tokens with my child:
Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung,
With feigning voice verses of feigning love,
And stolen the impression of her fantasy
With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gawds, conceits,
Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats, messengers
Of strong prevailment in unharden’d youth:
With cunning hast thou filch’d my daughter’s heart,
Turn’d her obedience, which is due to me,
To stubborn harshness: and, my gracious duke,
Be it so she; will not here before your grace
Consent to marry with Demetrius,
I beg the ancient privilege of Athens,
As she is mine, I may dispose of her:
Which shall be either to this gentleman
Or to her death, according to our law
Immediately provided in that case.
THESEUS
What say you, Hermia? be advised fair maid:
To you your father should be as a god;
One that composed your beauties, yea, and one
To whom you are but as a form in wax
By him imprinted and within his power
To leave the figure or disfigure it.
Demetrius is a worthy gentleman.
HERMIA
So is Lysander.
THESEUS
In himself he is;
But in this kind, wanting your father’s voice,
The other must be held the worthier.
HERMIA
I would my father look’d but with my eyes.
THESEUS
Rather your eyes must with his judgment look.
HERMIA
I do entreat your grace to pardon me.
I know not by what power I am made bold,
Nor how it may concern my modesty,
In such a presence here to plead my thoughts;
But I beseech your grace that I may know
The worst that may befall me in this case,
If I refuse to wed Demetrius.
THESEUS
Either to die the death or to abjure
For ever the society of men.
Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires;
Know of your youth, examine well your blood,
Whether, if you yield not to your father’s choice,
You can endure the livery of a nun,
For aye to be in shady cloister mew’d,
To live a barren sister all your life,
Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.
Thrice-blessed they that master so their blood,
To undergo such maiden pilgrimage;
But earthlier happy is the rose distill’d,
Than that which withering on the virgin thorn
Grows, lives and dies in single blessedness.
HERMIA
So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord,
Ere I will my virgin patent up
Unto his lordship, whose unwished yoke
My soul consents not to give sovereignty.
THESEUS
Take time to pause; and, by the next new moon–
The sealing-day betwixt my love and me,
For everlasting bond of fellowship–
Upon that day either prepare to die
For disobedience to your father’s will,
Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would;
Or on Diana’s altar to protest
For aye austerity and single life.
DEMETRIUS
Relent, sweet Hermia: and, Lysander, yield
Thy crazed title to my certain right.
LYSANDER
You have her father’s love, Demetrius;
Let me have Hermia’s: do you marry him.
EGEUS
Scornful Lysander! true, he hath my love,
And what is mine my love shall render him.
And she is mine, and all my right of her
I do estate unto Demetrius.
LYSANDER
I am, my lord, as well derived as he,
As well possess’d; my love is more than his;
My fortunes every way as fairly rank’d,
If not with vantage, as Demetrius’;
And, which is more than all these boasts can be,
I am beloved of beauteous Hermia:
Why should not I then prosecute my right?
Demetrius, I’ll avouch it to his head,
Made love to Nedar’s daughter, Helena,
And won her soul; and she, sweet lady, dotes,
Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry,
Upon this spotted and inconstant man.
THESEUS
I must confess that I have heard so much,
And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof;
But, being over-full of self-affairs,
My mind did lose it. But, Demetrius, come;
And come, Egeus; you shall go with me,
I have some private schooling for you both.
For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself
To fit your fancies to your father’s will;
Or else the law of Athens yields you up–
Which by no means we may extenuate–
To death, or to a vow of single life.
Come, my Hippolyta: what cheer, my love?
Demetrius and Egeus, go along:
I must employ you in some business
Against our nuptial and confer with you
Of something nearly that concerns yourselves.
EGEUS
With duty and desire we follow you.
Exeunt all but LYSANDER and HERMIA
LYSANDER
How now, my love! why is your cheek so pale?
How chance the roses there do fade so fast?
HERMIA
Belike for want of rain, which I could well
Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes.
LYSANDER
Ay me! for aught that I could ever read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth;
But, either it was different in blood,–
HERMIA
O cross! too high to be enthrall’d to low.
LYSANDER
Or else misgraffed in respect of years,–
HERMIA
O spite! too old to be engaged to young.
LYSANDER
Or else it stood upon the choice of friends,–
HERMIA
O hell! to choose love by another’s eyes.
LYSANDER
Or, if there were a sympathy in choice,
War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,
Making it momentany as a sound,
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream;
Brief as the lightning in the collied night,
That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,
And ere a man hath power to say ‘Behold!’
The jaws of darkness do devour it up:
So quick bright things come to confusion.
HERMIA
If then true lovers have been ever cross’d,
It stands as an edict in destiny:
Then let us teach our trial patience,
Because it is a customary cross,
As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs,
Wishes and tears, poor fancy’s followers.
LYSANDER
A good persuasion: therefore, hear me, Hermia.
I have a widow aunt, a dowager
Of great revenue, and she hath no child:
From Athens is her house remote seven leagues;
And she respects me as her only son.
There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee;
And to that place the sharp Athenian law
Cannot pursue us. If thou lovest me then,
Steal forth thy father’s house to-morrow night;
And in the wood, a league without the town,
Where I did meet thee once with Helena,
To do observance to a morn of May,
There will I stay for thee.
HERMIA
My good Lysander!
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.
LYSANDER
Keep promise, love. Look, here comes Helena.
Enter
HELENA
HERMIA
God speed fair Helena! whither away?
HELENA
Call you me fair? that fair again unsay.
Demetrius loves your fair: O happy fair!
Your eyes are lode-stars; and your tongue’s sweet air
More tuneable than lark to shepherd’s ear,
When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.
Sickness is catching: O, were favour so,
Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go;
My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye,
My tongue should catch your tongue’s sweet melody.
Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated,
The rest I’d give to be to you translated.
O, teach me how you look, and with what art
You sway the motion of Demetrius’ heart.
HERMIA
I frown upon him, yet he loves me still.
HELENA
O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!
HERMIA
I give him curses, yet he gives me love.
HELENA
O that my prayers could such affection move!
HERMIA
The more I hate, the more he follows me.
HELENA
The more I love, the more he hateth me.
HERMIA
His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine.
HELENA
None, but your beauty: would that fault were mine!
HERMIA
Take comfort: he no more shall see my face;
Lysander and myself will fly this place.
Before the time I did Lysander see,
Seem’d Athens as a paradise to me:
O, then, what graces in my love do dwell,
That he hath turn’d a heaven unto a hell!
LYSANDER
Helen, to you our minds we will unfold:
To-morrow night, when Phoebe doth behold
Her silver visage in the watery glass,
Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass,
A time that lovers’ flights doth still conceal,
Through Athens’ gates have we devised to steal.
HERMIA
And in the wood, where often you and I
Upon faint primrose-beds were wont to lie,
Emptying our bosoms of their counsel sweet,
There my Lysander and myself shall meet;
And thence from Athens turn away our eyes,
To seek new friends and stranger companies.
Farewell, sweet playfellow: pray thou for us;
And good luck grant thee thy Demetrius!
Keep word, Lysander: we must starve our sight
From lovers’ food till morrow deep midnight.
LYSANDER
I will, my Hermia.
Exit HERMIA
Helena, adieu:
As you on him, Demetrius dote on you!
Exit
HELENA
How happy some o’er other some can be!
Through Athens I am thought as fair as she.
But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so;
He will not know what all but he do know:
And as he errs, doting on Hermia’s eyes,
So I, admiring of his qualities:
Things base and vile, folding no quantity,
Love can transpose to form and dignity:
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;
And therefore is wing’d Cupid painted blind:
Nor hath Love’s mind of any judgement taste;
Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste:
And therefore is Love said to be a child,
Because in choice he is so oft beguiled.
As waggish boys in game themselves forswear,
So the boy Love is perjured every where:
For ere Demetrius look’d on Hermia’s eyne,
He hail’d down oaths that he was only mine;
And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,
So he dissolved, and showers of oaths did melt.
I will go tell him of fair Hermia’s flight:
Then to the wood will he to-morrow night
Pursue her; and for this intelligence
If I have thanks, it is a dear expense:
But herein mean I to enrich my pain,
To have his sight thither and back again.
Exit
SCENE II. Athens. QUINCE’S house.
Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, and
STARVELING
QUINCE
Is all our company here?
BOTTOM
You were best to call them generally, man by man,
according to the scrip.
QUINCE
Here is the scroll of every man’s name, which is
thought fit, through all Athens, to play in our
interlude before the duke and the duchess, on his
wedding-day at night.
BOTTOM
First, good Peter Quince, say what the play treats
on, then read the names of the actors, and so grow
to a point.
QUINCE
Marry, our play is, The most lamentable comedy, and
most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby.
BOTTOM
A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a
merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your
actors by the scroll. Masters, spread yourselves.
QUINCE
Answer as I call you. Nick Bottom, the weaver.
BOTTOM
Ready. Name what part I am for, and proceed.
QUINCE
You, Nick Bottom, are set down for Pyramus.
BOTTOM
What is Pyramus? a lover, or a tyrant?
QUINCE
A lover, that kills himself most gallant for love.
BOTTOM
That will ask some tears in the true performing of
it: if I do it, let the audience look to their
eyes; I will move storms, I will condole in some
measure. To the rest: yet my chief humour is for a
tyrant: I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to
tear a cat in, to make all split.
The raging rocks
And shivering shocks
Shall break the locks
Of prison gates;
And Phibbus’ car
Shall shine from far
And make and mar
The foolish Fates.
This was lofty! Now name the rest of the players.
This is Ercles’ vein, a tyrant’s vein; a lover is
more condoling.
QUINCE
Francis Flute, the bellows-mender.
FLUTE
Here, Peter Quince.
QUINCE
Flute, you must take Thisby on you.
FLUTE
What is Thisby? a wandering knight?
QUINCE
It is the lady that Pyramus must love.
FLUTE
Nay, faith, let me not play a woman; I have a beard coming.
QUINCE
That’s all one: you shall play it in a mask, and
you may speak as small as you will.
BOTTOM
An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too, I’ll
speak in a monstrous little voice. ‘Thisby,
Thisby;’ ‘Ah, Pyramus, lover dear! thy Thisby dear,
and lady dear!’
QUINCE
No, no; you must play Pyramus: and, Flute, you Thisby.
BOTTOM
Well, proceed.
QUINCE
Robin Starveling, the tailor.
STARVELING
Here, Peter Quince.
QUINCE
Robin Starveling, you must play Thisby’s mother.
Tom Snout, the tinker.
SNOUT
Here, Peter Quince.
QUINCE
You, Pyramus’ father: myself, Thisby’s father:
Snug, the joiner; you, the lion’s part: and, I
hope, here is a play fitted.
SNUG
Have you the lion’s part written? pray you, if it
be, give it me, for I am slow of study.
QUINCE
You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring.
BOTTOM
Let me play the lion too: I will roar, that I will
do any man’s heart good to hear me; I will roar,
that I will make the duke say ‘Let him roar again,
let him roar again.’
QUINCE
An you should do it too terribly, you would fright
the duchess and the ladies, that they would shriek;
and that were enough to hang us all.
ALL
That would hang us, every mother’s son.
BOTTOM
I grant you, friends, if that you should fright the
ladies out of their wits, they would have no more
discretion but to hang us: but I will aggravate my
voice so that I will roar you as gently as any
sucking dove; I will roar you an ‘twere any
nightingale.
QUINCE
You can play no part but Pyramus; for Pyramus is a
sweet-faced man; a proper man, as one shall see in a
summer’s day; a most lovely gentleman-like man:
therefore you must needs play Pyramus.
BOTTOM
Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I best
to play it in?
QUINCE
Why, what you will.
BOTTOM
I will discharge it in either your straw-colour
beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-in-grain
beard, or your French-crown-colour beard, your
perfect yellow.
QUINCE
Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and
then you will play bare-faced. But, masters, here
are your parts: and I am to entreat you, request
you and desire you, to con them by to-morrow night;
and meet me in the palace wood, a mile without the
town, by moonlight; there will we rehearse, for if
we meet in the city, we shall be dogged with
company, and our devices known. In the meantime I
will draw a bill of properties, such as our play
wants. I pray you, fail me not.
BOTTOM
We will meet; and there we may rehearse most
obscenely and courageously. Take pains; be perfect: adieu.
QUINCE
At the duke’s oak we meet.
BOTTOM
Enough; hold or cut bow-strings.
Exeunt
ACT II
SCENE I. A wood near Athens.
Enter from opposite sides, a Fairy, and
PUCK
PUCK
How now, spirit! whither wander you?
FAIRY
Over hill, over dale,
Thorough bush, thorough brier,
Over park, over pale,
Thorough flood, thorough fire,
I do wander everywhere,
Swifter than the moon’s sphere;
And I serve the fairy queen,
To dew her orbs upon the green.
The cowslips tall her pensioners be:
In their gold coats spots you see;
Those be rubies, fairy favours,
In those freckles live their savours:
I must go seek some dewdrops here
And hang a pearl in every cowslip’s ear.
Farewell, thou lob of spirits; I’ll be gone:
Our queen and all our elves come here anon.
PUCK
The king doth keep his revels here to-night:
Take heed the queen come not within his sight;
For Oberon is passing fell and wrath,
Because that she as her attendant hath
A lovely boy, stolen from an Indian king;
She never had so sweet a changeling;
And jealous Oberon would have the child
Knight of his train, to trace the forests wild;
But she perforce withholds the loved boy,
Crowns him with flowers and makes him all her joy:
And now they never meet in grove or green,
By fountain clear, or spangled starlight sheen,
But, they do square, that all their elves for fear
Creep into acorn-cups and hide them there.
FAIRY
Either I mistake your shape and making quite,
Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite
Call’d Robin Goodfellow: are not you he
That frights the maidens of the villagery;
Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern
And bootless make the breathless housewife churn;
And sometime make the drink to bear no barm;
Mislead night-wanderers, laughing at their harm?
Those that Hobgoblin call you and sweet Puck,
You do their work, and they shall have good luck:
Are not you he?
PUCK
Thou speak’st aright;
I am that merry wanderer of the night.
I jest to Oberon and make him smile
When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile,
Neighing in likeness of a filly foal:
And sometime lurk I in a gossip’s bowl,
In very likeness of a roasted crab,
And when she drinks, against her lips I bob
And on her wither’d dewlap pour the ale.
The wisest aunt, telling the saddest tale,
Sometime for three-foot stool mistaketh me;
Then slip I from her bum, down topples she,
And ‘tailor’ cries, and falls into a cough;
And then the whole quire hold their hips and laugh,
And waxen in their mirth and neeze and swear
A merrier hour was never wasted there.
But, room, fairy! here comes Oberon.
FAIRY
And here my mistress. Would that he were gone!
Enter, from one side, OBERON, with his train; from the other,
TITANIA
, with
hers
OBERON
Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.
TITANIA
What, jealous Oberon! Fairies, skip hence:
I have forsworn his bed and company.
OBERON
Tarry, rash wanton: am not I thy lord?
TITANIA
Then I must be thy lady: but I know
When thou hast stolen away from fairy land,
And in the shape of Corin sat all day,
Playing on pipes of corn and versing love
To amorous Phillida. Why art thou here,
Come from the farthest Steppe of India?
But that, forsooth, the bouncing Amazon,
Your buskin’d mistress and your warrior love,
To Theseus must be wedded, and you come
To give their bed joy and prosperity.
OBERON
How canst thou thus for shame, Titania,
Glance at my credit with Hippolyta,
Knowing I know thy love to Theseus?
Didst thou not lead him through the glimmering night
From Perigenia, whom he ravished?
And make him with fair Aegle break his faith,
With Ariadne and Antiopa?
TITANIA
These are the forgeries of jealousy:
And never, since the middle summer’s spring,
Met we on hill, in dale, forest or mead,
By paved fountain or by rushy brook,
Or in the beached margent of the sea,
To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturb’d our sport.
Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have suck’d up from the sea
Contagious fogs; which falling in the land
Have every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents:
The ox hath therefore stretch’d his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attain’d a beard;
The fold stands empty in the drowned field,
And crows are fatted with the murrion flock;
The nine men’s morris is fill’d up with mud,
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
For lack of tread are undistinguishable:
The human mortals want their winter here;
No night is now with hymn or carol blest:
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound:
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
Far in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’ thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set: the spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter, change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazed world,
By their increase, now knows not which is which:
And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissension;
We are their parents and original.
OBERON
Do you amend it then; it lies in you:
Why should Titania cross her Oberon?
I do but beg a little changeling boy,
To be my henchman.
TITANIA
Set your heart at rest:
The fairy land buys not the child of me.
His mother was a votaress of my order:
And, in the spiced Indian air, by night,
Full often hath she gossip’d by my side,
And sat with me on Neptune’s yellow sands,
Marking the embarked traders on the flood,
When we have laugh’d to see the sails conceive
And grow big-bellied with the wanton wind;
Which she, with pretty and with swimming gait
Following,–her womb then rich with my young squire,–
Would imitate, and sail upon the land,
To fetch me trifles, and return again,
As from a voyage, rich with merchandise.
But she, being mortal, of that boy did die;
And for her sake do I rear up her boy,
And for her sake I will not part with him.
OBERON
How long within this wood intend you stay?
TITANIA
Perchance till after Theseus’ wedding-day.
If you will patiently dance in our round
And see our moonlight revels, go with us;
If not, shun me, and I will spare your haunts.
OBERON
Give me that boy, and I will go with thee.
TITANIA
Not for thy fairy kingdom. Fairies, away!
We shall chide downright, if I longer stay.
Exit TITANIA with her train
OBERON
Well, go thy way: thou shalt not from this grove
Till I torment thee for this injury.
My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou rememberest
Since once I sat upon a promontory,
And heard a mermaid on a dolphin’s back
Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath
That the rude sea grew civil at her song
And certain stars shot madly from their spheres,
To hear the sea-maid’s music.
PUCK
I remember.
OBERON
That very time I saw, but thou couldst not,
Flying between the cold moon and the earth,
Cupid all arm’d: a certain aim he took
At a fair vestal throned by the west,
And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his bow,
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts;
But I might see young Cupid’s fiery shaft
Quench’d in the chaste beams of the watery moon,
And the imperial votaress passed on,
In maiden meditation, fancy-free.
Yet mark’d I where the bolt of Cupid fell:
It fell upon a little western flower,
Before milk-white, now purple with love’s wound,
And maidens call it love-in-idleness.
Fetch me that flower; the herb I shew’d thee once:
The juice of it on sleeping eye-lids laid
Will make or man or woman madly dote
Upon the next live creature that it sees.
Fetch me this herb; and be thou here again
Ere the leviathan can swim a league.
PUCK
I’ll put a girdle round about the earth
In forty minutes.
Exit
OBERON
Having once this juice,
I’ll watch Titania when she is asleep,
And drop the liquor of it in her eyes.
The next thing then she waking looks upon,
Be it on lion, bear, or wolf, or bull,
On meddling monkey, or on busy ape,
She shall pursue it with the soul of love:
And ere I take this charm from off her sight,
As I can take it with another herb,
I’ll make her render up her page to me.
But who comes here? I am invisible;
And I will overhear their conference.
Enter DEMETRIUS, HELENA, following him
DEMETRIUS
I love thee not, therefore pursue me not.
Where is Lysander and fair Hermia?
The one I’ll slay, the other slayeth me.
Thou told’st me they were stolen unto this wood;
And here am I, and wode within this wood,
Because I cannot meet my Hermia.
Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more.
HELENA
You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant;
But yet you draw not iron, for my heart
Is true as steel: leave you your power to draw,
And I shall have no power to follow you.
DEMETRIUS
Do I entice you? do I speak you fair?
Or, rather, do I not in plainest truth
Tell you, I do not, nor I cannot love you?
HELENA
And even for that do I love you the more.
I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius,
The more you beat me, I will fawn on you:
Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike me,
Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave,
Unworthy as I am, to follow you.
What worser place can I beg in your love,–
And yet a place of high respect with me,–
Than to be used as you use your dog?
DEMETRIUS
Tempt not too much the hatred of my spirit;
For I am sick when I do look on thee.
HELENA
And I am sick when I look not on you.
DEMETRIUS
You do impeach your modesty too much,
To leave the city and commit yourself
Into the hands of one that loves you not;
To trust the opportunity of night
And the ill counsel of a desert place
With the rich worth of your virginity.
HELENA
Your virtue is my privilege: for that
It is not night when I do see your face,
Therefore I think I am not in the night;
Nor doth this wood lack worlds of company,
For you in my respect are all the world:
Then how can it be said I am alone,
When all the world is here to look on me?
DEMETRIUS
I’ll run from thee and hide me in the brakes,
And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts.
HELENA
The wildest hath not such a heart as you.
Run when you will, the story shall be changed:
Apollo flies, and Daphne holds the chase;
The dove pursues the griffin; the mild hind
Makes speed to catch the tiger; bootless speed,
When cowardice pursues and valour flies.
DEMETRIUS
I will not stay thy questions; let me go:
Or, if thou follow me, do not believe
But I shall do thee mischief in the wood.
HELENA
Ay, in the temple, in the town, the field,
You do me mischief. Fie, Demetrius!
Your wrongs do set a scandal on my sex:
We cannot fight for love, as men may do;
We should be wood and were not made to woo.
Exit DEMETRIUS
I’ll follow thee and make a heaven of hell,
To die upon the hand I love so well.
Exit
OBERON
Fare thee well, nymph: ere he do leave this grove,
Thou shalt fly him and he shall seek thy love.
Re-enter PUCK
Hast thou the flower there? Welcome, wanderer.
PUCK
Ay, there it is.
OBERON
I pray thee, give it me.
I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine:
There sleeps Titania sometime of the night,
Lull’d in these flowers with dances and delight;
And there the snake throws her enamell’d skin,
Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in:
And with the juice of this I’ll streak her eyes,
And make her full of hateful fantasies.
Take thou some of it, and seek through this grove:
A sweet Athenian lady is in love
With a disdainful youth: anoint his eyes;
But do it when the next thing he espies
May be the lady: thou shalt know the man
By the Athenian garments he hath on.
Effect it with some care, that he may prove
More fond on her than she upon her love:
And look thou meet me ere the first cock crow.
PUCK
Fear not, my lord, your servant shall do so.
Exit
SCENE II. Another part of the wood.
Enter TITANIA, with her train
TITANIA
Come, now a roundel and a fairy song;
Then, for the third part of a minute, hence;
Some to kill cankers in the musk-rose buds,
Some war with rere-mice for their leathern wings,
To make my small elves coats, and some keep back
The clamorous owl that nightly hoots and wonders
At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep;
Then to your offices and let me rest.
THE FAIRIES SING
You spotted snakes with double tongue,
Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen;
Newts and blind-worms, do no wrong,
Come not near our fairy queen.
Philomel, with melody
Sing in our sweet lullaby;
Lulla, lulla, lullaby, lulla, lulla, lullaby:
Never harm,
Nor spell nor charm,
Come our lovely lady nigh;
So, good night, with lullaby.
Weaving spiders, come not here;
Hence, you long-legg’d spinners, hence!
Beetles black, approach not near;
Worm nor snail, do no offence.
Philomel, with melody, & c.
FAIRY
Hence, away! now all is well:
One aloof stand sentinel.
Exeunt Fairies. TITANIA sleeps
Enter OBERON and squeezes the flower on TITANIA’s eyelids
OBERON
What thou seest when thou dost wake,
Do it for thy true-love take,
Love and languish for his sake:
Be it ounce, or cat, or bear,
Pard, or boar with bristled hair,
In thy eye that shall appear
When thou wakest, it is thy dear:
Wake when some vile thing is near.
Exit
Enter LYSANDER and HERMIA
LYSANDER
Fair love, you faint with wandering in the wood;
And to speak troth, I have forgot our way:
We’ll rest us, Hermia, if you think it good,
And tarry for the comfort of the day.
HERMIA
Be it so, Lysander: find you out a bed;
For I upon this bank will rest my head.
LYSANDER
One turf shall serve as pillow for us both;
One heart, one bed, two bosoms and one troth.
HERMIA
Nay, good Lysander; for my sake, my dear,
Lie further off yet, do not lie so near.
LYSANDER
O, take the sense, sweet, of my innocence!
Love takes the meaning in love’s conference.
I mean, that my heart unto yours is knit
So that but one heart we can make of it;
Two bosoms interchained with an oath;
So then two bosoms and a single troth.
Then by your side no bed-room me deny;
For lying so, Hermia, I do not lie.
HERMIA
Lysander riddles very prettily:
Now much beshrew my manners and my pride,
If Hermia meant to say Lysander lied.
But, gentle friend, for love and courtesy
Lie further off; in human modesty,
Such separation as may well be said
Becomes a virtuous bachelor and a maid,
So far be distant; and, good night, sweet friend:
Thy love ne’er alter till thy sweet life end!
LYSANDER
Amen, amen, to that fair prayer, say I;
And then end life when I end loyalty!
Here is my bed: sleep give thee all his rest!
HERMIA
With half that wish the wisher’s eyes be press’d!
[They sleep]
Enter PUCK
PUCK
Through the forest have I gone.
But Athenian found I none,
On whose eyes I might approve
This flower’s force in stirring love.
Night and silence.–Who is here?
Weeds of Athens he doth wear:
This is he, my master said,
Despised the Athenian maid;
And here the maiden, sleeping sound,
On the dank and dirty ground.
Pretty soul! she durst not lie
Near this lack-love, this kill-courtesy.
Churl, upon thy eyes I throw
All the power this charm doth owe.
When thou wakest, let love forbid
Sleep his seat on thy eyelid:
So awake when I am gone;
For I must now to Oberon.
EXIT
Enter DEMETRIUS and HELENA, running
HELENA
Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Demetrius.
DEMETRIUS
I charge thee, hence, and do not haunt me thus.
HELENA
O, wilt thou darkling leave me? do not so.
DEMETRIUS
Stay, on thy peril: I alone will go.
Exit
HELENA
O, I am out of breath in this fond chase!
The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace.
Happy is Hermia, wheresoe’er she lies;
For she hath blessed and attractive eyes.
How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears:
If so, my eyes are oftener wash’d than hers.
No, no, I am as ugly as a bear;
For beasts that meet me run away for fear:
Therefore no marvel though Demetrius
Do, as a monster fly my presence thus.
What wicked and dissembling glass of mine
Made me compare with Hermia’s sphery eyne?
But who is here? Lysander! on the ground!
Dead? or asleep? I see no blood, no wound.
Lysander if you live, good sir, awake.
LYSANDER
[Awaking]
And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake.
Transparent Helena! Nature shows art,
That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart.
Where is Demetrius? O, how fit a word
Is that vile name to perish on my sword!
HELENA
Do not say so, Lysander; say not so
What though he love your Hermia? Lord, what though?
Yet Hermia still loves you: then be content.
LYSANDER
Content with Hermia! No; I do repent
The tedious minutes I with her have spent.
Not Hermia but Helena I love:
Who will not change a raven for a dove?
The will of man is by his reason sway’d;
And reason says you are the worthier maid.
Things growing are not ripe until their season
So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason;
And touching now the point of human skill,
Reason becomes the marshal to my will
And leads me to your eyes, where I o’erlook
Love’s stories written in love’s richest book.
HELENA
Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born?
When at your hands did I deserve this scorn?
Is’t not enough, is’t not enough, young man,
That I did never, no, nor never can,
Deserve a sweet look from Demetrius’ eye,
But you must flout my insufficiency?
Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth, you do,
In such disdainful manner me to woo.
But fare you well: perforce I must confess
I thought you lord of more true gentleness.
O, that a lady, of one man refused.
Should of another therefore be abused!
Exit
LYSANDER
She sees not Hermia. Hermia, sleep thou there:
And never mayst thou come Lysander near!
For as a surfeit of the sweetest things
The deepest loathing to the stomach brings,
Or as tie heresies that men do leave
Are hated most of those they did deceive,
So thou, my surfeit and my heresy,
Of all be hated, but the most of me!
And, all my powers, address your love and might
To honour Helen and to be her knight!
Exit
HERMIA
[Awaking]
Help me, Lysander, help me! do thy best
To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast!
Ay me, for pity! what a dream was here!
Lysander, look how I do quake with fear:
Methought a serpent eat my heart away,
And you sat smiling at his cruel pray.
Lysander! what, removed? Lysander! lord!
What, out of hearing? gone? no sound, no word?
Alack, where are you speak, an if you hear;
Speak, of all loves! I swoon almost with fear.
No? then I well perceive you all not nigh
Either death or you I’ll find immediately.
Exit
ACT III
SCENE I. The wood. TITANIA lying asleep.
Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING
BOTTOM
Are we all met?
QUINCE
Pat, pat; and here’s a marvellous convenient place
for our rehearsal. This green plot shall be our
stage, this hawthorn-brake our tiring-house; and we
will do it in action as we will do it before the duke.
BOTTOM
Peter Quince,–
QUINCE
What sayest thou, bully Bottom?
BOTTOM
There are things in this comedy of Pyramus and
Thisby that will never please. First, Pyramus must
draw a sword to kill himself; which the ladies
cannot abide. How answer you that?
SNOUT
By’r lakin, a parlous fear.
STARVELING
I believe we must leave the killing out, when all is done.
BOTTOM
Not a whit: I have a device to make all well.
Write me a prologue; and let the prologue seem to
say, we will do no harm with our swords, and that
Pyramus is not killed indeed; and, for the more
better assurance, tell them that I, Pyramus, am not
Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver: this will put them
out of fear.
QUINCE
Well, we will have such a prologue; and it shall be
written in eight and six.
BOTTOM
No, make it two more; let it be written in eight and eight.
SNOUT
Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion?
STARVELING
I fear it, I promise you.
BOTTOM
Masters, you ought to consider with yourselves: to
bring in–God shield us!–a lion among ladies, is a
most dreadful thing; for there is not a more fearful
wild-fowl than your lion living; and we ought to
look to ‘t.
SNOUT
Therefore another prologue must tell he is not a lion.
BOTTOM
Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must
be seen through the lion’s neck: and he himself
must speak through, saying thus, or to the same
defect,–’Ladies,’–or ‘Fair-ladies–I would wish
You,’–or ‘I would request you,’–or ‘I would
entreat you,–not to fear, not to tremble: my life
for yours. If you think I come hither as a lion, it
were pity of my life: no I am no such thing; I am a
man as other men are;’ and there indeed let him name
his name, and tell them plainly he is Snug the joiner.
QUINCE
Well it shall be so. But there is two hard things;
that is, to bring the moonlight into a chamber; for,
you know, Pyramus and Thisby meet by moonlight.
SNOUT
Doth the moon shine that night we play our play?
BOTTOM
A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanac; find
out moonshine, find out moonshine.
QUINCE
Yes, it doth shine that night.
BOTTOM
Why, then may you leave a casement of the great
chamber window, where we play, open, and the moon
may shine in at the casement.
QUINCE
Ay; or else one must come in with a bush of thorns
and a lanthorn, and say he comes to disfigure, or to
present, the person of Moonshine. Then, there is
another thing: we must have a wall in the great
chamber; for Pyramus and Thisby says the story, did
talk through the chink of a wall.
SNOUT
You can never bring in a wall. What say you, Bottom?
BOTTOM
Some man or other must present Wall: and let him
have some plaster, or some loam, or some rough-cast
about him, to signify wall; and let him hold his
fingers thus, and through that cranny shall Pyramus
and Thisby whisper.
QUINCE
If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down,
every mother’s son, and rehearse your parts.
Pyramus, you begin: when you have spoken your
speech, enter into that brake: and so every one
according to his cue.
Enter PUCK behind
PUCK
What hempen home-spuns have we swaggering here,
So near the cradle of the fairy queen?
What, a play toward! I’ll be an auditor;
An actor too, perhaps, if I see cause.
QUINCE
Speak, Pyramus. Thisby, stand forth.
BOTTOM
Thisby, the flowers of odious savours sweet,–
QUINCE
Odours, odours.
BOTTOM
–odours savours sweet:
So hath thy breath, my dearest Thisby dear.
But hark, a voice! stay thou but here awhile,
And by and by I will to thee appear.
Exit
PUCK
A stranger Pyramus than e’er played here.
Exit
FLUTE
Must I speak now?
QUINCE
Ay, marry, must you; for you must understand he goes
but to see a noise that he heard, and is to come again.
FLUTE
Most radiant Pyramus, most lily-white of hue,
Of colour like the red rose on triumphant brier,
Most brisky juvenal and eke most lovely Jew,
As true as truest horse that yet would never tire,
I’ll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny’s tomb.
QUINCE
‘Ninus’ tomb,’ man: why, you must not speak that
yet; that you answer to Pyramus: you speak all your
part at once, cues and all Pyramus enter: your cue
is past; it is, ‘never tire.’
FLUTE
O,–As true as truest horse, that yet would
never tire.
Re-enter PUCK, and BOTTOM with an ass’s head
BOTTOM
If I were fair, Thisby, I were only thine.
QUINCE
O monstrous! O strange! we are haunted. Pray,
masters! fly, masters! Help!
Exeunt QUINCE, SNUG, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING
PUCK
I’ll follow you, I’ll lead you about a round,
Through bog, through bush, through brake, through brier:
Sometime a horse I’ll be, sometime a hound,
A hog, a headless bear, sometime a fire;
And neigh, and bark, and grunt, and roar, and burn,
Like horse, hound, hog, bear, fire, at every turn.
Exit
BOTTOM
Why do they run away? this is a knavery of them to
make me afeard.
Re-enter SNOUT
SNOUT
O Bottom, thou art changed! what do I see on thee?
BOTTOM
What do you see? you see an asshead of your own, do
you?
Exit SNOUT
Re-enter QUINCE
QUINCE
Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art
translated.
Exit
BOTTOM
I see their knavery: this is to make an ass of me;
to fright me, if they could. But I will not stir
from this place, do what they can: I will walk up
and down here, and I will sing, that they shall hear
I am not afraid.
[Sings]
The ousel cock so black of hue,
With orange-tawny bill,
The throstle with his note so true,
The wren with little quill,–
TITANIA
[Awaking]
What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
BOTTOM
[Sings]
The finch, the sparrow and the lark,
The plain-song cuckoo gray,
Whose note full many a man doth mark,
And dares not answer nay;–
for, indeed, who would set his wit to so foolish
a bird? who would give a bird the lie, though he cry
‘cuckoo’ never so?
TITANIA
I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again:
Mine ear is much enamour’d of thy note;
So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape;
And thy fair virtue’s force perforce doth move me
On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.
BOTTOM
Methinks, mistress, you should have little reason
for that: and yet, to say the truth, reason and
love keep little company together now-a-days; the
more the pity that some honest neighbours will not
make them friends. Nay, I can gleek upon occasion.
TITANIA
Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful.
BOTTOM
Not so, neither: but if I had wit enough to get out
of this wood, I have enough to serve mine own turn.
TITANIA
Out of this wood do not desire to go:
Thou shalt remain here, whether thou wilt or no.
I am a spirit of no common rate;
The summer still doth tend upon my state;
And I do love thee: therefore, go with me;
I’ll give thee fairies to attend on thee,
And they shall fetch thee jewels from the deep,
And sing while thou on pressed flowers dost sleep;
And I will purge thy mortal grossness so
That thou shalt like an airy spirit go.
Peaseblossom! Cobweb! Moth! and Mustardseed!
Enter PEASEBLOSSOM, COBWEB, MOTH, and MUSTARDSEED
PEASEBLOSSOM
Ready.
COBWEB
And I.
MOTH
And I.
MUSTARDSEED
And I.
ALL
Where shall we go?
TITANIA
Be kind and courteous to this gentleman;
Hop in his walks and gambol in his eyes;
Feed him with apricocks and dewberries,
With purple grapes, green figs, and mulberries;
The honey-bags steal from the humble-bees,
And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs
And light them at the fiery glow-worm’s eyes,
To have my love to bed and to arise;
And pluck the wings from Painted butterflies
To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes:
Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.
PEASEBLOSSOM
Hail, mortal!
COBWEB
Hail!
MOTH
Hail!
MUSTARDSEED
Hail!
BOTTOM
I cry your worship’s mercy, heartily: I beseech your
worship’s name.
COBWEB
Cobweb.
BOTTOM
I shall desire you of more acquaintance, good Master
Cobweb: if I cut my finger, I shall make bold with
you. Your name, honest gentleman?
PEASEBLOSSOM
Peaseblossom.
BOTTOM
I pray you, commend me to Mistress Squash, your
mother, and to Master Peascod, your father. Good
Master Peaseblossom, I shall desire you of more
acquaintance too. Your name, I beseech you, sir?
MUSTARDSEED
Mustardseed.
BOTTOM
Good Master Mustardseed, I know your patience well:
that same cowardly, giant-like ox-beef hath
devoured many a gentleman of your house: I promise
you your kindred had made my eyes water ere now. I
desire your more acquaintance, good Master
Mustardseed.
TITANIA
Come, wait upon him; lead him to my bower.
The moon methinks looks with a watery eye;
And when she weeps, weeps every little flower,
Lamenting some enforced chastity.
Tie up my love’s tongue bring him silently.
Exeunt
SCENE II. Another part of the wood.
Enter OBERON
OBERON
I wonder if Titania be awaked;
Then, what it was that next came in her eye,
Which she must dote on in extremity.
Enter PUCK
Here comes my messenger.
How now, mad spirit!
What night-rule now about this haunted grove?
PUCK
My mistress with a monster is in love.
Near to her close and consecrated bower,
While she was in her dull and sleeping hour,
A crew of patches, rude mechanicals,
That work for bread upon Athenian stalls,
Were met together to rehearse a play
Intended for great Theseus’ nuptial-day.
The shallowest thick-skin of that barren sort,
Who Pyramus presented, in their sport
Forsook his scene and enter’d in a brake
When I did him at this advantage take,
An ass’s nole I fixed on his head:
Anon his Thisbe must be answered,
And forth my mimic comes. When they him spy,
As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye,
Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort,
Rising and cawing at the gun’s report,
Sever themselves and madly sweep the sky,
So, at his sight, away his fellows fly;
And, at our stamp, here o’er and o’er one falls;
He murder cries and help from Athens calls.
Their sense thus weak, lost with their fears
thus strong,
Made senseless things begin to do them wrong;
For briers and thorns at their apparel snatch;
Some sleeves, some hats, from yielders all
things catch.
I led them on in this distracted fear,
And left sweet Pyramus translated there:
When in that moment, so it came to pass,
Titania waked and straightway loved an ass.
OBERON
This falls out better than I could devise.
But hast thou yet latch’d the Athenian’s eyes
With the love-juice, as I did bid thee do?
PUCK
I took him sleeping,–that is finish’d too,–
And the Athenian woman by his side:
That, when he waked, of force she must be eyed.
Enter HERMIA and DEMETRIUS
OBERON
Stand close: this is the same Athenian.
PUCK
This is the woman, but not this the man.
DEMETRIUS
O, why rebuke you him that loves you so?
Lay breath so bitter on your bitter foe.
HERMIA
Now I but chide; but I should use thee worse,
For thou, I fear, hast given me cause to curse,
If thou hast slain Lysander in his sleep,
Being o’er shoes in blood, plunge in the deep,
And kill me too.
The sun was not so true unto the day
As he to me: would he have stolen away
From sleeping Hermia? I’ll believe as soon
This whole earth may be bored and that the moon
May through the centre creep and so displease
Her brother’s noontide with Antipodes.
It cannot be but thou hast murder’d him;
So should a murderer look, so dead, so grim.
DEMETRIUS
So should the murder’d look, and so should I,
Pierced through the heart with your stern cruelty:
Yet you, the murderer, look as bright, as clear,
As yonder Venus in her glimmering sphere.
HERMIA
What’s this to my Lysander? where is he?
Ah, good Demetrius, wilt thou give him me?
DEMETRIUS
I had rather give his carcass to my hounds.
HERMIA
Out, dog! out, cur! thou drivest me past the bounds
Of maiden’s patience. Hast thou slain him, then?
Henceforth be never number’d among men!
O, once tell true, tell true, even for my sake!
Durst thou have look’d upon him being awake,
And hast thou kill’d him sleeping? O brave touch!
Could not a worm, an adder, do so much?
An adder did it; for with doubler tongue
Than thine, thou serpent, never adder stung.
DEMETRIUS
You spend your passion on a misprised mood:
I am not guilty of Lysander’s blood;
Nor is he dead, for aught that I can tell.
HERMIA
I pray thee, tell me then that he is well.
DEMETRIUS
An if I could, what should I get therefore?
HERMIA
A privilege never to see me more.
And from thy hated presence part I so:
See me no more, whether he be dead or no.
Exit
DEMETRIUS
There is no following her in this fierce vein:
Here therefore for a while I will remain.
So sorrow’s heaviness doth heavier grow
For debt that bankrupt sleep doth sorrow owe:
Which now in some slight measure it will pay,
If for his tender here I make some stay.
Lies down and sleeps
OBERON
What hast thou done? thou hast mistaken quite
And laid the love-juice on some true-love’s sight:
Of thy misprision must perforce ensue
Some true love turn’d and not a false turn’d true.
PUCK
Then fate o’er-rules, that, one man holding troth,
A million fail, confounding oath on oath.
OBERON
About the wood go swifter than the wind,
And Helena of Athens look thou find:
All fancy-sick she is and pale of cheer,
With sighs of love, that costs the fresh blood dear:
By some illusion see thou bring her here:
I’ll charm his eyes against she do appear.
PUCK
I go, I go; look how I go,
Swifter than arrow from the Tartar’s bow.
Exit
OBERON
Flower of this purple dye,
Hit with Cupid’s archery,
Sink in apple of his eye.
When his love he doth espy,
Let her shine as gloriously
As the Venus of the sky.
When thou wakest, if she be by,
Beg of her for remedy.
Re-enter PUCK
PUCK
Captain of our fairy band,
Helena is here at hand;
And the youth, mistook by me,
Pleading for a lover’s fee.
Shall we their fond pageant see?
Lord, what fools these mortals be!
OBERON
Stand aside: the noise they make
Will cause Demetrius to awake.
PUCK
Then will two at once woo one;
That must needs be sport alone;
And those things do best please me
That befal preposterously.
Enter LYSANDER and HELENA
LYSANDER
Why should you think that I should woo in scorn?
Scorn and derision never come in tears:
Look, when I vow, I weep; and vows so born,
In their nativity all truth appears.
How can these things in me seem scorn to you,
Bearing the badge of faith, to prove them true?
HELENA
You do advance your cunning more and more.
When truth kills truth, O devilish-holy fray!
These vows are Hermia’s: will you give her o’er?
Weigh oath with oath, and you will nothing weigh:
Your vows to her and me, put in two scales,
Will even weigh, and both as light as tales.
LYSANDER
I had no judgment when to her I swore.
HELENA
Nor none, in my mind, now you give her o’er.
LYSANDER
Demetrius loves her, and he loves not you.
DEMETRIUS
[Awaking]
O Helena, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine!
To what, my love, shall I compare thine eyne?
Crystal is muddy. O, how ripe in show
Thy lips, those kissing cherries, tempting grow!
That pure congealed white, high Taurus snow,
Fann’d with the eastern wind, turns to a crow
When thou hold’st up thy hand: O, let me kiss
This princess of pure white, this seal of bliss!
HELENA
O spite! O hell! I see you all are bent
To set against me for your merriment:
If you were civil and knew courtesy,
You would not do me thus much injury.
Can you not hate me, as I know you do,
But you must join in souls to mock me too?
If you were men, as men you are in show,
You would not use a gentle lady so;
To vow, and swear, and superpraise my parts,
When I am sure you hate me with your hearts.
You both are rivals, and love Hermia;
And now both rivals, to mock Helena:
A trim exploit, a manly enterprise,
To conjure tears up in a poor maid’s eyes
With your derision! none of noble sort
Would so offend a virgin, and extort
A poor soul’s patience, all to make you sport.
LYSANDER
You are unkind, Demetrius; be not so;
For you love Hermia; this you know I know:
And here, with all good will, with all my heart,
In Hermia’s love I yield you up my part;
And yours of Helena to me bequeath,
Whom I do love and will do till my death.
HELENA
Never did mockers waste more idle breath.
DEMETRIUS
Lysander, keep thy Hermia; I will none:
If e’er I loved her, all that love is gone.
My heart to her but as guest-wise sojourn’d,
And now to Helen is it home return’d,
There to remain.
LYSANDER
Helen, it is not so.
DEMETRIUS
Disparage not the faith thou dost not know,
Lest, to thy peril, thou aby it dear.
Look, where thy love comes; yonder is thy dear.
Re-enter HERMIA
HERMIA
Dark night, that from the eye his function takes,
The ear more quick of apprehension makes;
Wherein it doth impair the seeing sense,
It pays the hearing double recompense.
Thou art not by mine eye, Lysander, found;
Mine ear, I thank it, brought me to thy sound
But why unkindly didst thou leave me so?
LYSANDER
Why should he stay, whom love doth press to go?
HERMIA
What love could press Lysander from my side?
LYSANDER
Lysander’s love, that would not let him bide,
Fair Helena, who more engilds the night
Than all you fiery oes and eyes of light.
Why seek’st thou me? could not this make thee know,
The hate I bear thee made me leave thee so?
HERMIA
You speak not as you think: it cannot be.
HELENA
Lo, she is one of this confederacy!
Now I perceive they have conjoin’d all three
To fashion this false sport, in spite of me.
Injurious Hermia! most ungrateful maid!
Have you conspired, have you with these contrived
To bait me with this foul derision?
Is all the counsel that we two have shared,
The sisters’ vows, the hours that we have spent,
When we have chid the hasty-footed time
For parting us,–O, is it all forgot?
All school-days’ friendship, childhood innocence?
We, Hermia, like two artificial gods,
Have with our needles created both one flower,
Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion,
Both warbling of one song, both in one key,
As if our hands, our sides, voices and minds,
Had been incorporate. So we grow together,
Like to a double cherry, seeming parted,
But yet an union in partition;
Two lovely berries moulded on one stem;
So, with two seeming bodies, but one heart;
Two of the first, like coats in heraldry,
Due but to one and crowned with one crest.
And will you rent our ancient love asunder,
To join with men in scorning your poor friend?
It is not friendly, ‘tis not maidenly:
Our sex, as well as I, may chide you for it,
Though I alone do feel the injury.
HERMIA
I am amazed at your passionate words.
I scorn you not: it seems that you scorn me.
HELENA
Have you not set Lysander, as in scorn,
To follow me and praise my eyes and face?
And made your other love, Demetrius,
Who even but now did spurn me with his foot,
To call me goddess, nymph, divine and rare,
Precious, celestial? Wherefore speaks he this
To her he hates? and wherefore doth Lysander
Deny your love, so rich within his soul,
And tender me, forsooth, affection,
But by your setting on, by your consent?
What thought I be not so in grace as you,
So hung upon with love, so fortunate,
But miserable most, to love unloved?
This you should pity rather than despise.
HERNIA
I understand not what you mean by this.
HELENA
Ay, do, persever, counterfeit sad looks,
Make mouths upon me when I turn my back;
Wink each at other; hold the sweet jest up:
This sport, well carried, shall be chronicled.
If you have any pity, grace, or manners,
You would not make me such an argument.
But fare ye well: ‘tis partly my own fault;
Which death or absence soon shall remedy.
LYSANDER
Stay, gentle Helena; hear my excuse:
My love, my life my soul, fair Helena!
HELENA
O excellent!
HERMIA
Sweet, do not scorn her so.
DEMETRIUS
If she cannot entreat, I can compel.
LYSANDER
Thou canst compel no more than she entreat:
Thy threats have no more strength than her weak prayers.
Helen, I love thee; by my life, I do:
I swear by that which I will lose for thee,
To prove him false that says I love thee not.
DEMETRIUS
I say I love thee more than he can do.
LYSANDER
If thou say so, withdraw, and prove it too.
DEMETRIUS
Quick, come!
HERMIA
Lysander, whereto tends all this?
LYSANDER
Away, you Ethiope!
DEMETRIUS
No, no; he’ll
Seem to break loose; take on as you would follow,
But yet come not: you are a tame man, go!
LYSANDER
Hang off, thou cat, thou burr! vile thing, let loose,
Or I will shake thee from me like a serpent!
HERMIA
Why are you grown so rude? what change is this?
Sweet love,–
LYSANDER
Thy love! out, tawny Tartar, out!
Out, loathed medicine! hated potion, hence!
HERMIA
Do you not jest?
HELENA
Yes, sooth; and so do you.
LYSANDER
Demetrius, I will keep my word with thee.
DEMETRIUS
I would I had your bond, for I perceive
A weak bond holds you: I’ll not trust your word.
LYSANDER
What, should I hurt her, strike her, kill her dead?
Although I hate her, I’ll not harm her so.
HERMIA
What, can you do me greater harm than hate?
Hate me! wherefore? O me! what news, my love!
Am not I Hermia? are not you Lysander?
I am as fair now as I was erewhile.
Since night you loved me; yet since night you left
me:
Why, then you left me–O, the gods forbid!–
In earnest, shall I say?
LYSANDER
Ay, by my life;
And never did desire to see thee more.
Therefore be out of hope, of question, of doubt;
Be certain, nothing truer; ‘tis no jest
That I do hate thee and love Helena.
HERMIA
O me! you juggler! you canker-blossom!
You thief of love! what, have you come by night
And stolen my love’s heart from him?
HELENA
Fine, i’faith!
Have you no modesty, no maiden shame,
No touch of bashfulness? What, will you tear
Impatient answers from my gentle tongue?
Fie, fie! you counterfeit, you puppet, you!
HERMIA
Puppet? why so? ay, that way goes the game.
Now I perceive that she hath made compare
Between our statures; she hath urged her height;
And with her personage, her tall personage,
Her height, forsooth, she hath prevail’d with him.
And are you grown so high in his esteem;
Because I am so dwarfish and so low?
How low am I, thou painted maypole? speak;
How low am I? I am not yet so low
But that my nails can reach unto thine eyes.
HELENA
I pray you, though you mock me, gentlemen,
Let her not hurt me: I was never curst;
I have no gift at all in shrewishness;
I am a right maid for my cowardice:
Let her not strike me. You perhaps may think,
Because she is something lower than myself,
That I can match her.
HERMIA
Lower! hark, again.
HELENA
Good Hermia, do not be so bitter with me.
I evermore did love you, Hermia,
Did ever keep your counsels, never wrong’d you;
Save that, in love unto Demetrius,
I told him of your stealth unto this wood.
He follow’d you; for love I follow’d him;
But he hath chid me hence and threaten’d me
To strike me, spurn me, nay, to kill me too:
And now, so you will let me quiet go,
To Athens will I bear my folly back
And follow you no further: let me go:
You see how simple and how fond I am.
HERMIA
Why, get you gone: who is’t that hinders you?
HELENA
A foolish heart, that I leave here behind.
HERMIA
What, with Lysander?
HELENA
With Demetrius.
LYSANDER
Be not afraid; she shall not harm thee, Helena.
DEMETRIUS
No, sir, she shall not, though you take her part.
HELENA
O, when she’s angry, she is keen and shrewd!
She was a vixen when she went to school;
And though she be but little, she is fierce.
HERMIA
‘Little’ again! nothing but ‘low’ and ‘little’!
Why will you suffer her to flout me thus?
Let me come to her.
LYSANDER
Get you gone, you dwarf;
You minimus, of hindering knot-grass made;
You bead, you acorn.
DEMETRIUS
You are too officious
In her behalf that scorns your services.
Let her alone: speak not of Helena;
Take not her part; for, if thou dost intend
Never so little show of love to her,
Thou shalt aby it.
LYSANDER
Now she holds me not;
Now follow, if thou darest, to try whose right,
Of thine or mine, is most in Helena.
DEMETRIUS
Follow! nay, I’ll go with thee, cheek by jole.
Exeunt LYSANDER and DEMETRIUS
HERMIA
You, mistress, all this coil is ‘long of you:
Nay, go not back.
HELENA
I will not trust you, I,
Nor longer stay in your curst company.
Your hands than mine are quicker for a fray,
My legs are longer though, to run away.
Exit
HERMIA
I am amazed, and know not what to say.
Exit
OBERON
This is thy negligence: still thou mistakest,
Or else committ’st thy knaveries wilfully.
PUCK
Believe me, king of shadows, I mistook.
Did not you tell me I should know the man
By the Athenian garment be had on?
And so far blameless proves my enterprise,
That I have ‘nointed an Athenian’s eyes;
And so far am I glad it so did sort
As this their jangling I esteem a sport.
OBERON
Thou see’st these lovers seek a place to fight:
Hie therefore, Robin, overcast the night;
The starry welkin cover thou anon
With drooping fog as black as Acheron,
And lead these testy rivals so astray
As one come not within another’s way.
Like to Lysander sometime frame thy tongue,
Then stir Demetrius up with bitter wrong;
And sometime rail thou like Demetrius;
And from each other look thou lead them thus,
Till o’er their brows death-counterfeiting sleep
With leaden legs and batty wings doth creep:
Then crush this herb into Lysander’s eye;
Whose liquor hath this virtuous property,
To take from thence all error with his might,
And make his eyeballs roll with wonted sight.
When they next wake, all this derision
Shall seem a dream and fruitless vision,
And back to Athens shall the lovers wend,
With league whose date till death shall never end.
Whiles I in this affair do thee employ,
I’ll to my queen and beg her Indian boy;
And then I will her charmed eye release
From monster’s view, and all things shall be peace.
PUCK
My fairy lord, this must be done with haste,
For night’s swift dragons cut the clouds full fast,
And yonder shines Aurora’s harbinger;
At whose approach, ghosts, wandering here and there,
Troop home to churchyards: damned spirits all,
That in crossways and floods have burial,
Already to their wormy beds are gone;
For fear lest day should look their shames upon,
They willfully themselves exile from light
And must for aye consort with black-brow’d night.
OBERON
But we are spirits of another sort:
I with the morning’s love have oft made sport,
And, like a forester, the groves may tread,
Even till the eastern gate, all fiery-red,
Opening on Neptune with fair blessed beams,
Turns into yellow gold his salt green streams.
But, notwithstanding, haste; make no delay:
We may effect this business yet ere day.
Exit
PUCK
Up and down, up and down,
I will lead them up and down:
I am fear’d in field and town:
Goblin, lead them up and down.
Here comes one.
Re-enter LYSANDER
LYSANDER
Where art thou, proud Demetrius? speak thou now.
PUCK
Here, villain; drawn and ready. Where art thou?
LYSANDER
I will be with thee straight.
PUCK
Follow me, then,
To plainer ground.
Exit LYSANDER, as following the voice
Re-enter DEMETRIUS
DEMETRIUS
Lysander! speak again:
Thou runaway, thou coward, art thou fled?
Speak! In some bush? Where dost thou hide thy head?
PUCK
Thou coward, art thou bragging to the stars,
Telling the bushes that thou look’st for wars,
And wilt not come? Come, recreant; come, thou child;
I’ll whip thee with a rod: he is defiled
That draws a sword on thee.
DEMETRIUS
Yea, art thou there?
PUCK
Follow my voice: we’ll try no manhood here.
Exeunt
Re-enter LYSANDER
LYSANDER
He goes before me and still dares me on:
When I come where he calls, then he is gone.
The villain is much lighter-heel’d than I:
I follow’d fast, but faster he did fly;
That fallen am I in dark uneven way,
And here will rest me.
Lies down
Come, thou gentle day!
For if but once thou show me thy grey light,
I’ll find Demetrius and revenge this spite.
[Sleeps]
Re-enter PUCK and DEMETRIUS
PUCK
Ho, ho, ho! Coward, why comest thou not?
DEMETRIUS
Abide me, if thou darest; for well I wot
Thou runn’st before me, shifting every place,
And darest not stand, nor look me in the face.
Where art thou now?
PUCK
Come hither: I am here.
DEMETRIUS
Nay, then, thou mock’st me. Thou shalt buy this dear,
If ever I thy face by daylight see:
Now, go thy way. Faintness constraineth me
To measure out my length on this cold bed.
By day’s approach look to be visited.
[Lies down and sleeps]
Re-enter HELENA
HELENA
O weary night, O long and tedious night,
Abate thy hour! Shine comforts from the east,
That I may back to Athens by daylight,
From these that my poor company detest:
And sleep, that sometimes shuts up sorrow’s eye,
Steal me awhile from mine own company.
[Lies down and sleeps]
PUCK
Yet but three? Come one more;
Two of both kinds make up four.
Here she comes, curst and sad:
Cupid is a knavish lad,
Thus to make poor females mad.
Re-enter HERMIA
HERMIA
Never so weary, never so in woe,
Bedabbled with the dew and torn with briers,
I can no further crawl, no further go;
My legs can keep no pace with my desires.
Here will I rest me till the break of day.
Heavens shield Lysander, if they mean a fray!
[Lies down and sleeps]
PUCK
On the ground
Sleep sound:
I’ll apply
To your eye,
Gentle lover, remedy.
Squeezing the juice on LYSANDER’s eyes
When thou wakest,
Thou takest
True delight
In the sight
Of thy former lady’s eye:
And the country proverb known,
That every man should take his own,
In your waking shall be shown:
Jack shall have Jill;
Nought shall go ill;
The man shall have his mare again, and all shall be well.
Exit
ACT IV
SCENE I. The same. LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HELENA, and HERMIA
lying asleep.
Enter TITANIA and BOTTOM; PEASEBLOSSOM, COBWEB, MOTH, MUSTARD-
SEED, and other Fairies attending; OBERON behind unseen
TITANIA
Come, sit thee down upon this flowery bed,
While I thy amiable cheeks do coy,
And stick musk-roses in thy sleek smooth head,
And kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy.
BOTTOM
Where’s Peaseblossom?
PEASEBLOSSOM
Ready.
BOTTOM
Scratch my head Peaseblossom. Where’s Mounsieur Cobweb?
COBWEB
Ready.
BOTTOM
Mounsieur Cobweb, good mounsieur, get you your
weapons in your hand, and kill me a red-hipped
humble-bee on the top of a thistle; and, good
mounsieur, bring me the honey-bag. Do not fret
yourself too much in the action, mounsieur; and,
good mounsieur, have a care the honey-bag break not;
I would be loath to have you overflown with a
honey-bag, signior. Where’s Mounsieur Mustardseed?
MUSTARDSEED
Ready.
BOTTOM
Give me your neaf, Mounsieur Mustardseed. Pray you,
leave your courtesy, good mounsieur.
MUSTARDSEED
What’s your Will?
BOTTOM
Nothing, good mounsieur, but to help Cavalery Cobweb
to scratch. I must to the barber’s, monsieur; for
methinks I am marvellous hairy about the face; and I
am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me,
I must scratch.
TITANIA
What, wilt thou hear some music,
my sweet love?
BOTTOM
I have a reasonable good ear in music. Let’s have
the tongs and the bones.
TITANIA
Or say, sweet love, what thou desirest to eat.
BOTTOM
Truly, a peck of provender: I could munch your good
dry oats. Methinks I have a great desire to a bottle
of hay: good hay, sweet hay, hath no fellow.
TITANIA
I have a venturous fairy that shall seek
The squirrel’s hoard, and fetch thee new nuts.
BOTTOM
I had rather have a handful or two of dried peas.
But, I pray you, let none of your people stir me: I
have an exposition of sleep come upon me.
TITANIA
Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.
Fairies, begone, and be all ways away.
Exeunt fairies
So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
Gently entwist; the female ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.
O, how I love thee! how I dote on thee!
[They sleep]
Enter PUCK
OBERON
[Advancing]
Welcome, good Robin.
See’st thou this sweet sight?
Her dotage now I do begin to pity:
For, meeting her of late behind the wood,
Seeking sweet favours from this hateful fool,
I did upbraid her and fall out with her;
For she his hairy temples then had rounded
With a coronet of fresh and fragrant flowers;
And that same dew, which sometime on the buds
Was wont to swell like round and orient pearls,
Stood now within the pretty flowerets’ eyes
Like tears that did their own disgrace bewail.
When I had at my pleasure taunted her
And she in mild terms begg’d my patience,
I then did ask of her her changeling child;
Which straight she gave me, and her fairy sent
To bear him to my bower in fairy land.
And now I have the boy, I will undo
This hateful imperfection of her eyes:
And, gentle Puck, take this transformed scalp
From off the head of this Athenian swain;
That, he awaking when the other do,
May all to Athens back again repair
And think no more of this night’s accidents
But as the fierce vexation of a dream.
But first I will release the fairy queen.
Be as thou wast wont to be;
See as thou wast wont to see:
Dian’s bud o’er Cupid’s flower
Hath such force and blessed power.
Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen.
TITANIA
My Oberon! what visions have I seen!
Methought I was enamour’d of an ass.
OBERON
There lies your love.
TITANIA
How came these things to pass?
O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!
OBERON
Silence awhile. Robin, take off this head.
Titania, music call; and strike more dead
Than common sleep of all these five the sense.
TITANIA
Music, ho! music, such as charmeth sleep!
Music, still
PUCK
Now, when thou wakest, with thine
own fool’s eyes peep.
OBERON
Sound, music! Come, my queen, take hands with me,
And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be.
Now thou and I are new in amity,
And will to-morrow midnight solemnly
Dance in Duke Theseus’ house triumphantly,
And bless it to all fair prosperity:
There shall the pairs of faithful lovers be
Wedded, with Theseus, all in jollity.
PUCK
Fairy king, attend, and mark:
I do hear the morning lark.
OBERON
Then, my queen, in silence sad,
Trip we after the night’s shade:
We the globe can compass soon,
Swifter than the wandering moon.
TITANIA
Come, my lord, and in our flight
Tell me how it came this night
That I sleeping here was found
With these mortals on the ground.
Exeunt
Horns winded within
Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, EGEUS, and train
THESEUS
Go, one of you, find out the forester;
For now our observation is perform’d;
And since we have the vaward of the day,
My love shall hear the music of my hounds.
Uncouple in the western valley; let them go:
Dispatch, I say, and find the forester.
Exit an Attendant
We will, fair queen, up to the mountain’s top,
And mark the musical confusion
Of hounds and echo in conjunction.
HIPPOLYTA
I was with Hercules and Cadmus once,
When in a wood of Crete they bay’d the bear
With hounds of Sparta: never did I hear
Such gallant chiding: for, besides the groves,
The skies, the fountains, every region near
Seem’d all one mutual cry: I never heard
So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.
THESEUS
My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,
So flew’d, so sanded, and their heads are hung
With ears that sweep away the morning dew;
Crook-knee’d, and dew-lapp’d like Thessalian bulls;
Slow in pursuit, but match’d in mouth like bells,
Each under each. A cry more tuneable
Was never holla’d to, nor cheer’d with horn,
In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly:
Judge when you hear. But, soft! what nymphs are these?
EGEUS
My lord, this is my daughter here asleep;
And this, Lysander; this Demetrius is;
This Helena, old Nedar’s Helena:
I wonder of their being here together.
THESEUS
No doubt they rose up early to observe
The rite of May, and hearing our intent,
Came here in grace our solemnity.
But speak, Egeus; is not this the day
That Hermia should give answer of her choice?
EGEUS
It is, my lord.
THESEUS
Go, bid the huntsmen wake them with their horns.
Horns and shout within.
LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HELENA, and HERMIA wake and start up
Good morrow, friends. Saint Valentine is past:
Begin these wood-birds but to couple now?
LYSANDER
Pardon, my lord.
THESEUS
I pray you all, stand up.
I know you two are rival enemies:
How comes this gentle concord in the world,
That hatred is so far from jealousy,
To sleep by hate, and fear no enmity?
LYSANDER
My lord, I shall reply amazedly,
Half sleep, half waking: but as yet, I swear,
I cannot truly say how I came here;
But, as I think,–for truly would I speak,
And now do I bethink me, so it is,–
I came with Hermia hither: our intent
Was to be gone from Athens, where we might,
Without the peril of the Athenian law.
EGEUS
Enough, enough, my lord; you have enough:
I beg the law, the law, upon his head.
They would have stolen away; they would, Demetrius,
Thereby to have defeated you and me,
You of your wife and me of my consent,
Of my consent that she should be your wife.
DEMETRIUS
My lord, fair Helen told me of their stealth,
Of this their purpose hither to this wood;
And I in fury hither follow’d them,
Fair Helena in fancy following me.
But, my good lord, I wot not by what power,–
But by some power it is,–my love to Hermia,
Melted as the snow, seems to me now
As the remembrance of an idle gaud
Which in my childhood I did dote upon;
And all the faith, the virtue of my heart,
The object and the pleasure of mine eye,
Is only Helena. To her, my lord,
Was I betroth’d ere I saw Hermia:
But, like in sickness, did I loathe this food;
But, as in health, come to my natural taste,
Now I do wish it, love it, long for it,
And will for evermore be true to it.
THESEUS
Fair lovers, you are fortunately met:
Of this discourse we more will hear anon.
Egeus, I will overbear your will;
For in the temple by and by with us
These couples shall eternally be knit:
And, for the morning now is something worn,
Our purposed hunting shall be set aside.
Away with us to Athens; three and three,
We’ll hold a feast in great solemnity.
Come, Hippolyta.
Exeunt THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, EGEUS, and train
DEMETRIUS
These things seem small and undistinguishable,
HERMIA
Methinks I see these things with parted eye,
When every thing seems double.
HELENA
So methinks:
And I have found Demetrius like a jewel,
Mine own, and not mine own.
DEMETRIUS
Are you sure
That we are awake? It seems to me
That yet we sleep, we dream. Do not you think
The duke was here, and bid us follow him?
HERMIA
Yea; and my father.
HELENA
And Hippolyta.
LYSANDER
And he did bid us follow to the temple.
DEMETRIUS
Why, then, we are awake: let’s follow him
And by the way let us recount our dreams.
Exeunt
BOTTOM
[Awaking]
When my cue comes, call me, and I will
answer: my next is, ‘Most fair Pyramus.’ Heigh-ho!
Peter Quince! Flute, the bellows-mender! Snout,
the tinker! Starveling! God’s my life, stolen
hence, and left me asleep! I have had a most rare
vision. I have had a dream, past the wit of man to
say what dream it was: man is but an ass, if he go
about to expound this dream. Methought I was–there
is no man can tell what. Methought I was,–and
methought I had,–but man is but a patched fool, if
he will offer to say what methought I had. The eye
of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not
seen, man’s hand is not able to taste, his tongue
to conceive, nor his heart to report, what my dream
was. I will get Peter Quince to write a ballad of
this dream: it shall be called Bottom’s Dream,
because it hath no bottom; and I will sing it in the
latter end of a play, before the duke:
peradventure, to make it the more gracious, I shall
sing it at her death.
Exit
SCENE II. Athens. QUINCE’S house.
Enter QUINCE, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING
QUINCE
Have you sent to Bottom’s house? Is he come home yet?
STARVELING
He cannot be heard of. Out of doubt he is
transported.
FLUTE
If he come not, then the play is marred: it goes
not forward, doth it?
QUINCE
It is not possible: you have not a man in all
Athens able to discharge Pyramus but he.
FLUTE
No, he hath simply the best wit of any handicraft
man in Athens.
QUINCE
Yea and the best person too; and he is a very
paramour for a sweet voice.
FLUTE
You must say ‘paragon:’ a paramour is, God bless us,
a thing of naught.
Enter SNUG
SNUG
Masters, the duke is coming from the temple, and
there is two or three lords and ladies more married:
if our sport had gone forward, we had all been made
men.
FLUTE
O sweet bully Bottom! Thus hath he lost sixpence a
day during his life; he could not have ‘scaped
sixpence a day: an the duke had not given him
sixpence a day for playing Pyramus, I’ll be hanged;
he would have deserved it: sixpence a day in
Pyramus, or nothing.
Enter BOTTOM
BOTTOM
Where are these lads? where are these hearts?
QUINCE
Bottom! O most courageous day! O most happy hour!
BOTTOM
Masters, I am to discourse wonders: but ask me not
what; for if I tell you, I am no true Athenian. I
will tell you every thing, right as it fell out.
QUINCE
Let us hear, sweet Bottom.
BOTTOM
Not a word of me. All that I will tell you is, that
the duke hath dined. Get your apparel together,
good strings to your beards, new ribbons to your
pumps; meet presently at the palace; every man look
o’er his part; for the short and the long is, our
play is preferred. In any case, let Thisby have
clean linen; and let not him that plays the lion
pair his nails, for they shall hang out for the
lion’s claws. And, most dear actors, eat no onions
nor garlic, for we are to utter sweet breath; and I
do not doubt but to hear them say, it is a sweet
comedy. No more words: away! go, away!
Exeunt
ACT V
SCENE I. Athens. The palace of THESEUS.
Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, PHILOSTRATE, Lords and Attendants
HIPPOLYTA
‘Tis strange my Theseus, that these
lovers speak of.
THESEUS
More strange than true: I never may believe
These antique fables, nor these fairy toys.
Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover and the poet
Are of imagination all compact:
One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,
That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,
Sees Helen’s beauty in a brow of Egypt:
The poet’s eye, in fine frenzy rolling,
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;
And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen
Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name.
Such tricks hath strong imagination,
That if it would but apprehend some joy,
It comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Or in the night, imagining some fear,
How easy is a bush supposed a bear!
HIPPOLYTA
But all the story of the night told over,
And all their minds transfigured so together,
More witnesseth than fancy’s images
And grows to something of great constancy;
But, howsoever, strange and admirable.
THESEUS
Here come the lovers, full of joy and mirth.
Enter LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HERMIA, and HELENA
Joy, gentle friends! joy and fresh days of love
Accompany your hearts!
LYSANDER
More than to us
Wait in your royal walks, your board, your bed!
THESEUS
Come now; what masques, what dances shall we have,
To wear away this long age of three hours
Between our after-supper and bed-time?
Where is our usual manager of mirth?
What revels are in hand? Is there no play,
To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?
Call Philostrate.
PHILOSTRATE
Here, mighty Theseus.
THESEUS
Say, what abridgement have you for this evening?
What masque? what music? How shall we beguile
The lazy time, if not with some delight?
PHILOSTRATE
There is a brief how many sports are ripe:
Make choice of which your highness will see first.
Giving a paper
THESEUS
[Reads]
‘The battle with the Centaurs, to be sung
By an Athenian eunuch to the harp.’
We’ll none of that: that have I told my love,
In glory of my kinsman Hercules.
‘The riot of the tipsy Bacchanals,
Tearing the Thracian singer in their rage.’
That is an old device; and it was play’d
When I from Thebes came last a conqueror.
‘The thrice three Muses mourning for the death
Of Learning, late deceased in beggary.’
That is some satire, keen and critical,
Not sorting with a nuptial ceremony.
‘A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus
And his love Thisbe; very tragical mirth.’
Merry and tragical! tedious and brief!
That is, hot ice and wondrous strange snow.
How shall we find the concord of this discord?
PHILOSTRATE
A play there is, my lord, some ten words long,
Which is as brief as I have known a play;
But by ten words, my lord, it is too long,
Which makes it tedious; for in all the play
There is not one word apt, one player fitted:
And tragical, my noble lord, it is;
For Pyramus therein doth kill himself.
Which, when I saw rehearsed, I must confess,
Made mine eyes water; but more merry tears
The passion of loud laughter never shed.
THESEUS
What are they that do play it?
PHILOSTRATE
Hard-handed men that work in Athens here,
Which never labour’d in their minds till now,
And now have toil’d their unbreathed memories
With this same play, against your nuptial.
THESEUS
And we will hear it.
PHILOSTRATE
No, my noble lord;
It is not for you: I have heard it over,
And it is nothing, nothing in the world;
Unless you can find sport in their intents,
Extremely stretch’d and conn’d with cruel pain,
To do you service.
THESEUS
I will hear that play;
For never anything can be amiss,
When simpleness and duty tender it.
Go, bring them in: and take your places, ladies.
Exit PHILOSTRATE
HIPPOLYTA
I love not to see wretchedness o’er charged
And duty in his service perishing.
THESEUS
Why, gentle sweet, you shall see no such thing.
HIPPOLYTA
He says they can do nothing in this kind.
THESEUS
The kinder we, to give them thanks for nothing.
Our sport shall be to take what they mistake:
And what poor duty cannot do, noble respect
Takes it in might, not merit.
Where I have come, great clerks have purposed
To greet me with premeditated welcomes;
Where I have seen them shiver and look pale,
Make periods in the midst of sentences,
Throttle their practised accent in their fears
And in conclusion dumbly have broke off,
Not paying me a welcome. Trust me, sweet,
Out of this silence yet I pick’d a welcome;
And in the modesty of fearful duty
I read as much as from the rattling tongue
Of saucy and audacious eloquence.
Love, therefore, and tongue-tied simplicity
In least speak most, to my capacity.
Re-enter PHILOSTRATE
PHILOSTRATE
So please your grace, the Prologue is address’d.
THESEUS
Let him approach.
Flourish of trumpets
Enter QUINCE for the Prologue
Prologue
If we offend, it is with our good will.
That you should think, we come not to offend,
But with good will. To show our simple skill,
That is the true beginning of our end.
Consider then we come but in despite.
We do not come as minding to contest you,
Our true intent is. All for your delight
We are not here. That you should here repent you,
The actors are at hand and by their show
You shall know all that you are like to know.
THESEUS
This fellow doth not stand upon points.
LYSANDER
He hath rid his prologue like a rough colt; he knows
not the stop. A good moral, my lord: it is not
enough to speak, but to speak true.
HIPPOLYTA
Indeed he hath played on his prologue like a child
on a recorder; a sound, but not in government.
THESEUS
His speech, was like a tangled chain; nothing
impaired, but all disordered. Who is next?
Enter Pyramus and Thisbe, Wall, Moonshine, and Lion
Prologue
Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show;
But wonder on, till truth make all things plain.
This man is Pyramus, if you would know;
This beauteous lady Thisby is certain.
This man, with lime and rough-cast, doth present
Wall, that vile Wall which did these lovers sunder;
And through Wall’s chink, poor souls, they are content
To whisper. At the which let no man wonder.
This man, with lanthorn, dog, and bush of thorn,
Presenteth Moonshine; for, if you will know,
By moonshine did these lovers think no scorn
To meet at Ninus’ tomb, there, there to woo.
This grisly beast, which Lion hight by name,
The trusty Thisby, coming first by night,
Did scare away, or rather did affright;
And, as she fled, her mantle she did fall,
Which Lion vile with bloody mouth did stain.
Anon comes Pyramus, sweet youth and tall,
And finds his trusty Thisby’s mantle slain:
Whereat, with blade, with bloody blameful blade,
He bravely broach’d is boiling bloody breast;
And Thisby, tarrying in mulberry shade,
His dagger drew, and died. For all the rest,
Let Lion, Moonshine, Wall, and lovers twain
At large discourse, while here they do remain.
Exeunt Prologue, Thisbe, Lion, and Moonshine
THESEUS
I wonder if the lion be to speak.
DEMETRIUS
No wonder, my lord: one lion may, when many asses do.
WALL
In this same interlude it doth befall
That I, one Snout by name, present a wall;
And such a wall, as I would have you think,
That had in it a crannied hole or chink,
Through which the lovers, Pyramus and Thisby,
Did whisper often very secretly.
This loam, this rough-cast and this stone doth show
That I am that same wall; the truth is so:
And this the cranny is, right and sinister,
Through which the fearful lovers are to whisper.
THESEUS
Would you desire lime and hair to speak better?
DEMETRIUS
It is the wittiest partition that ever I heard
discourse, my lord.
Enter Pyramus
THESEUS
Pyramus draws near the wall: silence!
PYRAMUS
O grim-look’d night! O night with hue so black!
O night, which ever art when day is not!
O night, O night! alack, alack, alack,
I fear my Thisby’s promise is forgot!
And thou, O wall, O sweet, O lovely wall,
That stand’st between her father’s ground and mine!
Thou wall, O wall, O sweet and lovely wall,
Show me thy chink, to blink through with mine eyne!
Wall holds up his fingers
Thanks, courteous wall: Jove shield thee well for this!
But what see I? No Thisby do I see.
O wicked wall, through whom I see no bliss!
Cursed be thy stones for thus deceiving me!
THESEUS
The wall, methinks, being sensible, should curse again.
PYRAMUS
No, in truth, sir, he should not. ‘Deceiving me’
is Thisby’s cue: she is to enter now, and I am to
spy her through the wall. You shall see, it will
fall pat as I told you. Yonder she comes.
Enter Thisbe
THISBE
O wall, full often hast thou heard my moans,
For parting my fair Pyramus and me!
My cherry lips have often kiss’d thy stones,
Thy stones with lime and hair knit up in thee.
PYRAMUS
I see a voice: now will I to the chink,
To spy an I can hear my Thisby’s face. Thisby!
THISBE
My love thou art, my love I think.
PYRAMUS
Think what thou wilt, I am thy lover’s grace;
And, like Limander, am I trusty still.
THISBE
And I like Helen, till the Fates me kill.
PYRAMUS
Not Shafalus to Procrus was so true.
THISBE
As Shafalus to Procrus, I to you.
PYRAMUS
O kiss me through the hole of this vile wall!
THISBE
I kiss the wall’s hole, not your lips at all.
PYRAMUS
Wilt thou at Ninny’s tomb meet me straightway?
THISBE
‘Tide life, ‘tide death, I come without delay.
Exeunt Pyramus and Thisbe
WALL
Thus have I, Wall, my part discharged so;
And, being done, thus Wall away doth go.
Exit
THESEUS
Now is the mural down between the two neighbours.
DEMETRIUS
No remedy, my lord, when walls are so wilful to hear
without warning.
HIPPOLYTA
This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard.
THESEUS
The best in this kind are but shadows; and the worst
are no worse, if imagination amend them.
HIPPOLYTA
It must be your imagination then, and not theirs.
THESEUS
If we imagine no worse of them than they of
themselves, they may pass for excellent men. Here
come two noble beasts in, a man and a lion.
Enter Lion and Moonshine
Lion
You, ladies, you, whose gentle hearts do fear
The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor,
May now perchance both quake and tremble here,
When lion rough in wildest rage doth roar.
Then know that I, one Snug the joiner, am
A lion-fell, nor else no lion’s dam;
For, if I should as lion come in strife
Into this place, ‘twere pity on my life.
THESEUS
A very gentle beast, of a good conscience.
DEMETRIUS
The very best at a beast, my lord, that e’er I saw.
LYSANDER
This lion is a very fox for his valour.
THESEUS
True; and a goose for his discretion.
DEMETRIUS
Not so, my lord; for his valour cannot carry his
discretion; and the fox carries the goose.
THESEUS
His discretion, I am sure, cannot carry his valour;
for the goose carries not the fox. It is well:
leave it to his discretion, and let us listen to the moon.
MOONSHINE
This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;–
DEMETRIUS
He should have worn the horns on his head.
THESEUS
He is no crescent, and his horns are
invisible within the circumference.
MOONSHINE
This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;
Myself the man i’ the moon do seem to be.
THESEUS
This is the greatest error of all the rest: the man
should be put into the lanthorn. How is it else the
man i’ the moon?
DEMETRIUS
He dares not come there for the candle; for, you
see, it is already in snuff.
HIPPOLYTA
I am aweary of this moon: would he would change!
THESEUS
It appears, by his small light of discretion, that
he is in the wane; but yet, in courtesy, in all
reason, we must stay the time.
LYSANDER
Proceed, Moon.
MOONSHINE
All that I have to say, is, to tell you that the
lanthorn is the moon; I, the man in the moon; this
thorn-bush, my thorn-bush; and this dog, my dog.
DEMETRIUS
Why, all these should be in the lanthorn; for all
these are in the moon. But, silence! here comes Thisbe.
[Enter Thisbe]
THISBE
This is old Ninny’s tomb. Where is my love?
LION
[Roaring] Oh–
[Thisbe runs off]
DEMETRIUS
Well roared, Lion.
THESEUS
Well run, Thisbe.
HIPPOLYTA
Well shone, Moon. Truly, the moon shines with a
good grace.
[The Lion shakes Thisbe’s mantle, and exit]
THESEUS
Well moused, Lion.
LYSANDER
And so the lion vanished.
DEMETRIUS
And then came Pyramus.
Enter Pyramus
PYRAMUS
Sweet Moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams;
I thank thee, Moon, for shining now so bright;
For, by thy gracious, golden, glittering gleams,
I trust to take of truest Thisby sight.
But stay, O spite!
But mark, poor knight,
What dreadful dole is here!
Eyes, do you see?
How can it be?
O dainty duck! O dear!
Thy mantle good,
What, stain’d with blood!
Approach, ye Furies fell!
O Fates, come, come,
Cut thread and thrum;
Quail, crush, conclude, and quell!
THESEUS
This passion, and the death of a dear friend, would
go near to make a man look sad.
HIPPOLYTA
Beshrew my heart, but I pity the man.
PYRAMUS
O wherefore, Nature, didst thou lions frame?
Since lion vile hath here deflower’d my dear:
Which is–no, no–which was the fairest dame
That lived, that loved, that liked, that look’d
with cheer.
Come, tears, confound;
Out, sword, and wound
The pap of Pyramus;
Ay, that left pap,
Where heart doth hop:
[Stabs himself]
Thus die I, thus, thus, thus.
Now am I dead,
Now am I fled;
My soul is in the sky:
Tongue, lose thy light;
Moon take thy flight:
Exit Moonshine
Now die, die, die, die, die.
[Dies]
DEMETRIUS
No die, but an ace, for him; for he is but one.
LYSANDER
Less than an ace, man; for he is dead; he is nothing.
THESEUS
With the help of a surgeon he might yet recover, and
prove an ass.
HIPPOLYTA
How chance Moonshine is gone before Thisbe comes
back and finds her lover?
THESEUS
She will find him by starlight. Here she comes; and
her passion ends the play.
[Re-enter Thisbe]
HIPPOLYTA
Methinks she should not use a long one for such a
Pyramus: I hope she will be brief.
DEMETRIUS
A mote will turn the balance, which Pyramus, which
Thisbe, is the better; he for a man, God warrant us;
she for a woman, God bless us.
LYSANDER
She hath spied him already with those sweet eyes.
DEMETRIUS
And thus she means, videlicet:–
Thisbe
Asleep, my love?
What, dead, my dove?
O Pyramus, arise!
Speak, speak. Quite dumb?
Dead, dead? A tomb
Must cover thy sweet eyes.
These My lips,
This cherry nose,
These yellow cowslip cheeks,
Are gone, are gone:
Lovers, make moan:
His eyes were green as leeks.
O Sisters Three,
Come, come to me,
With hands as pale as milk;
Lay them in gore,
Since you have shore
With shears his thread of silk.
Tongue, not a word:
Come, trusty sword;
Come, blade, my breast imbrue:
Stabs herself
And, farewell, friends;
Thus Thisby ends:
Adieu, adieu, adieu.
[Dies]
THESEUS
Moonshine and Lion are left to bury the dead.
DEMETRIUS
Ay, and Wall too.
BOTTOM
[Starting up]
No assure you; the wall is down that
parted their fathers. Will it please you to see the
epilogue, or to hear a Bergomask dance between two
of our company?
THESEUS
No epilogue, I pray you; for your play needs no
excuse. Never excuse; for when the players are all
dead, there needs none to be blamed. Marry, if he
that writ it had played Pyramus and hanged himself
in Thisbe’s garter, it would have been a fine
tragedy: and so it is, truly; and very notably
discharged. But come, your Bergomask: let your
epilogue alone.
[A dance]
The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve:
Lovers, to bed; ‘tis almost fairy time.
I fear we shall out-sleep the coming morn
As much as we this night have overwatch’d.
This palpable-gross play hath well beguiled
The heavy gait of night. Sweet friends, to bed.
A fortnight hold we this solemnity,
In nightly revels and new jollity.
Exeunt
Enter PUCK
PUCK
Now the hungry lion roars,
And the wolf behowls the moon;
Whilst the heavy ploughman snores,
All with weary task fordone.
Now the wasted brands do glow,
Whilst the screech-owl, screeching loud,
Puts the wretch that lies in woe
In remembrance of a shroud.
Now it is the time of night
That the graves all gaping wide,
Every one lets forth his sprite,
In the church-way paths to glide:
And we fairies, that do run
By the triple Hecate’s team,
From the presence of the sun,
Following darkness like a dream,
Now are frolic: not a mouse
Shall disturb this hallow’d house:
I am sent with broom before,
To sweep the dust behind the door.
Enter OBERON and TITANIA with their train
OBERON
Through the house give gathering light,
By the dead and drowsy fire:
Every elf and fairy sprite
Hop as light as bird from brier;
And this ditty, after me,
Sing, and dance it trippingly.
TITANIA
First, rehearse your song by rote
To each word a warbling note:
Hand in hand, with fairy grace,
Will we sing, and bless this place.
Song and dance
OBERON
Now, until the break of day,
Through this house each fairy stray.
To the best bride-bed will we,
Which by us shall blessed be;
And the issue there create
Ever shall be fortunate.
So shall all the couples three
Ever true in loving be;
And the blots of Nature’s hand
Shall not in their issue stand;
Never mole, hare lip, nor scar,
Nor mark prodigious, such as are
Despised in nativity,
Shall upon their children be.
With this field-dew consecrate,
Every fairy take his gait;
And each several chamber bless,
Through this palace, with sweet peace;
And the owner of it blest
Ever shall in safety rest.
Trip away; make no stay;
Meet me all by break of day.
Exeunt OBERON, TITANIA, and train
PUCK
If we shadows have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,
That you have but slumber’d here
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding but a dream,
Gentles, do not reprehend:
if you pardon, we will mend:
And, as I am an honest Puck,
If we have unearned luck
Now to ‘scape the serpent’s tongue,
We will make amends ere long;
Else the Puck a liar call;
So, good night unto you all.
Give me your hands, if we be friends,
And Robin shall restore amends.
The Aeneid and
The Divine Comedy
The labyrinth of initiation, the underworld, and the sacred grove
Publius Vergilius Maro
70 – 21 BCE
Virgil was regarded by the Romans as their greatest poet.
His influence on Dante and Western literature, like that
of Ovid, is profound. The Aeneid is his most famous work
and became Rome’s national epic.
The son of a farmer in northern Italy, Virgil came to be
regarded as one of Rome’s greatest poets. Virgil devoted
his life life to poetry and to studies connected with it. He
never married, and the first half of his life was that of a
scholar and near recluse. But, as his poetry won him
fame, he gradually won the friendship of many important
men in the Roman world.
(adapted from Encyclopedia Britannica and poetry foundation.org)
Dante Alighieri
1265 – 1321 CE
Dante Alighieri was born in Florence, Italy to a notable family of modest
means. His mother died when he was seven years old, and his father
remarried, having two more children.
Dante was never married to his “Beatrice.” They met twice, at a nine
year interval (although it might be a symbolic time period). They were
both married to other people, and she died at 25. But he continued to
write about throughout his life. We consider his love for her to be a
type of “courtly love.” It is otherworldly and has a spiritual aspect.
His most famous work is the Divine Comedy. The story begins when he
finds himself lost in a woods in middle age. Virgil finds him and leads
him through hell and purgatory. Beatrice is his guide in Paradise.
(adapted from poets.)
Dante is very important to western literature.
T. S. Eliot claimed:
Dante and Shakespeare divide the world between them, there is no third.
And Virgil is very important to Dante.
Dante, addressing Virgil in Canto 1 of the Divine Comedy: Thou art my master.
We will start with The Aeneid.
Who is Aeneas?
There are multiple myths about the founding of Rome. One very
important one is told in The Aeneas, the story of a Trojan prince who
brought together the survivors from Troy. They boarded ships and
sailed in search of a new home. The Aeneid tells their story, focused
of course on their leader.
As The Aeneid opens, Aeneas and the Trojans come to Carthage,
where he falls in love with the Queen Dido. His bliss is short lived, as
he is told by the gods that he must leave her. Our reading, Book 6,
comes half way through the story. Aeneas’s father has died along the
way, and Aeneas wants to see him. To do that, he must descend into
the underworld—and come back. Very few have ever made the round
trip journey. He is guided by the priestess of Apollo.
The Temple of Apollo built by Daedalus.
Book 6 of The Aeneid gives an elaborate description of
how Daedalus had depicted the story of Theseus, the
minotaur, Ariadne, and his escape from Crete on the
doors.
Aeneas must go through these doors, get advice from
the Sybil, enter the wood sacred to Persephone and
Diana, find the Golden Bough and make it all the way
to Persephone, Queen of the Underworld, give her the
Golden Bough and get her permission to see his father.
And then he has to make it back to the upper world.
The Sybil—
Prophetess and guide
“son of Trojan Anchises, easy is
the descent to Avernus: night and
day the door of gloomy Dis stands
open; but to recall one’s steps and
pass out to the upper air, this is
the task, this the toil! ”
Diana (trivia) Persephone Hecate
all three of these goddesses are mentioned in Book 6
All three of these goddesses are associated in Book 6 with a/the sacred wood:
Diana: “But Aeneas the True made his way to the fastness where Apollo rules
enthroned on high.and to the vast cavern beyond, which is the Sibyl’s own
secluded place; here the prophetic Delian god [Apollo] breathes into her the
spirits visionary might, revealing things to come. They were already drawing
near to Diana’s Wood and to the golden temple there.”
Hecate: Aeneas to the Sibyl,“. . . not without reason did Hecate appoint you to
be mistress over the forest of Avernus [where the Golden Bough is found].”
Persephone: “Hiding in a tree’s thick shade there is a bough, and it is golden,
with both leaves and pliant stem of gold. It is dedicated as sacred to Juno of
the Lower World [Persephone]. All the forest gives it protection, and it is
enclosed by shadows in a valley of little light.”
These two statues depict Diana as well in
her Diana of Ephesus version. We used to
think she just had an odd bosum to indicate
her significance as a fertility deity.
New theories (1979) are that she is
decorated with the body parts of sacrificed
bulls. Given the images of bulls (and bees)
on the statue this seems very plausible to
me, especially since bulls and bees were
also important in the myth of the minotaur
of the iconography (images and symbols) of
Crete.
So . . . Aeneas goes to Apollo’s temple, with its
depiction of the story of the labyrinth, Minotaur,
Theseus etc. The temple is located in Diana’s
wood, which is also the forest of Avernus and the
sacred grove of Persephone.
He must enter that wood and find the Golden
Bough, pluck it, descend to the Underworld, and
give the bough to Persephone. Then, hopefully he
can see his father and return from the Underworld
with new knowledge. In ancient mythology, a
descent and return to the Underworld symbolized
a type of initiation.
If you can make the round trip journey, you return
wiser and triumphant. Threading through the
labyrinth is in many ways a symbolically similar
journey, and this is likely one of the reasons that
the labyrinth story is depicted on Apollo’s temple
and relayed by Virgil.
When Aeneas enters the wood, he sees two doves
who lead him to the Golden Bough.
Doves are a symbol of Aphrodite (Venus) who is
the mother of Aeneas. A dove was also released
by Noah to see if there was dry land. It came back
with an olive twig in its mouth. And, of course, the
dove is also the symbol of the Holy Spirit who
guides Christians.
Aeneas and the Sibyl go to the Underworld
Just before the entrance, even within the very jaws of Hell, Grief and avenging Cares have set their bed;
there pale Diseases dwell, sad Age, and Fear, and Hunger, temptress to sin, and loathly Want, shapes
terrible to view; and Death and Distress; next, Death’s own brother Sleep, and the soul’s Guilty Joys, and,
on the threshold opposite, the death-dealing War, and the Furies’ iron cells, and maddening Strife, her
snaky locks entwined with bloody ribbons.
In the midst an elm, shadowy and vast, spreads her boughs and aged arms, the home which, men say,
false Dreams hold, clinging under every leaf. And many monstrous forms besides of various beasts are
stalled at the doors, Centaurs and double-shaped Scyllas, and he hundredfold Briareus, and the beast of
Lerna, hissing horribly, and the Chimaera armed with flame, Gorgons and Harpies, and the shape of the
three-bodied shade [Geryon]. Here on a sudden, in trembling terror, Aeneas grasps his sword, and turns
the naked edge against their coming; and did not his wise companion warn him that these were but faint,
bodiless lives, flitting under a hollow semblance of form, he would rush upon them and vainly cleave
shadows with steel.
From here a road leads to the waters of Tartarean Acheron. Here, thick with mire and of fathomless
flood, a whirlpool seethes and belches into Cocytus all its sand.
On the left: One of
Piranesci’s (1720–1778)
imaginary prison
etchings. Keep in mind
that the Underworld is a
prison, like the labyrinth
on Crete which held
first the Minotaur and
then Daedalus.
Remember Harry Potter and the
Philosopher’s Stone?
These realms huge Cerberus makes
ring with his triple-throated baying,
his monstrous bulk crouching in a
cavern opposite. To him, seeing the
snakes now bristling on his necks,
the seer flung a morsel drowsy
with honey and drugged meal. He,
opening his triple throat in
ravenous hunger, catches it when
thrown and, with monstrous frame
relaxed, sinks to earth and
stretches his bulk over all the den.
The warder buried in sleep, Aeneas
wins the entrance, and swiftly
leaves the bank of that stream
whence none return.
Aeneas meets his “Mal” in the Underworld
. . . the Mourning Fields; such is the name they bear.
Here those whom stern Love has consumed with cruel
wasting are hidden in walks withdrawn, embowered in a
myrtle grove; even in death the pangs leave them not.
“Unhappy Dido! Was the tale true then that came to
me, that you were dead and had sought your doom with
the sword? Was I, alas! the cause of your death? By the
stars I swear, by the world above, and whatever is
sacred in the grave below, unwillingly, queen, I parted
from your shores. . . . Stay your step and withdraw not
from our view. Whom do you flee? This is the last word
Fate suffers me to say to you.” . . .She, turning away,
kept her looks fixed on the ground and no more
changes her countenance as he essays to speak than if
she were set in hard flint or Marpesian rock. At length
she flung herself away and, still his foe, fled back to the
shady grove, where Sychaeus, her lord of former days,
responds to her sorrows and gives her love for love.
Minos, Judge of the Underworld.
Here is another connection
between the labyrinth story and
the underworld. Both Aeneas and
Dante encounter Minos on their
journeys through hell.
She ended, and, advancing side by side along the dusky way, they
haste over the mid-space and draw near the doors. Aeneas wins
the entrance, sprinkles his body with fresh water, and plants the
bough full on the threshold.
This at length performed and the task of the goddess fulfilled,
they came to a land of joy, the pleasant lawns and happy seats of
the Blissful Groves.
.
Aeneas has a long conversation with Anchises, who can now see the future and tells him about his
descendants and the great civilization, Rome, that he will found.
A couple of interesting points at the end:
Reincarnation:
All these that you see, when they have rolled time’s wheel through a thousand years, the god
summons in vast throng to Lethe’s river, so that, their memories effaced, they may once more revisit
the vault above and conceive the desire of return to the body.” Anchises also tells Aeneas that all of
life is part of a universal intelligence,
And then the curious (and rather abrupt) end:
Two gates of Sleep there are, whereof the one, they say, is horn and offers a ready exit to true
shades, the other shining with the sheen of polished ivory, but delusive dreams issue upward through
it from the world below. Thither Anchises, discoursing thus, escorts his son and with him the Sibyl,
and sends them forth by the ivory gate: Aeneas speeds his way to the ships and rejoins his comrades;
then straight along the shore he sails for Caieta’s haven.
The Divine Comedy
The Divine Comedy is
divided into three
main sections, the
inferno, purgatory and
paradise.
The final rhyme for
each section is stelle,
or the word star . . .
INFERNO I
Introduction to the Divine Comedy;
The Wood and the Mountain
How does Dante begin his story?
When half way through the journey of our life
I found that I was in a gloomy wood,
because the path which led aright was lost.
And ah, how hard it is to say just what
this wild and rough and stubborn woodland was,
the very thought of which renews my fear!
So bitter ’t is, that death is little worse;
but of the good to treat which there I found,
I ’ll speak of what I else discovered there.
I cannot well say how I entered it,
so full of slumber was I at the moment
when I forsook the pathway of the truth;
This passage should also put you in mind of the
verse in the gospel of Matthew “for the gate is
narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and
those who find it are few.” Dante isn’t just
physically lost—he is spiritually lost.
The word that is translated as “narrow” here is
translated as “straight” in the King James
version—for us, straight means without bend or
curve, but straight also used to mean narrow.
Essentially the message is that the path to
salvation or enlightenment is difficult and, like
the path through a maze, it is hard to find.
In the middle of his life (midlife crisis, anyone?), he’s lost the
“straight way” and found himself in a “gloomy forest.” He
doesn’t remember how he got there—he was “full of
slumber”—like Cobb, in a dream. This line also evokes the
end of the Aeneid chapter 6.
It also recalls the wood of Avernus which occupy the “mid
space” between the world and Hades’ realm in The Aeneid.
Chapter 6 is the “mid-point” of the Aeneid.
He sees the sun on the mountain, and is
comforted:
. . . after I had reached a mountain’s foot,
where that vale ended which had pierced my
heart
with fear, I looked on high,
and saw its shoulders
mantled already with that planet’s rays
which leadeth one aright o’er every path.
Then quieted a little was the fear,
which in the lake-depths of my heart had lasted
throughout the night I passed so piteously.[[5]]
And even as he who, from the deep emerged
with sorely troubled breath upon the shore,
turns round, and gazes at the dangerous water;
even so my mind, which still was fleeing on,
turned back to look again upon the pass
which ne’er permitted any one to live.
Until he sees the beasts.
He is bewildered and terrified. He sees a lion, a
leopard and a she-wolf. These ravenous beasts
might remind you of the Minotaur—and, perhaps,
the three headed dog of hell, Cerberus. They are
also, arguably, a type of unholy trinity. They
could be seen as lust or fraud (the spotted
leopard), pride/ambition and violence (the lion)
and avarice/greed (she-wolf), which correspond
to areas or categories of the Inferno.
There is also a reference to the Bible: Jeremiah
5:6 reads, “Wherefore a lion out of the forest
shall slay them, and a wolf of the evenings shall
spoil them, a leopard shall watch over their cities:
everyone that goeth out thence shall be torn into
pieces: because their transgressions are many
and their backslidings are increased.”
He tries to make his way to and up the mountain,
but the leopard and the other beasts block his way:
. . . she so hindered my advance,
that more than once I turned me to go back.
Some time had now from early morn elapsed,
and with those very stars the sun was rising
that in his escort were, when Love Divine
in the beginning moved those beauteous things; . . .
Here he references the creation of the world when
the stars sang, and this reference ties the beginning
of the Divine Comedy to the end.
The East is the direction of the rising sun, and has
significance spiritually.
Dante sees Virgil, recognizes and praises him, and begs
for his help. Virgil replies:
“A different course from this must thou pursue,”
he answered, when he saw me shedding tears,
“if from this wilderness thou wouldst escape;
for this wild beast, on whose account thou criest,
alloweth none to pass along her way, . . .
I therefore think and judge it best for thee
to follow me; and I shall be thy guide,
and lead thee hence through an eternal place,
where thou shalt hear the shrieks of hopelessness
of those tormented spirits of old times,
each one of whom bewails the second death;
Virgil tells him that after he has lead him as far as he
can, he will turn Dante over to a worthier guide.
INFERNO II
Introduction to the Inferno | The Mission of Virgil
At first Dante says yes!, but then he vascillates:
First response: Let’s Go!
. . . conduct me thither where thou saidst just now,
that I may see Saint Peter’s Gate, and those
whom thou describest as so whelmed with woe.
On second thought: Well, I’m not so sure . . .
I ’m not Aeneas, nor yet Paul am I;
me worthy of this, nor I nor others deem.
If, therefore, I consent to come, I fear
lest foolish be my coming; thou art wise,
and canst much better judge than I can talk.”
And such as he who unwills what he willed,
and changes so his purpose through new thoughts,
that what he had begun he wholly leaves;
such on that gloomy slope did I become.
This vascillation is a literary reflection of the winding
path of the psychological labyrinth of error and sin. It
also references a verse in the book of James: “A double-
minded man is unstable in all his ways.”
Virgil tells him he has been sent by Beatrice, St.
Lucia and the Virgin Mary. Then he takes him on a
tour of hell and purgatory.
“ . . . a friend of mine, but not a friend of Fortune,*
is on his journey o’er the lonely slope
obstructed so, that he hath turned through fear;
and, from what I have heard of him in Heaven,
I fear lest he may now have strayed so far,
that I have risen too late to give him help.
Bestir thee, then, and with thy finished speech,
and with whatever his escape may need,
assist him so that I may be consoled.
I, who now have thee go, am Beatrice;
thence come I, whither I would fain return;
’t was love that moved me, love that makes me
speak.
This love is an idealized, spiritual love.
*by this she means that he is not lucky. But Fortune or Fortuna
is also a Roman goddess, and this has a more nuanced meaning
as well. Fortune and fate are two different things. Your fate is,
essentially, the destination. Fortune turns like a wheel.
INFERNO III
The Gate and Vestibule of Hell. Cowards and
Neutrals. Acheron
Through me one goes into the town of woe,
through me one goes into eternal pain,
through me among the people that are lost.
. . . all hope abandon, ye that enter here!
These words of gloomy color I beheld
inscribed upon the summit of a gate;
whence I: “Their meaning, Teacher, troubles me.”
. . . Then, after he had placed his hand in mine
with cheerful face, whence I was comforted,
he led me in among the hidden things.
At the left is one version (perhaps the first) of
Rodin’s Gates of Hell—which was inspired by Dante.
The famous thinker sits above the gate, paralyzed
by indecision. Different figures represent persons
and creatures that Dante meets in hell.
Botticelli’s
illustration for the
9 circles of hell.
1. Limbo
2. Lust
3. Gluttony
4. Greed
5. Anger
6. Heresy
7. Violence
8. Fraud
9. Treachery
Crossing the Acheron
As with Aeneas, Charon is reluctant to convey the living Dante
across the river of death. Virgil explains that this is because Dante,
being essentially good, does not belong in hell:
“My son,” the courteous Teacher said to me,
“all those that perish in the wrath of God
from every country come together here;
and eager are to pass across the stream,
because Justice Divine so spurs them on,
that what was fear is turned into desire.
A good soul never goes across from hence;
if Charon, therefore, findeth fault with thee,
well canst thou now know what his words imply.”
They pass by the neutrals and the damned, ride with Charon, and
on reaching the other side, Dante essentially faints:
“The tear-stained ground
gave forth a wind, whence flashed vermilion light
which in me overcame all consciousness;
and down I fell like one whom sleep o’ertakes.”
INFERNO IV
The First Circle. The Borderland
Unbaptized Worthies. Illustrious Pagans
So dark it was, so deep and full of mist,
that, howsoe’er I gazed into its depths,
nothing at all did I discern therein.
“Into this blind world let us now descend!
. . .
Thus he set forth, and thus he had me enter
the first of circles girding the abyss.
Therein, as far as one could judge by list’ning,
there was no lamentation, saving sighs
which caused a trembling in the eternal air;
and this came from the grief devoid of torture
felt by the throngs, which many were and great,
of infants and of women and of men.”
To me then my good Teacher: “Dost not ask
what spirits these are whom thou seest here?
Now I would have thee know, ere thou go
further,
that these sinned not; and though they merits
have,
’t is not enough, for they did not have baptism,
the gateway of the creed believed by thee;
and if before Christianity they lived,
they did not with due worship honor God;
and one of such as these am I myself.
For such defects, and for no other guilt,
we ’re lost, and only hurt to this extent,
that, in desire, we live deprived of hope.”
Where the illustrious pagans dwell in limbo:
We reached a noble Castle’s foot, seven times
encircled by high walls, and all around
defended by a lovely little stream.
This last we crossed as if dry land it were;
through seven gates with these sages I went in,
and to a meadow of fresh grass we came.
The Harrowing of Hell
“Tell me, my Teacher, tell me, thou my Lord,”
I then began, through wishing to be sure
about the faith which conquers every error;
“came any ever, by his own deserts,
or by another’s, hence, who then was blest?”
Virgil tells him of Christ’s saving the
patriarchs—Adam, Abel, Moses, Noah,
Abraham, Rachel, King David and many
others.
INFERNO V
The Second Circle. Sexual Intemperance
The Lascivious and Adulterers
Hell proper starts here. Minos, who is given a
serpent’s tail by Dante, judges the damned:
thereupon that Connoisseur of sins
perceives what place in Hell belongs to it,
and girds him with his tail as many times,
as are the grades he wishes it sent down.
Before him there are always many standing;
they go to judgment, each one in his turn;
they speak and hear, and then are downward
hurled.
The lustful are essentially caught up in a whirling
tornado that is the “poetic justice” for their lack
of self control. They are whirled around and
dashed against rocks.
Here Dante speaks with Paolo and Francesco,
lovers who were tempted to adultery by reading
a romance—the story of Launcelot and
Guinevere. Paolo was the brother of Francesca’s
husband, who murdered them and will be found
deeper in hell.
Dante also sees Dido, who killed herself for love
of Aeneas:
“The next is she who killed herself through love,
and to Sichaeus’ ashes broke her faith; . . . “
At the end of the fifth canto, Dante faints:
out of sympathy
I swooned away as though about to die,
and fell as falls a body that is dead
INFERNO VI
The Third Circle. Intemperance in Food
Gluttons
In the third circle am I, that of rain
eternal, cursèd, cold and burdensome;
its measure and quality are never new.
The Labyrinth of Initiation, the sacred grove
and the Under/After World p. 42
Coarse hail, and snow, and dirty-colored water
through the dark air are ever pouring down;
and foully smells the ground receiving them.
A wild beast, Cerberus, uncouth and cruel,
is barking with three throats, as would a dog,
over the people that are there submerged.
Red eyes he hath, a dark and greasy beard,
a belly big, and talons on his hands;
he claws the spirits, flays and quarters them.
My Leader then stretched out his opened
palms,
and took some earth, and with his fists well
filled,
he threw it down into the greedy throats.
And like a dog that, barking, yearns for food,
and, when he comes to bite it, is appeased,
since only to devour it doth he strain
and fight;
“These torments, Teacher,
after the Final Sentence will they grow,
or less become, or burn the same as now.”
And he to me: “Return thou to thy science,
which holdeth that the more a thing is perfect,
so much the more it feels of weal or woe.
Although this cursèd folk shall nevermore
arrive at true perfection, it expects
to be more perfect after, than before.”
As in a circle, round that road we went,
speaking at greater length than I repeat,
and came unto a place where one descends;
there found we Plutus, the great enemy.
Dante reflects:
Dis and the City of Dis are mentioned in The
Aeneid and Dante’s Inferno. Essentially, this is the
Father of the Underworld, and you can picture
Pluto or Hades.
Lower Hell, inside the walls of Dis, in an
illustration by Stradanus. There is a drop from the
sixth circle to the three rings of the seventh circle,
then again to the ten rings of the eighth circle,
and, at the bottom, to the icy ninth circle.
Dante emphasizes the city aspect of Dis by
describing its architectural features: towers, gates,
walls, ramparts, bridges, and moats. Dis is an
antithesis to the heavenly city or Jerusalem.
Dante’s “City of Dis” is quite convoluted (literally).
INFERNO XII
The Seventh Circle. The First Ring. Violence
against one’s Fellow Man.
“. . . on the border of the broken bank
was stretched at length the Infamy of Crete,
who in the seeming heifer was conceived;
and when he saw us there he bit himself,
like one whom inward anger overcomes.
In his direction then my Sage cried out:
“Dost thou, perhaps, think Athens’ duke is here,
who gave thee death when in the world above?
Begone, thou beast! for this man cometh not
taught by thy sister, but is going by,
in order to behold your punishments.”
INFERNO XXXIV
The Ninth Circle. Treachery. Cocytus
Traitors to their Benefactors. Lucifer
. . . Raising mine eyes, I thought that I should still
see Lucifer the same as when I left him;
but I beheld him with his legs held up.
And thereupon, if I became perplexed,
let those dull people think, who do not see
what kind of point that was which I had passed.
“Stand up” my Teacher said, “upon thy feet!
the way is long and difficult the road,
and now to middle-tierce the sun returns.”
It was no palace hallway where we were,
but just a natural passage under ground,
which had a wretched floor and lack of light.
Where is the ice? And how is this one fixed
thus upside down? And in so short a time
how hath the sun from evening crossed to morn?”
Then he to me: “Thou thinkest thou art still
beyond the center where I seized the hair
of that bad Worm who perforates the world.
While I was going down, thou wast beyond it;
but when I turned, thou then didst pass the point
to which all weights are drawn on every side;
thou now art come beneath the hemisphere
opposed to that the great dry land o’ercovers,
and ’neath whose zenith was destroyed the Man,
who without sinfulness was born and died;
thy feet thou hast upon the little sphere,
which forms the other surface of Judecca.
There is a place down there, as far removed
from Beelzebub, as e’er his tomb extends,
not known by sight, but by a brooklet’s sound,
which flows down through a hole there in the rock,
gnawed in it by the water’s spiral course,
which slightly slopes. My Leader then, and I,
in order to regain the world of light,
entered upon that dark and hidden path;
and, without caring for repose, went up,
he going on ahead, and I behind,
till through a rounded opening I beheld
some of the lovely things the sky contains;
thence we came out, and saw again the stars.
PARADISO XXXIII
The Empyrean. GOD. St. Bernard’s Prayer to Mary
The Vision of God. Ultimate Salvation
“O Virgin Mother, Daughter of thy Son,
humbler and loftier than any creature,
eternal counsel’s predetermined goal,
thou art the one that such nobility
didst lend to human nature, that its Maker
scorned not to make Himself what He had made.
Within thy womb rekindled was the Love,
through whose warm influence in the eternal Peace
this Flower hath blossomed thus.”
St. Bernard prays for Dante:
Now doth this man, who from the lowest drain
of the Universe hath one by one beheld,
as far as here, the forms of spirit-life,
beseech thee, of thy grace, for so much strength
that with his eyes he may uplift himself
toward Ultimate Salvation higher still.
Dante does his best to remember his vision;
And such as he, who seeth in a dream,
and after it, the imprinted feeling stays,
while all the rest returns not to his mind;
even such am I; for almost wholly fades
my vision, yet the sweetness which was born
of it is dripping still into my heart.
Even thus the snow is in the sun dissolved;
even thus the Sibyl’s oracles, inscribed
on flying leaves, were lost adown the wind.
O the abundant Grace, whereby I dared
to pierce the Light Eternal with my gaze,
until I had therein exhausted sight!
I saw that far within its depths there lies,
by Love together in one volume bound,
that which in leaves lies scattered through the world;
substance and accident, and modes thereof,
fused, as it were, in such a way, that that,
whereof I speak, is but One Simple Light.
Within the Lofty Light’s profound and clear
subsistence there appeared to me three Rings,
of threefold color and of one content;
and one, as Rainbow is by Rainbow, seemed
reflected by the other, while the third
seemed like a Fire breathed equally from both.
. . . O Light Eternal, that alone dost dwell
within Thyself, alone dost understand
Thyself, and love and smile upon Thyself,
Self-understanding and Self-understood!
That Circle which appeared to be conceived
within Thyself as a Reflected Light,
when somewhat contemplated by mine eyes,
within Itself, of Its own very color,
to me seemed painted with our Human Form;
whence wholly set upon It was my gaze.
Like the geometer, who gives himself
wholly to measuring the circle, nor,
by thinking, finds the principle he needs;
ev’n such was I at that new sight. I wished
to see how to the Ring the Image there
conformed Itself, and found therein a place;
but mine own wings were not enough for this;
had not my mind been smitten by a flash
of light, wherein what it was willing came.
Here power failed my high imagining;
but, like a smoothly moving wheel, that Love
was now revolving my desire and will,
which moves the sun and all the other stars.
Fire and Ice by Robert Frost
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.