Measure for Measure
Written: 1603 Text: First Folio 1623 (Comedy); no quarto editions
Source: Geroge Whetstone (c.1544-87). Promos and Cassandra (1578); Cinthio, Giovanni Battista Giraldi.1504-73). Hecatommithi (1565. No English translations found, therefore, Shakespeare probably read it either in Italian or French.); Cinthio, Giovanni Battista Giraldi.1504-73) Epitia (1583. No English translations found, therefore, Shakespeare probably read it either in Italian or French..); Barnabe Riche (c.1540-1617). The Adventures of Brusanus, prince of Hungaria (1592)–Lucio's interactions with the disguised Duke.
Characters: Vincent the Duke, Isabella, Angelo, Lucio, Escalus, Provost, Claudio
Setting: Vienna
Time: c. AD 1485
Xxx xxx
Notes on Measure for Measure
Shakespeare and the Casting Couch
Read the NoteStories about women summoned as supplicants to the portals of men with the power to grant their wishes, for a price, are common across professions, across countries, across millennia. Shakespeare dramatized the dilemmas some of these women faced in more than one of his plays.
In both Henry VI Part 3 and Measure for Measure, for example,
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Tempter or Tempted?
Read the NoteIn Measure for Measure (2.2.197), Angelo confronts, possibly for the first time in his life, the temptation of lust. And since this is new to him and because he is highly moralistic, he is troubled and confused. He reacts by asking himself a series of questions for which he has no answers.
What’s this? What’s this? Is this her fault,
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Seduction or Harassment?
Read the NoteShakespeare delights in the seduction ceremonies of bright men with even brighter women. These dialogues, whether between adolescents like Romeo and Juliet, more mature characters like Henry V and Princess Katherine, or seasoned adults like the widow Lady Grey and the sexual harasser King Edward, in this scene (3HenryVI 3.2.36), give Shakespeare opportunities to employ dazzling webworks of rhetorical exchanges.
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Sexual Extortion
Read the NoteIn Measure for Measure (2.4.95), Angelo, the classic sexual harasser, adopts a method of sexual extortion similar to King Edward’s in Henry VI Part 3 (3.2.36). Both men begin with oblique insinuations about their desires, which can be innocently misread. When the women, Isabella in Measure for Measure and Lady Grey in Henry VI,
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Quotes from Measure for Measure
Of government the properties to unfold
Read the QuoteDuke
Of government the properties to unfold
Would seem in me t’ affect speech and discourse,
Since I am put to know that your own science
Exceeds, in that, the lists of all advice
My strength can give you. Then no more remains
But that, to your sufficiency, as your worth is able,
And let them work.
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Always obedient to your Grace’s will
Read the QuoteAlways obedient to your Grace’s will,
I come to know your pleasure.
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Angelo, There is a kind of character in thy life
Read the QuoteAngelo,
There is a kind of character in thy life,
That to th’ observer doth thy history
AlliterationFully unfoldHyperbaton. Thyself and thy belongings
Are not thine own so properAnastrophe as to waste
Thyself upon thy virtues, they on thee.
Heaven doth with us as we with torches do,
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Why, how now, Claudio? Whence comes this restraint?
Read the QuoteLucio
Why, how now, Claudio? Whence comes this
restraint?
Claudio
From too much liberty, my Lucio, liberty.
As surfeit is the father of much fast,Simile
So every scope by the immoderate use
Turns to restraint. Our natures do pursue,
Like rats that raven down their proper bane,
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And the new deputy now for the Duke—
Read the QuoteAnd the new deputy now for the Duke—
Whether it be the fault and glimpse of newness,
Or whether that the body public be
A horse whereon the governor doth ride,
Who, newly in the seat, that it may know
He can command, lets it straight feel the spur;
Whether the tyranny be in his place,
Or in his eminence that fills it up,
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I prithee, Lucio, do me this kind service
Read the QuoteI prithee, Lucio, do me this kind service:
This day my sister should the cloister enter,
And there receive her approbation.
Acquaint her with the danger of my state;
Implore her, in my voice, that she make friends
To the strict deputy; bid herself assay him.
I have great hope in that; for in her youth
There is a prone and speechless dialect,
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My holy sir, none better knows than you
Read the QuoteMy holy sir, none better knows than you
How I have ever lov’d the life removed,
And held in idle price to haunt assemblies
Where youth, and cost, witless bravery keeps.
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We have strict statutes and most biting laws
Read the QuoteWe have strict statutes and most biting laws
(The needful bits and curbs to headstrong weeds),
Which for this fourteen years we have let slip,
Even like an o’ergrown lion in a cave,
That goes not out to prey. Now, as fond fathers,
Having bound up the threat’ning twigs of birch,
Only to stick it in their children’s sight
For terror,
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Our doubts are traitors
Read the QuoteOur doubts are traitors,
And makes us lose the good we oft might win,
By fearing to attempt.
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‘Tis one thing to be tempted, Escalus
Read the Quote‘Tis one thing to be tempted, Escalus,
Another thing to fall. I not deny
The jury, passing on the prisoner’s life,
May in the sworn twelve have a thief or two
Guiltier than him they try. What’s open made to justice,
That justice seizes. What knows the laws
That thieves do pass on thieves? ‘Tis very pregnant,
The jewel that we find,
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