Conversation Piece - Monday, December 8, 2008
"Oh, come not near me, sir; I shall defile you.
I am that of your blood was taken from you
For your better health. Look no more upon't
But cast it to the ground regardlessly;
Let the common sewer take it from distinction.
Beneath the stars, upon yon meteor
Ever hung my fate, 'mongst things corruptible;
I ne'er could pluck it from him. My loathing
Was prophet to the rest, bu ne'er believed;
Mine honor fell with him, and now my life."
(The Changeling V.iii.158-67)
I am that of your blood was taken from you
For your better health. Look no more upon't
But cast it to the ground regardlessly;
Let the common sewer take it from distinction.
Beneath the stars, upon yon meteor
Ever hung my fate, 'mongst things corruptible;
I ne'er could pluck it from him. My loathing
Was prophet to the rest, bu ne'er believed;
Mine honor fell with him, and now my life."
(The Changeling V.iii.158-67)
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Order and Justice
During the time the play was written, which is listed as being 1585-1587(?), the word "unkind" was not used to describe unfriendliness but unnaturalness. During the period of the play the word could also mean bad, hurtful, or wicked. The OED illustrates the word’s various meanings in their historical contexts and the examples seem to play on some variation of the word’s unnatural connotation. In each of the cases where this word is used in the play the characters, in this case the viceroy, Bel-Imperia, and the third watchmen, are referring to the brutal, or uncalled-for murder of a person. The use of this word suggests that the murder of a person is not just unnatural because it wrong, but unnatural because it interferes with the inherit sense of order that the characters feel is present in their lives. Each murder upsets the balance of power within the court of Spain. Throughout the play there is a call for justice, a need to check and control the balance of power within the court and, ultimately, between good an evil. With each murder that is committed in the play, the balance of power is thrown off between the various groups of power. Bel-Imperia uses this word twice, the second time she uses it in her conversation with Hieronimo when she calls him a "unkind father" (4.1.7) for his failure to avenge the death of Horatio. Bel-Imperia feels that she has the right to call into question Hieronimo's relationship with his son because his lack of action. His vengeance would prove that he is a father and restore the order in his relationship with his dead son. In this case it is his unwillingness to commit murder, and return balance to the powers of the court of Spain, which makes him unnatural. In this speech she also calls his inaction monstrous which, unknowingly, helps to spur him into action. The word “monstrous” affects Hieronimo here because of his own usage of the word. Here he is made monstrous by his inaction, and hesitation in restoring justice, which is as much a slight to justice as throwing off the inherit order of their lives in the first place.
