From The Bride of Messina, and On the Use of the Chorus in Tragedy by Friedrich Schiller

My daughter! Child of all my cares and pains! And is it thus I see thee once again? Thus thou returnest to thy father's halls! Oh, let my breath relume thy vital spark; Yes! I will strain thee to a mother's arms And hold thee fast--till from the frost of death Released thy life-warm current throbs again. [To the Chorus. Where hast thou found her? Speak! What dire mischance Has caused this sight of woe? Chorus (BOHEMUND). My lips are dumb! Ask not of me: thy son will tell thee all-- Don Caesar--for 'tis he that sends her. ISABELLA 'Tell me Would'st thou not say Don Manuel? Chorus (BOHEMUND). 'Tis Don Caesar That sends her to thee. ISABELLA (to the MESSENGER). How declared the Seer? Speak! Was it not Don Manuel? (MESSENGER: 'Twas he! Thy elder born.) Be blessings on his head Which e'er it be; to him I owe a daughter, Alas! that in this blissful hour, so long Expected, long implored, some envious fiend Should mar my joy! Oh, I must stem the tide Of nature's transport! In her childhood's home I see my daughter; me she knows not--heeds not-- Nor answers to a mother's voice of love Ope, ye dear eyelids--hands be warm--and heave Thou lifeless bosom with responsive throbs To mine! 'Tis she! Diego, look! 'tis Beatrice! The long-concealed--the lost--the rescued one! Before the world I claim her for my own! Chorus (BOHEMUND). New signs of terror to my boding soul Are pictured;--in amazement lost I stand! What light shall pierce this gloom of mystery? ISABELLA (to the Chorus, who exhibit marks of confusion and embarrassment). Oh, ye hard hearts! Ye rude unpitying men! A mother's transport from your breast of steel Rebounds, as from the rocks the heaving surge! I look around your train, nor mark one glance Of soft regard. Where are my sons? Oh, tell me Why come they not, and from their beaming eyes Speak comfort to my soul? For here environed I stand amid the desert's raging brood, Or monsters of the deep! (DIEGO: She opes her eyes! She moves! She lives!) She lives! On me be thrown Her earliest glance!

Isabella Monologue from The Bride of Messina, and On the Use of the Chorus in Tragedy

Rehearse Isabella's monologue