Monologue

Leontes Monologue from The Winter's Tale

From The Winter's Tale by William Shakespeare

male · anguished · 1:38 min

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Is whispering nothing? Is leaning cheek to cheek? is meeting noses? Kissing with inside lip? Stopping the career Of laughter with a sigh?—a note infallible Of breaking honesty?—horsing foot on foot? Skulking in corners? Wishing clocks more swift? Hours, minutes? Noon, midnight? and all eyes Blind with the pin and web but theirs, theirs only, That would unseen be wicked? Is this nothing? Why, then the world and all that’s in’t is nothing, The covering sky is nothing, Bohemia nothing, My wife is nothing, nor nothing have these nothings, If this be nothing. (CAMILLO: Good my lord, be cur’d Of this diseas’d opinion, and betimes, For ’tis most dangerous.) Say it be, ’tis true. (CAMILLO: No, no, my lord.) It is; you lie, you lie: I say thou liest, Camillo, and I hate thee, Pronounce thee a gross lout, a mindless slave, Or else a hovering temporizer that Canst with thine eyes at once see good and evil, Inclining to them both. Were my wife’s liver Infected as her life, she would not live The running of one glass.

About this piece

Leontes, consumed by jealousy and suspicion, grapples with his emotions as he questions the nature of trust and fidelity in his relationships.

30s · anger · jealousy · betrayal · madness · identity

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