Monologue

Longaville Monologue from Love's Labour's Lost

From Love's Labour's Lost by William Shakespeare

male · romantic · 1:25 min

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I fear these stubborn lines lack power to move. O sweet Maria, empress of my love, These numbers will I tear, and write in prose. (BEROWNE: O, rhymes are guards on wanton Cupid’s hose. Disfigure not his shop.) This same shall go. (He reads the sonnet.) Did not the heavenly rhetoric of thine eye, ’Gainst whom the world cannot hold argument, Persuade my heart to this false perjury? Vows for thee broke deserve not punishment. A woman I forswore, but I will prove, Thou being a goddess, I forswore not thee. My vow was earthly, thou a heavenly love; Thy grace being gained, cures all disgrace in me. Vows are but breath, and breath a vapour is. Then thou, fair sun, which on my earth dost shine, Exhal’st this vapour-vow; in thee it is. If broken then, it is no fault of mine; If by me broke, what fool is not so wise To lose an oath to win a paradise?

About this piece

20s · longing · love · betrayal · redemption · identity

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