(sixty seconds.)

One-minute monologues for women

For the sixty-second slot: a general, a showcase, a self-tape that asks for one minute and means it. Everything here finishes inside it.

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1
Helena from All's Well That Ends Well
William Shakespeare · play · dramatic · 0:58 min
Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie, Which we ascribe to heaven: the fated sky Gives us free scope; only doth backward pull Our slow designs when we ourselves are dull. What…
2
Michelle from 12
Nikita Mikhalkov · film · dramatic · 0:56 min
3
Nora Helmer from A Doll's House
Henrik Ibsen · play · dramatic · 1:02 min
But you neither think nor talk like the man I could bind myself to. As soon as your fear was over--and it was not fear for what threatened me, but for what might happen to…
4
Beatrice from The Changeling
Peter Medak · film · dramatic · 1:00 min
5
Eleanor of Aquitaine from The Lion in Winter
Anthony Harvey · film · dramatic · 0:46 min
6
Phoebe from As You Like It
William Shakespeare · play · comedic · 1:05 min
I would not be thy executioner: I fly thee, for I would not injure thee. Thou tell'st me there is murder in mine eye: 'Tis pretty, sure, and very probable, That eyes, that are the…
7
Katherine from The Taming of the Shrew
William Shakespeare · play · dramatic · 0:43 min
No Shame but mine: I must, forsooth, be forced To give my hand opposed against my heart Unto a mad-brain rudesby full of spleen; Who woo’d in haste and means to wed at leisure. I…
8
Cordelia from King Lear
William Shakespeare · play · dramatic · 0:53 min
Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave My heart into my mouth. I love your Majesty According to my bond; no more nor less. Good my lord, You have begot me, bred me, lov'd me; I Return…
9
Gwendolen Fairfax from The Importance of Being Earnest
Oscar Wilde · play · comedic · 0:58 min
Ernest, we may never be married. From the expression on mamma’s face I fear we never shall. Few parents nowadays pay any regard to what their children say to them. The…
10
Mrs. Allonby from A Woman of No Importance
Oscar Wilde · play · comedic · 1:02 min
When Ernest and I were engaged, he swore to me positively on his knees that he had never loved any one before in the whole course of his life. I was very young at the time, so I…
11
Myra Arundel from Hay Fever
Noël Coward · play · comedic · 1:01 min
Well I’m not going to spare your feelings, or anyone else’s. You’re the most infuriating set of hypocrites I’ve ever seen. This house is a complete feather-bed of false…
12
Judith Bliss from Hay Fever
Noël Coward · play · comedic · 0:43 min
I’m much more dignified on the stage than in the country--it’s my milieu. I’ve tried terribly hard to be “landed gentry”, but without any real success. I long for excitement and…
13
Lady Betty Modish from The Careless Husband
Colley Cibber · play · comedic · 1:00 min
Pfhah; Will any thing a man says make a woman less agreeable? Will his talking spoil one’s complexion, or put one hair out of order? -- and for reputation, look you, my dear, take…
14
Cleopatra from Antony and Cleopatra
William Shakespeare · play · dramatic · 0:43 min
Sir, I will eat no meat, I'll not drink, sir; If idle talk will once be necessary, I'll not sleep neither: this mortal house I'll ruin, Do Caesar what he can. Know, sir, that I…
15
Jane Eyre from Jane Eyre
Cary Joji Fukunaga · film · dramatic · 0:44 min
16
Miranda from The Tempest
William Shakespeare · play · dramatic · 0:44 min
If by your art, my dearest father, you have Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them. The sky, it seems, would pour down stinking pitch, But that the sea, mounting to the…
17
Desdemona from Othello
William Shakespeare · play · dramatic · 0:54 min
O good Iago, What shall I do to win my lord again? Good friend, go to him; for, by this light of heaven, I know not how I lost him. Here I kneel: If e'er my will did trespass…
18
Mrs. Rackett from The Belle's Stratagem
Hannah Cowley · play · comedic · 0:50 min
And you I take to be a slanderous Cynic of two-and-thirty.—Twenty years hence, one might have forgiven such a libel!—Now, Sir, hear my definition of a Fine Lady:—She is a creature…
19
Aunt Lottie/Sea Witch from The Little Mermaid
Ron Clements, John Musker · film · comedic · 1:01 min
20
Tessa from The Gondoliers
W.S. Gilbert, Arthur Sullivan · play · comedic · 0:52 min
Yes, we thought you’d like it. You see, it was like this. After you left we felt very dull and mopey, and the days crawled by, and you never wrote; so at last I said to Gianetta,…
21
Lady Macbeth from Macbeth
William Shakespeare · play · dramatic · 0:45 min
Come, you spirits That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here, And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full Of direst cruelty! make thick my blood; Stop up the access and…
22
Juliet Capulet from Romeo and Juliet
William Shakespeare · play · dramatic · 0:54 min
The clock struck nine when I did send the nurse; In half an hour she promised to return. Perchance she cannot meet him: that’s not so. O, she is lame! love’s heralds should be…
23
Mrs. Robinson from The Graduate
Mike Nichols · film · dramatic · 0:59 min
24
Juliet from Romeo and Juliet
William Shakespeare · play · romantic · 0:53 min
Well, do not swear. Although I joy in thee, I have no joy of this contract tonight; It is too rash, too unadvis’d, too sudden, Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be Ere…
25
Nurse from Romeo and Juliet
William Shakespeare · play · anguished · 1:02 min
Faith, here it is. Romeo is banished; and all the world to nothing That he dares ne’er come back to challenge you. Or if he do, it needs must be by stealth. Then, since the case…
26
Desdemona from Othello
William Shakespeare · play · anguished · 0:50 min
That I did love the Moor to live with him, My downright violence and storm of fortunes May trumpet to the world: my heart’s subdued Even to the very quality of my lord. I saw…
27
Desdemona from Othello
William Shakespeare · play · anguished · 1:01 min
Why then tomorrow night, or Tuesday morn, On Tuesday noon, or night; on Wednesday morn. I prithee name the time, but let it not Exceed three days. In faith, he’s penitent; And yet…
28
Desdemona from Othello
William Shakespeare · play · anguished · 0:55 min
I prithee do so. (Exit Iago.) Something sure of state, Either from Venice, or some unhatch’d practice Made demonstrable here in Cyprus to him, Hath puddled his clear spirit, and…
29
Goneril from King Lear
William Shakespeare · play · defiant · 0:54 min
Not only, sir, this your all-licens’d fool, But other of your insolent retinue Do hourly carp and quarrel; breaking forth In rank and not-to-be-endured riots. Sir, I had thought,…
30
Goneril from King Lear
William Shakespeare · play · defiant · 1:03 min
This admiration, sir, is much o’ the favour Of other your new pranks. I do beseech you To understand my purposes aright: As you are old and reverend, you should be wise. Here do…

Length is estimated at a spoken pace of about 150 words a minute. Public-domain pieces are printed in full on their own page; copyrighted ones list the character and the source.

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