Helena's Lines

(puck) for I must now to Oberon

(enter, follow him) Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Demetrius

(hermia) why, get you gone: who is't that hinders you?

A foolish heart, that I leave here behind

(lysander) I will, my hermia

COUGH

(hermia) God speed fair Helena, wither away?

Call you me fair? That fair again unsay. Demetrius loves your fair... oh happy fair. Your eyes are loadstars and your tongue's sweet air more tunable than lark to shepherd's ear. Oh, teach me how you look and with what art you sway the motion of Demetrius' heart.

(hermia) Lower! Hark, again.

Good Hermia, do not be so bitter with me. I evermore did love you Hermia, did ever keep your counsels , never wrong'd you... Save that, in love onto Demetrius, told him of your stealth unto this wood. And now, so you will let me quiet go to Athens I bear my folly back and follow you no further. Let me go, you see how simple and how fond I am.

(hermia) I scorn you not: it seems that you scorn me

Have you not set Lysander, as in scorn, to follow me and praise my eyes and face? And made your other love, Demetrius to call me goddess, nymph, divine and rare, precious, celestial? Wherefore he speaks this to her he hates? And were doth Lysander deny your love, so rich within his soul, but by your setting on, by your consent?

(hermia) but that my nails can reach unto thine eyes

I pray you, though you mock me, gentlemen, let her not hurt me. I was never curst, I have no gift at all in shrewishness, I am a right maid for my cowardice, let her not strike me. You perhaps may think, because she is something lower than myself that I can match her...

(hermia) you mistress, all this coil is 'long of you, nay, go not back

I will not trust you, I no longer stay in your curst company. Your hands than mine are quicker for a fray, my legs are longer though, to run away.

(demetrius exits)

I'll follow thee and make a heaven of hell to die upon the hand I love so well

(demetrius) this princess of pure white, this seal of bliss

Oh spite, oh hell! I see you are all bent to set against me for your merriment! If you were civil, and knew courtesy, you would not do me thus much injury. Can you not hate me, as I know you do, but must join in souls to mock me too? If you were men, as men you are in show, you would not use a gentle lady so. To vow and swear and superpraise my parts, when I am sure you hate me with your hearts. You are both rivals, and love Hermia, and now both rivals to mock Helena.

(hermia) I give him curses, yet he gives me love

Oh that my prayers could such affection move

(hermia) I frown upon him yet he loves me still

Oh that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill

(demetrius) stay, on thy peril, I alone will go

Oh, I am out of breath in this fond chase. The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace. Happy is Hermia, wheresoer she lies, for she has blessed and attractive eyes. How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears, if so mine are oftener wash'd than hers. No, no I am as ugly as a bear for beasts that meet me run away for fear! But who is this on the ground? Lysander? Dead.. or asleep? I see no blood, no wound. Lysander, if you live, good sir, awake!

(lysander) my love, my life my soul, fair Helena

Oh, excellent

(demetrius) no, sir, she shall not through you take her part.

Oh, when she's angry she is keen and shrewd. She was a vixen when she went to school, and though she be but little she be fierce.

(demetrius) tell you, i do not, nor cannot love you?

and even for that do I love you the more! I am your spaniel, and, Demetrius, the more you beat me the more I will fawn on you. Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike me, neglect me, lose me, only give me leave, unworthy as I am to follow you. What worser place can I beg in your love- and yet a place of high respect in me- than to be used as you use your dog?

(hermia) yea, and my brother

and hippolytus

(lysander) keep promise, my love. Look, here comes Helena

enter

(puck) that befal preposterously

enter with lysander

(hermia) the more I hate, the more he follows me

The more I love, the more he hateth me

(lysander) and reason says you are the worthier maid

Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born? When at your hands did I deserve this scorn? Is it not enough... is it not enough young man that I did never, no, nor never can deserve a sweet look for Demetrius' eye, but you must flout my insufficiency? Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth you do in such disdainful manner me to woo. But fare you well: perforce I must confess, I thought you lord or more true gentleness.

(hermia) what, with lysander?

With Demetrius!

(lysander) why should you think that I should woo in scorn?

You do advance your cunning more and more. When truth kills truth, devilish holy fray. These vows are Hermia's, will you give her o'er? Weigh oath with oath and you will nothing weigh.

(demetrius) hence, get thee gone and follow me no further!

You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant!

(demetrius) for I am sick when I look on thee

And I am sick when I look not on you!

(hermia) I understand not what you mean by this

Ay, do, persever, counterfeit sad looks, make mouths upon me when I turn my back, wink at each other, hold this sweet jest up, but fare ye well, 'til partly my own fault, which death or absence shall soon remedy.

(demetrius) but I shall do thee mischief in the wood.

Ay, in the temple, in the town, in the field, you do me mischief. Fie, Demetrius! Your wrongs do set a scandal on my sex, we cannot fight for love as men may do, we should be wood and were not meant to woo.

(lysander) is that vile name tot perish on my sword

Do not say so, Lysander, say not so. What though he love your Hermia, lord, what though? Yet Hermia still loves you, then be content.

(hermia) and stolen my love's heart from him?

Fine! In faith! Have you no modesty? No maiden shame, no touch of bashfulness? What? Will you tear impatient answers from my gentle tongue? Fie, fie you counterfeit, you puppet, you!

(lysander) ...and demetrius, dote on you

How happy some o'er other some can be... Through Athens, I am thought as fair as she! But what of that... Demetrius thinks not so. He will not know what all but he do know. And as he errs, doting on Hermia's eyes, so I, admiring of his qualities. (SHIFT) I will go tell him of fair Hermia's flight... then to the woods will he tomorrow night pursue her... and for this intelligence if I have thanks it is a dear expense. But herein I mean to enrich my pain to have his sights thither and back again.

(hermia) you speak not as though you think: it cannot be

Lo, she is one of this confederacy? Now I perceive that they have conjoined all three to fashion this false sport, in spite of me. Injurious Hermia! Most ungrateful maid! Have you conspired, have you with these contrived to bait me with this foul derision? Is all the counsel that we two have shared, the sisters' vows, the hours we have spent when we chid in the hasty-footed time for parting us, oh, is it all forgot? All school-days friendship, childhood innocence. And you would rent our ancient love asunder to join with men in scorning your poor friend? It's not friendly, 'tis not maidenly. Our sex, as well as I may chide your for it, though I alone do feel the injury

(lysander) whom i do love and will do till my death

Never did mockers waste more idle breath

(hermia) his folly, helena, is no fault of mine

None, but your beauty, would that fault were mine

(lysander) I had no judgement when to her I swore

Nor none, in my mind, now you giver her o'er

(demetrius) Nay, then thou mock'st me... by day's approach look to be visited

O weary night, oh long and tedious night, abate thy hour! Shine comforts from the east, and sleep, that sometimes shuts up sorrows eye, steal me awhile from mine own company

(demetrius) I charge, thee, hence, and do not haunt me thus

O, wilt thou darkling leave me? Do not so

(hermia) when every thing seems double

So methinks, and I have found Demetrius like a jewel, mine own, and not mine own

(demetrius) and leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts!

The wildest hath not such a heart as you.