He hath, my lord, wrung from me my slow leave
By laborsome petition, and at last
Upon his will I sealed my hard consent.
I do beseech you give him leave to go.
1. Energy through the text: one thought leads to another, word to word, line to line, speech to speech; and the speeches always build. Look for ladders!
- In this text, look how "wrung" sets up what kind of leave Polonius gave to Laertes? Quick leave? Nope. Slooooooowwwww Leeeeaaaaaave.
- And the ladders from one thought leading to the next: slow leave (it took a long time), laborsome petition (and a lot of work), at last (did i mention how long it took?), upon his will (not because i wanted to) ... etc.
- Seems like the antithesis doesn't really happen until the end of the third line with the words "hard consent." Even then, it is complicated consent because of all the pain it caused to give it. So antithesis allows for words and phrases to carry a lot of nuance and complexity.
3. Substance of the word—the energy of the word in relation to its meaning.
- see above: sloooooowwwww leeeeeavvvve; contrast this with: hard consent. The word beseech takes on some weight, also, because of all the long vowels. Seems like he's saying "pleeeeease give him leave to go so he will leave me the heck alone."
4. Discovery and movement of thought
- Try the exercise moving on punctuation, commas and all. This is where you see how long it takes him to get the sentence out. It almost seems like he's still debating whether or not to admit that he's decided to let Laertes go to France up until the moment I said seemed like antithesis--hard consent.
- See Obadiah's post--the word "wrung" makes Polonius seem like a used washcloth, and "laborsome" makes him seem weary to me.
6. Argument and Emotion in Elizabethan thought
- Shakespeare was pre-Cartesian split! -- bodies and brains are not separate, but are often in conflict; the choice to let Laertes go despite the desire to make him stay creates a conflict in Polonius that affects him physically
- Everything fitted into a hierarchy -- note that the King is following the supposed hierarchy: the son is supposed to answer to the father; but the plays act out disorder in the great chain of being: here, the son has manipulated the father into giving him what he wants. But also: Polonius' need to make a choice in this moment comes from the fact that the King has asked him a question.
- Feelings are expressed in terms of argument, and are about something outside of the personal--you can tell how he feels about this choice, even though he doesn't say it. But also: this is almost more about his son than it is about him. "Look how badly Laertes wants to go to France! He must have a good reason for it, even if I can't figure out what it is ...
7. Word games and patterns-double meanings/puns, forms and patterns of words, repetition: there is delight in thoughts well-expressed.
- I don't know if this is intentional (who does?), but "upon his will i sealed my hard consent" could have double meaning. "Will" meaning Laertes' desire, but also meaning the document one puts together before one's death--and one might put a seal on a document with wax. By letting his son go to France, he feels like he is sealing his doom.
- argument is given at the beginning -- he hath wrung from me my slow leave
- thought is pursued with diversions into metaphor until the end -- all that hedging sort of re-enacts the wringing: on "and at last" you think he's done, but there's another twist "upon his will", etc.
- resolution ties in with the beginning -- i gave him my leave through all this labor, so please give him yours: i'm doing to you what he did to me.
- each individual thought refers back to the beginning and takes us closer to the end; the end refers back to the beginning. again, "he hath wrung from me my slow leave" and "i do beseech you give him leave"
So there's all that work being done even in just four brief lines!
1 comment:
As I said in class, I was blown away by how much could truly be “wrung” from a mere four lines which, in and of themselves, do not propel the plot at that exact moment, but do serve to inform the audience (as well as the actor)to something of Polonius’ emotional and mental state and his place in the cosmic hierarchy of that world.
I will be using some of your insights in my approach to Polonius, especially in light of a given circumstance Rinda has put on Gerry (Claudius) and me to explore. Polonius IS weary and “wrung out” at this point- not so much because of his son but from what he’s done to secure his own political and social position.
I don’t think he’s "debating" until the last sentence, but I do know this guy loves to talk and rarely gets to a point noncircuitously.
I felt the “iambic technique” told me what I needed to know and it did inform my approach in that scene to Laertes (and to him later, as well) and my public relationship to/with this new king.
I see now approaching a text with as many of these techniques as possible not only uncovers mines rich in gems for the portrayal of a living, vital character but can keep the revisiting of a role over the years fresh and interesting.
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