Authors: John McCann,Monica Sweeney,Becky Thomas
Brick Shakespeare: The ComediesA Midsummer Night's Dream, The Tempest, Much Ado About Nothing, and The Taming of the Shrew (35 page)
PROSPERO
No, wench; it eats and sleeps and hath such senses
As we have, such. This gallant which thou seest
Was in the wreck; and, but he’s something stain’d
With grief that’s beauty’s canker, thou mightst call him
A goodly person: he hath lost his fellows
And strays about to find ’em.
MIRANDA
I might call him
A thing divine, for nothing natural
I ever saw so noble.
PROSPERO
It goes on, I see,
As my soul prompts it. Spirit, fine spirit! I’ll free thee
Within two days for this.
FERDINAND
Most sure, the goddess
On whom these airs attend! Vouchsafe my prayer
May know if you remain upon this island;
And that you will some good instruction give
How I may bear me here: my prime request,
Which I do last pronounce, is, O you wonder!
If you be maid or no?
MIRANDA
No wonder, sir;
But certainly a maid.
FERDINAND
My language! heavens!
I am the best of them that speak this speech,
Were I but where ’tis spoken.
PROSPERO
How? the best?
What wert thou, if the King of Naples heard thee?
FERDINAND
A single thing, as I am now, that wonders
To hear thee speak of Naples. He does hear me;
And that he does I weep: myself am Naples,
Who with mine eyes, never since at ebb, beheld
The king my father wreck’d.
MIRANDA
Alack, for mercy!
FERDINAND
Yes, faith, and all his lords; the Duke of Milan
And his brave son being twain.
PROSPERO
The Duke of Milan
And his more braver daughter could control thee,
If now ’twere fit to do’t. At the first sight
They have changed eyes. Delicate Ariel,
I’ll set thee free for this.
PROSPERO (cont.)
A word, good sir;
I fear you have done yourself some wrong: a word.
MIRANDA
Why speaks my father so ungently? This
Is the third man that e’er I saw, the first
That e’er I sigh’d for: pity move my father
To be inclined my way!
