free booknotes online

Help / FAQ




<- Previous Page | First Page | Next Page ->
MonkeyNotes-Troilus and Cressida by William Shakespeare
Table of Contents | Printable Version

Notes

The sense of absurdity continues unabated through this scene. Pandarus apes courtly graces and the servant apes Pandarus. Courts, like all restricted societies, generate their own idiom and devise many nice distinctions in the use of every common word or phrase. The gracious scene of Lord, Lady and Servant is a set piece of high farce in which the language of courtly Petrarchan adoration can carry only the wheedling of a flatterer and the frivolous licentiousness of a bored middle-aged couple. So we have Pandarus babbling: ‘Fair be to you, my lord, and to all this fair company; fair desires in all fair measure fairly guide them - especially to you, fair queen: fair thoughts be your fair pillow.’


For the first time in this scene, we get to meet Helen, and she is revealed as truly vapid, indolent, unintelligent and given to bawdy humor. She hardly seems worth all the trouble, and this is a moment of profound anticlimax. She is revealed as a beauty but one devoid of any other admirable qualities - a mere argument for continuing the War.

The scene also gives us an insight into the character of Paris who appears here as weak-willed and besotted with Helen. He even refers to her as his ‘Nell.’ When, at the end of the scene, he tells Helen that ‘Sweet, above thought I love thee’, the audience recognizes him as a man of low intellectual capability.

Table of Contents | Printable Version


<- Previous Page | First Page | Next Page ->
MonkeyNotes-Troilus and Cressida by William Shakespeare
Google
Web
PinkMonkey

Google
  Web PinkMonkey.com   

All Contents Copyright © PinkMonkey.com
All rights reserved. Further Distribution Is Strictly Prohibited.


About Us
 | Advertising | Contact Us | Privacy Policy | Home Page
This page was last updated: 11/12/2023 12:31:36 AM