Bardisms (24 page)

In other words:

Hear me, you bullets, you lead deliverymen that travel fast on a fiery explosion: miss your mark! Split apart the air that closes together again behind you, air that makes a whizzing noise as you fly. Just don’t touch my husband!

How to say it:

Helena’s metaphor here imagines bullets as messengers made of lead that ride violently and fast not on horseback but instead on fire. It’s an image that’s typical of her rich imagination, which marks her as one of the most poetical of all Shakespeare’s heroines. To bring this speech to life, imagine that wherever you are, you’re capable of speaking directly to the enemy artillery being fired on whatever battlefield where your beloved may be fighting. Think of yourself making a cell-phone call to an AK-47 in Anbar Province: “Yo, bullets! Listen up! Make all the noise you want, but don’t hit my honey!”

The monosyllabic phrases on lines 3 and 4 are the most important words in the speech. Take your time with them and give each word in them real weight.
Fly. With. False. Aim! Do. Not. Touch. My. Lord!

The vowels in these lines are also indispensable and highly expressive. The long
o
sound that starts the speech; the three long
i
’s in
ride
,
violent
, and
fire
; the long
i
, long
a
, long
e
,
ooooh
,
uhhhh
, and
awww
of lines 3 and 4: these make Helena’s speech into a kind of aria of plaintiveness and desperate prayer. Explore them.

Substitute
lady
for
lord
, or, if some other term is more appropriate to your soldier, use
boy
,
girl
,
man
, or
wife
.

SHAKESPEARE ON REPUTATION

The purest treasure mortal times afford Is spotless reputation; that away,

Men are but gilded loam, or painted clay.

—M
OWBRAY
,
Richard II
, 1.1.177–79

Shakespeare’s was a period obsessed with rank, status, and hierarchy. Among the hoi polloi, one’s place in the pecking order determined everything from where one lived to whom one married to what one did on the job. At court, the other end of the social spectrum, the vicissitudes of rank also counted for everything. The game of “who loses and who wins; who’s in, who’s out,” as Lear puts it, was a blood sport. A gaffe could be disastrous, a faux pas could derail a career, and a scandal could—and often did—end in tragedy. Sound familiar? In the Renaissance, as today, when “mistakes have been made,” the consequences are dire. That explains why nearly every one of Shakespeare’s mentions of reputation comes in the context of the unbearable thought of its endangerment or imminent loss, and why his most vivid passages on the matter remain among the most frequently quoted lines from his plays. For all the differences between our society and Shakespeare’s, they have in common a fear of public disgrace and a keen sense of the devastation that follows it.

NOTHING’S MORE IMPORTANT THAN MY GOOD NAME

If you don’t agree with
Richard II
’s Duke of Mowbray, quoted above, that a good reputation is “the purest treasure mortal times afford,” then just ask Eliot Spitzer, Gary Hart, Larry Craig, John Edwards, or any of the other beyond-reproach politicos who have in recent years flamed out in public shamefests of their own invention. They’ll tell you what it feels like to utter the cri de coeur that shatters forth from
Othello
’s Lt. Cassio, the Act 2, Scene 3 lines that are the last word on a precipitous fall from grace:

Reputation, reputation, reputation—O, I ha’ lost my reputation, I ha’ lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial! My reputation, Iago, my reputation!

Scandal-prone politicians usually have only themselves to blame for their tattered reputations. Cassio, on the other hand, is set up by a bad guy: Iago. Honest, honest Iago. In an irony so typical of how Shakespeare sees the world, this hypocrite, this wizard of deceit, this manufacturer of Spitzerian disgraces, gets the great Bardism on the importance of a good reputation.

Good name in man and woman, dear my lord,

Is the immediate jewel of their souls.

Who steals my purse steals trash; ’tis something, nothing;

’Twas mine, ’tis his, and has been slave to thousands.

But he that filches from me my good name 5

Robs me of that which not enriches him

And makes me poor indeed.

—I
AGO
,
Othello
, 3.3.160–66

In other words:

For men and women alike, my friend, a good reputation is the one valuable possession held closer than any other. Swiping my money is like swiping garbage. It’s worth something, sure, but it’s trivial. It was mine, now it’s his. So what? It belonged to thousands of others before I had it. On the other hand, whoever makes off with my reputation grabs something that doesn’t make him any richer but that leaves me broke in the worst way.

How to use it:

With this Bardism, you can urge someone to consider the consequences of their actions before they commit to them. Or you can remind someone who would level an accusation that they hold tremendous power in their hands. It’s Shakespeare on the Occasion of Castigating a Gossip, as well as Shakespeare on the Occasion of “Governor, what
were
you thinking?”

The speech’s many antitheses are crucial to communicating its sense.
Man
versus
woman
;
purse
versus
trash
;
something
versus
nothing
;
mine
versus
his
; and
not enriches him
versus
makes me poor
. These antitheses all support an overarching opposition that shapes the entire speech:
steals my purse
versus
filches my good name
. Note that the two halves of that juxtaposition are on either side of a very important fulcrum:
But
. This speech is a great illustration of that little word’s power in Shakespeare. You can’t emphasize it too much. “But” turns an argument around and drives home its central point.

Substitute
dear my lady
for
dear my lord
if necessary.