: Act 2, Scene 1 Translation

    A side-by-side translation of Act 2, Scene 1 of from the original Shakespeare into modern English.

      Original Text

     Translated Text

      Source: Folger Shakespeare Library

    Enter Valentine and Speed, carrying a glove.

    SPEED
    Sir, your glove.

    VALENTINE Not mine. My gloves are on.

    SPEED
    Why, then, this may be yours, for this is but one.

    VALENTINE
    Ha? Let me see. Ay, give it me, it’s mine.
    Sweet ornament that decks a thing divine! 5
    Ah, Sylvia, Sylvia!

    SPEED, calling Madam Sylvia! Madam Sylvia!

    VALENTINE How now, sirrah?

    SPEED She is not within hearing, sir.

    VALENTINE Why, sir, who bade you call her? 10

    SPEED Your Worship, sir, or else I mistook.

    VALENTINE Well, you’ll still be too forward.

    SPEED And yet I was last chidden for being too slow.

    VALENTINE Go to, sir. Tell me, do you know Madam
    Sylvia? 15

    SPEED She that your Worship loves?

    VALENTINE Why, how know you that I am in love?

    SPEED Marry, by these special marks: first, you have
    learned, like Sir Proteus, to wreathe your arms like
    a malcontent; to relish a love song like a robin 20
    redbreast; to walk alone like one that had the
    pestilence; to sigh like a schoolboy that had lost his
    ABC; to weep like a young wench that had buried
    her grandam; to fast like one that takes diet; to
    watch like one that fears robbing; to speak puling 25
    like a beggar at Hallowmas. You were wont, when
    you laughed, to crow like a cock; when you walked,
    to walk like one of the lions. When you fasted, it was
    presently after dinner; when you looked sadly, it
    was for want of money. And now you are metamorphosed 30
    with a mistress, that when I look on you, I
    can hardly think you my master.

    VALENTINE Are all these things perceived in me?

    SPEED They are all perceived without you.

    VALENTINE Without me? They cannot. 35

    SPEED Without you? Nay, that’s certain, for without
    you were so simple, none else would. But you are so
    without these follies, that these follies are within
    you and shine through you like the water in an
    urinal, that not an eye that sees you but is a 40
    physician to comment on your malady.

    VALENTINE But tell me, dost thou know my Lady
    Sylvia?

    SPEED She that you gaze on so as she sits at supper?

    VALENTINE Hast thou observed that? Even she I mean. 45

    SPEED Why, sir, I know her not.

    VALENTINE Dost thou know her by my gazing on her
    and yet know’st her not?

    SPEED Is she not hard-favored, sir?

    VALENTINE Not so fair, boy, as well-favored. 50

    SPEED Sir, I know that well enough.

    VALENTINE What dost thou know?

    SPEED That she is not so fair as, of you, well-favored.

    VALENTINE I mean that her beauty is exquisite but her
    favor infinite. 55

    SPEED That’s because the one is painted, and the other
    out of all count.

    VALENTINE How painted? And how out of count?

    SPEED Marry, sir, so painted to make her fair, that no
    man counts of her beauty. 60

    VALENTINE How esteem’st thou me? I account of her
    beauty.

    SPEED You never saw her since she was deformed.

    VALENTINE How long hath she been deformed?

    SPEED Ever since you loved her. 65

    VALENTINE I have loved her ever since I saw her, and
    still I see her beautiful.

    SPEED If you love her, you cannot see her.

    VALENTINE Why?

    SPEED Because love is blind. O, that you had mine eyes, 70
    or your own eyes had the lights they were wont to
    have when you chid at Sir Proteus for going
    ungartered!

    VALENTINE What should I see then?

    SPEED Your own present folly and her passing deformity; 75
    for he, being in love, could not see to garter his
    hose, and you, being in love, cannot see to put on
    your hose.

    VALENTINE Belike, boy, then you are in love, for last
    morning you could not see to wipe my shoes. 80

    SPEED True, sir, I was in love with my bed. I thank you,
    you swinged me for my love, which makes me the
    bolder to chide you for yours.

    VALENTINE In conclusion, I stand affected to her.

    SPEED I would you were set, so your affection would 85
    cease.

    VALENTINE Last night she enjoined me to write some
    lines to one she loves.

    SPEED And have you?

    VALENTINE I have. 90

    SPEED Are they not lamely writ?

    VALENTINE No, boy, but as well as I can do them.
    Peace, here she comes.

    Back in Milan, Speed helps Valentine put on his gloves and finds a third glove that belongs to Sylvia—the girl with whom Valentine has recently fallen head over heels in love.

    Speed teases Valentine about his crush and says that Valentine's been moping around like a lovesick puppy: sighing, folding his arms, singing love songs, refusing to eat, and crying like a girl weeping over her dead grandmother (he seriously says that).

    Then Speed proceeds to insult Valentine and Sylvia by implying that Sylvia is ugly but Valentine thinks she's beautiful because he's wearing love goggles.

    Regardless, Valentine says he definitely likes her. And last night she asked him to write a love letter to someone she loves. Speed asks him if he did it, and Valentine says he did the best he could. 

    Enter Sylvia.

    SPEED, aside O excellent motion! O exceeding puppet!
    Now will he interpret to her. 95

    VALENTINE Madam and mistress, a thousand
    good-morrows.

    SPEED, aside O, give ye good ev’n! Here’s a million of
    manners.

    SYLVIA Sir Valentine, and servant, to you two 100
    thousand.

    SPEED, aside He should give her interest, and she
    gives it him.

    VALENTINE
    As you enjoined me, I have writ your letter
    Unto the secret, nameless friend of yours, 105
    Which I was much unwilling to proceed in
    But for my duty to your Ladyship.

    He gives her a paper.

    SYLVIA
    I thank you, gentle servant, ’tis very clerkly done.

    VALENTINE
    Now trust me, madam, it came hardly off,
    For, being ignorant to whom it goes, 110
    I writ at random, very doubtfully.

    SYLVIA
    Perchance you think too much of so much pains?

    VALENTINE
    No, madam. So it stead you, I will write,
    Please you command, a thousand times as much,
    And yet— 115

    SYLVIA
    A pretty period. Well, I guess the sequel;
    And yet I will not name it And yet I care not.
    And yet take this again.

    She holds out the paper.

    And yet I thank you,
    Meaning henceforth to trouble you no more. 120

    SPEED, aside
    And yet you will; and yet another “yet.”

    VALENTINE
    What means your Ladyship? Do you not like it?

    SYLVIA
    Yes, yes, the lines are very quaintly writ,
    But, since unwillingly, take them again.
    Nay, take them. 125

    She again offers him the paper. 

    VALENTINE Madam, they are for you.

    SYLVIA
    Ay, ay. You writ them, sir, at my request,
    But I will none of them. They are for you.
    I would have had them writ more movingly.

    VALENTINE, taking the paper
    Please you, I’ll write your Ladyship another. 130

    SYLVIA
    And when it’s writ, for my sake read it over,
    And if it please you, so; if not, why, so.

    VALENTINE If it please me, madam? What then?

    SYLVIA
    Why, if it please you, take it for your labor.
    And so good-morrow, servant.  135

    Sylvia exits.

    Sylvia enters and lovelorn Valentine proceeds to shower her with compliments. She returns the affection, which Speed notices, though it seems to go over Valentine's head. 

    Valentine says he wrote the love letter for her, but he didn't like writing to someone he doesn't know on her behalf. In fact, he wouldn't have done it, but because she asked, he couldn't say no. 

    Sylvia reads the letter and is disappointed with how unemotional it is. Valentine, the goofball, didn't get that she was flirting and asking him to write the letter to himself. From her. With lots of gooey love. 

    She shoves the letter back at Valentine, telling him to try again—this time, the letter should be more passionate. 

    When he's done writing, he should read it over and make sure it pleases him. Valentine still doesn't get it. Why should the letter please him when it's being written for some anonymous bloke?

    SPEED, aside
    O jest unseen, inscrutable, invisible
    As a nose on a man’s face, or a weathercock on a
    steeple!
    My master sues to her, and she hath taught her
    suitor, 140
    He being her pupil, to become her tutor.
    O excellent device! Was there ever heard a better?
    That my master, being scribe, to himself should
    write the letter?

    VALENTINE How now, sir? What, are you reasoning 145
    with yourself?

    SPEED Nay, I was rhyming. ’Tis you that have the
    reason.

    VALENTINE To do what?

    SPEED To be a spokesman from Madam Sylvia. 150

    VALENTINE To whom?

    SPEED To yourself. Why, she woos you by a figure.

    VALENTINE What figure?

    SPEED By a letter, I should say.

    VALENTINE Why, she hath not writ to me! 155

    SPEED What need she when she hath made you write
    to yourself? Why, do you not perceive the jest?

    VALENTINE No, believe me.

    SPEED No believing you indeed, sir. But did you perceive
    her earnest? 160

    VALENTINE She gave me none, except an angry word.

    SPEED Why, she hath given you a letter.

    VALENTINE That’s the letter I writ to her friend.

    SPEED And that letter hath she delivered, and there an
    end. 165

    VALENTINE I would it were no worse.

    SPEED I’ll warrant you, ’tis as well.
    For often have you writ to her, and she, in modesty
    Or else for want of idle time, could not again reply,
    Or fearing else some messenger that might her 170
    mind discover,
    Herself hath taught her love himself to write unto
    her lover.
    All this I speak in print, for in print I found it. Why
    muse you, sir? ’Tis dinnertime. 175

    VALENTINE I have dined.

    SPEED Ay, but hearken, sir, though the chameleon love
    can feed on the air, I am one that am nourished by
    my victuals and would fain have meat. O, be not like
    your mistress! Be moved, be moved. 180

    They exit.

    Poor Valentine continues to be baffled by Sylvia's behavior until Speed explains why Sylvia is so upset. 

    He says that Valentine has written to Sylvia, sure, but she may not be able to write back—either because she doesn't have time, because she's too modest, or because she's worried that a messenger would read her letter and her reputation would be ruined. So...she's been very clever in getting Valentine to write to himself (except that Valentine has been a bit slow to pick up on her strategy). 

    Speed announces it's dinner time, but Valentine isn't hungry. He's full of love. Speed says that's great, buddy, but I need real food. So they go.