Enter Isabella and Francisca, a Nun. ISABELLA
And have you nuns no farther privileges? NUN
Are not these large enough? ISABELLA
Yes, truly. I speak not as desiring more,
But rather wishing a more strict restraint
Upon the sisterhood, the votarists of Saint Clare. 5 LUCIO, within
Ho, peace be in this place! ISABELLA Who’s that which calls? NUN
It is a man’s voice. Gentle Isabella,
Turn you the key and know his business of him.
You may; I may not. You are yet unsworn. 10
When you have vowed, you must not speak with men
But in the presence of the Prioress.
Then, if you speak, you must not show your face;
Or if you show your face, you must not speak.
He calls again. I pray you answer him. 15 ISABELLA
Peace and prosperity! Who is ’t that calls? | At a strict and disciplined convent, Isabella and Francesca discuss all the "privileges" Isabella is about to give up by becoming a nun. Isabella says she sure does wish they were stricter at St. Clare's. Lucio comes knocking at the door and Sister Francesca tells Isabella she'll have to talk with him. Sister F explains that nuns at St. Clare's aren't allowed to talk to a man and show their faces at the same time. They can do one or the other but not both. Also, any speaking or showing of faces to men must be done in the presence of the prioress (head nun). Since Isabella is still a "novice" (she hasn't taken any final vows), she's can talk to Lucio face-to-face without breaking any rules. Presumably, Sister Francesca hightails it out of there, even though there's no stage direction saying she does. |
Enter Lucio. LUCIO
Hail, virgin, if you be, as those cheek-roses
Proclaim you are no less. Can you so stead me
As bring me to the sight of Isabella,
A novice of this place and the fair sister 20
To her unhappy brother, Claudio? ISABELLA
Why “her unhappy brother”? Let me ask,
The rather for I now must make you know
I am that Isabella, and his sister. LUCIO
Gentle and fair, your brother kindly greets you. 25
Not to be weary with you, he’s in prison. ISABELLA
Woe me, for what? LUCIO
For that which, if myself might be his judge,
He should receive his punishment in thanks:
He hath got his friend with child. 30 ISABELLA
Sir, make me not your story. LUCIO
’Tis true.
I would not, though ’tis my familiar sin
With maids to seem the lapwing and to jest,
Tongue far from heart, play with all virgins so. 35
I hold you as a thing enskied and sainted,
By your renouncement an immortal spirit,
And to be talked with in sincerity
As with a saint. ISABELLA
You do blaspheme the good in mocking me. 40 LUCIO
Do not believe it. Fewness and truth, ’tis thus:
Your brother and his lover have embraced;
As those that feed grow full, as blossoming time
That from the seedness the bare fallow brings
To teeming foison, even so her plenteous womb 45
Expresseth his full tilth and husbandry. ISABELLA
Someone with child by him? My cousin Juliet? LUCIO
Is she your cousin? ISABELLA
Adoptedly, as schoolmaids change their names
By vain though apt affection. 50 LUCIO
She it is. ISABELLA
O, let him marry her! | Lucio enters and says "Hail, virgin!" (We're not even kidding.) He says he hates to bother Isabella, but he's got bad news—Claudio, her brother, has been thrown in slammer because he got a "friend" of his "with child" (that's Shakespeare's gentle way of saying "pregnant"). Isabella doesn't believe him and tells him to stop lying. Lucio confesses that he often lies to women in order to get them into bed, but in this case he's telling the truth. He would never lie to Isabella because he has a lot of respect for virgins—as far as Lucio's concerned, Isabella's practically a "saint." Next, Lucio describes how Claudio and "his lover embraced" and now the woman's womb has grown "plenteous," like a field that's been plowed and planted with seed. Isabella guesses that the mystery girl with the plowed womb is Juliet and suggests that the couple solve the problem by getting hitched. |
LUCIO
This is the point.
The Duke is very strangely gone from hence;
Bore many gentlemen, myself being one, 55
In hand, and hope of action; but we do learn,
By those that know the very nerves of state,
His givings-out were of an infinite distance
From his true-meant design. Upon his place,
And with full line of his authority, 60
Governs Lord Angelo, a man whose blood
Is very snow-broth; one who never feels
The wanton stings and motions of the sense,
But doth rebate and blunt his natural edge
With profits of the mind: study and fast. 65
He—to give fear to use and liberty,
Which have for long run by the hideous law
As mice by lions—hath picked out an act
Under whose heavy sense your brother’s life
Falls into forfeit. He arrests him on it, 70
And follows close the rigor of the statute
To make him an example. All hope is gone
Unless you have the grace by your fair prayer
To soften Angelo. And that’s my pith of business
’Twixt you and your poor brother. 75 ISABELLA
Doth he so
Seek his life? LUCIO
Has censured him already,
And, as I hear, the Provost hath a warrant
For ’s execution. 80 ISABELLA
Alas, what poor ability’s in me
To do him good? LUCIO
Assay the power you have. ISABELLA
My power? Alas, I doubt— LUCIO
Our doubts are traitors 85
And makes us lose the good we oft might win
By fearing to attempt. Go to Lord Angelo
And let him learn to know, when maidens sue
Men give like gods; but when they weep and kneel,
All their petitions are as freely theirs 90
As they themselves would owe them. ISABELLA
I’ll see what I can do. LUCIO
But speedily! ISABELLA
I will about it straight,
No longer staying but to give the Mother 95
Notice of my affair. I humbly thank you.
Commend me to my brother. Soon at night
I’ll send him certain word of my success. LUCIO
I take my leave of you. ISABELLA Good sir, adieu. 100 They exit. | Lucio explains that simply getting married won't solve Claudio's problem. The Duke has mysteriously vanished and Angelo has taken his place as Vienna's head honcho. Since Angelo doesn't have a sexual appetite, he's enforcing the maximum punishment. Claudio is a goner for sure...unless Isabella can use her super virgin powers to persuade Angelo that Claudio's life should be spared. According to Lucio, men are suckers for "maidens." Isabella agrees to talk to Angelo on her brother's behalf. |