Salomé Death Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Line)

Quote #4

JOKANAAN Get thee behind me! I hear in the palace the beating of the wings of the angel of death.

THE YOUNG SYRIAN Princess, I beseech thee to go within.

JOKANAAN Angel of the Lord God, what dost thou here with thy sword? Whom seekest thou in this palace? The day of him who shall die in a robe of silver has not yet come. (140-2)

Here we see that Jokanaan 1) fully expects some kind of final judgment and 2) is in contact with the Lord God and his messenger, but 3) is nonetheless surprised to see him in the palace.

Quote #5

SALOMÉ I am amorous of thy body, Jokanaan! Thy body is white, like the lilies of a field that the mower hath never mowed. Thy body is white like the snows that lie on the mountains of Judæa, and come down into the valleys. The roses in the garden of the Queen of Arabia are not so white as thy body… There is nothing in the world so white as thy body. Suffer me to touch thy body.

JOKANAAN Back! daughter of Babylon! By woman came evil into the world. Speak not to me. I will not listen to thee. I listen but to the voice of the Lord God.

SALOMÉ Thy body is hideous. It is like the body of a leper. It is like a plastered wall, where vipers have crawled; like a plastered wall where the scorpions have made their nest. It is like a whited sepulchre, full of loathsome things. It is horrible, thy body is horrible. (145-147)

Here, again, we see life and death brought into close proximity. The whiteness of Jokanaan's body, which Salomé sees as pure, just as quickly becomes leprous, sepulchral, decaying.

Quote #6

FIRST SOLDIER We must bear away the body to another place. The Tetrarch does not care to see dead bodies, save the bodies of those whom he himself has slain. (166)

Herod clearly has some hang ups about death; he wants to maintain the illusion that only he can end life.