A Midsummer Night’s Dream Helena Lines

Act 1 Scene 1After (Hermia)God speed fair Helena! whither away? Call you me fair? that fair again unsay.Demetrius loves your fair: O happy fair!Your eyes are lode-stars; and your tongue’s sweet airMore tuneable than lark to shepherd’s ear,When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.Sickness is catching: O, were favour so,O, teach me how you look, and with what artYou sway the motion of Demetrius’ heart.
Act 1 Scene 1After (Hermia)I frown upon him, yet he loves me still. O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!
Act 1 Scene 1After (Hermia)I give him curses, yet he gives me love. O that my prayers could such affection move!
Act 1 Scene 1After (Hermia)The more I hate, the more he follows me. The more I love, the more he hateth me.
Act 1 Scene 1After (Hermia)His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine. None, but your beauty: would that fault were mine!
Act 2 Scene 1After (Demetrius)I love thee not, therefore pursue me not.Where is Lysander and fair Hermia?The one I’ll slay, the other slayeth me.Thou told’st me they were stolen unto this wood;And here am I, and wode within this wood,Because I cannot meet my Hermia.Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more. You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant;But yet you draw not iron, for my heartIs true as steel: leave you your power to draw,And I shall have no power to follow you.
Act 2 Scene 1After (Demetrius)Do I entice you? do I speak you fair?Or, rather, do I not in plainest truthTell you, I do not, nor I cannot love you? And even for that do I love you the more.I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius,The more you beat me, I will fawn on you:Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike me,Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave,Unworthy as I am, to follow you.What worser place can I beg in your love,–And yet a place of high respect with me,–Than to be used as you use your dog?
Act 2 Scene 1After (Demetrius)Tempt not too much the hatred of my spirit;For I am sick when I do look on thee. And I am sick when I look not on you.
Act 2 Scene 1After (Demetrius)You do impeach your modesty too much,To leave the city and commit yourselfInto the hands of one that loves you not. Your virtue is my privilege: for thatIt is not night when I do see your face,Therefore I think I am not in the night.
Act 2 Scene 1After (Demetrius)I will not stay thy questions; let me go:Or, if thou follow me, do not believeBut I shall do thee mischief in the wood. Ay, in the temple, in the town, the field,You do me mischief. Fie, Demetrius!Your wrongs do set a scandal on my sex:We cannot fight for love, as men may do;We should be woo’d and were not made to woo.(Demetrius exits)I’ll follow thee and make a heaven of hell,To die upon the hand I love so well. (Exit)
Act 2 Scene 2After (Puck)Through the forest have I gone.But Athenian found I none,On whose eyes I might approveThis flower’s force in stirring love.Night and silence.–Who is here?Weeds of Athens he doth wear:This is he, my master said,Despised the Athenian maid;And here the maiden, sleeping sound,On the dank and dirty ground.When thou wakest, let love forbidSleep his seat on thy eyelid:So awake when I am gone;For I must now to Oberon. (He exits) (Enter)Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Demetrius.
Act 2 Scene 2After (Demetrius)I charge thee, hence, and do not haunt me thus. O, wilt thou darkling leave me? do not so.
Act 2 Scene 2After (Demetrius)Stay, on thy peril: I alone will go.(He exits) O, I am out of breath in this fond chase!The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace.Happy is Hermia, wheresoe’er she lies;For she hath blessed and attractive eyes.How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears:If so, my eyes are oftener wash’d than hers.No, no, I am as ugly as a bear;For beasts that meet me run away for fear:But who is here? Lysander! on the ground!Dead? or asleep? I see no blood, no wound.Lysander if you live, good sir, awake.
Act 2 Scene 2After (Lysander)[Awaking] And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake.Transparent Helena! Nature shows art,That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart.Where is Demetrius? O, how fit a wordIs that vile name to perish on my sword! Do not say so, Lysander; say not soWhat though he love your Hermia? Lord, what though?Yet Hermia still loves you: then be content.
Act 2 Scene 2After (Lysander)Content with Hermia! No; I do repentThe tedious minutes I with her have spent.Not Hermia but Helena I love:Who will not change a raven for a dove? Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born?When at your hands did I deserve this scorn?Is’t not enough, is’t not enough, young man,That I did never, no, nor never can,Deserve a sweet look from Demetrius’ eye,But you must flout my insufficiency?O, that a lady, of one man refused.Should of another therefore be abused! (Exit)
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Why should you think that I should woo in scorn?Scorn and derision never come in tears. You do advance your cunning more and more.When truth kills truth, O devilish-holy fray!These vows are Hermia’s: will you give her o’er?
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)I had no judgment when to her I swore. Nor none, in my mind, now you give her o’er.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Demetrius)[Awaking] O Helena, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine!To what, my love, shall I compare thine eyne? O spite! O hell! I see you all are bentTo set against me for your merriment:If you were civil and knew courtesy,You would not do me thus much injury.Can you not hate me, as I know you do,But you must join in souls to mock me too?If you were men, as men you are in show,You would not use a gentle lady so.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)You are unkind, Demetrius; be not so; For you love Hermia; this you know I know:And here, with all good will, with all my heart,In Hermia’s love I yield you up my part;And yours of Helena to me bequeath,Whom I do love and will do till my death. Never did mockers waste more idle breath.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)You speak not as you think: it cannot be. Lo, she is one of this confederacy!Now I perceive they have conjoin’d all threeTo fashion this false sport, in spite of me.Injurious Hermia! most ungrateful maid!Have you conspired, have you with these contrivedTo bait me with this foul derision?
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)I am amazed at your passionate words.I scorn you not: it seems that you scorn me. Have you not set Lysander, as in scorn,To follow me and praise my eyes and face?And made your other love, Demetrius,Who even but now did spurn me with his foot,To call me goddess, nymph, divine and rare.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)I understand not what you mean by this. Ay, do, persever, counterfeit sad looks,Make mouths upon me when I turn my back;But fare ye well.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Stay, gentle Helena; hear my excuse:My love, my life my soul, fair Helena! O excellent!
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)Do you not jest? Yes, sooth; and so do you.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)You thief of love! what, have you come by nightAnd stolen my love’s heart from him? Fie, fie! you counterfeit, you puppet, you!
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)Puppet? why so? ay, that way goes the game.Now I perceive that she hath made compareBetween our statures; she hath urged her height;I am not yet so lowBut that my nails can reach unto thine eyes. I pray you, though you mock me, gentlemen,Let her not hurt me:You perhaps may think,Because she is something lower than myself,That I can match her.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)Lower! hark, again. Good Hermia, do not be so bitter with me.I evermore did love you, Hermia,And now, so you will let me quiet go.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)Why, get you gone: who is’t that hinders you? A foolish heart, that I leave here behind.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)What, with Lysander? With Demetrius.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Demetrius)No, sir, she shall not, though you take her part. O, when she’s angry, she is keen and shrewd!And though she be but little, she is fierce.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)You, mistress, all this coil is ‘long of you:Nay, go not back. Your hands than mine are quicker for a fray,My legs are longer though, to run away.(Exit)
Act 3 Scene 2After (Demetrius)If ever I thy face by daylight see:Now, go thy way. Faintness constraineth meTo measure out my length on this cold bed.By day’s approach look to be visited. (Enter)O weary night, O long and tedious night,Abate thy hour! Shine comforts from the east,That I may back to Athens by daylight,From these that my poor company detest:And sleep, that sometimes shuts up sorrow’s eye,Steal me awhile from mine own company.(Go to sleep)
August 11, 2019