in A Looking Glass for London and England — Lodge, Thomas; Greene, Robert
Metadata
Play
A Looking Glass for London and England
Author
Lodge, Thomas; Greene, Robert
Year (catalogued)
1594
First performance
1588
Decade
1590s
Genre
Biblical Moral
Play type
Adult Professional
Company
Derby's (Strange's) Men
Speech prefix(es)
Rada. | Rad. | Radag. | Radagon.
Words
503
Characters
2725
Typicality
0.32 (cosine to cluster centroid)
TCP id
A06185
BritDrama no.
829
Cluster
Cluster 18 — Chronicle statesmen & prelates
Important excerpts
No keyword-matching excerpt could be extracted (the cluster label doesn't share vocabulary with this character's speech).
Full speech
Presumptuous Viceroy darest thou check thy Lord, Or twit him with the laws that nature lowes, Is not great Rasin above nature's reach, God upon earth, and all his will is law. Why the ̄ she is yours my Lord, for marriage Makes no exception, where Rasni does command. Wife or not wife, what so he likes is his. Dread not Oh King, at ordinary chance, These are but common exhalations, Drawn from the earth, in substance hight and dry, Or moist and thick, or Meteors combust, Matters and causes incident to time, Enkindled in the firy region first. Tut be not now a Roman Angurer, Approach the Tent, look on Remelia. What makes Rasni moody? Loss of one? As if no more were left so fair as she? Behold a dainty minion for the nonce, Fair Alvida the Paphlagonian Queen, Woo her, and leave this weeping for the dead. Tut Kings this meum tuum should not know. Is she not fair? Is not her husband hence? Hold, take her at the hands of Radagon. A Pretty peat to driven your mourn away. Villain disturb me not, I cannot stay. Traitor unto my Princely Majesty, How darest thou lay thy hands upon a King? What succour me, false callet hence avant? Old dotard pack, move not my patience, I know you not, Kings never look so low. Dare you enforce the furrows of revenge, Within the brows of royal Radagon? Villain avant, hence beggars with your brats, Marshal why whip you not these rogues away? That thus disturb our royal Majesty. Yet more contempt before my royalty? Slaves fetch out tortures worse then Titius plagues, And tear their tongues from their blasphemous heads. Dread Monarch, this is but a lunacy, Which grief and want hath brought the woman to, What does this passion hold you every Moon? Mighty King he is, I blushing, tell it to your Majesty. Because he is a base and abject swain, My mother and her brat both beggarly, Unmeet to be allied unto a King. Should I that look on Rasnes countenance, And march amid his royal equipage, Embase my self to speak to such as they? It impious so to impair the love That mighty Rasni bears to Radagon. I would your grace would quit them from your sighed That dare presume to look on Jove's compare. Hence begging scold, hence caitiff clogged with years, On pain of death revisit not the Court. UUas I conceived by such a scurvy trull, Or brought to light by such a lump of dirt: Go Lossell trot it to the cart and spade, Thou art unmeet to look upon a King, Much less to be the father of a King. Like you her my Lord? She blushing yields concent, make no dispute: The King is sad, and must be gladded straight. Let Paphlagonian King go mourn meanwhile. Does not the brightness of his majesty, Shadow his deeds from being counted faults. Hence bastard boy for fear you taste the whip.
Plot summary
Plot — A Looking Glass for London and England
Triumphant over the King of Jerusalem, the Assyrian king Rasni declares himself divine and marries his sister, Remilia; a viceroy who objects is banished and the flatterer Radagon given his place. Inordinately proud of her beauty, Remilia is struck by lightning. Rasni is unable to revive her, and buries her in state; but is encouraged by Radagon to think of the living rather than the dead, and to take Alvida, wife of the King of Paphlagonia. When her husband objects to the adulterous liaison, she poisons him. Alvida continues to be unfaithful: her ambition attracts her to Rasni, but her sexual appetite favours the Viceroy of Cilicia, so she takes both. Thrasybulus and Alcon are both cheated by a usurer to whom they are trying to repay money: he keeps them talking beyond the due hour and then secures possession of Thrasybulus’ farm and Alcon’s cow as a penalty for non-payment. They attempt to sue him, but he bribes both the judge and their lawyer, and they lose their cases. Alcon appeals to Radagon, his son, to help his starving family, but Radagon is too proud to acknowledge his parent, and Rasni has him ejected from the court. Radagon’s mother curses him, and: he is swallowed by subterranean fire. Thrasybulus ard ===== PAGE 473 ===== 1589 Alcon turn to begging and theft in their destitution, and try to pawn stolen clothes to the usurer. Adam, a smith’s man, goes off with some ruffians to get drunk. After a drunken quarrel over a woman, one of them is killed. Rasni finds Adam in a stupor by the body, but decides that murder is ordinary drunken behaviour, and takes no judicial action. Adam and his mistress are having an illicit affair. The smith catches them canoodling, but when he attempts to take reprisals, Adam argues that he is the one who should be beaten for the sin of jealousy. An angel orders Jonah to preach against Nineveh’s wickedness. He is reluctant, and takes a ship to Tarshish instead. The ship encounters a storm, which Jonah identifies as a sign of divine displeasure at his disobedience. He has himself thrown overboard, and the storm abates. A whale swallows him, then belks him up on shore. He goes to Nineveh as ordered. These events are watched and commented on by the prophet Hosea, brought from Jerusalem by an angel. The angel removes him before the Ninevites’ corruption receives its due reward in the city’s destruction, and he returns to preach to the Jews of Nineveh’s wickedness. ‘The city is troubled by apparitions and portents, but…