Early Modern Drama · Character Archetypes

MELOS

in The Woman in the Moon — Lyly, John

Metadata

PlayThe Woman in the Moon
AuthorLyly, John
Year (catalogued)1597
First performance1593
Decade1590s
GenreComedy
Play typeBoys Professional
CompanyChildren of Paul's (first)
Theaterbefore the Court;
Speech prefix(es)Melos. | Mel.
Words835
Characters4414
Typicality0.48 (cosine to cluster centroid)
TCP idA06629
BritDrama no.819
ClusterCluster 5 — Romantic leads (high style)

Important excerpts

No keyword-matching excerpt could be extracted (the cluster label doesn't share vocabulary with this character's speech).

Full speech

Oh eyes more fair then is the morning star. Sweet Nature's pride, let me but see thy hand, And servant like, shall Melos wait on thee: And bear thy train: as in the glorious heavens, Perseus supports his love Andromeda: Whose thirty stars, whither they rise or fallen. He falls or riseth, hanging at her heals. She thrusts her hands in her pocket. Speak once Pandora to thy loving friends. What shall we do to vanquish her disease? The death of that were life to our desires: But let us go, we must not leave her thus. Exeunt. Saturn descendeth on the stage. Saturn hath laid foundation to the rest: Whereon to built the ruin of this dame: And spot her innocence with vicious thoughts, My turn is passed, and Jupiter is next. Exit. Melos must speed, or die. How long shall cares cut off my flowering prime, Before the harvest of my love be in? The only promise of thy future love, Will drown the secret heaps of my despair, In endless Ocean of expected joys. They give me life, and yet they let me die. And as thou wilt, so let me live or die, In life or death I must obey thy will. We go Pandora. The prize is mine, my sword cut off his head. Melos will die before he loose his right. Oh grant me love or wound me to the death. I swear the Like by all our country gods, Oh happy Stesias, but unhappy me, Oh Iphicles, behold the heavenly Nymph. Yea and the shepherd's that yet love thee still. Then would I make a world and give it thee. Oh that so fair a Lamb should be devoured: I'll go and rescue him. What makes Learchus here? Too foolish Melos that yet dotes on her. Dimde be the sunshine of her ravishing eyes. How oft have I leaned on her silver breast, She singing on her Lute, and Melos being the note. But ere I slept. Caetera quis nescit? Ah is she fair that is lascivious? Or that swain blessed that she makes but a stale. She played not unto Melos in her bower, Nor is his green bower strewed with Primrose leaves. This is Pandora's blood, hast Melos hast, And in her presence lance thy flesh as deep: Wicked Learchus, subtle Iphicles: You have undone me by your reaching wit. Once guilty, and suspected evermore, I'll never be guilty more, suspect me not. Pandora hath deceived me I am undone. Gunophilus, where is thy Mistress? She daunts Learchus with a strange aspect. I will go seek him in the busky groves. For thee I am sad, thou hast injured me, I pledge thee Iphicles. Pandora go with me to Stesias. Away base Iphieles. I defy thee Iphicles. Is this thy love to me? Follow me if thou darest, and fight it out. Nay to us all too false and full of guile, Yea he shall know she is lascivious. Forgive me love, it was not I alone, It was Learchus, and false Iphicles. Divine Pandora, stay thy desperate hand, May summer's lightning burn our Autumn crop, The thunders teeth plow up our fairest groves, The scorching sunbeam, dry up all our springs, And ruff winds blast the beauty of our plains, If Melos love not thee, more then his heart. I will Pandora, and to cure thy wound, Receive these virtuous herbs which I have found. When will the sun go down? fly Phœbus fly, Oh that thy steeds were winged with my swift thoughts: Now shouldst thou fallen in Thetis azure arms, And now would I fallen in Pandora's lap. Wherefore doth Iphicles desire the night? And I my love? here she will meet me straight, Exit Iphicles. See where she comes hiding her blushing eyes. My love Pandora for whose sake I live? Hide not thy beauty which is Melos sun. Here is none but us too, lay aside thy vale. What meanest thou by this. Such hap betide those that intend us ill. And thou this bloody napkin unto me. The wicked youngling flouteth us, let him go. Oh that a creature so divine as she, Whose beauty might enforce the heavens to blush, And make fair Nature angry at the heart, That she hath made her to obscure her self, Should be so fickle and so full of slights, And feigning love to all, love none at all. Here I abjure Pandora, and protest, To live for ever in a single life. Here lie the bloody Napkin which she sent, And with it my affection, and my love. Look how Pandora raves, now she is stark mad. The words we told thee Stesias were too true. Gunophilus brought me a bloody cloth, Saying for my love she was almost slain, And when I came she used me as this swain, Protesting love, and pointing me this place, Come let us leave him in this pensive mood. Such fortune happen to incredulus swains.

Plot summary

Plot — The Woman in the Moon
When. the SHépheérds of Utopia protest that, unlike all other creatures, they have no mates, Nature produces one she made earlier: a female statue, which Goneord animates by joining spirit with flesh, and to which DiS€6rd gives a tongue; Nature names her Pandora. The seven planets are jealous of Pandora, and take it in turns to cross her. First Saturn makes her melancholy, and she rejects all her wooers. Then jupiter makes her ambitious, and woos her himself; her acceptance angers JMO!) She sets the shepherds a-love test, to kill a savage boar; she will love the one who brings her its head. Ma#§ supplants Jupiter and makes Pandora aggressive: when the shepherds fight over who killed the boar, she joins in and wounds Stésias} Next Sl is in the ascendant, inducing Pandora to love, chastity, and other feminine virtues: she remorsefully accepts Stesias as her husband, and speaks ambiguous Latin prophecies about their future happiness. Wenus rises and makes Pandora amorous, so she wantons with the other shepherds. Stesias tries to catch her in the act, but G@iH@philis double-crosses him and he is persuaded of her chastity. Mereuty takes over and makes Pandora cunning and dishonest, qualities which save her when the three shepherds tell Stesias that she has indeed been unchaste: she is able to convince him that this is merely the jealousy of disappointed rivals, then pays back her accusers by making further assignations, which Stesias keeps, dressed as a woman, and beats them; they then swear to abjure women and live a single life. Meanwhile she steals Stesias’ jewels and elopes with Gunophilus, but on the way the ascent of Bia drives her mad. Stesias is again persuaded that Pandora is unchaste and, despairing, plans to kill her, but the planets intervene to protect her. Nature proposes to set her in one of the planets’ spheres, and she chooses that of Luna, since she has proven to be fundamentally changeable. Stesias is forced to accompany her, and he becomes the man in the moon.