in A Christian Turned Turk (The Two Famous Pirates) — Daborne, Robert
Metadata
Play
A Christian Turned Turk (The Two Famous Pirates)
Author
Daborne, Robert
Year (catalogued)
1612
First performance
1610
Decade
1610s
Genre
Tragedy
Play type
Boys Professional
Company
Unknown
Speech prefix(es)
Ray.
Words
424
Characters
2265
Typicality
0.41 (cosine to cluster centroid)
TCP id
A19757
BritDrama no.
1642
Cluster
Cluster 10 — Mourners, mothers & doleful voices
Important excerpts
No keyword-matching excerpt could be extracted (the cluster label doesn't share vocabulary with this character's speech).
Full speech
For ever be he servile that so makes they. Hardhearted; man, I cannot term thee, its A name that bears too much of pity int, Compared with so inhumane; creature Wertenberg thou a father, These tears would move thee, that bemoan a sons, Nay all my children's, worse then funeral, Their ever thraldom, but nature well denied Issu to thee, least in thy barbarous gilded She had be a party. When thy affectioned soul Had felt how much the name of child moves, with what care, How many jealous fears we view there infancy, Least having felt all this, thy accursed hand Should yet have dared to make men childless. Inhuman dog! o I could tear thee villain, Be gentle, take his money, forgive me sir, I see you are kind, would not now partly us That twenty and odd years have grown together, Will you not take it? give him so Jew, I will deserve they, see I am not old, No wrinkle is on my brow, these are but frowns, Raised by his unkind refusal of my offer. See what plump veins I have, no sinews shrunk, These are not gray-hairs, they are only white To show the lightness of my spirit: come Manacle these arms, you shall see us threee Tug the days eye out, there's not a father And his two boys shall dare to undertake us, The sun outvied we'll set us down together And with our sadder cheer out-mourne the night, And speak the happiness we might have lived too: How by mine own hearth in cold wintereues I might have told my sons some ancient tales, Which they might one day from their grandsire speak. We'll add unto our woes thus by compare Of what our joys might have been, then we'll curse, And when we want a plague, we'll think upon This bloody murderer, we shall have store then: Be eloquent in bitter execrations, Our choler vented, then again we'll weep, Till tears glew up our eyes to mock sad sleep. Is there no ear for misery to beat at? My sons, Frederick, Albert, they are gone, sent To perpetual vasselladge, I loved you boys A little better then to outlive your slaveries. I will not curse thee monster, I know my thoughts Cannot arrive unto so black revenge, As shall attend thee: crack, crack, you overladen strings, And set a miserable old man free, So, so, I will appeal for you my sons to the high Court Here none but beasts of prey Tigers resort.
Plot summary
Plot — A Christian Turned Turk (The Two Famous Pirates)
By a ruse, the pirate Ward takes prisoner two French merchants, Ferdinand and Albert. He attacks the ship taking Alizia to her bridegroom, Young Raymond, and kills her brother; she escapes by disguising herself as a ship-boy, Fidelio. Another pirate, Francisco, challenges him for the spoils; they engage in single combat, and ultimately agree to share the booty. During the fight, Ward’s men Gismund and Gallop mutiny and steal a ship, and make for Tunis, taking the disguised Alizia with them. Ward swears vengeance, seizes further prisoners, among them Alizia’s fiancé, and sells them into slavery in Tunis. Gallop makes his peace with Ward by pretending he was abducted, like ‘Fidelio’. The Turkish authorities in Tunis attempt to convert Ward to Islam. He is initially reluctant, but agrees when Voada offers herself as his wife; even so, he evades circumcision by putting an ape’s tail under the knife instead of his penis. He marries Voada as planned and gives her ‘Fidelio’ as her page; but in fact ‘Fidelio’ has been the object of her affections all along, and she has no sexual interest in Ward. ‘Fidelio’ agrees to sleep with her if she arranges for a particular slave to escape, claiming him to be a brother (though of course it is really Young Raymond). To evade the sexual part of the bargain, ‘Fidelio’ then makes an alternative arrangement with Ward, who agrees to help her, but then double-crosses her by telling his wife. Voada kills Raymond, thinking he is trying to rob her of ‘Fidelio’, then Alizia kills herself. Seeking revenge, Voada tries to attack Ward; she is slightly wounded when he defends himself, but exaggerates the injury in order to get him arrested. (The Tunisian authorities are uninterested in the murder of the two Christians.) Ward stabs himself, and dies cursing Turkish treachery. In the other plot, Gallop makes a date for sex with Agar. Her jealous husband Benwash allows the tryst to go ahead, since he needs definite proof of adultery if he is to end the marriage. Meanwhile, the reformed pirate Dansiker has been offered a pardon by the French King, but wishes to do something positive to redeem his past crimes, rather than passively accept forgiveness; so he plans to rid Tunis of its pirates by blowing up the town. Gallop keeps his date with Agar, but thieves steal his clothes and rope ladder while he is busy enjoying himself. The couple are disturbed by Dansiker’s explosion, which sets the house on fire, and Gallop has to escape in a state of…