And my ending is despairApplause, very good. But the assault upon mercy is a strange notion, isn’t it? Prayer, and the grace of God is calls down, may pierce the horny carapace of sin and neglect that wraps the sinners around—but how can it pierce mercy?
Unless I be relieved by prayer,
Which pierces so that it assaults
Mercy itself, and frees all faults.
As you from crimes would pardoned be
Let your indulgence set me free.
Monday, 19 March 2012
Shakespeare's mercy
Prospero asks for applause.
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5 comments:
I suppose there's an idea of Mercy as a fortress in which people are imprisoned while their faults are accepted, mitigated, overlooked but not forgiven; once truly forgiven mercy is impossible, because how do you show mercy to the innocent?
Perhaps 'assault' meant something less military and less violent to Shakespeare. The word derives from Latin assultus, a 'leaping towards'. Prayer is so efficacious (piercing) that it leaps towards heaven and the font of mercy, thus freeing the person praying from sin (all faults). Or perhaps mercy is here conceived as kept in some sort of heavenly bank vault which is opened when assaulted by prayer. Or perhaps Shakespeare needed a word to rhyme with 'fault', and 'assault' was the only one that occurred to him (even Shakespeare must have had bad-rhyme days).
It is a bit of a tangle, isn't it. I can sort-of trace through a line of thought that goes: 'despair is a sin, and difficult to penetrate; but prayer can break through its horny hide and get at the salvageable soul inside which can then encounter Mercy and free all faults. But that isn't really what's written.
Another thought--'prayer' and 'Mercy' tempt us to think of god, but Prospero, or the actor playing him, is addressing the audience here.
Perhaps he, both as the character Prospero and the actor playing that character, is praying to the audience by focussing on their sense of mercy and asking them to forgive his faults as a character and as an actor. By clapping, the audience acknowledges both the character and the actor, thus releasing Prospero from the island and the actor from the role. It's a wonderful bit of stagecraft that invites audience participation in bringing the play to an end.
Another thought--'prayer' and 'Mercy' tempt us to think of god, but Prospero, or the actor playing him, is addressing the audience here.
Perhaps he, both as the character Prospero and the actor playing that character, is praying to the audience by focussing on their sense of mercy and asking them to forgive his faults as a character and as an actor. By clapping, the audience acknowledges both the character and the actor, thus releasing Prospero from the island and the actor from the role. It's a wonderful bit of stagecraft that invites audience participation in bringing the play to an end.
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