Let Us Once Lose Our Oaths to Find Ourselves
-Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost
We heard from Love’s Labour’s Lost two weeks ago when Samantha Papke performed as Rosaline and before that from Ryan Puffer as Don Armado in January. This week UW - La Crosse graduate, Elissa Wolf, is sharing her monologue from Love’s Labour’s Lost.
Wolf says, “Love’s Labour’s Lost is my favorite comedy, probably because unlike most of Shakespeare’s comedies, it does not end in marriage, but instead a promise to meet again. The show’s ending brings about the idea that nothing can last forever, but before it comes to a somber end, we get to experience the magic of falling in love. This show is about studying and language. It is filled will beautiful wordplay, wit, and rhetoric. It is hard not to relish in the lines that are written. What I adore about this monologue is that it is the turning point for the men in the play, they realize they have been fools and that there is value in love. I decided to play Berowne as a woman because to me there is something playful about a woman sharing her opinion and knowledge on love, based on her own womanly experiences. Of course, she knows the value of women, because she is one herself. And she better share her knowledge with the men, or they might never come to the same conclusion.”
Wolf is a Chicago-based actor and alum of the University of Wisconsin - La Crosse. She recently graduated from the Shakespeare Institute in Stratford-Upon-Avon, where she earned an MA in Shakespeare and Creativity. To find out more, visit her website.
Elissa Wolf as Berowne in Love’s Labour’s Lost:
THE MONOLOGUE: LOVE’S LABOUR’S LOST, ACT IV SCENE 3, BEROWNE BY ELISSA WOLF
“Never durst poet touch a pen to write
Until his ink were tempered with love’s sighs.
O, then his lines would ravish savage ears
And plant in tyrants mild humility.
From women’s eyes this doctrine I derive.
They sparkle still the right Promethean fire.
They are the books, the arts, the academes
That show, contain, and nourish all the world.
Else none at all in ought proves excellent.
Then fools you were these women to forswear,
Or, keeping what is sworn, you will prove fools.
For wisdom’s sake, a word that all men love,
Or for love’s sake, a word that loves all men,
Or for men’s sake, the authors of these women,
Or women’s sake, by whom we men are men,
Let us once lose our oaths to find ourselves,
Or else we lose ourselves to keep our oaths.
It is religion to be thus forsworn,
For charity itself fulfills the law,
And who can sever love from charity?”
MORE ABOUT THE MONOLOGUE PROJECT
Our goal of Shakespeare from the Ground’s Monologue Project is to collect a library of Shakespearean monologues to share with our community for virtual entertainment while we are still socially distanced. You don’t need to be a professional actor to participate. If you’re inspired and ready to record, great! If you need help selecting your Shakespeare Monologue or getting it recorded, reach out and we’ll help you get the ball rolling. Are you ready to take to the boards once again…virtually?
