Get this No Fear to go!
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BASSANIO
None but that ugly treason of mistrust
Which makes me fear th' enjoying of my love.
There may as well be amity and life
'Tween snow and fire, as treason and my love.
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BASSANIO
The only treason I’m guilty of is worrying that I’m never going to
get to enjoy you. Treason has nothing at all to do with my love. They’re as
opposite as hot and cold.
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PORTIA
Ay, but I fear you speak upon the rack
Where men enforcèd do speak anything.
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PORTIA
Hmmm, I’m not sure I believe what you’re saying. Men under torture
will confess anything.
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BASSANIO
Promise me life, and I’ll confess the truth.
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BASSANIO
Promise me you’ll let me live, and I’ll confess the truth.
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PORTIA
Well then, confess and live.
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PORTIA
All right then, confess and live.
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BASSANIO
“Confess and
love”
Had been the very sum of my confession.
O happy torment, when my torturer
Doth teach me answers for deliverance!
But let me to my fortune and the caskets.
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BASSANIO
“Confess and love” is more like it. Oh, torture’s fun
when my torturer tells me what I have to say to go free! But let me try my luck on the
boxes.
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40 45 50 |
PORTIA
Away, then. I am locked in one of them.
If you do love me you will find me out.—
Nerissa and the rest, stand all aloof.
Let music sound while he doth make his choice.
Then if he lose he makes a swanlike end,
Fading in music. That the comparison
May stand more proper, my eye shall be the stream
And watery deathbed for him. He may win,
And what is music then? Then music is
Even as the flourish when true subjects bow
To a new-crownèd monarch. Such it is
As are those dulcet sounds in break of day
That creep into the dreaming bridegroom’s ear
And summon him to marriage.
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PORTIA
Go ahead, then. I’m locked in one of them. If you really love me,
you’ll find me.—Nerissa and the rest of you, get away from him. Play
some music while he chooses. Then if he loses, it’ll be his swan song, music before
the end. And since swans need water to swim in, I’ll cry him a river when he loses.
But on the other hand, he may win. What music should we play then? If he wins, the music
should be like the majestic trumpets that blare when subjects bow to a newly crowned
monarch. It’s the sweet sounds at daybreak that the dreaming bridegroom hears on
his wedding morning, calling him to the church.
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