Shakespeare · Soliloquies & Solo Speeches
Production Notes
Edmund opens with a declaration of allegiance to Nature over law — to appetite, energy, and cunning over the accident of birth order. He is a bastard son who intends to take what the world has withheld from him. The speech is a manifesto delivered with full wit and charm.
Edmund is one of Shakespeare’s most attractive villains precisely because his argument is not entirely wrong. Players who find the genuine grievance underneath the scheming will give the speech real power.
Script
EDMUND
Thou, Nature, art my goddess. To thy law My services are bound. Wherefore should I Stand in the plague of custom, and permit The curiosity of nations to deprive me For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines Lag of a brother? why “bastard”? Wherefore “base,” When my dimensions are as well compact, My mind as generous and my shape as true As honest madam’s issue? Why brand they us With “base,” with “baseness,” “bastardy,” “base,” “base,” Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take More composition and fierce quality Than doth within a dull, stale, tired bed Go to th’ creating a whole tribe of fops Got ’tween asleep and wake? Well then, Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land. Our father’s love is to the bastard Edmund As to th’ legitimate. Fine word, “legitimate.” Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed And my invention thrive, Edmund the base Shall top th’ legitimate. I grow, I prosper. Now, gods, stand up for bastards!
Facilitator Notes
Warm-up: Ask Players: what is something you have every right to want but were told you can’t have? Approach the speech from that energy.
Debrief prompts:
- Edmund repeats “legitimate” several times. What does the word mean to him? How does his voice change each time he says it?
- The speech is addressed to Nature — a goddess. How does speaking to an invisible presence change the way a Player delivers the argument?
- Edmund ends by asking the gods to stand up for bastards. Does he believe they will? Does he need them to?
- Where do Players feel sympathy for Edmund? Where does that sympathy become uncomfortable?