Line By Line Explanation Of Edward II By Marlowe

1. Therefore……………….seem to die.

These lines have been extracted from the first soliloquy of Gaveston in Marlowe’s Edward H. Gaveston, the friend and favourite of King Edward II was banished from England by the order of the late king. As soon as Edward Il comes to power, he recalls his friend. Accordingly, Gaveston has returned from France. On his way to the royal court, he meets three poor men who request him for help. Gaveston has no pity for them and therefore makes false promises to help them. Then in a soliloquy he reveals the scheme whereby he contemplates to win the king’s favour. He knows that the king is fond of low company and vulgar pastimes. So he plans to please him by providing him with coarse and voluptuous pleasures.

Edward II is fond of music and poetry. Therefore, Gaveston suggests that he will have Italian masks played at night. Their sweet speeches, humours and entertaining shows will give immense pleasure to the king. During the days time, when he will be walking out from his palace, his (Gaveston’s) servants will go with him in the dress of pastoral nymphs to please him. His men will be dressed like satyrs, half-humans, half-goats, and they will graze in the green meadows and with their Cloven goat-like feet, they will perform an old-fashioned country-dance before him. Sometimes, a lovely boy, dressed like Diana, with his golden hair gilding the water as he glides, with pearl crownets round his naked arms and an olive branch in his hand to hide those parts of the body which men love to see, will swim before him in a spring. And nearby another boy, dressed like Actacon will peep through the groves and will be converted into a stag by the angry goddess Diana. He will be hunted by his own barking hounds and he will pretend to die. Gaveston means to please the king with the help of such shows.

These lines reveal the sensuous paganism in which Marlowe’s own Renaissance temper delighted. They reveal-Marlowe’s deep intoxication with classical beauty and the strain of epicureanism in Gaveston. This epicureanism has the seeds of self-destruction, inherent in the story of Actaeon.

The Masque or Mask was of Italian origin. It was a courtly dramatic entertainment which with its story blended pageantry, dance and song. Both Queen Elizabeth and James I Were extremely fond of Masques.

Actaeon, the Greek huntsman, was caught spying on the goddess Diana while she was bathing. He was changed into a stag, then hunted and-killed by his own hounds. Bent Sunesen suggests that this description, functions in the same way as the dumb-show used in early drama to prefigure in mine the events of the play: Actacon and his hounds are emblematic of Edward and his harons. Regarding ‘a lovely boy’ Briggs, and Lees point out that Gaveston plans have a boy impersonating Diana because there were no actresses on the Elizabethan stage. But Gaveston is, after all, planning an entertainment, whose mixture of sex and sadism seems designed to appeal to the king’s homosexual leanings.

2. Proud Rome…………..Sepulchres.

These words have been extracted from the soliloquy of Edward in Marlowe’s Edward II. When the Barons prevail upon the King Edward to subscribe to the decree of Gaveston’s banishment, he feels quite helpless and does accordingly. But he makes it clear that he is not ready to give up the company of Gaveston. When the Bishop of Canterbury threatens to ex- communicate him, he impotently rages against the Papal authority. He feels that a king is unjustly dictated by the priests.

In a Protestant outburst. Edward accuses the Pope of Rome of keeping such domineering priests, because they act as his servants. They help him in maintaining the dim light of superstitions. It is for these that the holy candles burn in the Churches. They are the causes of flaring up of anti-Christian beliefs. In a rage, Edward declares that he would set fire on such anti-Christian Churches. He would demolish the towers of the palace of Pope and make the banks of the river Tiber swell with the bodies of slaughtered priests. He means to say that he would get the priests slaughtered and get their graves erected on the banks of the river Tiber.

This Protestant outburst is anachronistic in the play. It is true that in the Middle Ages, the kings of Christendom were subordinate to the Pope, who apart from being the spiritual head, was also the temporal head of Europe. But here this anti papal sentiment if Elizabethan and not medieval.

3. Like frantic……………….Gaveston.

These words have been spoken by Queen Isabella in Marlowe’s Edward II. The King is depressingly grieved to sign the decree of Gaveston’s banishment. In his rage, he expressed his anger against the papal authority. He goes to the extent of saying that he would set fire to the crazed papal buildings. When Gaveston enters he expresses his helplessness. However, he makes him the governor of Ireland in his place. But when Isabella arrives, he scolds her as usual and in the presence of the king. Gaveston accuses her of having illicit relations with Mortimer. When left alone. Isabella expresses her dejection. She says, it would have been better if she were transformed by Circe or offered a cup of poison by Hymen on her bridal day.

The queen Isabella feels so forlorn that she is almost driven to madness by sorrow. She is so beside herself with grief that like Juno, she would fill the world with cries of sorrow and grief. She would declare in the world that her grief is the greatest. She is surprised to see the King’s love for Gaveston. Even Jupiter did not love Ganymede so passionately as the king loves the cursed Gaveston Such feelings of Isabella show only one aspect of her character. In fact she is a split personality. In the first stage, she is a forlorn wife, vainly seeking her husband’s love, but in the second stage, she is a scheming adulteress However, at this stage, her grief appears to he genuine.

Juno raged and wept when Jupiter neglected her to lavish affection on Ganymede, a mortal boy of great beauty whom he had snatched away to heaven. The same comparison of Gaveston and Ganymede is made by Drayton in his Piers Gaveston, where the hero laments.

4. My heart…………Gaveston.

These words have been spoken by the king in Marlowe’s Edward II when the Barons succeed in getting Gaveston exiled once again. But Edward is deeply grieved and more so at his helplessness. With a heavy heart, he sees off his favourite, but mourns his absence, for his heart is pierced with grief. Even if all the wealth of his kingdom could bring him back, he would willingly give it all away to his enemies and consider himself a gainer in having won such a dear friend.

When the Barons have granted Edward’s request to recall Gaveston, they are waiting to acquaint the king with their decision. In the meantime, the king indulges in deep melancholy thoughts. His heart is greatly oppressed hy sorrow. He considers his heart like an anvil upon which sorrow heats like the hammers of Cyclop’s men. The noise confuses his brain and makes him impatient for his dear Gaveston. To relieve himself of this agony, he wishes that some invisible goddess of Fate had come out of hell and struck him dead with his kingly scepter when he was actually compelled to leave his Gaveston.

According to Classical mythology, the Cyclopes are Vulcan’s assistants in his forges under Mount Etna. They prepare thunderbolts for Jove. The noise produced by sorrow in the heart of king has been likened to the noise of the strokes of hammers on the anvil of Cyclopes. The epithet ‘bloodness’ is used for the furies because they live in Hades, and are thus associated with death and pallor. The Furies were goddesses of revenge and punishment.

5. If i be………………….progeny.

These words of the King have been taken from Marlowe’s Edward II. The King Edward decides to send Isabella to France with the. Prince in order to propitiate her brother, who has captured Normandy. In the meantime. Arundel brings the news of Gaveston’s execution. The King is violently enraged and is further instigated by Younger Spencer to take revenge upon his enemies. He, therefore, swears in the name of the earth that he would destroy as many lives as he has manors, castles and towers:

As the King, Edwards II vows vengeance upon Warwick and Mortimer and ‘declares that he would see their headless bodies floating in pools of blood so that they might drink their own blood to their fill and stain his banner with their blood. These stains would serve as eternal warning of revenge. They would serve to remind their descendants of their treachery and his. vengeance.

It is well-known that the King does not possess the requisite strength of character to enforce his will on others. But here, for the first time, he is genuinely roused to fury and action. It might be on account of the fact that Gaveston is finally murdered. Therefore, finally, he seems to have arrived at a do-or-die stage and it will be seen subsequently that he rises to the only effective action in the play, i.e., he punishes the Barons after they have executed Gaveston.

6. What, Mortimer……….fortune far.

These are the words of Younger Mortimer in Marlowe’s Edward II. The differences between Edward II and his Barons have already resulted into a civil war. At Boroughbridge when the rebels come before the King, they ask him to banish from the court such base flatterers as Spencer. But the King would prefer a war to yielding to the Barons, who are ultimately defeated and captured. The King banishes Kent from the court, orders immediate execution of Warwick and Lancaster and sends Mortimer to the Tower as a prisoner.

With the capture and execution of the Barons. Mortimer is thrown into prison. But he is too ambitious to be oppressed by the idea of captivity. The strong stony walls of the prison cannot hold back the spirit that wants to fly to heaven. Edward, the blood- sucker of England, cannot intimidate him. Mortimer declares that he is too ambitious to remain long confined in a prison. His hopes are far stronger than his misfortune at the moment.

This observation of Younger Mortimer reveals him as a person full of a towering ambition. His imprisonment does not seem to shake his will to rule. He is a power drunk dissembler whose scheming mind works even in the face of the greatest danger for his life. His towering ambition reminds one of Satan’s courage even in the lake of fire.

7. Misgoverned………….thou be.

These words have been extracted from the speech of Queen Isabella in Marlowe’s Edward II. Queen Isabella, Prince Edward, Kent, Mortimer junior and Sir John of Hainault are assembled at Harwick. The Queen naturally welcomes her allies to England. But it is painful for her to think that brotherly forces from the two sides are entangled in a Civil War. In such wars kinsmen and relations kill themselves with their weapons.

But inspite of the fact that the kinsmen are wounded with their own weapons there is no remedy to avoid a civil war. Isabella says that misguided and irresponsible kings bring about such disastrous situations. Isabella is grieved to say that Edward is such a king. On account of his misgovernment, the country has been ruined. His base and licentious habits have pushed the country to this sport of blood and caused rivers of blood flow on the battlefield. What is more shocking, it is the blood of the king’s own people. Edward should have been a helper, caretaker and protector of his subjects, but now he has become the cause of their disaster.

Here the Queen seems to grow sentimental. Though by now, she ha assumed the role of a soldier, but she is a woman first. The ruin of the people grieves her soul; but her interests dominate her nature and she is able to think of the misfortune of the country only to a superficial extent. It is also noteworthy that by now she has reached a stage from where there is no going back.

8. Vilde wretch……………..revolt.

These words have been extracted from the soliloquy of Kent in Marlowe’s Edward 11. King Edward is defeated in the battle of Bristol and the Queen is victorious. The King wants to rally his forces and to fight one more battle against the Queen. He prefers death on the battlefield to the ignominy of being captured by his enemies. But Junior Spencer advises him to go to Ireland rather than risk his life in another battle. Taking his advice, the King flees from the battlefield.

Just at the moment when Edward II has left the battlefield, Kent arrives, alone. He is full of-remorse for having revolted against his own “King and brother. He curses himself, for he himself proved to be the most unkind to the king. He raised arms against his King who is also his brother. Kent is so penitent that he prays to God to shower curses and vengeance upon his head to punish him, for it is only God who can punish one for such an unnatural rebellion against the King, the rightful ruler of England.

Here Kent refers to the Divine Theory of Kingship which was the prevalent political faith in the days of Marlowe. According to this theory, the king is God’s representative on the earth, and if anybody revolts against him, it becomes God’s just duty to punish the traitor.

9. Good father…………..dying heart.

These pathetic words have been extracted from the speech of the speech of the King in Marlowe’s Edward II. When the King Edward II, Junior Spencer and Baldock are driven back by the fierce storm to the English shore, they take shelter in the Abbey of Neath. The afflicted King now realises that life is vain and that only the contemplative life is the supreme bliss.

By and by, Edward II becomes pathetically appealing. Like a tired child he craves for sleep. He wistfully longs to keep his agonised head lying in the lap of the priest. He is so burdened with numerous cares and laden with sorrow that he wishes to die at that very moment. He does not want to move his head from the lap of holy father.

Edward’s mood is drowsy and hopeless, therefore, he longs for death which will be the end of all his mental agonies. The lines are deeply pathetic, the cry of an agonised soul which is the symbol of miserable fate. It is true that towards the end of the play. Edward does not rise to tragic dignity, but his suffering evokes deep pity.

10. Lay me……………Sword.

These words have been spoken by the King in Marlowe’s Edward II. The king is compelled to take shelter in the Abbey of Neath, but he does not feel safe here too. Spencer Junior is particularly afraid of a gloomy man in the monastery, who long stared at the fugitives when they entered it. The King is in drooping spirits. He is fed up with his life of frets and kingly anxieties. At the same time, Rice Ap Howell, a Mower and Earl of Leicester enter the monastery. Leicester arrests Spencer and Baldock and asks the King to get ready to go to Kenilworth Castle.

Edward II is totally broken when Leicester comes to arrest him along with his associates. In a highly dejected and hopeless mood, he expresses his longing to die. Therefore, when Leicester tells him that there is a coach ready for him, he says that it would have been better, if a coffin career had been brought for him. This career would have taken him to the gates of Hell. Edward wishes that Pluto’s bells ring in the Hell to announce his death and let the witches mourn his death on the banks of the river Styx. With deep agony he wants to embrace death, for he has no friends left in the world. His only friends are Spencer and Baldock who, too have been taken prisoners and they are very soon going to be killed by the tyrant’s sword.

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Here ‘tyrant’ is obviously Mortimer Junior. The irony of the situation is that the king who intended to be a tyrant to punish the rebels, is now afraid of his enemies who are proving to be tyrants for him.

Pluto was the king of the underworld in classical mythology. No classical author ascribes bells to Pluto. However, Peele refers to this in his Battle of Alcazar: “The bells of Pluto ring revenge amain”. Charon is the boatman in classical mythology who rows the dead across the river of underworld, i.e… Styx. These words of Edward foreshadow the conditions of his own death which he would subsequently have to meet.

11. The griefs………….air.

These lines have been extracted from the speech of the King Edward in Marlowe’s Edward II. When Edward has been taken prisoner and is confined to Kenilworth Castle, he laments his fate. The Earl of Leicester consoles him in his sore affliction. But the words of consolation cannot mitigate his deep sorrow. Words and long consolatory speeches are not able to pacify his deep-rooted agony.

Edward’s agony is greater than the grief of common people. Men in personal and private capacity can easily overcome their griefs, but it is not the case with the kings. Edward expresses his sorrow through a grand elaborate image of deer and lion. The gentle and meek deer, when struck by the hunter’s arrow, runs to find out the healing herb and gets its wounds healed up. But when the kingly lion is hurt, he scratches and tears his flesh in his great wrath and thus deepens his wounds all the more. The lion is contemptuous of the idea that the lowly earth should taste his blood. Therefore, he jumps high into the air to avoid touch with the earth and in his such vain attempts he ultimately dies.

The image given by Marlowe is very apt. Like a hurt lion, the King is not able to make anything of the situation and is thus heading towards his doom.

12. For such………day?

These lines have been extracted from the speech of the King Edward in Marlowe’s Edward II. In the Kenilworth Castle, where Edward II has been confined as a prisoner, he is consoled by the Earl of Leicester. But the words of consolation cannot mitigate his deep sorrow. His wounds are not like those a deer, but are like those of a lion who, instead of healing the wounds as a deer does, scratches and tears his flesh in his great wrath.

The thought of treacherous Mortimer and disloyal Isabella pains the bean of Edward all the more. His soul is so torn with violent and wrathful passion that he feels like flying on the wings of contempt and vengeance. In this flight he imagines to sour to heaven and there appeal to the gods to punish both Mortimer and Isabella. But at the same time he is reminded that he is a king Therefore, instead of praying to God with suppliant knees, he feels that it is hi proper duty to punish both Mortimer and Isabella. But again he feels his feet on the plain of reality. His kingdom has virtually gone from him. He is now no more the king. The country is being ruled not by him but by the Queen and the Barons. He is now no better than a shadow of his former glory.

Here is a note of real anguish in the heart of Edward II. He is now undergoing the ‘reluctant pangs of abdicating royalty”. His former violence and authority are submerged in his adversity. Now he has become pathetically appealing

13. But stay………..king.

These lines have been extracted from the speech of the king Edward II in Marlowe’s play Edward II. In the Kenilworth Castle, Edward II, is kept as a prisoner. The Earl of Leicester and the Bishop of Winchester arrive and ask the king to relinquish the crown in favour of the Prince. The king is ready to do so, but he is apprehensive from the side of Mortimer, for he fears that instead of the Prince, Mortimer will rule the country.

What pains Edward most is that he is being asked to give up the crown and the kingdom without any cause. Proud Mortimer has obstructed his happiness. In fact, the crown is his life. Therefore, when he is preparing himself to give the crown to Leicester, he is also mentally preparing to die. So he asks Leicester and the Bishop to wait awhile, for he wishes to remain the King till night so that he may have the last look at his glittering crown to his heart’s content. He tells them that his crown is the last mark of honour to his head After enjoying this honour for a few minutes more, he would lose his crown and his head jointly.

In a moment of emotional turn, he wishes to remain the King forever. Bu it is possible only when the nature changes her course. Therefore, he prays t the Sun to continue to shine for ever so that night never comes to tak possession of the day. He vehemently wishes the Sun and other phenomena of Nature to stand still so that time and seasons may also never change, an thereby retain Edward the King of England for ever.

These are the most remarkable moments in the play. Marlowe has strained to retrieve sympathy for the King. The reluctant pangs of abdicating royalty are most pathetically portrayed. A similarity between Edward II in his la hours and Faustus may be noted. Both know that they are doomed and the desperate efforts to pretend that it is not so are frustrated by the passage o time which, inspite of their agonised appeals, they cannot prevent.

14. Inhuman creatures…………..while.

These lines have been extracted from the speech of the King Edward II in Marlowe’s Edward II. The King is torn between his ambition to remain the king and his helplessness to give up the crown and kingdom. In a most pathetic moment, he wishes the Sun and other phenomena of Nature to stand still so that the time and seasons may also never change and thereby retain him the king of England for ever.

In a sudden fit of rage, Edward refuses to resign his kingship. He tries to become the real king once more. He calls Leicester and the Bishop of Winchester as the inhuman creatures, brought up on tigress’ milk and scolds them for waiting so eagerly to overthrow their sovereign and to take possession of his innocent life. First he uncrowns himself in despair, but burst into a last defiance. He asks them if they did not fear their king. But the next moment he realises his actual state that he is foolish to believe that he is still a king. The Barons now do not care for his fury, as they did in the past. Now they have decided to elect a new king. Such thoughts have filled his mind with strange thoughts of melancholy, thoughts which create unending suffering in his mind. Edward feels that in this state of mental agony, he has no comfort and solace except the thought that he has a crown upon his head. Therefore, he wishes to enjoy that comfort for a while more.

Here Edward’s character has been drawn on the most pathetic lines. The reluctant pangs of abdicating royalty are most pathetically portrayed. Here we are reminded of Faustus’s spiritual agony, where like Edward II. Faustus also knows that he is doomed, but he also knows that the passage of time will not prevent his doom, inspite of his agonised appeals. So is the case with Edward II.

15. Base Fortune………….unknown?

This is the final speech of Mortimer Junior in Marlowe’s Edward II. After Edward II has been murdered as per orders of Mortimer Junior, the Queen informs him that her son, Prince Edward has come to know about their hand in the murder of his father. But Mortimer believes that the King (Edward III) being too young cannot do anything. However, when the King arrives, he accuses Mortimer of his father’s murder and orders his execution.

When Mortimer’s end arrives, he accepts the decree with stoicism. He now sees that in the ever-moving wheel of the fickle Fortune, there is a point which having been attained, men fall headlong down Mortimer realises that he has attained this highest point of fortune and there is no higher point to achieve now and therefore he need not grieve at his receding fortune and fall. Mortimer bids farewell to the Queen Isabella and requests her not to mourn for him. Now he has begun scorning the world and as a traveler he now goes to discover new countries in a region unknown.

Mortimer, who earlier assumed a full-fledged Machiavellian role, is now seen in more chastened spirits. At the end of his life he has no repentance and accepts his fatal decree with stoicism, which is more a Senecan conception that a Machiavellian one. This sudden reversal of Mortimer’s fortune has been antedated by Marlowe to round off the play expeditiously.

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