The Two Noble Kinsmen
Act II

ACT II

SCENE i

A Jailer speaks with his Daughter’s “Wooer,” initially commenting on his poverty: “Alas, the prison I keep, though it be for great ones, yet they seldom come” (II.i.2-3). In other words, rich criminals don’t wind up in jail. Sound familiar, 2026?

The two discuss “the old business” (II.i.17) — the match between the Wooer and the Daughter. It doesn’t seem very Shakespearean for even relatively important characters such as Jailer’s Daughter not to have real names, even if “The fact that these country characters have labels rather than names … underscores their difference from the nobility” (Garber 903).

The Daughter enters with “strewings”: rushes for covering the floor of the prison containing “the two kinsmen (whose miraculous recovery from their supposedly fatal wounds is taken for granted)” (Potter 3). She is impressed with them: “I think fame but stammers ’em, they stand a grise above the reach of report” (II.i.26-27). She rhapsodizes about their classy and blithe behavior despite imprisonment. “I never saw ’em,” remarks Wooer, anticlimactically. The Jailer points out Arcite in the window above, but his Daughter corrects him, identifying that one as Palamon. The Jailer wants to escape the gaze of the prisoners, but the Daughter sighs, “It is a holiday to look on them. Lord, the diff’rence of men!” (II.i.53-54), no doubt glancing with dismay at the obtuse Wooer.

SCENE ii

“How do you, noble cousin?” “How do you, sir?” (II.ii.1). Maybe the Daughter gave them too much credit for being aware that they are prisoners in the same cell. With a spasm of “Ubi sunt” — “Where is Thebes now? where is our noble country? / Where are our friends and kindreds? (II.ii.7-8) — Palamon waxes nostalgic over countless aspects of their former lives. Oddly, he emphasizes the loss of soldierly opportunity:

. . .Oh, never
Shall we two exercise, like twins of honour,
Our arms again and feel our fiery horses
Like proud seas under us; Our good swords now
(Better the red-ey’d god of war nev’r wore),
Ravish’d our sides, like age must run to rust.
(II.ii.17-22)

Arcite, oddly, emphasizes love and family:

The sweet embraces of a loving wife,
Loaden with kisses, arm’d with thousand Cupids,
Shall never clasp our necks; no issue know us;
No figures of ourselves shall we ev’r see.
(II.ii.30-33)

Palamon laments the alienation from “our Theban hounds, / That shook the aged forest with their echoes” (II.ii.46-47). The kinsmen speak with patriotic nostalgia here about their former court life, despite this being “at odds with their former condemnation of its faults” and in spite of their despair later (III.ii) over the “moral laxity” of Thebes (Wells 384).

But let’s look on the bright side. Arcite considers this no prison as he is together with Palamon (II.ii.61-62). Similarly, for Palamon, at least “our fortunes / Were twin’d together” (II.ii.63-64). And soon the two adopt a Boethian contemptus mundiphilosophy about their life imprisonment. Arcite suggests,

Let’s think this prison holy sancutary
To keep us from corruption of worse men.
. . .
We are one another’s wife, ever begetting
New births of love; we are father, friends, acquaintance;
We are, in one another, families;
I am your heir, and you are mine.
. . .
Were we at liberty,
A wife might part us lawfully, or business,
Quarrels consume us, envy of ill men
Crave our acquaintance.
(II.ii.71-91)

Palamon adds, “What had we been, old in the court of Creon, / Where sin is justice, lust and ignorance / The virtues of the great ones?” (II.ii.105-107). They agree to think of prison as sanctuary from human corruption. “Is there record of any two that loved / Better than we do, Arcite?” (II.ii.12-13). Nope.

Emilia and her attendant, another unnamed “Woman,” stroll through the garden below, identifying first a narcissus, Emilia disapproving of the mythological character: “Were there not maids enough?” (II.ii.121). Meanwhile, an enthralled Palamon draws Arcite’s attention to this “goddess” (II.ii.134). The ladies next wax eloquent about the rose:

It is the very emblem of a maid;
For when the west wind courts her gently,
How modestly she blows, and paints the sun
With her chaste blushes! When the north comes near her,
Rude and impatient, then, like chastity,
She locks her beauties in her bud again,
And leaves him to base briers.
(II.ii.137-143)

The Woman adds, “Yet, good madam, / Sometimes her modesty will blow so far she falls for’t” (II.ii.143-144). Palamon is lovestruck: “Never till now was I in prison, Arcite” (II.ii.132). As the two women approach some bawdy talk and depart, Palamon remarks, “Might not a man well lose himself and love her?” (II.ii.154-155). Arcite acknowledges that he is also stricken: “Now I feel my shackles” (II.ii.157). Perhaps we have another Shakespearean instance of “mimetic desire,” as in The Two Gentlemen of Verona (Garber 893). “I saw her first,” says Palamon (II.ii.160), as in Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale. But Arcite claims that Palamon loves her as a goddess; “I love her as a woman, to enjoy her” (II.ii.164). The two “noble” kinsmen instantly dissolve their friendship. Palamon threatens, “Friendship, blood, / And all the ties between us, I disclaim / If thou once think upon her” (II.ii.172-174). Arcite adamantly insists he will love her despite Palamon’s madness. As the Keeper approachs, Palamon warns, “I shall live / To knock thy brains out with my shackles” (II.ii.218-219).

[Here is the Flight of the Conchords’ take on the phenomenon.]

Arcite is taken away, and it turns out that Prince Pirithous has liberated him, but Arcite is banished from the land. Palamon is jealous, since Arcite could raise an army in Thebes and impress Emilia.

Were I at liberty, I would do things
Of such a virtuous greatness that this lady,
This blushing virgin, should take manhood to her
And seek to ravish me.
(II.ii.256-259)

Palamon hears the “pelting scurvy news” (II.ii.266) that he is to be taken to a different cell without such open windows. He threatens to harass the Keeper, but has no choice, except to play up his drama queen act. “Farewell, kind window. / May rude wind never hurt thee!” (II.ii.274-275).

SCENE iii

Arcite is conversely envious of Palamon and paranoid about his banishment: “O, ’twas a studied punishment” (II.iii.4). He envies Palamon:

Twenty to one, he’ll come to speak to her,
And if she be as gentle as she’s fair,
I know she’s his; he has a tongue will tame tempests,
And make the wild rocks wanton.
(II.iii.14-17).

Risking death if caught, he is determined to remain in the vicinity.

Four country people stroll by with more stage debris: a garland. They discuss, at tedious and pointless length, an upcoming fair; and it’s no one’s dream scene, for it hath no Bottom.

Arcite emerges and questions the rubes. He resolves to attend in disguise and participate in the games. Perhaps he’ll catch a glimpse of “her.”

SCENE iv

In a 33-line soliloquy, the Jailer’s Daughter acknowledges having been affected by Palamon’s politenesses. She has decided that she’s in love with him, hopelessly because of their class differences: “To marry him is hopeless; / To be his whore is witless. Out upon’t! / What pushes are we wenches driven to / When fifteen once has found us!” (II.iv.4-7). “As Palamon and Arcite, in the prison, have fallen in love at first sight with Emilia, so has the Daughter with Palamon; but whereas Emilia is determined (at first) to preserve her virginity, the Daughter is desperate with desire to lose hers” (Wells 387). She resolves to help Palamon escape: “Say I ventur’d / To set him free? what says the law then? / Thus much for law or kindred! I will do it, / And this night, or to-morrow, he shall love me” (II.iv.30-33). It’s interesting to consider this unwise resolve in light of the Theseus frame of the play: Theseus was helped out of prison and instructed how to kill the Minotaur by a woman he jilted. (See Chaucer’s Legend of Good Women: Ariadne.)

SCENE v

Theseus and his court have been impressed with Arcite’s athletic talents. Oh, darn, we missed the wrastling! Theseus, Hippolyta, Prithous, and Emilia remark further about him. His mother must have been hot! and his father totally the dude! (II.v.19-22). Theseus suspects Arcite is more noble than his clothes suggest: “Mark how his virtue, like a hidden sun, / Breaks through his baser garments” (II.v.23-24).

Asked by Theseus why he has come to these parts, Arcite answers, “To purchase name, and do my ablest service” (II.v.26). Pirithous assigns him to serve Emilia, so he gets to kiss her hand. Pirithous invites Arcite to ride this afternoon but warns that the horse is “a rough one” (II.v.46). That’s perfect, says Arcite. “I shall not then / Freeze in my saddle” (II.v.47-48). [Warning: pre-irony.]

Theseus makes sure everyone has remembered that tomorrow is the day to make observance “To flow’ry May, in Dian’s wood” (II.v.51) — so jot that down. [Note to self: tomorrow, be carefree.]

SCENE vi

It’s a 39-line soliloquy this time. The Jailer’s Daughter has liberated Palamon and will provide him with food and a file to get his shackles off. Surely he’ll run off with her, and she plans to join him, despite the inevitable jailhouse and paternal fall-out. “I love him beyond love and beyond reason, / Or wit, or safety. I have made him know it. / I care not, I am desperate” (II.vi.11-13).