Four Tragedies and Octavia (24 page)

Are mingled with the stars, when fire drinks water,

When heaven's high pole is sunk in Tartarus,

When kindly light is one with darkness, day

With dewy night – sooner than can my heart,

Which never may forget my brother's death,

Be one with my vile husband's evil soul.

Would that the ruler of the gods in heaven

Might send his fire to strike the sinful head

Of that foul emperor – if he can shake

The earth with horrid thunder and affright

Our mortal senses with his sacred fires

And portents strange: comets and shooting stars

Have blazed their fiery trail across the sky

Where cold Boötes stiff with Arctic ice

Wheels his slow wagon through the march of night.

Look, how the air of heaven is diseased

By the infection of this monstrous tyrant's

Destroying breath, when over all the world

Ruled by this evil monarch stars foretell

Renewed calamities. Less dread attended

The giant Typhon whom the angry Earth

Once spawned in spite of mighty Jupiter.

A far more dangerous monster now, the foe

Of gods and men, has driven the holy ones

Out of their temples, banished citizens,

Taken his brother's life, and drained the blood

Of his own mother's body – and still lives,

Still looks upon the light, still draws

His poisonous breath. O Father of mankind!

How can your royal hand so heedlessly,

So indiscriminately, hurl your weapons

Wide of their mark, yet spare a man so guilty?

May the full forfeit of his crimes be paid

By this false Nero, this Domitius' son,

Whose infamous yoke oppresses all the world,

Whose sins besmirch the name he bears, Augustus.

NURSE
: I grant he is not fit to be your husband.

Yet let your destiny, your fortune, rule you,

Dear child, I beg. Do not excite his anger,

Which can be terrible. Some god there may be

Who can avenge your wrongs; some day will dawn.

OCTAVIA
: Too long the anger of the cruel gods

Has pressed upon my house; Venus at first

Brought ruin on it, through the fatal error

Of my ill-fated mother; married once,

Infatuated by illicit passion,

She made a second marriage,
¹
had no thought

For children or for husband, or for law.

On that infernal marriage vengeful Fury,

Her flying locks with serpents bound, attended,

To snatch the torches from the nuptial chamber

And quench their fire in blood; ay, she it was

That spurred the emperor's heart with savage wrath

To impious murder. So my hapless mother

Fell to the sword, and by her death condemned me

To everlasting anguish; husband too,

And son, she took down with her to the grave,

Betrayer and destroyer of our house.

NURSE
: Repeat no more your pious lamentations,

No longer call upon your mother's shade;

She has paid heavily for her offences.

*

CHORUS
: What new report is this?

Pray God it be but idle talk,

As all too often heard before

And no more worth the hearing.

Our emperor to take another wife?

That must not be; his lawful spouse

Octavia must retain her place

In her own father's house.

And let us pray that she may bear

A child to pledge our peace,

The peace of an untroubled world

In which the honoured name of Rome

May ever live.

Queen Juno shares in heaven by right

Her brother's bed; shall our Augustus

Banish from her ancestral house

His sister wife? What then avail

True goodness, fatherhood divine,

Pure virtue and virginity?

We are to blame; we have betrayed,

After his death, our emperor's child,

To sacrifice her to the fears

That threatened us. Yet our forefathers knew

True Roman virtue; they were men

In whom the seed and blood of Mars still lived.

They were the men who drove proud kings

Out of this city. They did well

When they avenged the dying soul

Of a pure maiden whom her father slew

To save her from base servitude,

To rob vile lust of its unlawful triumph.
¹

And, sad Lucretia, for thy sake

Grim war began, when thou wast wronged

By a base tyrant's lust, and died

By thine own hand. The price was paid

Not by Tarquinius alone

For his foul deed, but by his wife
²

Tullia, who mutilated

Her own dead father's limbs

Under her flying chariot wheels,

Inhuman daughter, and refused his aged corpse

The rite of funeral fire.

We in our time have seen

A son's iniquity:

The emperor's mother lured

Into a ship devised for death

On the Tyrrhenian sea.
¹

The crew obeyed their orders; made all haste

To leave the innocent harbour; plash of oars

Sang on the waves; the ship sped out to sea,

There to collapse, timbers falling apart,

To split, filling with water, and to sink.

Shouts rise up to the heavens, despairing cries

Of weeping women. Spectre of terrible death

Meets every eye; which every man for himself

Seeks to escape. Some on the wrecked ship's planks

Clinging, naked, battle against the waves.

Some make shift to swim to the nearest shore.

Many are doomed to drown.

The emperor's lady rends her clothes,

Plucks at her hair, and tears

Course down her cheeks.

She saw there was no hope;

Helpless in her distress, but loud in wrath

‘Is this,' cried she, ‘my son's reward

For all that I have given him?

Is this what I have earned? This ship

Is my just punishment

For having mothered such a son,

For having given him life.… O fool!

For having made him Caesar, Emperor!

Lift up your eyes from Acheron,

My husband, and enjoy the sight

Of my just punishment!

Your death, poor wretch, was of my doing;

Your son's assassination was my work.

Unburied now, as I deserve,

Sunk in the cruel sea,

I come to join your soul in death.'

Upon her speaking lips

The wild waves beat.

She plunged into the sea, sank down,

And rose again above the billows.

Fear forced her hands

To strive against the surging flood,

But soon she tired. Yet in her heart

Remained unspoken hope

And courage to defy death's angry face.

Many there were that rendered gallant aid,

Though with spent strength,

Under the onslaught of the sea.

And while her arms flagged limply

They bore her up and spoke assuringly.

For what then, lady, were you saved

From the destroying sea? You were to die

By your son's sword – a deed

Our sons will shudder to believe

And after ages for all time

Think unbelievable.
¹

Hearing that she was rescued from the sea

And still alive, this impious son

In rage and desperation planned

A repetition of his villainy.

In haste to seal his mother's fate

He would allow his infamy no pause.

An underling was sent,

And did what he was told to do –

Pierced with a sword his mistress's breast.

Then, dying, the unhappy woman

Implored the murderer to thrust his blade

Into her belly. ‘Let the sword

Sink in this womb,' she cried, ‘this flesh

That brought so foul a monster forth!'

And with that word,

And a last cry of pain, her stricken soul

From her torn body fled away.

*

SENECA
: Almighty Fate, why hast thou smiled on me

With thy deceiving face? Why hast thou raised me

When I was satisfied with what I had,

To this high eminence? That I might see

From this exalted seat how many dangers

Encompassed me, and from this altitude

My fall might be the greater? Happier far

Was my retreat upon the rocky shores

Of Corsica, removed from envy's snares.

My carefree mind, owning no other master,

Was mine to use for my own chosen studies.
¹

My greatest pleasure was to scan the sky,

That noblest work of the great architect

Of infinite creation, Mother Nature,

Marking the motions of the universe,

The passage of the chariot of the sun,

The night's recurring phases, and the moon's

Bright orb encircled by the wandering stars,

The vast effulgence of the shining heavens.

Is all this glory doomed to age with time

And perish in blind chaos? Then must come

Once more upon the world a day of death,

When skies must fall and our unworthy race

Be blotted out, until a brighter dawn

Bring in a new and better generation

Like that which walked upon a younger world

When Saturn was the ruler of the sky.
¹

That was the age when the most potent goddess,

Justice, sent down from heaven with Faith divine,

Governed the human race in gentleness.

War was unknown among the nations; arms,

Shrill trumpets, cities guarded by strong walls,

Were things unheard of; roads were free for all,

And all earth's goods were common property.

Nay, Earth herself was happy to extend

Her bounteous fertility to all

Without compulsion, like a joyful parent

Sure in the trust of her devoted sons.

But then a second generation rose

Less gentle than the first; and after that

A third, gifted with skill for new inventions,

Yet still controlled by sanctity of law.

The next, a restless breed, presumed the right

To hunt wild beasts, to drag the sea with nets

For fish that sheltered in its lower depths,

To catch small birds with reed-traps, snare wild game

With cage or noose, and force the savage bull

To bear the yoke; then ploughshares first began

To cleave the yet untroubled earth, which then,

Affronted, hid her fruit more secretly

Within her sacred womb. But those base sons

Spared not to rifle their own mother's body

For gold, and that dread iron whence ere long

They fashioned arms to fit their murderous hands.

This was the generation that set bounds

To establish kingdoms; built new-fashioned cities;

Fought to defend their neighbours' property,

Or marched against it, covetous for spoil.

Then heaven's brightest star, the maid Astraea,

Abandoned earth and fled the wicked ways

And blood-polluted hands of cruel man.

So over all the world the rage for war

And greed for gold increased; and last was born

That most delectable destroyer, Lust,

Whose power grew greater with the growth of time

And fatal Folly. Now upon our heads

The gathered weight of centuries of sin

Falls like a breaking flood. We are crushed down

Under our own intolerable age

When crime is king, impiety let loose,

And lawless love gives reign to Lechery.

All-conquering Lust with hands long used to rapine

Plunders the boundless wealth of all the world

To squander it for nothing.

                                         Nero comes,

With agitated steps and angry look.

I dread to think what new intent he brings.…

NERO
: Obey your orders; tell some of your men

To bring me the decapitated heads

Of Plautus and of Sulla.
¹

PREFECT
:                          It shall be done

Without delay. I'll to the camp myself.…

SENECA
: Is that just treatment for those nearest to you?

NERO
: Let him be just who has no need to fear.

SENECA
: Best antidote to fear is clemency.

NERO
: A king's best work is to put enemies down.

SENECA
: Good fathers of the state preserve their sons.

NERO
: Soft-hearted greybeards should be teaching children.

SENECA
: Headstrong young men need to be sent to school.

NERO
: Young men are old enough to know their minds.

SENECA
: May yours be ever pleasing to the gods.

NERO
: I, who make gods, would be a fool to fear them.

SENECA
: The more your power, greater your fear should be.

NERO
: I, thanks to Fortune, may do anything.

SENECA
: Fortune is fickle; never trust her favours.

NERO
: A man's a fool who does not know his strength.

SENECA
: Justice, not strength, is what a good man knows.

NERO
: Men spurn humility.

SENECA
:                              They stamp on tyrants.

NERO
: Steel is the emperor's guard.

SENECA
: Trust is a better.

NERO
: A Caesar should be feared.