2 Best Arkadina Monologues

Category: Play Role: Arkadina From: The Seagull

Arkadina says

Now it appears that he has produced a masterpiece, if you please! I suppose it was not meant to amuse us at all, but that he arranged the performance and fumigated us with sulphur to demonstrate to us how plays should be written, and what is worth acting. I am tired of him. No one could stand his constant thrusts and sallies. He is a wilful, egotistic boy. Is that so? I notice, though, that he did not choose an ordinary play, but forced his decadent trash on us. I am willing to listen to any raving, so long as it is not meant seriously, but in showing us this, he pretended to be introducing us to a new form of art, and inaugurating a new era. In my opinion, there was nothing new about it, it was simply an exhibition of bad temper. Let him write as he feels and can, but let him spare me his nonsense.

Category: Play Role: Arkadina From: The Seagull

Arkadina says

Am I then so old and ugly already that you can talk to me like this without any shame about another woman? Oh, you have lost your senses! My splendid, my glorious friend, my love for you is the last chapter of my life. You are my pride, my joy, my light. I could never endure it should you desert me, if only for an hour; I should go mad. Oh, my wonder, my marvel, my king! Let them come! I am not ashamed of my love. My jewel! My despair! You want to do a foolish thing, but I don’t want you to do it. I shan’t let you do it! You are mine, you are mine! This forehead is mine, these eyes are mine, this silky hair is mine. All your being is mine. You are so clever, so wise, the first of all living writers; you are the only hope of your country. You are so fresh, so simple, so deeply humourous. You can bring out every feature of a man or of a landscape in a single line, and your characters live and breathe. Do you think that these words are but the incense of flattery? Do you think I am not speaking the truth? Come, look into my eyes; look deep; do you find lies there? No, you see that I alone know how to treasure you. I alone tell you the truth. Oh, my very dear, you will go with me? You will? You will not forsake me?