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• Mad for Love : From ACT ONE, Farndon's 'Mad for Love'

Mad for Love, translated by John Farndon

From ACT ONE, Farndon's 'Mad for Love'

Context:

Having shifted his amorous intentions from Nise to her sister, this is Laurencio’s first attempt to seduce the ‘boba’, the childlike Finea.

Further information:

Lope de Vega’s ‘Mad for Love’ translated by John Farndon sample excerpt 1 Reposted with permission from http://www.johnfarndon.com/sites/default/files/translations-sample_text/Mad-for-love.pdf

Sample text

FINEA:

What is love?

LAURENCIO:

Love? Love’s a longing.

FINEA:

What for?

LAURENCIO:

For a beautiful thing ...

FINEA:

What thing? A diamond? Or a ruby?

Or a kitten? I think they’re lovely.

LAURENCIO:

No, for a beautiful woman like you –

Yes, a beautiful woman who,

As God ordains, is destined

To yield herself to the right end.

So, it is this thing which you possess

That engenders longing in me. Yes?

FINEA:

And me? What do I have to do?

LAURENCIO:

Long for me. Has no-one told you

Love is repaid by love?

FINEA:

Oh dear

I don’t know how to, I fear

I’ve really never ‘longed’ before.

It’s not in my spelling book, I’m sure.

And mother never showed me how.

Perhaps I’ll ask my father now.

LAURENCIO:

Wait! Let me explain.

FINEA:

Explain what?

LAURENCIO:

From my two eyes come living rays

Darting blood red and ablaze

Like visual spirits, fiery and hot

To enter into your two eyes.

FINEA:

I don’t think you should play with fire.

LAURENCIO:

It is our spirits that must be afire.

They must burn as one and atomize

And mix in one sweet perfect flame,

Until combined in utter peace

And Ecstasy that may not cease.

Two souls are then one and the same -

Joined in a matchless union

Which culminates in marriage.

This blessed state is love’s true image –

A spiritual communion

That must surely bear my pure soul

At last into your very heart.

FINEA:

All this happens when you get married?

PEDRO:

I’m gripped by forces beyond control.

Like him, I’m dying now for love –

Except, of course, I’m dying for you.

CLARA:

What do you say love? Tell me do.

PEDRO:

Love? Madness. Rage!

CLARA:

Heavens above!

So you have to be mad for love?

PEDRO:

It is such a sweet madness, see,

That men of sense will gladly

Swap their sanity for love.

CLARA:

It sounds like a rather poor exchange.

PEDRO:

When a love affair commences

The will falls ill and then the senses

Succumb to sweet sickness.

CLARA:

How strange.

Well don’t you give me this disease;

All I’ve ever had is chill-blains.

FINEA:

Oh, I see now. Yes, that explains it.

So you ‘look after’ me.

LAURENCIO:

If you please.

FINEA:

And then you take me to your place

And look after me there as well.

LAURENCIO:

Yes.

FINEA:

And this is good? It’s hard to tell.

LAURENCIO:

It’s good if you wish to embrace

The state of holy matrimony.

So your father and mother did;

Thus you were born.

FINEA:

Me? How learned

You are.

LAURENCIO:

Yes.

FINEA:

I was born already

When my father married, wasn’t I?

LAURENCIO: (Aside.)

I think a liaison of this kind

Might drive me clean out of my mind!

FINEA:

I think my father’s coming. Bye!

LAURENCIO:

I’m going, then; but think of me.

FINEA:

If I want to.

Exit LAURENCIO

CLARA:

Go away.

PEDRO:

OK,

I was going to follow him anyway.

Now do try to remember me.

Exit Pedro

CLARA:

Why?

FINEA:

Well, Clara, do you know

What this thing love is, better now?

Who’d have thought such a thing?

CLARA:

I vow

I’ve seen neither stew nor guiso

With as much tripe and trotters.

FINEA:

The trouble with my father is

He’s always talking irrelevancies.

He comes to me, when I’m at pelota –

Says, I must wed a caballero

From the Indies, Seville, Toledo.

Once when he came to speak to me,

He took a posh little playing-card

From his backpocket and, staring hard,

Said, ‘Take it, Finea, for this is to be

Your husband.’ And then off he went.

I took the card – and at once I see

The dark side of husbands, then, for he

Had no more than an upper garment,

Two sleeves and a face. Now, what good,

Clara, is a well-dressed husband

If his body does not extend

At all below his belt? You would

Never see anyone here walking

Without legs.

CLARA:

You’re right, Finea

Have you got the card?

FINEA:

It’s right here.

She gets out a playing card.

CLARA:

Very nice face and torso.

FINEA:

Yes,

But nothing below the jerkin.

CLARA:

That’ll certainly stop him walking.

Oh, but doesn’t he have nice eyes.

FINEA:

He could marry Nise...

CLARA:

Isn’t he

Supposed to marry you?

FINEA:

Oh no.

I’m not marrying him, you know –

The man who just left in such a rush

Has both legs, and other things.

Copyright

The above sample taken from the translation Mad for Love by John Farndon is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Entry written by Kathleen Jeffs. Last updated on 12 May 2012.

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