Friday, December 11, 2009

Chapter Epigraphs for PLAN FOR CHAOS

[Revised and corrected from the Liverpool University Press 2009 1st edition. The Penguin paperback edition is due for publication January 7th.]



Chapter 1. ‘Look here, upon this picture.’ William Shakespeare, Hamlet: (III . i. 54) (Hamlet).

Chapter 2. ‘Where I love I must not marry.’ Sir Thomas Moore (1779-1852), famous for Lalla Rookh (1817). The line is from ‘Love and Marriage’:

Still the question I must parry,
Still a wayward truant prove:
Where I love I must not marry,
Where I marry, can not love.

Chapter 3. ‘These hands are not more like’. William Shakespeare, Hamlet (I . ii. 211–12):

‘I knew your father,
These hands are not more like (Horatio).

Chapter 4. ‘A foul, and pestilent congregation of vapours.’ William Shakespeare, Hamlet: (II.ii)

‘this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul, and pestilent congregation of vapours.’ (Hamlet.)

Chapter 5. ‘Confusion now hath made his masterpiece’ William Shakespeare, Macbeth (II.iii.72):

‘Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!
Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope
The Lord's anointed temple, and stole thence
The life o' the building!’ (MacDuff.)

Chapter 6. ‘Disguise fair nature with hard favoured rage.’ William Shakespeare, Henry V (III.i.5–8):

‘Then imitate the action of the tiger.
Stiffen the sinews, conjure up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favoured rage.’ (King Henry)


Chapter 7. ‘Which way I fly is Hell.’ John Milton, Paradise Lost (IV. 75):

‘Which way I fly is Hell; myself am Hell.’

Chapter 8.And here you sty me in this hard rock’ William Shakespeare,
The Tempest (I. ii. 343):


Caliban: ‘ . . . and here you sty me
In this hard rock, whiles you do keep from me
The rest o’ th’ island.’

Prospero: ‘Thou most lying slave,
Whom stripes may move, not kindness! I have used thee,
Filth as thou art, with human care, and lodged thee
In mine own cell, till thou didst seek to violate
The honour of my child.’

Caliban: ‘O ho, O ho! Would’t had been done
Thou didst prevent me; I had peopled else
This isle with Calibans.’

Chapter 9. ‘The constant image of the creature’ William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night (II.iv.17- 20).


‘such as I am, all true lovers are:
Unstaid and skittish in all motions else,
Save in the constant image of the creature
That is beloved.’ (Duke Orsino.)


Chapter 10. ‘…like this insubstantial pageant faded’ William Shakespeare, The Tempest (IV. i. 165-8)

‘The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind.’ (Prospero.)

Chapter 11. ‘Accuse not nature, she hath done her part’ John Milton, Paradise Lost VIII, 561-2

Accuse not Nature: she hath done her part;Do thou but thine.

Chapter 12. ‘Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream’ William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar II.i. 69-70

‘all the interim is
Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream:’ (Brutus.)


Chapter 13. ‘Sometimes I go about and poison wells’ Christopher Marlowe, The Jew of Malta II.iii. 170-72)

As for myself, I walk abroad ’a nights
And kill sick people groaning under walls.
Sometimes I go about and poison wells.’ (Barabas.)


Chapter 14. ‘Now sits Expectation in the air’ William Shakespeare, Henry V II. 9-12

‘For now sits Expectation in the air
And hides a sword from hilts unto the point

With crowns imperial, crowns and coronets,

Promis’d to Harry and his followers.’ (Chorus.)


Chapter 15. ‘Hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders’ William Shakespeare, King Lear I.ii. 112-114)

‘We have seen the best of our time: machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our graves.’ (Gloucester.)

Chapter 16.This is the poison of deep grief.’ William Shakespeare, Hamlet IV.v. 45-6.

‘O! this is the poison of deep grief; it springs
All from her father’s death.’ (Claudius.)


Chapter 17.Give her the wages of going on, and not to die’ Alfred, Lord Tennyson , ‘Wages’ (final line)

Chapter 18. ‘And some...have in their hearts...millions of mischiefs’ William Shakespeare, Julius Casear Vi. i. 55-6.

‘And some that smile have in their hearts, I fear,
Millions of mischiefs.’ (Octavius.)


Chapter 19. ‘­They never see us but they wish us away’ David Garrick, ‘Hearts of Oak’

Chapter 20. ‘Finality is not the language of politics.’ Benjamin Disraeli, Speech in Parliament 28 Feb 1859.