871 Best Play Monologues

A Woman of No Importance (Mrs. Arbuthnot)

Category: Play Role: Mrs. Arbuthnot From: A Woman of No Importance

Mrs. Arbuthnot says

Gerald, there was a girl once, she was very young, she was little over eighteen at the time. George Harford – that was Lord Illingworth’s name then – George Harford met her. She knew nothing about life. He – knew everything. He made this girl love him. He made her love him so much that she left her father’s house with him one morning. She loved him so much, and he had promised to marry her! He had solemnly promised to marry her, and she had believed him. She was very young, and – and ignorant of what life really is. But he put the marriage off from week to week, and month to month. – She trusted in him all the while. She loved him. – Before her child was born – for she had a child – she implored him for the child’s sake to marry her, that the child might have a name, that her sin might not be visited on the child, who was innocent. He refused. After the child was born she left him, taking the child away, and her life was ruined, and her soul ruined, and all that was sweet, and good, and pure in her ruined also. She suffered terribly – she suffers now. She will always suffer. For her there is no joy, no peace, no atonement. She is a woman who drags a chain like a guilty thing. She is a woman who wears a mask, like a thing that is a leper. The fire cannot purify her. The waters cannot quench her anguish. Nothing can heal her! no anodyne can give her sleep! no poppies forgetfulness! She is lost! She is a lost soul! – That is why I call Lord Illingworth a bad man. That is why I don’t want my boy to be with him.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Titania)

Category: Play Role: Titania From: A Midsummer Night's Dream

Titania says

These are the forgeries of jealousy:
And never, since the middle summer’s spring,
Met we on hill, in dale, forest or mead,
paved fountain or rushy brook,
Or in the beached margent of the sea,
To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturb’d our sport.
Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have suck’d up from the sea
Contagious fogs; which falling in the land
Have every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents:
The ox hath therefore stretch’d his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attain’d a beard;
The fold stands empty in the drowned field,
And crows are fatted with the murrion flock;
The nine men’s morris is fill’d up with mud,
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
For lack of tread are undistinguishable:
The human mortals want their winter here;
No night is now with hymn or carol blest:
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound:
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
Far in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’ thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set: the spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter, change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazed world,
their increase, now knows not which is which:
And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissension;
We are their parents and original.

A Question of Sex (Francis)

Category: Play Role: Francis From: A Question of Sex

Francis says

I will tell you his object, Mrs. Stanton. As you may possibly have heard, I am an industrious and painstaking person. I work hard and live plainly, and the exercise of those gifts which heaven has been pleased to grant me, I have accumulated a fortune–some would call it a large fortune; I merely call it a fortune. I daresay I am worth a hundred thousand pounds. Now you might imagine that, possessing this and a clear conscience, I am happy.

But there is another and darker side to the picture which I am endeavouring to paint, Mrs. Stanton. I am cursed, continually cursed, in spite of what George is pleased to consider my advanced age, with an impulse–the impulse of unrestrained generosity. Acting under this impulse, about six months ago, when George imparted to me the information that–er–he, that Ada–when, I say, George, imparted to me the information, I said: “George, if your child is a boy, I will settle ten thousand on him.”

You see boys are so helpless. A boy can’t marry a rich husband; can’t make his own clothes; can’t, if the worst comes to the worst, go out as mother’s help–that is why I said, “if it is a boy I will settle ten thousand pounds on your child.” I was under no obligation to make the offer. I acted more from impulse, the impulse of absurd generosity.

And how does George repay me? lying to me, and, what is worse, getting his sister to lie to me. In order to obtain a paltry ten thousand pounds he is willing to stain his honour with a lie. Bah! You, Mrs. Stanton, with characteristic insight and common-sense, have at once put your finger on the most despicable aspect of this painful affair.

The lie was useless, futile, silly.

A Question of Sex (George)

Category: Play Role: George From: A Question of Sex

George says

Strain! If you knew the strain I’ve been bearing for months past!

Haven’t you noticed the dark rings under my eyes, the unnatural brightness of my orbs, the hectic flush on my cheeks, the bald spot on the back of my head?

Strain!… My dear sister, I have a secret and terrible woe — a woe which, with courage worthy of an Englishman and a parent, I have shared with none.

May, I am undone! I feared it. I have feared it for many weeks.

Listen. Five or six months ago, Uncle Francis said that if it was a son, he would settle ten thousand pounds upon it.

And if a daughter? He coldly declined to consider the possibility of such a thing.

You know the special brand of ass he is sometimes. I said nothing to anybody, not even to my wife, for I felt that it would worry her. Imagine my condition of mind, my agonising suspense.

Do you wonder that I have been wakeful night after night?

Do you wonder that, from pure weariness and fatigue, I should fall asleep on this very afternoon of my undoing? Oh, May! To be a father is not so simple and pleasing as the superficial observer might fancy.

A Question of Sex (Helen)

Category: Play Role: Helen From: A Question of Sex

Helen says

George Gower, does it not occur to you that these terrible oaths are sadly out of place?

Recollect that as a father you are considerably less than a day old. Blasphemy from lips so young is an instance of infant depravity, such as even I, a district visitor, have seldom seen surpassed.

Our curate at Ealing has composed a special form of prayer for young parents.

I have brought it over with me, and I shall ask you to — to make it your own.

In the meantime I beg you not to disgrace the sacred name of father. Think of poor, dear Ada. Ah, my darling sister has behaved splendidly! Think of what she has been through!

A Marriage has been Arranged (Crockstead)

Category: Play Role: Crockstead From: A Marriage has been Arranged

Crockstead says

I was the most unpleasant person you ever had met. The most repulsive–And who prided himself on his repulsiveness. Very true, in the main, and yet consider! My wealth dates back ten years; till then I had known hunger, and every kind of sorrow and despair. I had stretched out longing arms to the world, but not a heart opened to me. And suddenly, when the taste of men’s cruelty was bitter in my mouth, capricious fortune snatched me from abject poverty and gave me delirious wealth. I was ploughing a barren field, and flung up a nugget. From that moment gold dogged my footsteps. I enriched the few friends I had–they turned howlingly from me because I did not give them more. I showered money on whoever sought it of me–they cursed me because it was mine to give. In my poverty there had been the bond of common sorrow between me and my fellows: in my wealth I stand alone, a modern Ishmael, with every man’s hand against me.

A Matter of Husbands (Earnest Young Woman)

Category: Play Role: Earnest Young Woman From: A Matter of Husbands

Earnest Young Woman says

No. I’ll read it to you.

(She opens it and reads mournfully)

“My darling, Shan’t be able to call for you at the theater tonight. Urgent business. A thousand apologies. Ten thousand kisses. Alfred.” I found it on his desk this morning. He probably intended to send it to the theater messenger. But he forgot it. And I opened it.

(She weeps.)

Why mustn’t I? You steal my husband and I mustn’t cry! Oh, I know how little it means to you. And how easy it is for you. One night you dress like a royal princess, and the next night you undress like a Greek goddess. You blacken your eyebrows and redden your lips and wax your lashes and paint your face. You have cosmetics and bright lights to make you seem beautiful. An author’s lines to make you seem witty and wise. No wonder a poor, simple-minded lawyer falls in love with you. What chance have I against you in my cheap little frock, my own lips and eyebrows, my own unstudied ways? I don’t know how to strut and pose and lure a man. I haven’t got Mr. Shakespeare to write beautiful speeches for me. In reality you may be more stupid than I am, but I admit that when it comes to alluring men I am no match for you.

A Matter of Husbands (Famous Actress)

Category: Play Role: Famous Actress From: A Matter of Husbands

Famous Actress says

There, dear, you mustn’t apologize. You couldn’t know, of course. It seems so plausible. You fancy your husband in an atmosphere of perpetual temptation, in a backstage world full of beautiful sirens without scruples or morals. One actress, you suppose, is more dangerous than a hundred ordinary women. You hate us and fear us. None understands that better than your husband, who is evidently a very cunning lawyer. And so he plays on your fear and jealousy to regain the love you deny him. He writes a letter and leaves it behind him on the desk. Trust a lawyer never to do that unintentionally. He orders flowers for me telephone in the morning and probably cancels the order the moment he reaches his office. the way, hasn’t he a lock of my hair? Yes. They bribe my hair-dresser to steal from me. It is a wonder I have any hair left at all.

A Matter of Husbands (Famous Actress)

Category: Play Role: Famous Actress From: A Matter of Husbands

Famous Actress says

My dear, if you knew how often we actresses meet this sort of thing! It is perfectly clear that your husband has been playing a little comedy to make you jealous, to revive your interest in him. It happens to every actress who is moderately pretty and successful. It is one of the oldest expedients in the world, and we actresses are such conspicuous targets for it! There is scarcely a man connected with the theater who doesn’t make use of us in that way some time or another–authors, composers, scene designers, lawyers, orchestra leaders, even the managers themselves. To regain a wife or sweetheart’s affections all they need to do is invent a love affair with one of us. The wife is always so ready to believe it. Usually we don’t know a thing about it. But even when it is brought to our notice we don’t mind so much. At least we have the consolation of knowing that we are the means of making many a marriage happy which might otherwise have ended in the divorce court.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Helena)

Category: Play Role: Helena From: A Midsummer Night's Dream

Helena says

O, I am out of breath in this fond chase!
The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace.
Happy is Hermia, wheresoe’er she lies;
For she hath blessed and attractive eyes.
How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears:
If so, my eyes are oftener wash’d than hers.
No, no, I am as ugly as a bear;
For beasts that meet me run away for fear:
Therefore no marvel though Demetrius
Do, as a monster fly my presence thus.
What wicked and dissembling glass of mine
Made me compare with Hermia’s sphery eyne?
But who is here? Lysander! on the ground!
Dead? or asleep? I see no blood, no wound.
Lysander if you live, good sir, awake