Isabella
O miserable and distressed queen!
Would, when I left sweet France and was embark’d,
That charming Circe, walking on the waves,
Had chang’d my shape, or at the marriage-day
The cup of Hymen had been full of poison,
Or with those arms that twin’d about my neck
I had been stifled, and not liv’d to see
The king my lord thus to abandon me!
Like frantic Juno will I fill the earth
With ghastly murmur of my sighs and cries;
For never doated Jove on Ganymede
So much as he on cursed Gaveston.
But that will more exasperate his wrath;
I must entreat him, I must speak him fair,
And be a means to call home Gaveston.
And yet he’ll ever doat on Gaveston;
And so am I for ever miserable.
Christopher Marlowe, Edward II, Scene 4 Lines 170-185
Queen Isabella comes to terms that if she wants Edward to love her and to regain her power she must help him to get Gaveston back. She knows that in reality she won’t really be getting Edward back, but she will settle for a false sense of love to keep her together. This continues to be an ongoing struggle between her and Edward before she realizes it can no longer hol don to the Edward she use to love.
