Chapter 9 of 24 · 3'22"
The revels are over and the talk turns to marriage. Beatrice jokes that everyone is paired off but her, crying 'Heigh-ho for a husband!', then politely refuses Don Pedro: 'Your grace is too costly to wear every day.' He decides to match her with Benedick anyway.
Beatrice's Merry Heart
Beatrice Jokes About Wanting a Husband
After the masked dance, Don Pedro teases Beatrice about love and offers to find her a husband. She jokes that everyone is married off but herself, then turns the offer down with a compliment about his being too costly to wear daily. The scene ends with Don Pedro planning to match her with Benedick.
The scene is built on a contradiction that everyone but Beatrice seems to find funny. Don Pedro praises her as a woman born in a happy hour — 'you were born in a merry hour' — and she answers with the same wit she uses as a shield: 'No, sure, my lord, my mother cried.' Marriage is the one subject she will not take seriously, and her refusal of the Prince is a masterpiece of politeness, since 'Your grace is too costly to wear every day' says no without ever sounding rude. Yet the men immediately start planning her life for her: Don Pedro wants 'to bring Benedick and Beatrice into a mountain of affection.' The audience is invited to laugh, but the joke is also the plot — Beatrice's freedom is exactly what the others intend to arrange away.
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“Poor fool, it keeps on the windy side of care.”
The heart becomes a little fool that stays upwind of trouble, a sailing image for staying cheerful.
literary
“Thus goes everyone to the world but I, and I am sunburnt.”
She admits being left out and adds one self-mocking detail, which makes the loneliness funny rather than sad.
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“I may sit in a corner and cry, "Heigh-ho for a husband!"”
A wistful sigh turned into a little song: the corner, the cry and the old phrase make loneliness charming.
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“Your grace is too costly to wear every day.”
She refuses a proposal by saying he is too fine to wear daily: a face-saving joke that says no.
literary
“which is to bring Benedick and Beatrice into a mountain of affection, the one with the other.”
The matchmaking is framed as a labour, capped by the absurdly grand phrase a mountain of affection.
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Up next · 10make an oyster of someoneThe scene: Benedick Mocks Men in LoveShe keeps marriage at a distance throughout, and answers his offer with a joke about his being too costly to wear daily. It is a polite refusal, not an insult.
It is the sigh of an unmarried woman, half joke and half complaint. Beatrice uses it to mock her own situation while everyone around her pairs off.
He plans to match her with Benedick, hoping to turn their constant quarrelling into love, and asks the others to help him do it.
Yes. Leonato calls her an excellent wife for Benedick and jokes that a week of marriage would have them talking each other mad.
Several of the company say they are for him, and Hero offers to do any modest office to help her cousin find a good husband.
