Benedick Falls for Beatrice, Explained：paper bullets of the brain

What's really going on

Benedick has spent the whole play mocking marriage, and the trick works precisely because it gives him a way to save face. He does not simply fall in love; he builds a case. He notes that people 'say I will bear myself proudly,' so he resolves to seem humble, then turns their praise of the lady over in his mind until he can say, 'I cannot reprove it.' His old jibes are the last obstacle, and he argues them away with appetite and age: 'A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age.' When he asks whether 'quips and sentences and paper bullets of the brain' should stop him, the answer is a flat 'No!' The scene is funny because he is still the same man, proud of his own arguments, using them to arrive at the very thing he swore against.

Theme

このチャプターで学べること

• The funniest vows are the ones broken on stage.
• He turns criticism into a blessing to save face.
• Paper bullets cannot stop a man from what he wants.
• Self-persuasion works by tiny, convenient steps.
• A grand excuse often hides a very small desire.

発音のポイント

• Happy are they — Stress Happy, soften are, and let they fall at the end.
• no addition — Link no and addition so it sounds like no-waddition.
• endure in his age — Link endure in, then run his age together.