Seven Founding Hills

This marks the second winter our family is completing a Shakespeare Unit Study. My kids are ages 12, 4, 3, and an infant, so most of our school work is catered towards our middle schooler. One of our favorite parts of our Shakespeare unit study has been to memorize a Shakespeare monologue and this year we selected the “St. Crispin Day” speech.

How to Memorize a Monologue

Memorization is such personal task that if you have something that works for you I would not change it, but I will share the steps we go through to memorize work in our home.

1. Print out or write out the monologue
2. Read the work out loud once
3. Break the work down into 4-6 line stanzas I personally prefer to separate the work based on topic rather than length
4. Memorize one stanza before moving on to the next
5. Practice reciting all of the stanzas together

Bonus: We enjoy watching videos of other people reciting the monologue we are memorizing

St. Crispin Day Speech

In Shakespeare’s “Henry V”, the English find themselves before the Battle of Agincourt exhausted and outnumbered five to one. Hearing his men lament they could use some of the men idling in England, Henry V delivers the St. Crispin’s Day speech to inspire his troops to embrace the glory they will receive upon victory precisely because they are the lucky few ready to fight.

King Henry V: What’s he that wishes so?
My cousin Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin:
If we are mark’d to die, we are enow
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires:
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.
No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England:
God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one man more, methinks, would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made
And crowns for convoy put into his purse:
We would not die in that man’s company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is called the feast of Crispian:
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say ‘To-morrow is Saint Crispian:’
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars.
And say ‘These wounds I had on Crispin’s day.’
Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day: then shall our names.
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember’d.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember’d;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

From Henry V, Act IV, Scene III