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Shakespeare plays AARON on stage


A view of the stage, with a sign telling us that we are in a forest near Rome; there are bushes at the back, and a money-bag and a sheet of parchment on the floor.  Shakespeare is centre-stage, performing as Aaron dressed in Moorish style.   He shakes his fist fiercely while Tamora, his lover, stands behind him looking on in admiration

AARON Madam, though Venus govern your desires,
Saturn is dominator over mine.
What signifies my deadly-standing eye,
My silence, and my cloudy melancholy,
My fleece of woolly hair that now uncurls
Even as an adder when she doth unroll
To do some fatal execution?
No madam, these are no venereal signs;
Vengeance is in my heart, death in my hand,
Blood and revenge are hammering in my head.
Hark Tamora, the empress of my soul,
This is the day of doom for Bassanius.

Titus Andronicus, Act 2 Scene 2


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