QUOTES FROM THE BARD

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 1 ACT/SCENE: 5.4 SPEAKER: Joan la Pucelle CONTEXT: Will nothing turn your unrelenting hearts?
Then, Joan, discover thine infirmity,
That warranteth by law to be thy privilege.
I am with child, ye bloody homicides:
Murder not then the fruit within my womb,
Although ye hale me to a violent death. DUTCH: Kan niets u ‘t onmeedoogend hart vermurwen? —
Dan, Jeanne, kome uw zwakheid nu aan ‘t licht,
Die naar de wet een voorrecht u verleent.
MORE: CITED IN US LAW:
Ligon v. Middletown Area School District, 584 A.2d 376, 379 (Pa. Ct. App. 1990). (The court wrote, “…not since Joan de Plucelle in Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part I attempted to defend herself from a capital charge by proclaiming herself a virgin and then, seeing that that particular defense was unlikely to prevail, informed the judge that she was with child, has anyone argued a judicial point with a more breathtaking Jack of concern for consistency.”

Schmidt:
Turn=Change
Unrelenting=Pitiless
Privilege=Right (of a pregnant woman to postpone execution until after the birth of her child)
Homicided=Murderers
Hale=To pull, drag

Compleat:
Turn=Veranderen
Unrelenting=Onmedoogend, onvermurwelyk
Homicide=Doodslager
Hale=Sleepen, trekken, sleuren Topics: cited in law, rights, pity

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