The Cenci: A Tragedy in Five Acts

by Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Todhunter, Alfred Forman

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Genres: Plays, Classics, Drama, Poetry, 19th Century, Fiction, Romanticism

136 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1819

About the author

Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley, British romantic poet, include "To a Skylark" in 1820; Prometheus Unbound , the lyric drama; and "Adonais," an elegy of 1821 to John Keats.

The Cenci , work of art or literature of Percy Bysshe Shelley of 1819, depicts Beatrice Cenci, Italian noblewoman.

People widely consider Percy Bysshe Shelley among the finest majors of the English language. He is perhaps most famous for such anthology pieces as Ozymandias , Ode to the West Wind , and The Masque of Anarchy . His major long visionary Alastor , The Revolt of Islam , and the unfinished The Triumph of Life .

Unconventional life and uncompromising idealism of Percy Bysshe Shelley combined with his strong skeptical voice to make an authoritative and much denigrated figure during his life. He became the idol of the next two or three generations, the major Victorian and Pre-Raphaelite Robert Browning, Alfred Tennyson, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Algernon Charles Swinburne, as well as William Butler Yeats and in other languages, such as Jibanananda Das and Subramanya Bharathy . Karl Marx, Henry Stephens Salt, and [authorm:Bertrand Russell] also admired him. Famous for his association with his contemporaries Lord Byron, he also married Mary Shelley, novelist.

Reviews

[Karen Witzler · Rating 3 out of 5]

A long time ago, on a dark autumn night, a fire burning, good red wine. (It might have been really crappy wine, but I was young and easily impressed.) People drunkenly crying out "Beatrice" with four syllables - or was it "Berenice" - or did we read Poe the same night?

~~~~~~~ Probably need to do a sober reread.

[Peter Heavenheld · Rating 3 out of 5]

Even the greatest good can be corrupted into its inverse by the greatest evil. Cenci is a monster, who fears nor God nor man. He destroys because it is in his nature. When he rapes Beatrice, his forgiving daughter, a priest and his banished son convince her to be an accessory to his murder.

Shelley was certainly no great dramatist, but this is a fitting tribute to Shakespeare, redeemed by his rich, varied and inventive language. At times, he achieves that rare theatrical perfection of scene, character and language, for example in the chilling trial/torture scene or Beatrice’s lullaby towards the end of the play.

[Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you aren't the biggest fan of Shelley's sometimes flowery and self-indulgent poetry, you will be glad to know that this blank-verse play has a much simpler style and is, for that reason, a much more gratifying read. Despite the Gothic setting and characters, Shelley's play has that rare ring of truth to it that shines through the best tragedies, and it is, in fact, based off of a true historical event. The tragic heroine Beatrice is given touching inner strength and dignity despite her awful circumstances. The other characters, though not as perfectly drawn, are compelling. Shelley's distrust of religious and political authority is woven well into the text, enhancing rather than distracting from the story. Trigger Warnings for: the worst father and the most mustache-twirling-villain you are ever likely to encounter in a Gothic play.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Out of the two plays I have read by Shelley, this is the better one. The Cenci is actually a pretty interesting and spicy tragedy about a daughter who is raped by her father, then is part of a scheme to have him murdered. Of course, this is just the bare bones of the plot, as Shelley clearly fills out the rest with language that I think is not exactly suited for a drama. Now, it is not as obvious as it is in Prometheus Unbound by any means, but it is still a little clunky to read amidst the action that is frankly quite interesting, if not controversial.

Other than that, I am at a loss for words with this one. Not exactly remarkable, but also not a bad play.

[Moira]

Yet another book I'm not going to be reading on the bus. ("And what's that about, dear?")

[Reza · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Death, death! our law and religion call thee
A punishment and a reward; oh, which
Have I deserved?"

[BookChampions · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yet another disturbing Romantic drama that leaves the reader with a ton of ethical questions. This was particularly gruesome (Count Cenci is a nasty human being), but it's provocative and meaningful. Shelley does a nice job with both pacing and stylizing the prose. Yet if I had to choose, though, I'd read Hemans' The Siege of Valencia again, for the musicality of Hemans' prose and the intricacies of character.

[Somya · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shelley's poetry is definitely way better and well written than his plays. It's based on a true incident that took place in the late 16th century, Italy, in which one of the noblest and richest families of that city had been destroyed. It indeed is a tragedy.

Beatrice's death at the end, I think is one of the saddest deaths I've ever read of and to think it actually happened, in reality, breaks my heart.

[Ana · Rating 3 out of 5]

3? Idk I guess, but I do know I want to use this gif.

[Connor Baldwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beatrice might be one most interesting characters ever... I think she's guilty of her crime

[The Aspie Author · Rating 4 out of 5]

The fact that this play is based on a true story baffles me.

[Steve R · Rating 3 out of 5]

This ‘Tragedy in Five Acts’ was written in 1819 and described the thoroughly horrific demise of a wealthy Roman family around the turn of the seventeenth century. As it is based on a true story, it brought to mind Browning’s The Ring and the Book which, also set in Italy and based on a true story, tells a somewhat similar story of intrigue and murder. Also, George Eliot’s Romolo seems akin with these two other works in capturing the intense, totally unbridled moral laxity and personal selfishness which seems to have animated Renaissance Italian society.

Multiple murders, financial embezzlement, defamation of character and incestuous rape abound through this relatively short play. It begins with a Cardinal telling Cenci, the head of the family, that a recent murder will be covered up by the Pope if he simply forfeit a fief of land he controls to Papal control. It seems that paying to have the authorities look the other way has become a custom for Cenci, who later holds a banquet to quite surprisingly celebrate the deaths of his sons. His justification for such elated feelings: they will no longer cost him any money. He has also hoodwinked another relative, Giacomo, out of his wife’s dowry, leaving him close to destitute. Then, he lies about it to Giacomo’s wife, blaming it on her husband squandering the money, which turns both her and his children against him. This skewed sense of right and wrong then is carried to a truly horrific extent with his incestuous importuning of his daughter Beatrice. Seeming to go mad, she eventually joins Giacomo and Lucretia, her step-mother, in parricidal plans.

Contemplation of lust for own’s own daughter evokes the following self-analysis:

‘Tis an awful thing/To touch such mischief as I now conceive:/So men sit shivering on the dewy bank/And try the chill stream with their feet/Once in…/How the delightful spirit pants for joy!’

This tortured family gets no help from others. The Cardinal Camillo, who seemed more interested in furthering the Pope’s aggrandizement at the expense of the evildoer, later fails in his effort to persuade Pope Clement VIII to show mercy. While after declaiming at length against her father’s imperfidities to the guests at the banquet, Beatrice realizes there is not only no response, but no one will meet her eyes: (I thought of Liz Cheney’s morally upright voice in the Republican wilderness over the criminal acts of Donald Trump as I read these lines.)

Dare no one look on me?/None answer? Can one tyrant overbear the sense of many best and wisest men?

Even more reprehensible is the smiling countenance and soothing words of Orsini, a former suitor of Beatrice who, now a priest whom, like both the Pope and her father, seems intent on maneuvering the situation to his own personal advantage. Though not extended as far as Cenci, his depravity certainly has been developed in a similar direction. He is instrumental in making sure that murderous intentions achieve a practical application.

Shelley seems to have been drawn to this story due to the juxtaposition it provided between cold tyranny and innocent self-defense. As Beatrice remarks on her mother’s outlook:

She knows not the uses of the world./She fears that power is as a beast whose look transmutes/All things to guilt which is its nutriment./She cannot know how well the supine slaves/Of blind authority read the truth of things/When written on a brow of guilelessness.

Although it lacked the insightful moral ambiguities which made Mi>The Ring and the Book so riveting and the broader social and religious backdrop of Romola, Shelley has captured the hypocrisies and violence underpinning a vast portion of Italian society in the Renaissance.

Recommended.

[Anand · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I first started on this, I knew that I'd be reading something deeply searing, uncomfortable, yet engrossing. The Cenci deals with incest, parental abuse, rape, murder, religious authoritarianism, torture, nature, Catholicism, and more. In five acts Percy Shelley follows his predecessors Sophocles and Shakespeare by taking a story from the deep past and reanimating it with his own poetic imagination and creating something that's excellent in both language and dramatic force. Shelley does well to conceal the rape and the murder of Cenci offstage, leaving us with the evocative power of the devastating effects of all this violence. He also follows Greek drama in its general abstinence from displaying on-screen violence, while he is almost very Shakespearean in his own Shelleyan way through the way poetry is interwoven into speech so that I cannot isolate a specific line so much as take passages as wholes. I am impressed also by Shelley's grasp of metaphors, similes, figurative language, and while it can get a bit thick at times (this is the Romantic era), it generally feels right for this sort of elevated drama that has not only an important lesson to teach (authoritarianism is devastating and can, unchecked, lead to both violence and to enabling) but also pity to evoke. Beatrice's speech after the rape has a mad cadence in which all nature is wrecked.

The beautiful blue heaven is flecked with blood!
The sunshine on the floor is black! The air
Is changed to vapours such as the dead breathe
In charnel pits!

Interestingly, Shelley has a particular feel for the religious setting, for an Italian Catholic world that is "alien" to us Anglo-Americans but which is just as real as anything within our Protestant-influenced world. He also has an excellent grasp of the motivations and desperation that drives an essentially saintly and brave woman like Beatrice Cenci to commit this murder, a deceitful Orsino to do what he does at the expense of those around him, and the madness of the tyrannical Cenci himself to wreck damage on his family through deceit and violence.

I would recommend everyone read The Cenci at least once in their lifetime. It's one of Shelley's most engrossing dramatic works both in poetry and in drama, though Prometheus Unbound is perhaps his most successful and sublime, and its focus on rape, the culture of authoritarianism, and revenge, make it feel very timely in an era of #MeToo and attention to sexual abuse and rape and violence.

Shelley was right to see the deep past as a reservoir of stories and images. Like Yeats after him in "Leda and the Swan", and Shakespeare before him in King Lear (which Shelley considered the greatest drama of all time), and Keats alongside him in his various odes, Shelley believed in the power of myth to enchant, terrify, teach, exhort, and empower readers to be free and to imagine and to come through their readings to a kind of emotional, intellectual, philosophical, and ultimately sensual enlightenment.

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

i read a pdf of an old edition

[Kuba Skomorowski · Rating 3 out of 5]

Murphy's law: killing your father edition

[Lauren 🧸 · Rating 2 out of 5]

deeply unsettling. poor beatrice

[Poppy]

I actually loved this. Beatrice’s soliloquies towards the end were excellent

[vee:) · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shelley's adaptation of the one of the most infamous murder plots in renaissance Italy--the story of a family who plotted the murder of its own leader and patriarch, Francesco Cenci--is a powerful dramatic work and a blistering indictment of the Catholic church. Cenci is your typical sadistic libertine--remorseless, filled with hatred, and devoid of pity--straight from the pages of a Sade novel. He commits countless atrocities, raping his daughter Beatrice and gloating over the death of his two sons. About to drink some wine, he says of his two sons with a villainy almost implausible: "Could I believe thou [his wine] wert their mingled blood, / Then would I taste thee like a sacrament" (I.iii.81-83). Everyone in Italy loathes the count, but he's managed to avoid legal retribution by bribing the Catholic church (with the villainous Clement VIII at its head) with money. The church emerges, throughout the drama, as deeply ruthless and corrupt institution. Beatrice, Lucretia, Giacomo, and Orsino (Beatrice's would-be lover) conspire to have the count killed, and eventually succeed in doing so, but one of the pope's messengers arrives just after the fact, and the Cenci's are sent to Rome to be "tried" and subjected to inquisitional torture. The real heroine of "The Cenci," of course, is Beatrice, who stands up to her abusive father and the crooked tribunal with remarkable--indeed heroic--grace and poise. Like Antigone, she defends, in powerful and persuasive terms, a higher law than that of her corrupt country. Just before the Cencis are hanged, Beatrice tells her mother and brother to remain calm and embrace their death with dignified composure.

[Farzane · Rating 4 out of 5]

بئاتریچه: (برآشفته) اوه، خدای من! سزاست که چنین ناگهانی بمیرم؟ جوان تر از آنم که در زیر خاک تیره و سرد، تن به نیستی آکنده از کرم دهم! که در جایی تنگ و تاریک زندانی شوم؛ که دیگر آفتاب قشنگ را نبینم؛ که دیگر آوای خوش تنابنده ای را نشنوم؛ که دیگر به اندیشه های آشنا میدان ندهم، اندیشه هایی اندوهناک که با این همه دیگر از کف می روند! چه وحشتناک است که چیزی نباشی! یا اینکه... هان؟ اوه، من کجایم؟ نگذارید دیوانه شوم! ای خدای بخشنده، مرا ببخش که چنین پندارهای سستی دارم! کاش نه خدایی، نه بهشتی، و نه زمینی در این جهان تهی می بود؛ دنیایی تهی از مردم، فراخ، تیره، بی فروغ، و رازانگیز! کاش آن گاه همه چیز... سایه هولناک او، چشمانش، آوایش، دستان او گرداگرد مرا گرفته است؛ زیستگاه و دم مرده ی زندگی من! کاش دمی، با چهرکی که بیشتر همانند خودش باشد، درست به همان گونه که مرا در جهان خاکی شکنجه می کرد، با چهرکی چروکیده و مویی سفید، بیاید و مرا در بازوان جهنمی اش در هم بکوبد، چشم در چشم من اندازد، و مرا در چاهی فرو برد، پایین، پایین، پایین! آخر مگر تنها او در روی زمین توانگری بی همتا نبود، و مگر او هستی همیشگی ندارد؟ هر چند که مرده است، مگر روحش در هر آن چه دم می زند زنده نیست، و جلوه اش بر من و خانواده ام همان تباهی، سرکوفت، درد، و ناامیدی نیست؟ تا کنون چه کسی از آن دنیا بازگشته تا یاساهای وادی ناپیموده مرگ را به ما بیاموزد؟ که شاید به همان اندازه ی یاساهایی که بر ما چیره اند بیدادگر باشند، آه، به کجا، به کجا پناه برم؟

[Giulia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read for uni

Second re-read: June 2019

I still love this, but now enough is enough.
Analysed The Cenci for my MA dissertation. Now I don't wanna think about this play anymore.

It is still a very strong tragedy that I find incredibly engrossing and beautifully sad.

"My friend, that palace-walking devil Gold
Has whispered silence to his Holiness"

—————————————————————————

"That matter of the murder is hushed up
If you connect to yield his Holiness
Your fief that lies beyond the Pincian gate."

TW: rape

First re-read: May 2019

I mean, with an opening like this one, how can you think that this play is not gonna fuck you up?
I'm incredibly happy I can analyze this one for my dissertation.
Upon re-read I loved The Cenci even more and thus I decided to change my rating: from a three to a full on four stars!

It is such a heart-wrenching story.
A toxic family, stunning characters, arguable morality, not so pious men of faith, splendid writing.
This play has it all.

I truly deeply love this hard-hitting, stunning play.

"My Lord,
We are quite ready. Well, 'tis very well."

—————————————————————————

Interesting read.

[Krystalia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shelley chose a suitable topic for a tragedy, a story based on a horrifying real story. Unlike his flowery and hard to follow writing in his "Prometheus Unbound", the one here is much simpler and down-to-earth. I found the final Act V to be the best as I believe he succeeds in highlighting the contemporary religious and aristocratic abuse of power. He doesn't do this in an aggressive way, but in an exasperated one, upon reaching the timeless notion of civil justice versus moral justice. The tragic effect lies in the failure of the contemporary system to produce any justice whatsoever, which forces people to take the matter on their own hands only to be punished for it.

It's a decent tragedy that I enjoyed reading, although I wouldn't put it up there with the big tragedies of the past. The characters weren't very well-developed, but this is somewhat counterbalanced by the insightful psychological depiction of a rape victim. Maybe Shelley had the potential to be a better dramatist, had he lived to mature and practice the assertive language needed for this genre. But, reading this was interesting nonetheless to see how a Romantic tragedy is and it did achieve in arousing feelings of injustice and, so, producing a good tragic effect.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 2 out of 5]

This menacing tragedy is based upon a morose and disreputable Italian tale, being principally a drama of emotion rather than of character. There is an admixture of classical elements here. You’d find unity of action and exclusion of comic relief. And say what , you’d also find Gothic accoutrements. You have shadowy dungeons and a shocking atmosphere. The creator has also punched in some romantic elements!! You get emotional outpourings and an overweight abhorrence of injustice. But even after all such high-minded paraphernalia, this is a shitty tome. At least I found it shitty. For strters, the ‘Blank verse’ is very very woody and inexpressive!! The soliloquies are extremely long-drawn-out. And wanna know more? The action is hesitant, characterisations are distorted, and style is unwelcoming. What more nightmarish experience do you want? This tome is influenced by Calderon's ‘El Purgatorio de San Patricio’ and by the Bard’s ‘Macbeth’!! Seriously? And a horde of experts do recurrently accept this tome as the finest poetic drama since Shakespeare!! Dude. seriously? They say that: “underneath the austere verse shoulders an intensity of passion” – my foot Sirs. I read it thrice. Please.

[Darryl Friesen · Rating 5 out of 5]

😳🤯😱

So… how would I describe this play?!

1) Depraved
2) Horrifying
3) BRILLIANT!!

I was on the edge of my proverbial seat the whole reading experience! While certainly written with shock value in mind (!), everything truly horrifying and disturbing happens off the page. The Cenci asks some sobering questions about the nature of justice, a shockingly corrupt ecclesial government, and the actions to which people can be driven when they are deprived of all hope and agency towards the bettering of their situation.

Beatrice is an incredible protagonist. Some favourite lines of hers, spoken at the climax of the play:

“What a world we make, the oppressor and the oppressed…”

“If thou hopest mercy in heaven, show justice upon earth: worse than a bloody hand is a hard heart.”

Even the morally slippery Orsino states at one point, “Where shall I find the disguise to hide me from myself, as now I skulk from every other eye?”

Incredibly perceptive and brilliantly written, though not for the faint of heart!!

[Meg · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my second time reading this tragic play. The first time I read this was in my Romantic Drama class in the spring semester of my senior year of college. I enjoyed this play a lot more now that I had more time to read it.

This play is tragic and heartbreaking. I recommend this to anyone who is a fan of Percy Shelley or is a fan of Romantic drama.

Things I enjoyed:
- The plot is entertaining.
- Beatrice is such a wholesome character.
- Easy to read/understand for a classic.

Things I didn't like:
- The Cenci is the worst character
- Orsino is terrible as well
- The ending is super sad.

[Byron Griffin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Cenci, a play by Percy Shelley, is a tragic history depicting the fall of the titular italian noble family, brought about by the immorality of Count Francesco Cenci. The count is a figure that feels as though he stepped out of the mind of Marquis de Sade, guilty of numerous crimes and possessed of heart hardened even, if not especially to his own children yet, one Crime, which Percy does avoid describing overtly is what signs his death warrant. The most tragic aspect of the story is how the salvation of Beatrice from her father did lead to her doom.

Writing wise I adored the poetic manner of Beatrice in her trial and the lamentations of the doomed.

[Drew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Artaud was obsessed with this play. So am I. A tragedy of Shakespearean proportions and rhythmically driven poetry, Shelley's familial drama of revenge has unforgettable characters, plenty of perverse subtext, and a momentum that's somehow fueled by Doom instead of being weighed down by it. Why "The Cenci" has yet to take its rightful place in the canon is perplexing. Count Cenci's ungodly curse of his daughter Beatrice alone rivals any mean-spirited monologue of Richard III or sacrilegious speech of Lady Macbeth. This one always quickens my pulse!

[Keerthi Vasishta · Rating 4 out of 5]

A marvellous effort, almost Shakespearean in the complexity of its lead, the doomed Beatrice. Lucretia, her step-mother is the weakest character, both in the play and in her construction. The Count Cenci is truly evil, Cardinal Camillo is a cartoon and the Pope is depicted as greedy. Moral Justice as practised is shown to be flawed in its inability to account for nuance in the way it is executed in the world.
Is PB Shelley's view on all of these things flawed because of his idealism? Yes. Is it a good play? Yes.
Helps that he wrote it for two specific actors...

[cat · Rating 2 out of 5]

Why should Beatrice's actions have consequences? She's literally a girl.

Anyway, I did not feel invested at all. Each scene was just anguish followed by more anguish, it was all so emotionally flat. Furthermore, I despise the use of rape as a plot device: we knew the Count was evil and that his family wished him gone, we didn't need him to sexually assault his daughter to prove that.

Overall, the whole play gave 'written by a man' and the only cool character was Beatrice.

[char]

could go pound for pound with shakespeares tragedies and histories. so fascinated by the (in its time) largely reviled artaud staging/reworking of this as a project of theater of cruelty. would not take much to push this there... surely wilde, an admirer of this, took it to heart in some way for salome.