Flores Character Analysis

COMMANDER: Respect’s the key
To men’s good will; discourtesy merely
Makes enemies.

ORTUÑO: If such men knew
How everyone detests them and longs
To see them grovel, they’d sooner die.

FLORES: Such people are so hard to take!
Such surliness and lack of manners.
Amongst equals it’s pure folly;
Towards inferiors sheer tyranny.

COMMANDER: I’m talking to you, my pretty creature,
And to your friend. You belong to me,
Do you not?

PASCUALA: We do, my lord, but not
In the way you mean.

COMMANDER: Step inside. My men are there. Don’t be afraid.

LAURENCIA: I shall if the magistrates come too. One of them’s my father, but otherwise…

COMMANDER: Flores!

FLORES. Yes, sir?

COMMANDER: Why aren’t they doing what
I say?

FLORES: Get in there!

LAURENCIA: Get your hands
Off us!

FLORES: Come on, you stupid girls!

PASCUALA: Whoa now! For you to lock the stable-door?

FLORES: Inside! He wants to show you all
The spoils of war.

FLORES: These village scum defy us!
You’d do well to raze their village to
The ground. They are nothing but trouble.

MENGO: My lord, I beg you. Punish these men
For what they try to do to us.
In your name they would take this girl
Away with them, despite the fact
She’s married and has honourable parents.
I ask for leave to take her home.

COMMANDER: I give them leave to take revenge
On you. Hand over the sling at once!

COMMANDER: Why run away? Would you prefer
A yokel to a man of my
Great rank?

JACINTA: They offended my honour.
To take me for yourself is not
The way to give it back to me.

COMMANDER: To take you for myself?

JACINTA: My father is
An honourable man. Not of
Such noble birth as you, my lord,
But nobler in his deeds and actions.

COMMANDER: You think these peasant insults will
Dispel my anger? Come!

The people there
Have mercilessly killed their lord
And master: Fernán Gómez murdered by
His faithless subjects, vassals who,
Believing they’d been wronged, rose up
Without good cause. These people called
Him tyrant, and on the strength of that
Committed this foul deed. They broke into
His house, and though he offered, as
An honourable man, to see
To their complaints, not only did
They fail to heed his words but rained
Upon the Cross upon his breast
A thousand cruel blows.

COMMANDER: Respect’s the key
To men’s good will; discourtesy merely
Makes enemies.

ORTUÑO: If such men knew
How everyone detests them and longs
To see them grovel, they’d sooner die.

FLORES: Such people are so hard to take!
Such surliness and lack of manners.
Amongst equals it’s pure folly;
Towards inferiors sheer tyranny.

COMMANDER: I’m talking to you, my pretty creature,
And to your friend. You belong to me,
Do you not?

PASCUALA: We do, my lord, but not
In the way you mean.

COMMANDER: Step inside. My men are there. Don’t be afraid.

LAURENCIA: I shall if the magistrates come too. One of them’s my father, but otherwise…

COMMANDER: Flores!

FLORES. Yes, sir?

COMMANDER: Why aren’t they doing what
I say?

FLORES: Get in there!

LAURENCIA: Get your hands
Off us!

FLORES: Come on, you stupid girls!

PASCUALA: Whoa now! For you to lock the stable-door?

FLORES: Inside! He wants to show you all
The spoils of war.

FLORES: These village scum defy us!
You’d do well to raze their village to
The ground. They are nothing but trouble.

MENGO: My lord, I beg you. Punish these men
For what they try to do to us.
In your name they would take this girl
Away with them, despite the fact
She’s married and has honourable parents.
I ask for leave to take her home.

COMMANDER: I give them leave to take revenge
On you. Hand over the sling at once!

COMMANDER: Why run away? Would you prefer
A yokel to a man of my
Great rank?

JACINTA: They offended my honour.
To take me for yourself is not
The way to give it back to me.

COMMANDER: To take you for myself?

JACINTA: My father is
An honourable man. Not of
Such noble birth as you, my lord,
But nobler in his deeds and actions.

COMMANDER: You think these peasant insults will
Dispel my anger? Come!

The people there
Have mercilessly killed their lord
And master: Fernán Gómez murdered by
His faithless subjects, vassals who,
Believing they’d been wronged, rose up
Without good cause. These people called
Him tyrant, and on the strength of that
Committed this foul deed. They broke into
His house, and though he offered, as
An honourable man, to see
To their complaints, not only did
They fail to heed his words but rained
Upon the Cross upon his breast
A thousand cruel blows.