As I pour through the cut material from THE MASTER OF VERONA, looking for pieces to resurrect for the shorts I’m putting together (rather like Frankenstien’s monster), I keep coming across bits of dialogue that I like that were lost.

Here’s an example. This would be from page 125 in MV, just after Mussato declares that he’s writing a play in Seneca’s style:

Mussato cut in. “But that wasn’t the only reason for my choice of Seneca, as opposed to, say, Euripedes.”

Dante pursed his lips. “You mean the violence.”

Mussato looked smug. “Yes. Seneca’s plays are by far the most violent of the Roman tragedies. Look at his Oedipus, where Jocasta rips open her own womb. If I’m going to leave posterity the venal truth of the Great Dog of Verona, the repugnance of the bellicose autocrat, what better indictment than showing the full horror onstage? That was Seneca – no deaths offstage, everything as horrible as it is. He impressed the Romans with his gore.”

“No mean feat,” observed Dandolo.

“Probably had to do with the times he was living in,” said Cangrande, unconcerned by his depiction as a despotic maniac. “He was Nero’s tutor. When Nero tired of him, he was made to commit suicide.”

“No, no – that was Seneca the Moralist,” corrected Dante.

Mussato glanced sharply at his fellow poet. “I’ve always had a theory that they were the same person.”

“Ridiculous!” said Dante. “It would be like confusing Cato the Censor and Cato of Utica.”

“Heaven forfend!” sighed Passerino wryly.

Too much esoteric poetic structure talk, and names that the average reader won’t know (though we should all know Cato of Utica, if only for the way he died), so it went. Mine was the hand that cut it, and I’ll stand by the cut. But I still miss it – so I thought I’d share it.

DB