Monologues for the "Ingénue / Innocent" type

Juliet

Romeo and Juliet · William Shakespeare

«Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds, Towards Phoebus' lodging: such a wagoner As Phaethon would whip you to…»

'Gallop apace…' — the impatience of young love: pure ardour and longing.

Viola

Twelfth Night · William Shakespeare

«I left no ring with her: what means this lady? Fortune forbid my outside have not charm'd her! She made good…»

'I left no ring with her…' — realising she's been fallen for, and her own tangle: wit, humour, charm.

Olivia

Twelfth Night · William Shakespeare

«'What is your parentage?' 'Above my fortunes, yet my state is well: I am a gentleman.' I'll be sworn thou…»

Olivia catches herself falling in love at first sight — play the surprise and surrender to the feeling.

Gwendolen

The Importance of Being Earnest · Oscar Wilde

«Yes, I am quite well aware of the fact. And I often wish that in public, at any rate, you had been more…»

A love declaration aimed at the name 'Ernest': earnest ardour on an absurd premise—comedy mined from total sincerity.

Cecily

The Importance of Being Earnest · Oscar Wilde

«Well, ever since dear Uncle Jack first confessed to us that he had a younger brother who was very wicked and…»

Cecily recounts an engagement she invented entirely: dreamy naivety delivered as established fact—pure ingénue comedy.

Miranda

The Tempest · William Shakespeare

«I do not know One of my sex; no woman's face remember, Save, from my glass, mine own; nor have I seen More…»

The innocent heroine confesses love for the first time — chaste, candid, without coquetry.

Cordelia

King Lear · William Shakespeare

«I yet beseech your majesty,— If for I want that glib and oily art, To speak and purpose not; since what I…»

The quiet dignity of a rejected daughter — play it restrained, tearless, anchored in truth.

Julia

Two Gentlemen of Verona · William Shakespeare

«Nay, would I were so anger'd with the same! O hateful hands, to tear such loving words! Injurious wasps, to…»

Having torn up Proteus's love letter in pique, she instantly repents and tenderly gathers the scraps bearing his name — a play of shame, love and wilful pride.

Marina

Pericles · William Shakespeare

«Why would she have me kill'd? Now, as I can remember, by my troth, I never did her hurt in all my life: I…»

An innocent girl pleads with her hired killer, cataloguing her harmlessness — play genuine bewilderment building into dread.

Helena

A Midsummer Night's Dream · William Shakespeare

«How happy some o'er other some can be! Through Athens I am thought as fair as she. But what of that?…»

Play the thought being born in real time, not a complaint: avoid self-pity, find the self-irony and the thrill of the moment her bad idea suddenly feels brilliant.

Lydia Languish

The Rivals · Richard Brinsley Sheridan

«Why, is it not provoking? when I thought we were coming to the prettiest distress imaginable, to find myself…»

A perfect comic ingenue piece: play her despair absolutely sincerely — the joke is that her tragedy is getting everything she should want; don't wink at the audience.