SILVIA O miserable, unhappy that I am!

PROTEUS       Unhappy were you, madam, ere I came,

But by my coming I have made you happy.

SILVIA By thy approach thou mak’st me most unhappy.

JULIA  [aside] And me, when he approacheth to your presence.

SILVIA Had I been seized by a hungry lion

I would have been a breakfast to the beast

Rather than have false Proteus rescue me.

O God be judge how I love Valentine,

Whose life’s as tender to me as my soul!

And full as much – for more there cannot be –

I do detest false perjured Proteus.

Therefore, be gone. Solicit me no more!     (5.4.28-40)

O miserable, unhappy that I am! Woe is me! says Silvia, with considerable justification. This is the worst possible luck. And so Proteus takes mansplaining to new depths: unhappy were you, madam, ere I came, but by my coming I have made you happy. No no, you’ve got it all wrong, you’re completely mistaken. You were in a bad place, really unlucky, before I got to you, but I’ve saved you and made you joyful, restored your fortunes completely! #blessed or what? Get away from me, Silvia might as well say: by thy approach thou mak’st me most unhappy. You’ve ruined everything, crashing in like that—and approach here also suggests some kind of ‘advance’, that he’s had his arm around her, for instance, not least when Julia chips in, bitterly: and me too, I’m also made unhappy when he approacheth to your presence. I hate watching this.

But Silvia’s just getting started, after her initial furious rebuff, trying to spell it out. Had I been seized by a hungry lion I would have been a breakfast to the beast rather than have false Proteus rescue me. (The alliteration, let alone the breakfast, adds a touch of bathos to her fury.) I’d rather be eaten by a LION (and there’s perhaps a suggestion of martyrdom in the choice of animal—also, not many lions in the woods around Milan? a martyr for love, for Valentine…) than be rescued by you, you despicable, treacherous man. O God, be judge how I love Valentine, whose life’s as tender to me as my soul! I love Valentine! He’s part of me! I love him as I love my self; he’s my other self. (Silvia’s glancing at the language often used of friendship between men, such as Proteus and Valentine exemplified at the play’s beginning.) And full as much—for more there cannot be—I do detest false perjured Proteus! I hate you as much as I love Valentine, which means I hate you as much as it’s possible to hate anyone or anything. Because you’re a traitor and a breaker of vows, to Valentine and to Julia! Therefore, be gone. Solicit me no more! Get out! Leave me alone! Just STOP.