SOURCE: Hart, F. Elizabeth. “Cerimon's ‘Rough’ Music in Pericles, 3.2.” Shakespeare Quarterly 51, no. 3 (fall 2000): 313-31.

In the following essay, Hart argues that analysis of the adjective “rough” in Cerimon's phrase “rough music” points to the mother goddess Diana as the controlling deity of the play.

Shakespeare's use of “rough” in The Tempest to describe the magic that Prospero must “abjure” (5.1.50, 51) has inspired debate over the adjective's meaning, some critics finding in it the key not only to Prospero's powers but to the play as a whole.¹ A less well-studied but similarly ambiguous use of “rough” occurs in the 1609 quarto of Pericles (Q1), where it modifies the “Musick” that precedes Cerimon's revival of Thaisa, Pericles's presumed-dead wife and queen (sig. E4^r).² Owing to the questionable status of Q1 Pericles, however, “rough” in this case has frequently been emended to “still” in important editions, including the Arden; the Cambridge; the...