Summary

Note that, other than the separate first "Argument," there are no divisions within the original. They have been added here for convenience in summary and analysis, but the poem itself is told as a single unbroken narrative.

Before the text of the poem proper, Shakespeare presents the "Argument." The argument is essentially a short summary, written in prose, that retells the story of the rape of Lucrece and the fall of the house of Tarquin. Notably, the argument emphasizes the ending of the poem: that "the state government changed from kings to consuls," introducing the beginning of the Roman republic, as a result of the poem's events (p. 6).

The text of the poem itself begins with action, as Tarquin approaches Lucrece's home at Collatium. The poem narrates the events of the nights before, in which Lucrece's husband, Collatine, praised both Lucrece's...