What advice does Antonio give to his brother regarding his grief?

Answer 1

Shakespeare's favourite character name is Antonio. He used it in no less than five different plays, and you haven't said which one. It can't be the Merchant from the Merchant of Venice or the sea-captain from Twelfth Night, since neither of them has a brother. So cross them out. The Antonio from The Tempest is the brother of Prospero, but is not the kind of person who would console Prospero even if he needed consoling. In The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Antonio is Proteus's father, and has a brother, and the brother is sad and needs consoling, because Antonio says to his servant Panthino, "Tell me, Panthino, what sad talk was that, wherewith my brother held you in the cloister?" However, we do not see Antonio speak to his brother about his sadness. That leaves the Antonio in Much Ado about Nothing. He has a brother, called Leonato, who suffers grief because his only daughter Hero has been traduced by her fiancé Claudio. He is pretending to suffer a greater grief because they are pretending that Hero died of the shame. The traducing and the pretence that Hero is dead takes place in the extremely long Act IV Scene 1. Any consoling must come after. Act IV Scene 2 is all about Dogberry, but O look! Act V Scene 1 starts off with Antonio and Leonato. And Antonio's first line in that scene is "If you go on thus, you will kill yourself, and 'tis not wisdom thus to second grief against yourself." In other words, if Leonato spends so much time grieving that he kills himself, he will cause even more grief. In yet other words, Antonio is advising Leonato not to be so violent in his grief.