Shakespeare Read-Alongs discussion

Okay, great, then you'll get a jumble of some of my thoughts and questions mixed together.


At first I asked myself, why this play is entitled „The Winter's Tale“ - it doesn't necessarily seem like a seasonal story at all. ;) My introduction of the play provides some intriguing answers: in Shakespeare's day a „winter's tale“ meant a fantastic tale, especially a ghost story. The main intention of the title would therefore be to emphasize that this play tells an incredible story, which might display some thing out of the ordinary *coughs * the resurrection of Hermione *coughs * (but we're going to talk about this later) :D

However, the play is called the Winter's Tale and not A Winter's Tale, so Shakespeare might have been referring to a particular story? Shakespeare talks about such a story in Act II where Hermione begs Mamillius to tell her a tale, and he says: „A sad tale's best for winter. I have one/ Of sprites and goblins.“ (II.1.25) And the story he recounts actually mirrors parts of the overarching play, Leontes has become the man who „dwelt by a churchyard“, and even Mamillius' „sprites and goblins“ are represented by the vision that Antigonus has of the dead Hermione.

I was wondering whether Antigonus has had a simple dream or has he seen a „real“ ghost/ apparation? Usually, Shakespeare doesn't incorporate too many fantasy/magical/paranormal elements in his plays – I mean he did it in „A Midsummer Night's Dream“ and in „The Tempest“ but usually he stays in the bounds of reality, so I was wondering where he was getting at with that scene of Antigonus' vision. Any ideas?


The last association one could have with the title is that this play is in a sense about winter, namele the winter which Leontes creates within and around himself after losing his wife and his son.


Something that I didn't know before going into the play was that Shakespeare based it on Robert Greene's „Pandosto“ (1588). I honestly thought that Shakespeare invented his plots on his own, but it was interesting to see where he parted from the source material. In general I think that Shakespeare did a better job than Greene, because just the idea of Leontes falling in love with Perdita and terrorizing her makes me want to vomit. Steering a little off topic here, but I really have a problem putting this play into a category. I honestly think it's a mixture between a tragedy and a comedy. I know that it is discussed as a comedy because of the happy ending, but the play had so much suffering, and Mamillius still dead at the end of it, that I can't fully agree with that category.

In my introduction of my edition, the author argues that the only reason why Shakespeare resurrected Hermione by the end (in contrast to the source material) was that none of his comedies include the death of a central character who is a model of virtue, therefore Hermione had to live by the end of it. I am really curious if Shakespeare was really so aware of the pattern of his comedies and whether he wanted them all to share a pattern... What do you think?

And know I have to ask you a really stupid question, but neither whilst reading the play nor the introduction did I understand whether or not Hermione was dead at some point??? I mean did she die and then get resurrected after Leontes' repentance etc. or was she simply in hiding for 16 years? It seems to be the latter, but Shakespeare's choice of stage direction („Hermione descends“) seems so „holy“ and dramatic to me as if she had been dead for real. I am confused... And if she had been alive the whole time, why had she stayed in hiding? Why didn't she search for her child? I mean what did she do in all those years?

In general I found the statue-scene it bit ridiculous... (??) I don't know, it didn't pack an emotional punch for me and it wasn't all that surprising... I wanted to feel a little more about this happy reunion but I thought it was just weird. And how did you feel about Paulina being paired off with Camillo? It seemed so out of the blue, and it was super weird that Leontes just decided that for her, without even considering whether she wanted anything to do with Camillo? I wasn't really a fan of it, because Paulina was by far my favorite character in the play and I wanted her to stay the strong, independant woman that she was but alas!


And of course, we have to talk about the bear. The stage direction which made me, intitally, want to pick up this play, and... I wasn't disappointed. I thought it provided a great comic relief, even though I didn't get at first that the bear killed Antigonus off-stage. I mean how brutal??? :D I love the fact that scholars discussed for centuries if Shakespeare intended the companies to use a real bear? I mean WTF? How would they manage that? The thought of an actor in a bear-skin is quite hilarious... I'm wondering how you perceived it, since you watched a stage adaptation of it?

Now some questions regarding certain characters. I wasn't so sure of the role of Autolycus? Was he simply there to get a laugh out of the audience? (I didn't find him that funny at all, but I had problems understanding his jokes because I am not a native speaker soooo....) I mean his actions didn't advance the plot at all, and in general I was just confused why he got so much stage time...

Another character that I didn't understand was the Clown, the shepherd's son (it took me so long to figure that out, because I didn't go back to the title page to check who he was exactly and for the longest time I thought he was a jester... oops). I didn't find him that funny either?? I'm probably missing something to his character... I really enjoyed the contrast he provided to his father – in general there are some great differences shown between two generations (Leontes vs Perdita, Polixenes vs Florizel, the Old Shepherd vs the Clown) – I think that Shakespeare is sending some mixed messages here. On the one hand he definitely favors Perdita and Florizel's view, their love and affection for one another basically brings „spring“ to Leontes' „winter“ (to speak with the metaphor above), but on the other hand we are supposed to love the Old Shepherd, representative of the traditional, rustic virtues, instead of the Clown. Maybe Shakespeare wanted to show that both generations can be at fault, or maybe he didn't want to show anything regarding that matter and I'm just overthinking again...

The last thing I wanna touch upon (for now... I have more in store, but I don't want to overwhelm you :D) is the jump in time. I was honestly sooo surprised when the Chorus came around and announced that 16 years have passed now. I never seen that before (in a Shakespeare play), in some of his plays he even sticks to the Unity of Time, and in most plays months laps, at most. But not years. I'm not sure how I'm feeling about it. It is, of course, necessary for the story Shakespeare wanted to communicate, but it makes some things, especially Hermione's hiding (if she's hiding, that is :D), unbelievable. However, I loved to learn about that little theory that Shakespeare might have written the role of „Time“ (so the Chorus in the play) for himself, and that he might have played Time in his lifetime – indicators for this theory are the usage of phrase such as „my tale“, „I turn my glass, and give my scene such growing“ or „I mentioned...“ - whether or not this is true, I think it's a fun theory that actually makes sense...


So this is the first round of my thoughts... I know it's quite a lot, and not necessarily well-structured (SOORRY), so feel free to reply to whatever you want to reply... I can't wait to hear your thoughts and share some more of mine! :D

First of all, everything you wrote makes perfectly sense. :)

Knowing that „The Winter's Tale“ was an adaptation of „Pandosto“ makes me wonder if more of Shakespeare's plays are adaptations rather than original stories. (?)

Uhh, that is very interesting. I didn't know that one could classify his works in „romance“ as well, I thought it were only comedies, tragedies and histories. The author of my introduction still classifies „The Winter's Tale“ and „The Tempest“ as „comedies“, but he says that Shakespeare tried to style them as Greek romances. So romance motifs are very present in his play, e.g. the resurrection of a beloved person, a statue impersonated by a living woman believed dead, or the rousing of a feeling of wonder. Especially the last motif really surprised me, because usually Shakespeare passes on to his audience the vital pieces of knowledge to understand the plot, and takes them in on the character's secrets... but in „The Winter's Tale“ he does not merely decline to do that, he even goes further, leading the audience utterly astray through Paulina's speeches (in which she pronounced the queen as dead) or Antigonus' vision (in which he saw the dead queen). I think it's relly interesting to see this shift in his narrative choices toward the end of his career.

„Hermione comes down“ definitely sounds less holy than „Hermione descends“. :D I agree, that both readings work, but if she was alive the whole time, I still think it's weird that she hid for over 16 years. :D

I totally agree with you, I really liked that Nature played such a huge role in this play. Even though I have to admit, that Perdita's discussion with Polixenes in Act IV kind of flew over my head. I consulted the commentary for this play, which roughly says that Montaigne asserts the superiority of so-called savages to civilized men, in Shakespeare's play: the analogy of wild to cultivated fruits. Montaigne uses the word „bastardized“ of cultivated fruits and that people shouldn't interfere with Nature, whereas the argument put forward by Polixenes says that art by means of which man improves the products of Nature is itself the creation of Nature. So is Shakespeare just presenting the debate on what Nature is, and whether people should led it run wild or try to cultivate it? I'm really not sure...

One interpretation of this play, that really blew my heads off, is that in „The Winter's Tale“ we may see the whole scheme of Dante's „Divine Comedy“ (which is a work that I definitely wanna read in my lifetime, but now I am still too intimidated by it). Especially if we see „The Winter's Tale“ as Leontes' spiritual journey. In Acts I-III we are given the Inferno, the hell which Leontes builds in his own mind, or like we put it earlier, the winter he creates around himself. This hell is created and sustained only by himself. Next, at the end of Act III and the beginning of Act V, we are given glimpses of the Purgatorio, Leontes sixteen year period of repentance and penance. And finally, in the remainder of Act V, we have the Paradiso in his reunion with daughter, wife and friend. I can definitely see the parallels there, and it really excites me because Dante's „Divine Comedy“ is such a universal tale, and yeah, I really need to get on that...


I also enjoyed the social commentary regarding the relationship between Florizel and Perdita, and that he didn't mind that she is, supposedly, the daughter of a shepherd. He doesn't think (unlike his father, here we have the generation conflict again) that it is dishonorable or disgraceful to marry „below“ his status. I really loved Florizel's declarations of love, and that he saw Perdita as more noble than princesses..


What do you think is the meaning of the play? Just by analyzing the structure of the play (its two halves, seperated by the jump in time) one can sense a sort of deeper meaning. The first half is predominantly destructive (with Leontes accusing his wife, and losing basically his entire family, and getting into this gloomy spirit), whereas the second half is predominantly creative and restorative (Leontes winter is broken, by the mutual love of Florizel and Perdita, and his reunion with his family). The sudden and violent blows of fortune that strike Leontes, deepen and widen the play's image of life as a lasting storm, it increases our sense of the fragility of human happiness, how easily it can be snatched away. Or to speak with our initial metaphor, winter may follow suddenly upon the joys of spring and summer. ;) I would be really interested in your thoughts on this!

That's really interesting then, I really ought to go back on all the Shakespeare plays that I've read and look on which story they are based on.

Yeah, you caught that right. Perdita gives them flowers with the words „these are flowers/ Of middle summer, and I think they are given/ To men of middle age. Y'are very welcome“ (IV.4.105), which is really funny indeed. :D I think it's fascinating that Shakespeare is drawing from so many different symbolism, e.g. the flower symbolisms. And that his contemporary audiences were able to understand them effortlessly.

I read the thing about Persephone as well, but apart from the fact that both Perdita and Persephone are seperated from their mothers and later reunited with them, and that they are emblematic of spring, their two tales share no similarities. The tale of Persephone is about her being abducted by Hades, and how her mother searches for her through the world – I guess the award for Mother of the Year doesn't go to Hermione then ;)) Nonetheless, it is an interesting analysis!!!

Oh, that's so cool that you brought up „The Picture of Dorian Gray“. I totally forgot that this scene existed but it's just perfect :D Thank you so much for bringing it up! However, it makes me wonder what Oscar intended with this Shakespeare reference? The part about Perdita being no longer disgraced and living happily in her garden is quite clear, but since when is Florizel faithless? I didn't go back on every scene to check, but from what I can remember his faith is never in question? Do you have an idea what Oscar was getting at?

I loved the point you made about the play being seperate and destroyed in itself, it's a really neat textual analysis because it holds true!

Personally, I think the latter half is about healing AND creation, creation in the sense of Perdita and Florizel forming a relationship and therefore bringing spring to the court of Leontes – similar to the way in which we discussed that Leontes is creating the winter around himself^^

Btw, do you want to buddy-read „The Merchant of Venice“ next? Or if you have already read it, just discuss it with me? :D

haha Oscar is just talking nonsense at times, he probably just thought he seemed cheeky, I mean the quote above is quite the dandy-thing to say ;), without actually talking sense :D

I know for sure that I will take forever to finish "The Merchant of Venice" because my reading pace is soo slow at the moment, and I have to hand in a paper for University next week, so let's settle roughly for the weekend in two week's time (so March 31) - would that work for you?

I'm not a religious person, and therefore not very educated on the different belief systems, but I'll def keep the anti-semitism in mind whilst reading, and will do some research on it! Thanks for giving me a heads up. :)

So, unless you have something left to discuss, I would call it a day, regarding our discussion of "The Winter's Tale" because I have nothing more to add. It was super fun to hear of your perspective and all the points you've brought up, so I am really looking forward to reading "The Merchant of Venice with you". :D

Okay great! Of course, birthdays and school are more important, so don't stress yourself out over the reading. It doesn't matter if we'll discuss it a little later, but to have a rough timeline helps! :)