Thursday, June 10, 2010

The Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare

The Comedy of Errors is generally assumed to be one of Shakespeare's early plays, (perhaps even his very first) and its emphasis on slapstick over verbal humor (in contrast with later comedies) has led many critics to term it an "apprentice comedy." The exact date of composition is unknown: It was first performed on December 28, 1594, at the Gray's Inn Christmas Revels, to an audience that would have been largely composed of lawyers and law students. Attempts have been made to date it by references to historical events mentioned in the text (notably in Act III Scene ii, when Dromio describes the fearsome Nell/Luce with references to European politics and geography), but the references are so vague that any exact dating amounts to guesswork.


As with many of his plays, Shakespeare drew on classical sources for the plot of The Comedy of Errors. The bare bones of the story are drawn from the Roman comedy Menaechmi, written by the ancient dramatist Plautus (c.254- 184 B.C.); Shakespeare might have read the play either in the original Latin or in an English translation that was published in 1594 but may have circulated in manuscript form before that year. In any case, the English playwright made a number of changes to the original story, including the addition of a second set of identical twins (the Dromios), the expansion of Adriana's character and the creation of her sister, Luciana, and, finally, the creation of the back-story involving Egeon and Emilia. The play also draws on a number of other sources-- the lock-out scene, where Antipholus of Ephesus is locked out of his home for dinner, resembles a scene in another Plautine work, Amphitruo, in which a master is kept out of his own house while the God Jupiter impersonates him. The general tone of Comedy is drawn from Italian comedy of the period, the shrewish wife is a characteristic figure in English comedy, and a number of the ideas about marriage are drawn from early humanists like Erasmus of Rotterdam. The play has always been very popular with audiences, if somewhat less so with critics, and in this century, the plot was borrowed by Rodgers and Hart for their musical, The Boys from Syracuse.


The Comedy of Errors is light, frothy entertainment, driven by coincidence and slapstick humor, its events confined within a single day. There are hints of Shakespeare's later forays into deeper character development, especially in the early laments of Antipholus of Syracuse for his missing twin, but the story remains largely on the surface. Characters are mistaken for one another, but they do not pretend to be other than what they are--there are no disguises here, only resemblances. The plot, so concerned with outward appearances, appropriately turns on the exchange of material objects--a Courtesan's ring, a gold chain, and the thousand marks that Egeon needs to save his life. Virtually all interior life is absent, and the action is entirely physical.


There are intimations of disturbing, even tragic issues in the story, of course--the plot depends on an initial threat of execution, and the play is filled with unsettling subjects. There are broken families, a troubled marriage, slavery, grief and anger, frequent violence, and a beheading lying in wait at the end of the day. But the play is not about these issues--it touches them briefly before skating on to happier, funnier subjects. The audience's moments of unease are brief and quickly give way to laughter.


And indeed, because this play is a comedy, everything that threatens the laughter is eliminated at the end. It is not only the characters' confusion that is relieved by the final scene, in which the "errors" are explained and resolved; all the darker, unpleasant issues are resolved, as well. Duke Solinus begins the play as a figure of unbending, almost tyrannical legalism; he ends it as a forgiving father figure. The broken halves of Egeon's family have been separated for more than 20 years; now they are put back together, and wife and husband fall into one another's arms as if time and distance had not intervened between them. The marriage of Antipholus of Ephesus and Adriana is threatened by mutual jealousy; their reconciliation, once their misapprehensions have been cleared away, is the work of a few moments. And even the poor, abused slaves, the Dromios, quickly forget their beatings and bruises and embrace. The ease with which these problems are overcome points to the central theme of the play: Love and felicity will triumph over all.

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