The winter's tale - Rambling Readers

English language

Published April 13, 2008

ISBN:: 978-0-19-953591-0

(1 review)

The Winter's Tale is a play by William Shakespeare originally published in the First Folio of 1623. Although it was grouped among the comedies, many modern editors have relabelled the play as one of Shakespeare's late romances. Some critics consider it to be one of Shakespeare's "problem plays" because the first three acts are filled with intense psychological drama, while the last two acts are comic and supply a happy ending.The play has been intermittently popular, revived in productions in various forms and adaptations by some of the leading theatre practitioners in Shakespearean performance history, beginning after a long interval with David Garrick in his adaptation Florizel and Perdita (first performed in 1753 and published in 1756). The Winter's Tale was revived again in the 19th century, when the fourth "pastoral" act was widely popular. In the second half of the 20th century, The Winter's Tale in its entirety, and …

The Winter's Tale is a play by William Shakespeare originally published in the First Folio of 1623. Although it was grouped among the comedies, many modern editors have relabelled the play as one of Shakespeare's late romances. Some critics consider it to be one of Shakespeare's "problem plays" because the first three acts are filled with intense psychological drama, while the last two acts are comic and supply a happy ending.The play has been intermittently popular, revived in productions in various forms and adaptations by some of the leading theatre practitioners in Shakespearean performance history, beginning after a long interval with David Garrick in his adaptation Florizel and Perdita (first performed in 1753 and published in 1756). The Winter's Tale was revived again in the 19th century, when the fourth "pastoral" act was widely popular. In the second half of the 20th century, The Winter's Tale in its entirety, and drawn largely from the First Folio text, was often performed, with varying degrees of success.

9 editions

Arbieroo reviewed The winter's tale by William Shakespeare

Review of "The winter's tale" on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

The title of this play, which means something between old wives' tale and fairy tale and romance (in the older sense), shows that Shakespeare was well aware of the preposterous and silly nature of the material. Arguably the setting of "the coast of Bohemia" is another nod to this because the the term was a proverbial error used ironically - and if you're not Ben Jonson you probably think Shakespeare was well enough educated to know that Bohemia was land-locked.

Despite, therefore, it being foolish to take the play too seriously it still doesn't seem to work very well. The shift from tragic to comedic tone doesn't seem to work as well as the reverse, as exemplified by Romeo and Juliet, and the resurrection in the statue scene is irritating - leaving some tragedy would have suited better and the lack of any explanation of how it could have happened …

The title of this play, which means something between old wives' tale and fairy tale and romance (in the older sense), shows that Shakespeare was well aware of the preposterous and silly nature of the material. Arguably the setting of "the coast of Bohemia" is another nod to this because the the term was a proverbial error used ironically - and if you're not Ben Jonson you probably think Shakespeare was well enough educated to know that Bohemia was land-locked.

Despite, therefore, it being foolish to take the play too seriously it still doesn't seem to work very well. The shift from tragic to comedic tone doesn't seem to work as well as the reverse, as exemplified by Romeo and Juliet, and the resurrection in the statue scene is irritating - leaving some tragedy would have suited better and the lack of any explanation of how it could have happened irks. Perhaps one is supposed to take the whole thing ironically, like the Scream movies? I think maybe someone should take this approach to a production.

The equally daft Pericles seems to work better and I think it's because it is much more uniform in tone - it's just silly and jolly through-out.