The Winter's Tale

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DOVER THRIFT EDITIONS

GENERAL EDITOR: PAUL NEGRI

EDITOR OF THIS VOLUME: SUSAN L. RATTINER

Copyright

Copyright © 2000 by Dover Publications, Inc.

All rights reserved.

Theatrical Rights

This Dover Thrift Edition may be used in its entirety, in adaptation or in any other way for theatrical productions, professional and amateur, in the United States, without fee, permission, or acknowledgment. (This may not apply outside of the United States, as copyright conditions may vary.)

Bibliographical Note

This Dover edition, first published in 2000, contains the unabridged text of The Winter’s Tale as published in Volume VIII of The Caxton Edition of the Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Caxton Publishing Company, London, n.d. A new introductory Note has been specially prepared for the present edition, and explanatory footnotes from the Caxton edition have been revised.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616.

The winter’s tale / William Shakespeare.

p. cm.—(Dover thrift editions)

Contains the unabridged text of The winter’s tale as published in volume VIII of the Caxton edition of the Complete works of William Shakespeare, Caxton Publishing Company, London, n.d., with new introductory note and revised explanatory footnotes.

9780486113074

1. Sicily (Italy)—Kings and rulers—Drama. 2. Fathers and daughters—Drama. 3. Married people—Drama. 4. Castaways—Drama. I. Title. II. Series.

PR2839 .Al 2000

822.3’3—dc21

00-027749

Manufactured in the United States by Courier Corporation

41118403

www.doverpublications.com

Note

ACCORDING TO Simon Forman’s Booke of Plaies and Notes Thereof (ca. 1611?), the earliest known performance of The Winter’s Tale took place at the Globe Theatre on May 15, 1611. Already established as a premier writer of tragedies, comedies, and sonnets, William Shakespeare (1564-1616) probably wrote the romance during the years 1610-1611. Considered to be from the late period in his career, the play was written when he was forty-seven and had already left London and settled in his house at Stratford.

Synonymous with the expression, an old wives’ tale, the title of the play signifies an improbable story, or one in which the very unlikeliness of the melodramatic spectacle is its principal attraction. This fanciful tale was not an original creation by Shakespeare. In fact, the bulk of his work was based on stories initially popularized by other authors during his lifetime. These tales—regarded as contemporary favorites of the time—had the best potential for luring audiences to the theatre. Shakespeare’s selection of material for The Winter’s Tale is no exception; the plot is based on Pandosto, the Triumph of Time (1588), a novel by Robert Greene, one of Shakespeare’s literary rivals. Analogously, Greene’s work was itself conceived from an actual incident that occurred in the Bohemian and Polish courts in the late 14th century. The work was later reprinted and known as Dorastus and Fawnia (1607), retitled after the names of the young lovers in the story (Florizel and Perdita in Shakespeare’s version).

Remaining generally faithful to the events in the original tale, Shakespeare nonetheless incorporated changes to the plot and added new characters, adapting the material to his own thematic ends. Infusing the story with a perspective uniquely his own, he divides the play into two distinct parts, the first tragic, the second comic. The convincing union of these parts into a harmonious whole represents what many critics have cited as Shakespeare’s clearest and most successful example of the tragicomedy.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Note

Dramatis Personæ

ACT I

ACT II

ACT III

ACT IV

ACT V

Dramatis Personæ

¹

LEONTES, king of Sicilia.

MAMILLIUS, young prince of Sicilia.

POLIXENES, king of Bohemia.

FLORIZEL, prince of Bohemia.

ARCHIDAMUS, a Lord of Bohemia.

Old Shepherd, reputed father of Perdita.

Clown, his son.

AUTOLYCUS, a rogue.

A Mariner.

A Gaoler.

HERMIONE, queen to Leontes.

PERDITA, daughter to Leontes and Hermione.

PAULINA, wife to Antigonus.

EMILIA, a lady attending on Hermione.

Other Lords and Gentlemen, Ladies, Officers, and Servants, Shepherds, and Shepherdesses.

Time, as Chorus.

SCENE—Partly in Sicilia, and partly in Bohemia

ACT I

SCENE I. Antechamber in Leontes’ Palace

Enter CAMILLO and ARCHIDAMUS

ARCHIDAMUS. If you shall chance, Camillo, to visit Bohemia,² on the like occasion whereon my services are now on foot, you shall see, as I have said, great difference betwixt our Bohemia and your Sicilia.

CAM. I think, this coming summer, the King of Sicilia means to pay Bohemia the visitation which he justly owes him.

ARCH. Wherein our entertainment shall shame us we will be justified in our loves;³ for indeed—

CAM. Beseech you,—

ARCH. Verily, I speak it in the freedom of my knowledge: we cannot with such magnificence—in so rare—I know not what to say. We will give you sleepy drinks, that your senses, unintelligent of our insufficience, may, though they cannot praise us, as little accuse us.

CAM. You pay a great deal too dear for what’s given freely.

ARCH. Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs me, and as mine honesty puts it to utterance.

CAM. Sicilia cannot show himself over-kind to Bohemia.⁴ They were trained together in their childhoods; and there rooted betwixt them then such an affection, which cannot choose but branch now. Since their more mature dignities and royal necessities made separation of their society, their encounters, though not personal, have been royally attorneyed⁵ with interchange of gifts, letters, loving embassies; that they have seemed to be together, though absent; shook hands, as over a vast;⁶ and embraced, as it were, from the ends of opposed winds. The heavens continue their loves!

ARCH. I think there is not in the world either malice or matter to alter it. You have an unspeakable comfort of your young prince Mamillius: it is a gentleman of the greatest promise that ever came into my note.

CAM. I very well agree with you in the hopes of him: it is a gallant child; one that indeed physics the subject,⁷ makes old hearts fresh: they that went on crutches ere he was born desire yet their life to see him a man.

ARCH. Would they else be content to die?

CAM. Yes; if there were no other excuse why they should desire to live.

ARCH. If the king had no son, they would desire to live on crutches till he had one. [Exeunt.

SCENE II. A Room of State in the Same

Enter LEONTES, HERMIONE, MAMILLIUS, POLIXENES, CAMILLO, and Attendants

POL.

Nine changes of the watery star⁸ hath been The shepherd’s note since we have left our throne

Without a burthen: time as long again

Would be fill’d up, my brother, with our thanks;

And yet we should, for perpetuity,

Go hence in debt: and therefore, like a cipher,

Yet standing in rich place, I multiply

With one We thank you, many thousands moe

That go before it.

LEON.

Stay your thanks a while; And pay them when you part.⁹

POL.

Sir, that’s to-morrow.

I am question’d by my fears, of what may chance

Or breed upon our absence; that may blow

No sneaping winds at home, to make us say

This is put forth too truly:¹⁰ besides, I have stay’d

To tire your royalty.

LEON.

We are tougher, brother, Than you can put us to ’t.

POL. No longer stay.

LEON. One seven-night longer.

POL. Very sooth, to-morrow.

LEON.

We’ll part the time¹¹ between’s, then: and in that I’ll no gainsaying.

POL.

Press me not, beseech you, so. There is no tongue that moves, none, none i’ the world,

So soon as yours could win me: so it should now,

Were there necessity in your request, although

’T were needful I denied it. My affairs

Do even drag me homeward: which to hinder

Were in your love a whip to me; my stay

To you a charge and trouble: to save both,

Farewell, our brother.

LEON. Tongue-tied our queen? speak you.

HER.

I had thought, sir, to have held my peace until You had drawn oaths from him not to stay. You, sir,

Charge him too coldly. Tell him, you are sure

All in Bohemia’s well; this satisfaction

The by-gone day proclaim’d: say this to him,

He’s beat from his best ward.¹²

LEON. Well said, Hermione.

HER.

To tell, he longs to see his son, were strong: But let him say so then, and let him go;

But let him swear so, and he shall not stay,

We’ll thwack him hence with distaffs.

Yet of your royal presence I’ll adventure

The borrow of a week. When at Bohemia

You take my lord, I’ll give him my commission

To let him there a month behind the gest

Prefix’d for’s parting:¹³ yet, good deed,¹⁴ Leontes,

I love thee not a jar o’ the clock¹⁵ behind

What lady she¹⁶ her lord. You’ll stay?

POL. No, madam.

HER. Nay, but you will?

POL. I may not, verily.

HER.

Verily! You put me off with limber¹⁷ vows; but I,

Though you would seek to unsphere the stars¹⁸ with oaths,

Should yet say Sir, no going.