Comedy of Errors
Lecture Notes November 2011
A. Difficulties of reading and following
1.
The errors creating confusion/bewilderment difficulty of
following the plot and trying to unfold the errors
a)
I
catalogued 30 errors and there are many more; difficulty of unfolding error,
correcting a mistake.
(1)
Comments on student papers: What’s intended and where did it
go wrong?
b)
“Echo
chamber of a play”—“dizzying dialogue”
c)
“the
idea of understanding Errors is itself called into question by these games with
a supposedly omniscient reader” (Barbara Freedman)
2.
The long sequences of witty banter, centered on puns and
allusions that also include the doubling and confusing of differences that
provide sense to language.
3.
The understanding of characters—they are not clearly
defined, and their attitudes are not simply expressed; they are changeable and
inconsistent and multilayered
4.
The mixture of register—serious or silly?—switching
from one to the other and superimposing them
B. Solutions
1.
Reading and watching both productions; prepare for the live
one—an educated response different from mere attendance
2.
Genre—meaning of Comedy
a)
serious
romantic comedy—desire resolved in marriage; despair resolved in the
restoration of a long broken family—pathos—sea comedy
b)
Divine
comedy;
(1)
sense of an ending related to the Apocalyptic ending of the
Bible, when all time is reabsorbed; biblical allusions in the play
(2)
Kinney:
(a) from mechanical farce to “toward a
sense of comedy…as providential confusion when wandering and bafflement invite
man to contemplate wonder and grace—and achieve, through a kind of
rebirth, a baptizing or godparenting” (1988, 33)
(3)
Emilia waits 33 years for the birth; gossips feast is a
christening; Emilia’s dominance and control as Abbess
(4)
“frenetically dense” Biblical allusions explicated in
Patricia Parker article
(5)
all errors or limitations of vision transcended through
enlightenment
(a) as in Twelfth Night
(6)
part 6 of 5:38 BBC production
c)
“New Comedy” or Vaudeville farce
(1)
Greek (Terence) and Roman (Plautus) traditions:
(2)
silliness; slapstick—sex and violence presented and
trivialized
(3)
stock character types
(a) running servant
(b) courtesan
(c) mountebank
(4)
formulaic plots
(5)
part 2 of Karamazov: 56:45-- Abbess and Courtesan
3.
Plot and story
a)
the
confusions and the symmetries; chaos and order in chaos when seen from a
distance
(1)
Framing plot of Egeon and Emilia
(a) tragic shading; serious framing;
death in the offing; father’s search, loneliness, family separation
(2)
Awareness of the clock: 2pm to 5 pm—governed by real time
chronology
(a) computer clock; biological clock;
time running out—interval of time before the end—errors cause delay
b)
progression
of escalating confusion and violence:
(1)
masters to slaves;
(2)
beating down house;
(3)
4.4 EAntiph vs. Adriana; Pinch and Officers
(4)
SAntiph with swords;
(5)
5.1 Merchant vs. SAntiph
(6)
EAntiph vs. Pinch
c)
Natural
laws of life sweep away confusion and legalism of Duke
(1)
only the Abbess and family and nativity can resolve the
conflicting truths and perspectives
(2)
; no precedence for the Dromios;
d)
Plot
outline
1.1
The square
(a) Ageon’s framing backstory
1.2
The mart
(b) SAntiph arrival, SDromio sent off
to stash money at Centaur
(c) EDromio arrives and summons SAntiph
and refused [Error 1]
2.1
The phoenix
(d) Adriana and Luciana’s complaints
about men
(e) EDromio reports incomprehension and
sent back to get EAntiph [Error 2]
2.2
The mart
(f) S Antiph beats SDromio for supposed
invitation; joking [Error 3]
(g) Adriana meets and reproaches
SAntiph and gets him and SDromio to her house [Error 4]
3.1 The phoenix outside
(h) first appearance of EAntiph; orders
chain from goldsmith.
(i)
EDromio
reproaches him for beating from SAntiph [Error 5]
(j)
EAntiph
cant get in his house because SAntiph’s already there [Error 6]
(k) tries to break door; goes to
courtesan
3.2 The phoenix inside
(l)
SAntiph
in the house with Adriana and Luciana; [Error 7]
(m) falls for Luciana; SDromio chased
by Luce; [Error 8]
(n) SAntiph and SDromio joke about
women;
(o) Goldsmith brings SAntiph chain
meant for EAntiph; after first refusing, he accepts it, just as he accepts the
women [Error 9]
4.1 The mart
(p) EDromio sent by EAntiph to buy rope
to whip wife
(q) EAntiph arrested for not paying
Angelo for the chain he ordered, which was given to SAntiph, money Angelo owes
the merchant [Error 10]
(r) EAntiph sends SDromio, not EDromio,
to Adriana for bail money [Error 11]
4.2 The phoenix
(s) Luciana and Adriana converse about
men
(t)
Adrianna
gives SDromio bail for EAntiph [[Error 12]
4.3 The mart
(u) SAntiph, wearing chain, treated
like EAntiph by strangers; wants to leave town because disoriented [Error 13]
(v) SDromio brings him the bail for
EAntiph from Adriana [Error 14]
(w) Courtesan wants chain from SAntiph
in return for ring EAntiph took from her [Error 15]
(x) SAntiph and SDromio freaked by her [Error
16]; she goes to Adrianna to make claim and tell her EA’s mad [Error 17]
4.4 The mart
(y) EDromio brings a rope instead of
ransom to EAntiph [Error 18]
(z) Adriana and Courtesan arrive and
think EAntiph’s mad and bring Pinch the conjurer [Error 19]
(aa)EAntiph and Adrianna argue about what happened re: dinner [Errors20
and 21]
(bb)
testimony
of EDromio controverts both his and her story
(cc)she attacks EDromio; EAntiph attacks her;
(dd)
EAntiph
is restrained and taken to Adriana’s
house;
(ee)She provides bail to officer
(ff) SAntiph and SDromio enter with
swords, running from the Courtesan; everyone else flees, thinking it’s EA
escaped [Error 22]
(2)
5.1 The square
(a) SAntip and SDromio meet Angelo and
Merchant, who accuse them of denying possession of the chain [Error23]; they
deny the denial and owing money for it and fight
(b) Adriana et. al. running from
SAntiph, whom they think is EAntiph, chase them into the Priory[Error 24]
(c) Adriana is tricked by Prioress about
the treatment and care of husbands. [Error 25] Adriana locked out of priory (like
EAntiph locked out of house)
(d) Five o’clock: crisis of confusion
(i) Egeon
and Duke enter for execution
(ii) Adriana appeals to
Duke [Error 26]
(iii) Messenger tells of
EAntiph’s escape from the Phoenix
(iv) EAntiph and EDromio
enter with swords having escaped from Pinch at the Phoenix
(v) EAntiph and
Adriana tell conflicting stories to the Duke [Error 27 and 28]
(vi) Duke gets more testimony
and more confusion
(e) Denouement
(i) Egeon misrecognizes
Antipholus [Error 29 and 30]
(ii) Abbess enters with
the SAntiph and SDromio and reveals herself as Egeon’s wife
(iii) Errors all unfolded
4.
Characters
a)
S.Antipholus
(1)
changes clothes
(2)
alien in disguise as citizen
(3)
needs to learn to juggle and joke and pick up women
(4)
lonely, unmarried, confused; doesn’t know
himself—Orsino-like
(5)
“seeks his identity in whatever he encounters and lacks the
boundaries we associate with ego stability” “his meanings endlessly displaced”
(6)
melancholy and alien but is showered with unexpected gifts
(7)
world of illusions, confusions, dangers, spirits and love;
dreamlike—ready to be transformed by love; auras of mystery
(8)
“calls into question the boundaries between dream and
reality, self and other, past and present, order and disorder”
b)
E.
Antipholus
(1)
never knew father or mother
(2)
a native; plays the trombone in a band—member of the
community; has respect and friends and a connection with courtesan and lots of
money
(3)
for Antiph. E, its world of commerce, domesticity, lunch and
siesta; excessive commercialism—the war, the ransom, the officer-- along
with lots of credit: merchant, goldsmith, etc.—commercial life is
disrupted; there’s no explicit reconciliation between Antiph. E and Adriana
(4)
somewhat henpecked husband with a good and devoted wife
(5)
Like Luciana: the master/lord of the wide world and wild
watry seas
(6)
secure, but deprived of all familiar comforts
(7)
aggressive; a soldier; bites through the bonds
(8)
relation with slave—not different
c)
Dromios
(1)
“clownish efforts to mediate between the twins…doomed to be
beaten and never know why”; “the function of these perplexed messengers is to
act as potential mediators between disjunctive worlds…with unfailingly
disastrous results.” Like the reader trying to make sense of the play
(2)
S. Dromio—more shy and fearful
(3)
E. Dromio--
d)
Adriana
and Sister
(1)
Adriana--she’s twinned in herself
(a) jealous—angry and loving
(b) expects reciprocity; feminist;
shrewish and jealous (2.1)
(i) Why
should their liberty than ours be more?...
(ii) So thou, that hast
no unkind mate to grieve thee,
With urging helpless patience wouldst relieve me,
But, if thou live to see like right bereft,
This fool-begg'd patience in thee will be left….
(iii) So thou, that hast no
unkind mate to grieve thee,
With urging helpless patience wouldst relieve me,
But, if thou live to see like right bereft,
This fool-begg'd patience in thee will be left….
(iv) Sister, you know he
promised me a chain;
Would that alone, alone he would detain,…
(c)
2.2
(i) How
comes it now, my husband, O, how comes it,
That thou art thus estranged from thyself?
Thyself I call it, being strange to me,
That, undividable, incorporate,
Am better than thy dear self's better part.
Ah, do not tear away thyself from me!
For know, my love, as easy mayest thou fall
A drop of water in the breaking gulf,
And take unmingled that same drop again,
Without addition or diminishing,
As take from me thyself and not me too.
How dearly would it touch me to the quick,
Shouldst thou but hear I were licentious
And that this body, consecrate to thee,
By ruffian lust should be contaminate!
(d) following Luciana:
(i) Come,
I will fasten on this sleeve of thine:
Thou art an elm, my husband, I a vine,
Whose weakness, married to thy stronger state,
Makes me with thy strength to communicate:
If aught possess thee from me, it is dross,
Usurping ivy, brier, or idle moss;
Who, all for want of pruning, with intrusion
Infect thy sap and live on thy confusion.
(e) Emilia tricks her into admitting
she’s been too jealous toward her husband
(i) Luciana:
She never reprehended him but mildly,
When he demean'd himself rough, rude and wildly.
Why bear you these rebukes and answer not?
(ii) ADRIANA: She did betray me to my own reproof.
(2)
Luciana—also twinned
(a) pieties along with pragmatic
adjustment
(i) A man
is master of his liberty:
Time is their master, and, when they see time,
They'll go or come: if so, be patient, sister….
(ii) Why, headstrong
liberty is lash'd with woe.
There's nothing situate under heaven's eye
But hath his bound, in earth, in sea, in sky:
The beasts, the fishes, and the winged fowls,
Are their males' subjects and at their controls:
Men, more divine, the masters of all these,
Lords of the wide world and wild watery seas,
Indued with intellectual sense and souls,
Of more preeminence than fish and fowls,
Are masters to their females, and their lords:
Then let your will attend on their accords….
(iii) Ere I learn love, I'll
practise to obey.
(b) strong cynicism about marriage but
looking for a husband
e)
Courtesan
and Abbess/Mother and Kitchen Maid—angel and devil and body
5.
Themes
a)
Time
(1)
Time that makes and unfolds error
(a) The Winter’s Tale, Act 4.Scene 1: I, — that please some, try all;
both joy and terror
Of good and bad; — that make and unfold error; —
Now take upon me, in the name of Time,
To use my wings. Impute it not a crime
To me or my swift passage, that I slide
O'er sixteen years, and leave the growth untried
Of that wide gap, since it is in my power
To o'erthrow law, and in one self-born hour
To plant and o'erwhelm custom
(i) http://cla.calpoly.edu/~smarx/shakespeare/triang/performing/WT510fil.html
(ii) http://www.mediaserver.calpoly.edu/mbase/asset/Liberal%20Arts/English/Marx/marx2000/wint6?autostart=true
(2)
The clock
(3)
Disseverance of family in wide gap of time
(a) play Time in WT
(4)
Dilation of time; world outside time
b)
Appearance
and knowledge; error and truth
(1)
illusion, magic, disguise
(2)
madness, obsession, misprision
(3)
error and errant—mistake and wandering
aimlessly—reading errantly
c)
Identity
(1)
marriage as two in one
(a) Adriana
(b) severed marriage: Aegeon and
Emilia; EA and Adriana
(2)
SA looking for partner to dissolve
(a) 3.2 he echoes Adriana’s love as
doubling
(b) S. Dromio: am I myself? I am
besides myself
(3)
Phoenix and Centaur are both images of problematic identity
(4)
Dark sense of dreamlike, nightmarish confusion, lockout,
identity loss, alienation and fury, jealousy, violence
d)
Communication
(1)
Characters live in different realities, either because of
mechanics of plot, or in “reality”—e.g. Luciana and Adriana
(2)
who are you talking to; who is talking—multiple roles
and voices
(3)
tragic and comic errors
(4)
characters living in different worlds/realities
e)
Doubleness,
echoing, mirroring
(1)
exchanges in the mart
(a) chain, ring, ducats, credit, bail
(b) Feste—two coins reproduce and
make more=interest
(2)
puns and double meanings
(3)
doubled scenes
(4)
acting scenes and retelling scenes
(5)
he said/she said
f)
Marriage:
husbands and wives
(1)
marriage broken in
frame plot; is also threatened
in the main one
(2)
Adriana’s marriage arranged as debt payment by Duke
g)
Alien
and native
(1)
how deep is culture—how can differences be overcome?
h)
Money
(1)
Angelo goldsmith brings SA chain meant for EA; after
protest, he accepts it, just as he accepts the women
(2)
debt to women—affection, sex—and debt for gold
i)
The
supernatural or supposed supernatural
6.
Setting
a)
Ephesus—orientalism
b)
Ancient
world—masters and slaves; classical model; courtesan
c)
Ephesians
in NT
(1)
Paul in Ephesus in Acts 19—Temple of Diana
(a) Paul having passed through the
upper coasts came to Ephesus
(b) Many of them also which used
curious arts brought their books together, and burned them before all men:
(c) ye see and hear, that not alone at
Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and turned
away much people, saying that they be no gods, which are made with hands:
(d) Great is Diana of the Ephesians.
(e) 29And the whole city was
filled with confusion
(f) Some therefore cried one thing, and
some another: for the assembly was confused: and the more part knew not
wherefore they were come together.
(2)
Themes
(a) on marriage and women
(b) on citizen vs. alien and
reconciliations
(c) on apocalypse
(3)
Rivalries
(a) Diana and Christ
(b) role of women
7.
Language
a)
the
errors involved in language itself
b)
rhymes and puns
c)
self-consciousness
and framebreaking uses of language—tap dance, juggle, etc
C. Appendices.
1.
Karamazov Brothers version—
a)
general
(1)
what’s added: juggling and drumming to accentuate the
rhythms of rhymes and promote absurdity, especially in lengthy speeches and in
extended wordplay
(2)
frenetic pace and crowdedness
(3)
Jewish, not Christian—contrast Arthur Kinney and the
pious interpretation—Klesmer music and star of David underpants
(4)
the lengthy wordplay—goofing around because it’s
incomprehensible
(5)
vaudeville and shtick—chases, cigars, sexist jokes,
transvestite, burlesque, variety show, asides to audience; sight
gags—“give me your hand”; stand up dialogue—e.g. 3.2 on Nell by S.
Antip and S. Dromio; hey I didn’t write this stuff
b)
1.1—Egeon’s
speech abbreviated
c)
1.2
(1)
S. Dromio leaves with gold—short but important
occasion
(2)
E. Dromio enters. His juggling of axe intimidates S.
Antipholus. E Dromio more
confident and at home [alien vs.
citizen]
(3)
S. Antipholus doesn’t juggle
(4)
Summons S. Antipholus for dinner
(5)
S. beats him and he splits
d)
2.1
At the phoenix—
(1)
two housewives; mixing bowl; aprons
(2)
Dialogue on liberty; tapdance for the rhyme
(3)
juggling batons
(4)
speech about patience
(5)
Dance routines to emphasize rhythm of speech and
stychomachia—hava nagila
(6)
screaming and slapstick—strong physical comedy
(7)
E. Dromio echoing S. Antipholus speech in 2.1
(8)
Adriana’s complaint—her loss of confidence
e)
2.2.
the Mart
(1)
trapeze artistry—Ephesus atmosphere
(2)
S. Antiph—reading how to tell a joke; meets S. Dromio
who doesn’t understand his reproach for the dinner summons
(3)
Beats S. Dromio
(4)
reading obscure jokes from books—nobody gets the
jokes; reading them—he likes it; Shakespeare laughing; juggling;
unending joke telling
(a) this is the heir/hair
sequence—Parker, p. 54
(5)
pies—now that’s funny
(6)
in comes Adriana—they don’t recognize her; she’s all
over him
(7)
her long reproach; gags him and gets to knife throwing; drop
of water—their identity—ruffian lust—her
fierceness—divorcing vow; adulterous blood—seltzer bottle
(8)
gentilewoman
(9)
S accepts invitation—she’s turned on; Dromio as
porter—earth, heaven or hell?
f)
3.1
outside the Phoenix
(1)
Nell; what time is it; the clock
(2)
First entrance of E. Antipholus, playing trombone;
music—he’s at home
(3)
E Dromio reproaching him for the beating from S. Antipholus
in 1.2
(4)
wordplay about cheer and welcome
(5)
luce vs. dromio; knock door; noise at door—shtick;
door breaking—crow fish, feather; shooting chicken
(6)
Shakespeare with PLOT sign—going to the courtesan;
ordering the chain.
g)
3.2
above—at dinner
(1)
S. Antipholus--How to pick up girls—he’s cleaning up
(a) luciana’s advice – make us
but believe; her cynicism—Ephesus trickery—who’s the courtesan,
who’s the prim virtuous one? love and hate, back and forth
(b) he echoes Adriana’s love as
doubling; he doubles her for her sister—sister’s
sister—tightrope—he’s learning acrobatics—give me your hand
(c) S. Dromio: am I myself? I am
besides myself—anticipates Duke at end; I am a woman’s man—this is
S. Antipholus’ previous dialogue: “I am thee”
(d) She lays claim to Dromio—as
Adriana does to E. Antipholus
(e) S. Antiph learning to juggle and
have fun with S. Dromio as long as they are putting down woman; juggling
getting more extreme; author, author [read Parker ont his dialogue]—or
better heir and hair…look so low…author…SA: made me traitor to myself
(f) Angelo goldsmith brings SA chain
meant for EA; after protest, he accepts it, just as he accepts the women
(g) debt to women—affection,
sex—and debt for gold
h)
4.1
Mart
(1)
wild juggle and music; nell chases dromio
(2)
smoke; sword swallow; tightrope; bellydance; wild chaos; gas
mask; police on unicycle
(3)
Merchant and goldsmith and officer wanting money from AE, who hasn’t got the
chain—both played by one actor—needed by five oclock
(4)
Edromio sent to buy a rope to whip his wife
(5)
dispute over whether he’s received the chain, which went to
SA
(6)
standing on credit
(7)
arrests of goldsmith and EA [NB]
(8)
SD comes to EA thinking he’s SA; EA expects rope and sends
SD to Adriana’s for gold for ransom or payment
i)
4.2 Phoenix—Adriana and Luciana
(1)
Luciana tells her SA went after her
(2)
Adriana: heart vs. tongue—long put down of man; like
their put down of Nell
(3)
Luciana about jealousy—Adriana’s inconsistency
(4)
SDromio tells Adriana EA is arrested; she gives him bail;
conceit: comfort and injury
j)
4.3
Mart
(1)
SA, wearing chain, wants to leave town; people know him
without his knowing them and give him stuff; SD brings him money (meant for EA)
for bail—getting more stuff while EA’s stuff is taken away
(2)
disorientation
(a) swimmer from cellar disoriented
(b) another wrong guy on stage;
(c) SA doesn’t understand Dromio’s
jokes;
(d) Shakespeare in Shower x
(e) “This fellow is distract and so am
I/ we wander in delusion/some blessed power deliver us from hence ”
(3)
enter Courtesan who wants chain or ring back from
EAntipholus; SA and SD treat her as Satan
(a) exchange and market transactions
are doubling
(b) courtesan is drag queen
(c) sorceress; conjure
(d) chain on SA
(e) she’ll go to his house and tell his
wife
(4)
the clock
k)
4.4
The Mart—the dramatic climax?
(1)
EA under arrest; ED brings a rope instead of ransom
(2)
beatings and Dromio’s complaint about them
(3)
Adriana and courtesan enter—Adriana wants to
“establish him in his true sense” with a conjurer, Pinch
(a) Pinch is on puppet
stage—illusion
(b) Pinch is two people as one
(4)
EA insists he’s sane; he argues with Adriana about what
happened earlier--infuriated
(a) this continual debate about past
events that audience has witnessed—doubles of the doubled events
(b) she calls him mad, but her
inference is false; as mad as his that conjurer had dinner with her—was
“customer”
(c) he calls ED to witness he was
locked out
(5)
Pinch says humor him
(6)
Her story of what happened conflicts with his, sending
money—both are true—the two experiences here confront one another
(a) ED controverts her story of
bringing him money via himself
(b) she provides Luciana as witness
(7)
ED controverts his story of being sent for money and her
story of being given it, but confirms his story of being locked out
(8)
Pinch tries to adjudicate, saying master and man are mad
(9)
She attacks ED
(10)
EA attacks her
and is restrained—big wrestling match—he strives
(11)
Pinch calls for reinforcments
(12)
Luciana expresses sympathy for him
(13)
Adriana arranges for her men to take him from officer’s
restraint—for his benefit—officer objects—her compassion;
offers to ransom the bond to the officer, who otherwise will be responsible
(14)
ED offers to be his stand-in for officer
(15)
Adriana tries to untangle things by finding out why he’s
arrested
(a) the money for the chain, pledged
for the ring—the money for the chain pledged to the goldsmith and futher pledged
to the merchant [doubled]
(16)
SAntipholus and SDromio enter carrying chain, swords
drawn—after having run from Satanic courtesan, witches; everyone else
flees
(17)
Once again SA wants to leave town on the boat, SD wants to
stay “and turn witch”
l)
5.1
(1)
Angelo and Merchant vs. SA
(a) Angelo telling Merchant he gave
chain to EAntiph, who denied it [Angelo and Merchant doubled—cf. Pinch]
(b) Enter SAntiph wearing
chain—both merchant and SAntip want to make sea voyage
(c) SAntiph denies he said he didn’t
have it; Merchant and he start to fight—[another battle as in TN]
(i) sword
fight—the wrong plays; big chase
(2)
Adriana, Luciana, Courtesan vs. Abbess
(a) and others who just exited running
from SA, reenter and try to capture(recapture) SA; they escape into Priory
(b) Abbess enters—in
drag—doubled for Pinch as the problem solver
(c) Inquiry about cause of madness
(i) Adriana
admits his going to courtesan—errantcy
(ii) Prioress is
contradictory: not enough reproach; too much reproach
(iii) Luciana defends her as
gentle reproacher
(iv) Adriana admits too much
reproach
(d) Adriana vs. Abbess, who wont
release husband to her care, but will offer hers—rival loving treatments
of madness
(i) Abbess:
charitable duty of my order: syrups, drugs, and holy prayers
(3)
Five O’clock—big bird—the Duke and
Egeon—beheading; public execution—Duke Ellington?
(a) She retells the story of what
happened from her point of view—trying to fix things, pay debts, heal
husband—but opposed by Abbess
(b) The Duke arranged marriage between
Adriana and EA—she had money—as reward for service in the
wars—mentioned 3 times
(c) Messenger tells of escape and
threat to scorch face and disfigure her
(d) EA and ED enter with
swords—more violent [like SA] “we bad”--having escaped from Pinch, etc.
– a doubled escape
(e) Adriana: he is borne about
invisible; past thought of human
reason
(f) Egeon recognizes him
(g) Two conflicting stories again
before the Duke—[seems to be replaying 4.4] , EA controverting Angelo and
Adriana [improvised confusion]—emphasizing the climactic chaos
(h) Duke trying to untangle
it—testimony from everybody—more confusion
(i)
Call
Abbess and wait as Egeon speaks
(i) confusion
of Egeon thinking EA is SA
(ii) his multiple
hypotheses about time creating confusion and forgetfulness—his change of
appearance and inability in old age to understand current situation
(j)
SA
and SD show up; Aemilia reveals herself as Aegon’s wife
(k) Two couples untangled
(l)
Untangled
chain--Angelo
2.
Patricia Parker, Recherches Semiotique (1993)
a)
CE
stuffed with Biblical allusion: wordplay and larger structures
b)
“Echo
chamber of a play”—“dizzying dialogue”
c)
Centrality
of passage from Ephesians 2
(1)
plot of alien and citizen
(2)
family separated until final Recognition scene
(3)
Ephesians: alien gentile and citizen Jew
(4)
Cross breaks down the partition between the two; twain are
made one—Ephesians 2:12-22
(a) ¶ For he is our peace, who hath
made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition [between us];
(b) Now therefore ye are no more
strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the
household of God;
(5)
Familiar beginning of Sh. Comedy: harsh law
(6)
Egeon’s doom is postponed until his narrative is
dilated. Comedy falls between his
entry and 5 o’clock when the wall between them—partition—falls
down.
(7)
Biblical interim of waiting for redemption before the Last
Judgment or doom is described as period of dilation
d)
Theme
of Error and Circuitous detour
e)
Opening
scene
(1)
The doom and Egeon’s death wish
(2)
contrast of imminent end and delay or dilation in both the
present action and in the story of the earlier separation
(3)
Sense of time passing—the evening sun will be the
execution; the day remains
(4)
Famously protracted discourse: Aeneas’ in Carthage; Egeon
himself keeps calling attention to its length
(5)
Distinction between speed and delay
(6)
Emilia’s travail mentioned here is like travel; she repeats
the term in 5.401-405
(7)
Delay of immediate death leads to his errancy and opens up
space in time for his ransom or redemption
(8)
Severance=dilation
f)
The
Comedy proper
(1)
severance created by duplication:
(a) presence of two sets of twins who
are never on the stage simultaneously
(b) by the duplication of Egeon
searching for ransom by S. Antipholus searching for his twin
(c) he encounters many “liberties of
sin”—disguised cheaters
g)
The “unjust divorce” of Egeon and Emilia—echoing
partition of Ephesus and Syracuse
(1)
is echoed by divorce of Adriana and E. Antipholus
(2)
Platonic myth of marriage as union of separated halves
(3)
The “one flesh” of Ephesians 5:31 – a reunion of
divided parts
(4)
Adriana is waiting, fasting and starving for her absent
husband
(5)
Luciana counsels wife to patience in passage recalling
Ephesians 5
(6)
Adriana’s speech in 2.2 about the undividable union of
marriage—two made one—one the occasion of their
separation—i.e. her husband’s putative betrayal
(a) 22Wives, submit yourselves unto your
own husbands, as unto the Lord. 23For the husband is the
head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the
saviour of the body. 24Therefore as the church
is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every
thing.
(b) 25Husbands, love your wives, even as
Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; 26That he might sanctify
and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, 27That he might present it
to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing;
but that it should be holy and without blemish. 28So ought men to love
their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself.
(7)
drop of water 2.2.126 echoes S. Antipholus 1.2.35
h)
Other
echoings (within play and through allusion, to other works)
(1)
puns:
(a) a thousand marks—money and
beatings
(b) Egeon’s ransom and cost of
chain—(chain is ornament but also impediment; cf. rope binding
Egeon—SM)
(2)
five o’clock is convergent goal of repayment of E.
Antipholus’ debt and of execution if Egeon’s debt isn’t paid)
(3)
The Errors of the play’s own plot delays are
underscored: “the hoy Delay,”
4.3.40—ship of escape—preceding the Apocalypse; redemption that
puts an end to error; delayed return of a bridegroom or spouse
(a) Error 1: E. Dromio mistakes S.
Antipholus for E. Antipholus, the tardy master/spouse. But the End is already “at
hand”—punning on hit with hand
(b) Puns:
amphibology/ambiguitas—2.1.50-54—Luciana feel his meaning
(i) “Amphibology
and punning involve two meanings competing for the same space, blocking the way
to single “understanding” just as Shakespeare’s redoubling of Plautine twins
retards movement toward resolution and end.” 52
(c) Doubled twinning generates temporal
illusion—(deja-vu SM)
(i) elaborate
exchange on Time 2.2.57-109
(ii) S. Antipholus
beats S. Dromio, he thinks, a second time, for telling him what he thinks is a
second time about informing him a second time about the mistress
(iii) [it’s almost impossible
for a reader or viewer to follow this because of brain interference]
(iv) the exchange takes up
time, but also creates more time on stage
(v) it ends with
reference to world’s end at conclusion
(a)
another reference to
that in Luce’s grease candle burning (SM)
(d) Two brothers—biblical twins
Jacob and Esau
(i) Elder
and younger—Emilia prefers younger twin
(ii) Two Dromios invoke
and drop issue of priority at end
(iii) The wall from Ephesians
that keeps Esau and Jacob, Gentile and Jew, alien and citizen, apart, comes
down at the Apocalypse. The wall
is there in Act 3 between the two Dromios
(iv) Jacob and Esau all over
the dialogue on Time, hair and heir—Esau the hairy older brother and heir
(v) The final
reconciliation suggests Paul’s reading of the final reconciliation between
adopted Gentile and inherited Jew
(4)
Biblical marriage vs. harlotry
(a) Harlotry is wandering—threshold
or betrothal period of error and wandering
(b) Nell/Luce is identified both with
the Bride and the Whore of Babylon
(5)
Tardy master and imposter
(a) Extraordinary concentration of
Biblical allusions, which thickens as the play proceeds: the biblical imposter
who comes in the name of another tardy master, takes his place and keeps out
those who “come too late.”
(b) This scene of the imposter creates
a false resolution—premature address of S. Antipholus to Luciana
3.2.29-52 and creates the need for more patience to await the true apocalyptic
end or “fine.”
(6)
The Chain
(a) linked with
“Patience”—waiting for the true end
(b) associated with bonds of society
connecting characters in their apparent separateness
(c) also with detours of circuitous
plot—errancy and delay (dilation)
(d) links E. Antipholus with Egeon,
since he also needs ransom, a monetary redemption
(e) Look at the rope—respice
funem—respice finem—look at the end.
(f) Chain that binds the devil in final
stages of the Apocalypse
(g) Desire to know the truth
(7)
Ending
(a) truth at large, not just of this
day’s error, but the entire family’s history of travail
(b) Ephesians: “redeeming of the time”
(c) Goldsmith asks for sum due before
Pentecost
(d) emphasis on excessive delay
(e) Bark Expedition vs. hoy Delay
(f) Courtesan referred to as Devil’s
Dam
(g) in Revelation, Satan bound for a
thousand years with chain—like E. Antipholus bound
(h) Place of doom becomes place of
nativity; period of travil is Christological thirty three years
(i)
unbinding
and rebinding
(j)
Feasting
with harlots—Christ accused of that; prodigal son does that as dilatory
delay before redemption
i)
The
biblical allusions are both pious, evoking the story of the final unmasking of
error and absorption of time into eternity, and at the same time jocular,
coexisting absurdly with Plautine comedy, irreverence, Falstaffian
parody—“Post Christian.”
3.
Alexander Leggatt, “Sh’s Comedy of Love: CE”
a)
Mixing
of the register of incidents and speeches; seriousness of Adriana’s speech
about marriage; silliness that its addressed to wrong person
b)
Gaps
of understanding can be comic or disturbing
c)
Characters
live in different realities, either because of mechanics of plot, or in
“reality”—e.g. Luciana and Adriana
d)
Gaps
between philosophy and experience
e)
Two
twins live in different worlds
(1)
Antipholus S. is melancholy and alien but is showered with
unexpected gifts
(2)
Antipholus E. is secure, but deprived of all familiar
comforts
f)
Contrast
of tone: 3.1 vs. 3.2—raucous vs. intimate
g)
Ephesus:
two towns—
(1)
for Antiph. E, its world of commerce, domesticity, lunch and
siesta; excessive commercialism—the war, the ransom, the officer-- along
with lots of credit: merchant, goldsmith, etc.—commercial life is
disrupted; there’s no explicit reconciliation between Antiph. E and Adriana
(2)
for Antiph. S, world of illusions, confusions, dangers,
spirits and love; dreamlike—ready to be transformed by love; auras of
mystery
(3)
For Adriana, the idealism of love is transformed to tensions
of sex war; for Luciana, its all a matter of pragmatic adjustment
(4)
For S. Dromio, Ephesus is a folk-tale horror story;
courtship here is nightmare
(5)
S. Dromio and Antipholus emphathize with each other
h)
Aegeon
story—it’s distanced
i)
When
he returns at the end, the two brothers worlds begin to fuse as do their
characters
j)
The
Duke cant deal with the cry for Justice, since so many conflicting perspectives
ask it; the Abbess can, putting all in the context of rebirth
k)
Natural
laws of life sweep away the legalism of Duke; no precedence for the Dromios
l)
Marriage
is subordinated to family reunion—return to the old and familiar, rather
than start of something new symbolized by marriage
m) The whole play is about the
intersection of the everyday and the fantastic
n)