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In: Plays/Films/Dramas·Classics of Literature·British Literature
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The Winter’s Tale unfolds as a sprawling tragicomedy that immediately thrusts the reader into a courtly world of royal intrigue and fragile alliances. The play opens with a cryptic exchange between Archidamus and Camillo, who discuss the “magnificence” of a gift and the tangled childhood bond between Sicily and Bohemia, hinting at the deep‑seated ties that will shape the drama. Their conversation segues into a bustling state chamber where King Leontes, his brother Polixenes, Queen Hermione, and the infant Prince Mamillius grapple with promises, departures, and the uneasy balance of friendship and sovereignty. The dialogue is dense with the concerns of fathers and daughters, married couples, and the looming specter of exile, all set against the backdrop of Sicilian royalty and the looming threat of a castaway’s return.
Shakespeare’s language here is unmistakably Elizabethan, rich with rhetorical flourishes, layered metaphors, and a rhythm that swings between solemnity and playful banter. The voice is both poetic and argumentative, demanding attentive reading to follow its intricate wordplay. Readers who relish complex character dynamics, the mingling of grief and humor, and the historical texture of 16th‑century drama will find this work rewarding, especially those drawn to stories of familial duty, political machinations, and the occasional bittersweet twist of fate.
The opening · free to read
ARCHIDAMUS. 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.
CAMILLO. You pay a great deal too dear for what’s given freely.
ARCHIDAMUS. Believe me, I speak as my understanding instructs me and as mine honesty puts it to utterance.
CAMILLO. Sicilia cannot show himself over-kind to Bohemia. 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 attorneyed with interchange of gifts, letters, loving embassies, that they have seemed to be together, though absent; shook hands, as over a vast; and embraced as it were from the ends of opposed winds. The heavens continue their loves!
ARCHIDAMUS. 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.
CAMILLO. I very well agree with you in the hopes of him. It is a gallant child; one that indeed physics the subject, makes old hearts fresh. They that went on crutches ere he was born desire yet their life to see him a man.
ARCHIDAMUS. Would they else be content to die?
CAMILLO. Yes, if there were no other excuse why they should desire to live.
ARCHIDAMUS. If the king had no son, they would desire to live on crutches till he had one.
POLIXENES. Nine changes of the watery star hath been The shepherd’s note since we have left our throne Without a burden. 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 more That go before it.
LEONTES. Stay your thanks a while, And pay them when you part.
POLIXENES. Sir, that’s tomorrow. 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.” Besides, I have stay’d To tire your royalty.
LEONTES. We are tougher, brother, Than you can put us to ’t.
POLIXENES. No longer stay.
LEONTES. One seve’night longer.
POLIXENES. Very sooth, tomorrow.
LEONTES. We’ll part the time between ’s then: and in that I’ll no gainsaying.
POLIXENES. Press me not, beseech you, so, There is no tongue that moves, none, none i’ th’ world, So soon as yours, could win me: so it should now, Were there necessity in your request, although ’Twere 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.
LEONTES. Tongue-tied, our queen? Speak you.
HERMIONE. 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 proclaimed. Say this to him, He’s beat from his best ward.
LEONTES. Well said, Hermione.
HERMIONE. 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. [_To Polixenes._] 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:—yet, good deed, Leontes, I love thee not a jar of th’ clock behind What lady she her lord. You’ll stay?
POLIXENES. No, madam.
HERMIONE. Nay, but you will?
POLIXENES. I may not, verily.
HERMIONE. Verily! You put me off with limber vows; but I, Though you would seek t’ unsphere the stars with oaths, Should yet say “Sir, no going.” Verily, You shall not go. A lady’s verily is As potent as a lord’s. Will go yet? Force me to keep you as a prisoner, Not like a guest: so you shall pay your fees When you depart, and save your thanks. How say you? My prisoner or my guest? By your dread “verily,” One of them you shall be.
POLIXENES. Your guest, then, madam. To be your prisoner should import offending; Which is for me less easy to commit Than you to punish.
HERMIONE. Not your gaoler then, But your kind hostess. Come, I’ll question you Of my lord’s tricks and yours when you were boys. You were pretty lordings then.
POLIXENES. We were, fair queen, Two lads that thought there was no more behind But such a day tomorrow as today, And to be boy eternal.
HERMIONE. Was not my lord The verier wag o’ th’ two?
POLIXENES. We were as twinn’d lambs that did frisk i’ th’ sun And bleat the one at th’ other. What we chang’d Was innocence for innocence; we knew not The doctrine of ill-doing, nor dream’d That any did. Had we pursu’d that life, And our weak spirits ne’er been higher rear’d With stronger blood, we should have answer’d heaven Boldly “Not guilty,” the imposition clear’d Hereditary ours.
HERMIONE. By this we gather You have tripp’d since.
POLIXENES. O my most sacred lady, Temptations have since then been born to ’s! for In those unfledg’d days was my wife a girl; Your precious self had then not cross’d the eyes Of my young play-fellow.
HERMIONE. Grace to boot! Of this make no conclusion, lest you say Your queen and I are devils. Yet go on; Th’ offences we have made you do we’ll answer, If you first sinn’d with us, and that with us You did continue fault, and that you slipp’d not With any but with us.
LEONTES. Is he won yet?
HERMIONE. He’ll stay, my lord.
LEONTES. At my request he would not. Hermione, my dearest, thou never spok’st To better purpose.
HERMIONE. Never?
LEONTES. Never but once.
HERMIONE. What! have I twice said well? when was’t before? I prithee tell me. Cram ’s with praise, and make ’s As fat as tame things: one good deed dying tongueless Slaughters a thousand waiting upon that. Our praises are our wages. You may ride ’s With one soft kiss a thousand furlongs ere With spur we heat an acre. But to th’ goal: My last good deed was to entreat his stay. What was my first? It has an elder sister, Or I mistake you: O, would her name were Grace! But once before I spoke to the purpose—when? Nay, let me have’t; I long.
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