h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Leontes is presented as being jealous without reason, but is he actually right to be suspicious of Polixenes and Hermione?

Hi,

Leontes actually suffered from madness, lunacy. This is leitmotif that Shakespeare has often used in his plays. He is under a spell. And theres the intervention Apollo, the Greek god and finally the play moves towards a classic denoument where Hermione's statue comes to life and order is restored. The main pattern here is of rebirth, of spring time renewal which the ship shearing festival brings into the play. Right combinations are sorted out and the love of Florizel and Perdita is a mimesis of true love.

Other characters like Lear, Hamlet also suffered from the bout of madness in Shakespearean plays. The fact that in Winter's tale Polixenes stayed at his friend's place for nine months sparked his jealousy to dizzy heights.

That is certainly the traditional way the play is read and produced, and I'd hardly expect to persuade the world to see such a well established plot in a new way. But I still wonder. The oracle seems too direct, Polixenes too vicious (towards Perdita). There's something else going on besides Leontes' madness. If that madness were justified, then there would be another layer of irony in the play.

Hi John,

May be you could pick up some metaphors or imagery to justify leontes's madness. A very close re-reading of the text could provide a solution.

How about this: beginning of Act I Sc II, Pol. " Nine changes of the watery star hath been/ The Shepherd's note since we have left our throne/Without a burden..."

Moon's nine changes relate to themes of pregnancy ( carefully reread the word " burden" ), sudden changes of fortune and madness.

Cheers

Roying: There's no doubt, as you say, that Shakespeare signals very clearly that Leontes becomes insane with jealousy. But even in that first "nine changes of the watery star" he also signals that, to Leontes, it is possible that Polixenes could be the father of the child who is Perdita. And, at least at the start of the play, that possibility must be real for the audience. My question is simply: can we rule it out as the play develops? Leontes is certainly paranoid (or whatever is the proper description of his state) but that doesn't mean "they are not out to get him".