Chapter three
It must seem strange
that we have begun our analysis of the basic elements of a Shakespearian comedy
with the ending, but we have not done so randomly. The happy ending is a sine
qua non condition of a Shakespearian comedy and of comedies in general. For
this reason we have chosen this order of analysis.
For Shakespeare, a happy
ending meant marriage or the promise of a marriage or the restoration of a
marriage, although this last situation is not very frequent (we have it in The
Comedy of Errors, where Egeon and Aemilia are reunited after thirty-three
years of separation). But marriage is the ending of the play, but life does not
end with it. Even more, life begins with marriage, and when we say this, we are
making reference to the consummation of marriage, to sex, the act of union
between a man and a woman and its result, a new life.
Marriage exists in all
of Shakespeare’s comedies, because, let us not forget, comedies are about life,
and marriage is about giving life, and although a comedy ends with marriage,
the audience and the reader knows that this particular ending, or this
particular feature of a comedy reassures us of the continuity of life.
For Luciana in The
Comedy of Errors, the promise of a marriage appears only in the end, or at
least for her it does. But she somehow has no saying in that. She cannot give
Antipholus of Syracuse an answer because other characters do not let her. So we
wonder ourselves whether we shall have a marriage or not.
Antipholus of Ephesus is
already married to Adriana, more than marriage, when speaking about him we must
undoubtly refer to his adultery: confusion in the play leads Antipholus to
believe that Adriana has committed adultery and therefore revenges by being
unfaithful with a prostitute. Being marriage a recurrent pattern in
Shakespeare’s plays we should also mention adultery and the fact of breaking
your vows.
This recurrent pattern can also be observed in A Midsummer Night’s Dream,
mainly in relation to the character of Hermia. She is in love with Lysander,
but her father wants her to marry Demetrius. As we have seen before, in most of
Shakespearian comedies marriage is present, but sometimes it is not so easy to
reach, in this case because of parental disapproval. At this time in this
society, aristocrats, husbands and fathers were the dominant voices; in the
case of fathers they decided to whom their daughter should marriage with, the
best candidate was the worthiest.
In the play, Hermia opposes her father’s decision and even argues the Duke
(Theseus), she prefers to die instead of marrying a man that she does not love.
So, instead of accepting the impossibility of their love, Lysander convinces
Hermia to run away:
“If thou lovest me then,
Steal forth thy father's house tomorrow
night.
And in the wood, a league without the
town—
Where I did meet thee once with
To do observance to a morn of May—
There will I stay for thee.”13
So, we could interpret this reaction as
love challenging this authoritarian and patriarchal society. Finally, the play
ends with a promise of marriage, which is allowed by the Duke, between Hermia
and Lysander (so she will marry the man she loves) and even between Helena and
Demetrius. As we have mentioned at the end of the previous chapter and at the
beginning of this one, there is a close relation between marriage and happy
ending.
This
is Rita Costell´s contribution to the recurrent pattern of marriage.To arrive
at these unavoidable happy endings, a marriage or even multiple marriages must
take place. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream,
Theseus chooses to share his happiness and welfare inviting the two young
couples –Hermia and Lysander, Helena and Demetrius- to get married at the same
time. One single ceremony will get together three happy couples, Shakespeare
kills three birds in just one shot.
“For in the temple by and by with us
These
couples shall eternally be knit.”14
Marriage is conceived as the perfect expression of social
balance, a confined space in which real expectations are updated. A woman and a
man find their public identity and their social utility through marriage, and a
non-married person does not correspond to an acceptable social pattern, if not
belonging to a clerical order.
We can observe how marriage is so
important in the play, due to the fact that all the characters are joined in a
marriage, and the play is going to finish with the mentioned celebration.
Marriage,
consequently, is mostly shown as the last consecution of love or social
commitment and normally appears at the end of
the plays to symbolize the perfect agreement of all parts. That is the
case for the couples in A Midsummer
Night’s Dream and also for Antipholus of Syracuse, who discovers his love
towards Luciana, who discovers her acceptance to Antipholus love.
“And
this fair gentlewoman, her sister here,
Did call me brother. (To Luciana) What I told
you then
I hope I shall have
leisure to make good,
If
this be not a dream I see and hear.”15
Nevertheless, the marriage is not always a final resource in
Shakespeare’s plays. The marriage of Antipholus of Ephesus and Adriana lacks
from happiness and satisfactions. Adriana is jealous of the courtesan who stops
her husband from having dinner at time. On the other side, Antipholus seems to
be quite bored of his wife. All through the action, and unconsciously, Adriana
will perpetrate her unspoken desire for revenge on her husband thanks to the
mistaken identity with his twin brother.
“Were
not my doors locked up, and I shut up?”
“And
did not she herself revile me there?”
“Did not her kitchen-maid
rail, taunt, and scorn me?”16
Adriana carries out all the actions that she would never
have dared to achieve if it was not by mistake. In fact, the women who really
understand and enjoy these facts as a
subtle revenge are those in the audience, who really know that Antipholus of
Ephesus is being left outside and that his chair besides his woman is being
occupied by his brother.
Another
unusual marriage that does not take place at the end of the play is the one
between Katharina and Petruchio in The
Taming of the Shrew. Undoubtedly, the holy union of these characters is far
from being a conventional one. In their case, the traditional order of marriage
and wooing has been inverted. The first thing they do is getting married in a
rush due to the urgency of Petruchio in getting Kate’s dowry. No love, no
romance appear before the ceremony that Kate does not accept but mournfully.
Basically, she has no other choice.
“And to conclude, we have ‘greed so well
together,
That
upon Sunday is the wedding-day.”17