Shakespeare & The Battle of the Sexes
"The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together. Our virtues would be proud if our faults whipped them not, and our crimes would despair if they were not cherished by our virtues."
“The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together. Our virtues would be proud if our faults whipped them not, and our crimes would despair if they were not cherished by our virtues.” — All’s Well that Ends Well, Act IV, Scene 3, Lines 73-77.
I have avoided this play.
I knew the plot and I was not looking forward to discussing it. In fact, at one point, this newsletter was titled ‘Shakespeare and the Problematic Plot Device’ (we’ll get to that later), but then I sat with this quote and the characters, and found an affection for this play I didn’t expect. It’s uncomfortable because everyone is a bit of a mess (some more than others) and the ending is not a neatly tied bow.
And maybe that’s ok.
All’s Well that Ends Well — a title referenced three times within the text of the play — was written sometime between 1601 and 1605. It is ostensibly a comedy. My first impressions of it, having never read or seen it, was that it was a farce. The reversal of gender stereotypes (i.e. Bertram forced to marry and run away), suggested that might be the case. But then along the way there are such beautiful meditations on the imperfection of being human that I wondered if the emotional messiness of the play was the point.
Maybe this play isn’t a farce. Maybe it’s Shakespeare pushing back on the morality plays that end in a neat life lesson or traditional comedies that wrapped up with a joyous marriage. Maybe this is Shakespeare’s invitation to rumble with our own discomfort with how we’ve lived and who we are.
Maybe Helen and Bertram are much like Claire Dederer’s New York Times’ review of Anne Lamott’s book ‘Blue Shoe’ — ‘Messy, brave and weirdly loveable.’
I’ll let you be the judge.
The Shake-Scene
As the play opens, we learn that Bertram’s father has died and he is now ward of the King of France. The King is very ill and cannot be cured. There was once a wise physician who could have saved him — Helen’s father— but he is now dead. And for her part, Helen, who is ward of Bertram’s mother, is grief-stricken, presumably because of the death of her father. But once Bertram leaves for the King’s court, Helen admits that her grief is because she loves Bertram and because of her lack of status she can never be with him. She is then accosted in a war of words with the cowardly and unsavory Parolles for some comedic relief. If you’re someone who enjoys the bawdier side of Shakespeare, I would direct you to the delightful exchange in Act I, Scene 1, Lines 115 to 221 that I’m unwilling to quote in a newsletter occasionally read by my mother.
Bertram arrives in court and is greeted by the King. The King gives his courtiers permission to fight on either side in a war between Sienna and Florence, but refuses to take a side himself.
Back in Rossillion, Bertram’s mother (the Countess) tells a steward that she loves Helen as if she were her daughter. The steward then tells the Countess of Helen’s love for Bertram. The Countess confronts Helen and forces her to confess her love. Helen admits she intends to use medicines left to her by her father to cure the King and ask for Bertram to marry her in return. The Countess is overjoyed and gives her full permission to travel to court and enact her plan. She doesn’t even have to pretend to be a boy! IYKYK.
At court, the King is sending off his courtiers to fight but he has commanded Bertram to stay behind because he is too young. I think it is important as this play progresses that we remember that both Bertram and Helen are quite young, and maybe that allows us to view their actions with more grace. It’s also one of the many ways this play feels reminiscent of Rome & Juliet (but more on that later). Bertram makes a plan to run away from court and go to war against the King’s wishes. He’s encouraged in this endeavor by Parolles and several Lords.
Helen arrives and introduces herself as the famed doctor’s daughter (not David Tenant’s wife). She asks for the right to cure the King and they strike a deal. If she fails, she dies. If she succeeds, he gives her whatever man of his court she desires as her husband. And, unsurprisingly, she succeeds and asks the King to marry her to Bertram. Bertram strongly objects and the King berates him. At this point, Helen tells the King to forget their pact, but the King’s honor is on the line and he insists that they marry. Bertram seemingly relents but later in the scene vows to his companion that he will not ‘bed her’ and that he intends to run off to fight in the war.
Here is the bit that feels like a farce to me. Normally the young woman is the one being forced to marry against her will — think Juliet being betrothed to Paris or Hermia to Demetrius. But here, Bertram’s mother and surrogate father figure desire his marriage to Helen. But Bertram is a young man, so he doesn’t have to cross-dress or run off into fairy-infested woods. Instead he dresses as a captain and runs off to war to prove his honor.
Bertram tricks his now-wife Helen into returning home to Rossillion and confesses to the audience that he never intends to meet her there. He’s also warned that his companion Parolles is untrustworthy, but refuses to heed the advice. Once Helen returns to Rossillion, Bertram sends letters to his mother and his wife informing them that he’s running off to war and refusing to consummate his marriage to Helen. In the letter, Bertram says he won’t be her husband until she can get the ring off his finger and show him a child begotten of them. Kind of impossible, right?
Don’t bet against Helen.
Helen is devastated. She’s also afraid that Bertram will die in battle and blames herself for him leaving. We the audience know that Bertram always intended to run off and fight in the war, but Helen hopes that if she leaves Rossillion, Bertram will come back safely.
In Florence, Bertram is put in charge of the calvary, which seems an awfully high honor for someone who was too young to fight. But hey, maybe they’re desperate. He vows to be ‘a lover of [Mars’, the god of war’s] drum and a hater of love.’ The theme of men eschewing love and embracing male camaraderie in war comes up a lot in Shakespeare’s works.
Back in Rossillion, the Countess receives a letter informing her that Helen has stolen away on a pilgrimage to a holy site to repent for driving her husband off to the wars. Please re-read that sentence dripping with sarcasm. Ok, now with even more. Ugh. Thankfully, Shakespeare writes more active protagonists than that. On her pilgrimage, Helen meets Diana, and learns that our fair Bertram who so eloquently swore off love has been attempting to seduce her.
Another thing of potential interest that jumped out at me is the choice of the name Diana. Diana is also the name of the virgin goddess in Roman myth who protects childbirth. When Bertram swore off love, he swore his allegiance to Great Mars, the god of war. But interestingly, Diana stepped into his path. But, spoilers…
Throughout the play, many characters extoll Helen’s beauty, intelligence, and virtue, while denouncing the wickedness of Bertram’s friend Parolles. Again, this is likely in service of Shakespeare’s interrogation of the theme of young men leaving male friendship to join in heterosexual unions. But please note, like with many of Shakespeare’s themes, he doesn’t rubber stamp this as ‘right’ but merely presents the metaphor and let’s the audience sit in it.
Parolles is ‘a most notable coward, an infinite and endless liar, an hourly promise-breaker, the owner of no one good quality worthy of [Bertram’s] entertainment.’ And yet, despite repeated warnings, Bertram continues to trust him. The Lords convince Bertram to play a trick on Parolles in hopes of exposing him for the rascal he is. During the recent battle, he lost his drum and is very upset, so they send him off to retrieve it. They then plan to pretend to be the enemy and capture him to scare him into betraying them. You know, typical fraternity prank.
And, speaking of ill-conceived pranks, we now arrive at my least favorite Shakespearean plot device: the bed trick. Helen convinces Diana to tell Bertram she’ll sleep with him in return for his ancestral ring, and then sneak Helen into the room to sleep with Bertram instead. This plot device is used a few times in Shakespearean cannon and likely played on male fears of their wives being unfaithful and raising children that weren’t theirs. As we discussed in The Comedy of Errors, comedy and tragedy tend to overlap. This is also dangerous for Diana. If word gets out that she’s given away her virginity, it would hurt her chances of getting married and possibly leave her and her widowed mother destitute.
But before we can find out if this gambit has played out, we must first pause for Parolles to get his comeuppance. His fellow soldiers dress up in the opposing party’s military attire and speak gibberish to disguise their accents and voices. They capture and blindfold him. One of the soldiers — one whose voice Parolles won’t be able to discern— acts as a translator for this gibberish language. They then send for Bertram to prove to him that Parolles is untrustworthy.
Elsewhere, Bertram seduces Diana. Diana resists, reminding him of the duty he owes his wife, Helen. Bertram vows he loves Diana, but Diana says his vows are meaningless. She demands his ring and he gives it over. She then tells him to meet at her chamber window and he runs off elated. Alone, Diana confesses she was unmoved by his vows and intends to go along with Helen’s plan.
After having slept with ‘Diana,’ Bertram returns to the court in Florence where he learns Helen has died.1 We also learn that the war has ended. Bertram plans to go back to France. He has references from the Duke of Florence in hope of assuaging the King of France’s anger at him for running away. He then watches as Parolles is interrogated and gives away all the information about the army, says quite unflattering things about the lords, and admits to having betrayed Bertram by warning Diana against him. It’s a funny slap-stick scene that’s also deeply ironic when comparing Parolles’s literal blind-foldedness to the ways in which Bertram is also blind.
In the next scene, we find a very alive Helen leading Diana and her mother back to France. They intend to tell the whole affair to the King of France so that he’ll sort it out. It’s not exactly a joyous conclusion, but as Helen says, ‘All’s well that ends well.’ But will it end well?
The Countess (Bertram’s mother) has learned of Helen’s death and is heartbroken. She is brokering with another lord for Bertram to marry his daughter. Bertram arrives in Rossillion.
Helen and crew arrive in Marseilles but the King has already left for Rossillion. Helen again states her refrain — ‘all’s well that ends well’ — but she’s less certain now. Her plan is not coming together. She gives a message for the King to a gentleman leaving for Rossillion. But as we’ve all learned from Juliet, early-modern mail leaves much to be desired… Will this end well after all?
The Countess begs the King to forgive her son for abandoning Helen and disobeying his orders to not go to war. Reluctantly, the King forgives him. Bertram apparently repents his rejection of Helen (director’s choice on how earnest that is), and the King blesses Bertram’s marriage to a new young woman.
Uh oh.
Bertram then gives his new bride-to-be a ring. Helen’s ring. Bertram insists he received the ring from Diana, but the King recognizes it as a token he gave to Helen. The Countess and the King are now convinced that Bertram has killed Helen. The King has Bertram arrested and taken away.
Double Uh oh.
The gentleman then rushes in with Helen’s letter. This is how we know the gentleman isn’t a friar — the letter arrives. The letter tells the King that Bertram has slept with Diana Capilet (in case you thought Shakespeare was subtle), and she is now requesting to be married to him. At this point, the father of the young woman who Bertram was about to marry washes his hands of him. Diana arrives and Bertram claims she’s a prostitute. She presents his ring, proving that he’s made vows to her and she’s now his wife. Bertram continues to be a slut-shaming jerk, claiming “she got the ring, and I had that which any inferior might at market price have bought.” He really is the worst.
But then the King puts together that Diana is who gave Bertram Helen’s ring, and is certain she was complicit in Helen’s death. She’s about to be led off to prison when her mother presents Helen. A very pregnant Helen. And Helen presents Bertram’s letter where he said that, if she presents his ring and a child conceived by him, he’ll accept her as his wife.
Helen turns to her ne'er-do-well husband and asks: “Will you be mine now you are doubly won?”
And Bertram replies “If she, my liege, can make me know this clearly, I’ll love her dearly, ever, ever dearly.”
And so ends the play. Not joyously or tragically, but fine. Or perhaps
Well.
Speak the Speech, I Pray You
Bring Shakespeare’s words into your own life by:
Taking that holier-than-though church lady down a peg;
Assuring the pal trapped in self-loathing that she’s got good bits too; and
Telling off the PTA Mom who flaunts her Suzy Homemaker prowess in your overwhelmed face:
Additional Resources
Find a copy of the entire play here.
Listen to Dr. Emma Smith’s discussion of whether the play actually does, “end well” here.
Read some famous quotes from the play (there are some great ones) compiled by the Royal Shakespeare Company here.
Perhaps an echo of Romeo learning Juliet has died, except Bertram is not lovesick.