Characters
- Duke of Milan: Silvia's father
- Valentine: Gentleman of Verona
- Proteus: Gentleman of Verona
- Antonio: Proteus' father
- Thurio: foolish rival to Valentine
- Eglamour: Agent for Silvia in escape
- Host: where Julia lodges
- Outlaws: with Valentine
- Speed: a clownish servant to Valentine
- Launce: a clownish servant to Proteus
- Panthino: Servant to Antonio
- Julia: beloved of Proteus
- Silvia: beloved of Valentine
- Lucetta: waiting-woman to Julia
Summary
- After receiving no response from Julia to his letter of love, Proteus follows his friend Valentine to Milan and decides to begin pursuing the current love interest of Valentine, Silvia. By informing the Duke of Valentine's plan to run off with the Duke's daughter Silvia, Valentine is banished to Mantua, and Proteus continues in his pursuit. His abandoned love interest, Julia gets in close to the intrigue by dressing herself as a boy and delivering a message to Silvia and observing the results.
Notes/Quotes
- Proteus. He [Valentine] after honour hunts, I after love: he leaves his friends to dignify them more; I leave myself, my friends and all, for love. (1.1)
- Proteus is sent by his father Antonio to serve in the emperor's court alongside Valentine, just as the relationship between Proteus and Julia is budding. (1.3)
- Proteus. O, how this spring of love resembleth the uncertain glory of an April day, which now shows all the beauty of the sun, and by and by a cloud takes all away. (1.3)
- Speed. If you lover here [Silvia], you cannot see her.
- Valentine. Why?
- Speed. Because Love is blind. (2.1)
- Proteus. I will forget that Julia is alive, remembering that my love to her is dead; and Valentine I'll hold an enemy, aiming at Silvia as a sweeter friend. (2.6).
- in regards to winning the heart of a 'lady of Verona',
- Duke. She did scorn a present that I sent her.
- Valentine. A woman sometimes scorns what best contents her. (3.1)
- First Outlaw. [on the frontiers of Mantua, between Milan and Verona]...you [Valentine] are beautified with goodly shape and by your own report a linguist and a man of such perfection as we do in our quality much want --
- Second Out. ...Are you content to be our general? To make a virtue of necessity and live, as we do, in this wilderness?...
- Valentine. I take your offer and will live with you, provided that you do no outrages on silly women or poor passengers.
- Third Out. No, we detest such vile base practices.
- Thurio. How likes she [Silvia] my discourse?
- Proteus. Ill, when you talk of war.
- Thurio. But well, when I discourse of love and peace?
- Julia. [In disguise; Aside] But better, indeed, when you hold your peace.
- Thurio. What says she to my valor?
- Proteus. O, sir, she makes no doubt of that.
- Julia. [Aside] She needs not, when she knows it cowardice.
- Thurio. What says she to my birth?
- Proteus. That you are well derived.
- Julia. [Aside] True; from a gentleman to a fool.
- Thurio. Considers she my possessions?
- Proteus. O, ay; and pities them.
- Thurio. Wherefore?
- Julia. [Aside] That such an ass should owe them.
- Proteus. That they are out by lease.
- Alonso: King of Naples
- Sebastian: Alonso's brother
- Prospero: the right Duke of Milan
- Antonio: Prospero's brother, the usurping Duke of Milan
- Ferdinand: Alonso's son
- Gonzalo: honest old Counsellor
- Adrian: Lord
- Francisco: Lord
- Caliban: savage and deformed Slave
- Trinculo: Jester
- Stephano: drunken Butler
- Miranda: Prospero's daughter
- Ariel: airy Spirit, among others (Iris, Ceres, Juno, etc.)
Summary
- As the King of Naples and his crew return home from the wedding of his daughter in Tunis, they are shipwrecked on an island by a spirit commanded by the Duke of Milan. The Duke has been on the island for 12 years along with his daughter, and his brother, the usurping Duke of Milan, washes ashore with the other members of the King's entourage. There is love. There is forgiveness.
Notes/Quotes
- Antonio [usurping Duke]. Let's all sink with the king.
- Sebastian [King's brother]. Let's take leave of him. (1.1)
- Prospero has been in an island gaol for 12 years (1.2)
- Miranda [Prospero's daughter]. I should sin to think but nobly of my grandmother: good wombs have borne bad sons. (1.2)
- Prospero enlisted Ariel's help in crashing the boat with the King's and his entourage and dispersing them safely on the island in exchange for the spirit's liberty (1.2)
- Sebastian. Thy case, dear friend, shall be my precedent; as thou got'st Milan, I'll come by Naples. Draw thy sword: one stroke shall free thee from the tribute which thou payest; and I the king shall love thee.
- Antonio. Draw together; and when I rear my hand, do you the like, to fall it on Gonzalo. (2.1)
- Trinculo [Jester]. Swum ashore, man, like a duck: I can swim like a duck, I'll be sworn. (2.2)
- Enter Prospero above, invisible. Enter several strange Shapes, bringing in a banquet; they dance about it with gently actions of salutation; and, inviting the King, et cetera, to eat, they depart (3.3)
- Ariel. But remember -- for that's my business to you -- that you three from Milan did supplant good Prospero; exposed unto the sea, which hath requit it, him and his innocent child: for which foul deed the powers, delaying, not forgetting, have incensed the seas and shores, yea, all the creatures, against your peace. (3.3)
- Miranda. These our actors, as I foretold you, were all spirits and are melted into air, into thin air: and, like the baseless fabric of this vision, the cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, the solemn temples, the great globe itself, yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve and, like this insubstantial pageant faded, leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with sleep. [emphasis mine] (4.1)
