The Winters Tale: The Oxford Shakespeare

The Winters Tale is Shakespeares most perfectly realized tragi- comedy, as notable for its tragic intensity as for its comic grace and, throughout, for the richness and complexity of its poetry. It concludes, moreover, with the most daring and moving reconciliation scene in all Shakespeares plays.

Though the title may suggest an escapist fantasy, recent criticism has seen in the play a profoundly realist psychology and a powerful commentary on the violence implicit in family relationships and deep, longlasting friendships. Stephen Orgels edition considers the play in relation to Renaissance conceptions of both dramatic genre and the family, traces the changing critical and theatrical attitudes towards it, and places its psychological and dramatic conflicts within the Jacobean cultural and political context. The commentary pays special attention to the plays linguistic complexity, and the edition also includes a complete reprint of Shakespeares source, Pandosto, by Robert Greene.