19 THE PLAYS OF SHAKESPEARE ALL'S WELL THAT WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY GEORGE BRANDES and a Plate representing Mrs. MACKLIN as 'Helena.' INTRODUCTION. I. The THOUGH there is little true mirth to be found in All's Well that Ends Well, the piece reminds us in various ways of some of Shakespeare's real comedies. story resembles in several details that of The Merchant of Venice. Portia in disguise persuades the unwilling Bassanio to give up his ring to her; and Helena, in the darkness of night mistaken for another, coaxes Bertram out of the ring which he had made up his mind she should never obtain from him. In the closing scenes, both Bertram and Bassanio are minus their rings; both are wretched because they have not got them; and in both cases the knot is unravelled by their wives being found in possession of them. There is a more essential relation-that of direct contrast-between the story of All's Well that Ends Well and that of The Taming of the Shrew. The earlier comedy sets forth in playful fashion how a man by means of the attributes of his sex-physical superiority, boldness, and coolnesshelped out by imperiousness, bluster, noise, and violence, wins the devotion of a passionately recalcitrant young woman. All's Well that Ends Well shows us how a woman, by means of the attributes of her sex -gentleness, goodness of heart, cunning, and finesseconquers a vehemently recalcitrant man. And in both cases the pair are married before the action proper of the play begins. Seeing that Shakespeare in The Taming of the Shrew followed the older play on the same subject, and that 131615 he took the story of All's Well that Ends Well from Boccaccio's Gilette of Narbonne, a translation of which appeared as early as 1566 in Paynter's Palace of Pleasure, this contrast cannot be said to have been devised by the poet. But it is evident that one of the chief attractions of the latter subject for Shakespeare was the opportunity it offered him of delineating that rare phenomenon— a woman wooing a man and yet possessing and retaining all the charm of her sex. Shakespeare has worked out the figure of Helena with the tenderest partiality. Pity and admiration in concert seem to have guided his pen. We feel in his portraiture a deep compassion for the pangs of despised love-the compassion of one who himself has suffered and over the whole figure of Helena he has shed a Raphael-like beauty. She wins all, charms all, wherever she goes-old and young, women and men-all except Bertram, the one in whom her life is bound up. The King and the old Lafeu are equally captivated by her, equally impressed by her excellences. Bertram's mother prizes her as if she were her daughter; more highly, indeed, than she prizes her own obstinate son. The Italian widow becomes so devoted to her that she follows her to a foreign country in order to vouch for her statement and win her back her husband. She ventures all that she may gain her well-beloved, and in the pursuit of her aim shows an inventive capacity not common among women. For the real object of her journey to cure the King is, as she frankly confesses, to be near Bertram. As in the tale, she obtains the King's promise that she may, if she is successful in curing him, choose herself a husband among the lords of his court; but in Boccaccio it is the King who, in answer to her question as to the reward, gives her this promise of his own accord; in the play it is she who |