ShmoopTube
Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.
Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos
British Literature Videos 176 videos
Meet Charles Darnay, the nobleman who spends more time on trial and in prison than attending balls and drinking expensive wine. Don't feel too bad...
Written in Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, sometime between the 8th and 11th centuries, Beowulf is an epic poem that reflects the early medieval warri...
Brave New World is supposed be an exciting book about a negative utopia and the corrupt powers of authority. So where’s the big car chase? What's...
The Winter's Tale 8705 Views
Share It!
Description:
The Winter's Tale is like the Disney movie of Shakespeare plays—if you ignore all the murders, mauling, and love-children, anyway.
Transcript
- 00:01
The Winter’s Tale, a la Shmoop. Shakespeare sure likes to mix things up. Take
- 00:09
his play, The Winter’s Tale.
- 00:11
It’s set in faraway lands with castles, lovers and magic. Sounds like a romance fit
- 00:17
for Disney, right?
- 00:19
Wrong, because then our playwright literally tries to kill babies.
Full Transcript
- 00:24
It begs the question, is this a happy romance or a dark tragedy? Or did Shakespeare visit
- 00:28
the apothecary one too many times? Let’s study the facts.
- 00:31
Kings and queen in a beautiful castle. Romance!
- 00:35
King tries to murder best friend and throws very pregnant wife in the slammer because
- 00:40
he thinks they’re having a love-child. Tragedy. A princess is born. Romance!
- 00:46
Actually… Have you tried to give birth in a jail cell without an epidural? We’re going
- 00:51
to say tragedy. Then, like a bad episode of Maury, the king
- 00:54
won’t admit he’s the baby daddy.
- 00:56
And he orders the baby killed.
- 00:59
And the kid prince dies from despair over his mom.
- 01:03
But maybe it’s a good thing he dies? Who wants a fragile mama’s boy to be the future
- 01:07
king?
- 01:08
Wait, no, not a good thing. Because the queen drops dead. Bummer.
- 01:12
Although… the King’s servant doesn’t actually kill the baby, and instead leaves
- 01:19
her in a faraway land to be raised by a funny shepherd and his clown-friend. Romance!
- 01:25
Then the servant gets eaten by a bear.
- 01:27
That’s right. Eaten. On stage. By a live bear. Tragedy.
- 01:36
Time passes, and the pretty princess wins the sheep sheering festival’s beauty pageant.
- 01:40
She’s even dating a prince. Sigh.
- 01:43
Not so fast. The prince’s father… the king’s ex-best friend, awkward… thinks
- 01:49
she’s just a country bumpkin and threatens to disfigure her. Double awkward.
- 01:54
Back at the castle, the king is sad. It’s hard murdering your entire family.
- 01:59
But sure enough, the Shepherd and clown-man come with documents and prove the princess
- 02:03
is alive. And so, a perfectly logical ending occurs
- 02:07
where…
- 02:07
The king is reunited with his best bud.
- 02:10
The princess and prince are allowed to get married.
- 02:13
Everyone visits a statue of the dead queen.
- 02:16
Which then comes alive!
- 02:18
And they all live happily ever after. Perhaps we’ll never know Shakespeare’s
- 02:22
intentions.
- 02:23
But at least it all ends up right as rain in the end.
- 02:26
Except for the king’s servant and son, who are still very much dead.
Related Videos
They say that honesty is the best policy, but Jack lies about his identity and still gets the girl. Does that mean we should all lie to get what we...
Ever wish you could remember everything that you ever studied? How about everything that everyone has ever studied? Yeah, pretty sure our brains ju...
Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man is an American classic. Hope you're not expecting any exciting shower scenes though. It's not that kind of book.
Do not go gentle into that good night. In fact, if it's past your curfew, don't go at all into that good night. You just stay in your good bed and...
