Cymbeline

This article is about Shakespeare's tragedy. For other uses, see Cymbaline (disambiguation).

Imogen Discovered in the Cave of Belarius by George Dawe

Cymbeline (Template:Pron-en) is a play by William Shakespeare, based on legends concerning the early Celtic British King Cunobelinus. Although listed as a tragedy in the First Folio, modern critics often classify Cymbeline as a romance. Like Othello, Measure for Measure, and The Winter's Tale, it deals with the themes of innocence and jealousy. While the precise date of composition remains unknown, the play was certainly produced as early as 1611.

Sources

The plot of Cymbeline is loosely based on a tale by Geoffrey of Monmouth about the real-life British monarch Cunobelinus. Shakespeare, however, freely adapts the legend to a large extent and adds entirely original sub-plots. Iachimo's wager and subsequent hiding-place within a chest in order to gather details of Imogen's room derive from story II.9 of Giovanni Boccaccio's Decameron.

Date and text

Facsimile of the first page of Cymbeline from the First Folio

Cymbeline cannot be precisely dated. The Yale edition suggests a collaborator had a hand in the authorship, and some scenes (e.g. Act III scene 7 and Act V scene 2) may strike the reader as particularly un-Shakespearean when compared with others. The play shares notable similarities in language, situation and plot with Beaumont and Fletcher's tragicomedy Philaster, or Love Lies a-Bleeding, (c.1609-10). Both plays concern themselves with a princess who, after disobeying her father in order to marry a lowly lover, is wrongly accused of infidelity and thus ordered to be murdered, before escaping and having her faithfulness proven. Furthermore, both were written for the same theatre company and audience. Some scholars believe this supports a dating of approximately 1609, though it is not clear which play preceded the other. Cymbeline was first published in the First Folio in 1623 but the first recorded production, as noted by Simon Forman, was in April 1611.

Some have taken the convoluted plot as evidence of the play's parodic origins. In Act V Scene IV, "Jupiter descends in thunder and lightning, sitting upon an eagle: he throws a thunderbolt." After stating that Posthumus's fortunes will improve, Jupiter returns to heaven on his eagle.

Though once held in very high regard Cymbeline has lost favour over the past century. Some have held that Shakespeare, by frivolously spinning absurd tales, merely wrote it to amuse himself. William Hazlitt and John Keats, however, number it among their favorite plays. It is sometimes referred to as a "problem play", because its central character confronts a specific moral or social concern.

The editors of the Oxford and Norton Shakespeare believe the name of Imogen is a misspelling of Innogen—they draw several comparisons between Cymbeline and Much Ado About Nothing, in which a ghost character named Innogen was supposed to be Leonato's wife (Posthumus being also known as "Leonatus", the Latin form of the Italian name in the other play). Stanley Wells and Michael Dobson point out that Holinshed's Chronicles, which Shakespeare used as a source, mention an Innogen, and that Forman's eyewitness account of the April 1611 performance refers to "Innogen" throughout. In spite of these arguments, most editions of the play have continued to use the name Imogen.

Characters

CYMBELINE, King of Britain

QUEEN, Wife to Cymbeline

CLOTEN, Son to the Queen by a former Husband

IMOGEN / INNOGEN, Daughter to Cymbeline by a former Queen

POSTHUMUS LEONATUS, a Gentleman, Husband to Imogen

BELARIUS, a banished Lord, disguised under the name of Morgan

GUIDERIUS & ARVIRAGUS, Sons to Cymbeline, disguised under the names of Polydore and Cadwal, supposed Sons to Morgan

PHILARIO, Friend to Posthumus

IACHIMO / JACHIMO / GIACOMO , Friend to Philario

HELEN, a Lady attending on Imogen

CAIUS LUCIUS, General of the Roman Forces

PISANIO, Servant to Posthumus

CORNELIUS, a Physician

A Roman Captain

Two British Captains

A French Gentleman, Friend to Philario

Two Lords of Cymbeline's Court

Two Gentlemen of the same

Two Gaolers

Lords, Ladies, Roman Senators, Tribunes, a Dutch Gentleman, a Spanish Gentleman, a Soothsayer, Musicians, Officers, Captains, Soldiers, Messengers, and other Attendants

Synopsis

Postumus and Imogen by John Faed

Posthumus, a man of low birth but exceeding personal merit, has secretly married his childhood friend Imogen, daughter of King Cymbeline. Cymbeline, upon finding out, banishes Posthumus from the kingdom. His faithful servant Pisanio, however, remains.

Iachimo, a soldier in the Roman army, makes a bet with Posthumus that he can tempt Imogen to commit adultery. Iachimo sneaks into her bedchamber and examines her while she sleeps, stealing a bracelet. Then he tells Posthumus he has won the bet, offering the bracelet as proof, along with details of Imogen's bedchamber and naked body. Posthumus orders his faithful servant Pisanio to murder the falsely besmirched Imogen. Pisanio warns her instead, then helps her fake her death, and to disguise herself as a boy. He sends her to Milford Haven on the West Coast of Britain. There she befriends "Polydore" and "Cadwell" who, unbeknownst to her, are really Guiderius and Arviragus, her own brothers.

Twenty years before the action of the play, two British noblemen swore false oaths charging that Belarius had conspired with the ancient Romans, which led Cymbeline to banish him. Belarius kidnapped Cymbeline's young sons in retaliation, to hinder him from having heirs to the throne. The sons were raised by the nurse Euriphile, whom they called mother and took her for such.

At the play's resolution, virtually the entire cast comes forth one at a time to add a piece to the puzzle. Cornelius, the court doctor, arrives to dazzle everyone with news that the Queen, Imogen's stepmother, is dead, reporting that with her last breath she confessed her wicked deeds: she never loved old Cymbeline, she unsuccessfully attempted to have Imogen poisoned by Pisanio (without Pisanio's knowledge), and she was ambitious to poison Cymbeline so Cloten, her own son, could assume the throne.

Cymbeline concludes with an oration to the gods, declares peace and friendship between Britain and Rome, and great feasting in Lud's Town (London), concluding "Never was a war did cease, / Ere bloody hands were washed, with such a peace."

Performance

Following the performance mentioned by Forman, the play was revived at court for Charles I and Henrietta Maria in 1634. In the Restoration era, Thomas D'Urfey staged an adaptation of Cymbeline, titled The Injur'd Princess, or The Fatal Wager. John Rich staged the play with his company at Lincoln's Inn Fields; the performance was not long-remembered, as Rich's company was less famous for its work with Shakespeare than for its pantomimes and spectacles. Theophilus Cibber revived Shakespeare's text in 1758. In November 1761, David Garrick returned to a more-or-less original text, with good success: Posthumus became one of his star roles. Garrick rearranged some scenes; in particular, he shortened Imogen's burial scene and the entire fifth act, omitting the dream of Posthumus. The production was highly praised.

The play entered the Romantic era with John Philip Kemble's company in 1801. Kemble's productions made use of lavish spectacle and scenery; one critic noted that during the bedroom scene, the bed was so large that Jachimo all but needed a ladder to view Imogen in her sleep. Kemble added a dance to the Cloten's comic wooing of Imogen. In 1827, his brother Charles mounted an antiquarian production at Covent Garden; it featured costumes designed after the descriptions of the ancient British by such writers as Julius Caesar and Diodorus Siculus.

William Charles Macready mounted the play several times between 1837 and 1842. At the Theatre Royal, Marylebone, an epicene production was staged with Mary Warner, Fanny Vining, Anna Cora Mowatt, and Edward Loomis Davenport.

Dame Ellen Terry as Imogen

In 1864, as part of the celebrations of Shakespeare's birth, Samuel Phelps performed the title role at Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. Helen Faucit returned to the stage for this performance.

The play was also one of Ellen Terry's last performances with Henry Irving at the Lyceum in 1896. Terry's performance was widely praised, though Irving was judged an indifferent Iachimo. Like Garrick, Irving removed the dream of Posthumus; he also curtailed Iachimo's remorse and attempted to render Cloten's character consistent. A review in the Athenaeum compared this trimmed version to pastoral comedies such as As You Like It. The set design, overseen by Lawrence Alma-Tadema, was lavish and advertised as historically accurate, though the reviewer for the time complained of such anachronisms as gold crowns and printed books as props.

Similarly lavish but less successful was Margaret Mather's production in New York in 1897. The sets and publicity cost $40,000, but Mather was judged too emotional and undisciplined to succeed in a fairly cerebral role.

Barry Vincent Jackson staged a modern-dress production for the Birmingham Rep in 1923, two years before his influential modern-dress Hamlet. Walter Nugent Monck brought his Maddermarket Theatre production to Stratford in 1946, inaugurating the post-war tradition of the play.

London saw two productions in the 1956 season. Michael Benthall directed the less successful production, at the Old Vic. The set design by Audrey Cruddas was notably minimal, with only a few essential props. She relied instead on a variety of lighting effects to reinforce mood; actors seemed to come out of darkness and return to darkness. Barbara Jefford was criticized as too cold and formal for Imogen; Leon Gluckman played Posthumus, Derek Godfrey Iachimo, and Derek Francis Cymbeline. Following Victorian practice, Benthall drastically shortened the last act.

By contrast, Peter Hall's production at the Shakespeare Memorial presented nearly the entire play, including the long-neglected dream scene (although a golden eagle designed for Jupiter turned out too heavy for the stage machinery and was not used). Hall presented the play as a distant fairy tale, with stylized performances. The production received favorable reviews, both for Hall's conception and, especially, for Peggy Ashcroft's Imogen. Richard Johnson played Posthumus, and Robert Harris Cymbeline. Iachimo was played by Geoffrey Keen, whose father Malcolm had played Jachimo with Ashcroft at the Old Vic in 1932.

Hall's approach attempted to unify the play's diversity by means of a fairy-tale topos. The next major Royal Shakespeare Company production, in 1962, went in the opposite direction. Working on a set draped with heavy white sheets, director William Gaskill employed Brechtian alienation effects, to mixed critical reviews. Bernard Levin complained that the bare set deprived the play of necessary scenic splendor. The acting, however, was widely praised. Vanessa Redgrave as Imogen was often compared favorably to Ashcroft; Eric Porter was a success as Jachimo, as was Clive Swift as Cloten. Patrick Allen was Posthumus, and Tom Fleming played the title role.

A decade later, John Barton's 1974 production for the RSC (with assistance from Clifford Williams) featured Sebastian Shaw in the title role, Tim Pigott-Smith as Posthumus, Ian Richardson as Jachimo, and Susan Fleetwood as Imogen. Charles Keating was Cloten. As with contemporary productions of Pericles, this one used a narrator (Cornelius) to signal changes in mood and treatment to the audience. Robert Speaight disliked the set design, which he called too minimal, but he approved the acting.

In 1980, David Jones revived the play for the RSC; the production was in general a disappointment, although Judi Dench as Imogen received reviews that rivalled Ashcroft's. Ben Kingsley played Jachimo; Roger Rees was Posthumus.

At the Stratford Festival, the play was directed in 1970 by Jean Gascon and in 1987 by Robin Phillips. The latter production, which was marked by much-approved scenic complexity, featured Colm Feore as Jachimo, and Martha Burns as Imogen. The play was again at Stratford in 2005, directed by David Latham. A large medieval tapestry unified the fairly simple stage design and underscored Latham's fairy-tale inspired direction.

At the new Globe Theatre in 2001, a cast of six (including Abigail Thaw, Mark Rylance, and Richard Hope) used extensive doubling for the play. The cast wore identical costumes even when in disguise, allowing for particular comic effects related to doubling (as when Cloten attempts to disguise himself as Posthumus.)

The play is rarely performed, and has thus far never been filmed. Elijah Moshinsky directs the 1983 made-for-television videotaped production, ignoring the ancient British period setting in favour of a more timeless and snow-laden atmosphere inspired by Rembrandt and his contemporary Dutch painters. Richard Johnson, Helen Mirren, and Robert Lindsay play Cymbeline, Imogen, and Jachimo, respectively.

Despite a lack of cinematic adaptations, there have been some well-received major theatrical productions including 1998's Public Theatre production in New York City directed by Andrei Serban. Cymbeline was also performed in Cambridge in October 2007 in a production directed by Sir Trevor Nunn, who sought to re-capture the essence of the play as a story narrative, and in November 2007 at the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre.

Adaptations and cultural references

Imogen by Herbert Gustave Schmalz

The play was adapted by Thomas d'Urfey as The Injured Princess, or, the Fatal Wager; this version was produced at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, presumably by the united King's Company and Duke's Company, in 1682. The play changes some names and details, and adds a subplot, typical of the Restoration, in which a virtuous waiting-woman escapes the traps laid by Cloten. D'Urfey also changes Pisanio's character so that he at once believes in Imogen's (Eugenia, in D'Urfey's play) guilt. For his part, D'Urfey's Posthumus is ready to accept that his wife might have been untrue, as she is young and beautiful. Some details of this alteration survived in productions at least until the middle of the century.

William Hawkins revised the play again in 1759. His was among the last of the heavy revisions designed to bring the play in line with Aristotelean unities. He cut the Queen, reduced the action to two places (the court and a forest in Wales). The dirge "With fairest flowers..." was set to music by Thomas Arne.

Nearer the end of the century, Henry Brooke wrote an adaptation which was apparently never staged. His version eliminates the brothers altogether as part of a notable enhancement of Posthumus' role in the play.

George Bernard Shaw, who criticized the play perhaps more harshly than he did any of Shakespeare's other works, took aim at what he saw as the defects of the final act in his 1937 Cymbeline Refinished; as early as 1896, he had complained about the absurdities of the play to Ellen Terry, then preparing to act Imogen.

Probably the most famous verses in the play come from the funeral song of Act IV, Scene 2, which begins:

Fear no more the heat o' the sun,

Nor the furious winter's rages;

Thou thy worldly task hast done,

Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages:

Golden lads and girls all must,

As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.

These last two lines appear to have inspired T. S. Eliot; in "Lines to a Yorkshire Terrier" (in Five-Finger Exercises), he writes:

Pollicle dogs and cats all must

Jellicle dogs and cats must

Like undertakers, come to dust.

The first two lines of the song appear in Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway. The lines, which turn Mrs. Dalloway's thoughts to the trauma of the First World War, are at once an elegiac dirge and a profoundly dignified declaration of endurance. The song provides a major organizational motif for the novel.

At the end of Stephen Sondheim's The Frogs, William Shakespeare is competing against George Bernard Shaw for the title of best playwright, deciding which of them is to be brought back from the dead in order to improve the world. Shakespeare sings the funeral song of Act IV, Scene 2, when asked about his view of death (the song is titled "Fear No More").

The last two lines of the Act IV-scene 2 funeral song may also have inspired the lines W. H. Auden, the librettist for Stravinsky's "The Rake's Progress", puts into the mouth of Anne Truelove at the end of the opera: "Every wearied body must late or soon return to dust".

External links

• Cymbeline - searchable, indexed e-text
• Cymbeline - Full text at M.I.T.
• Cymbeline - Scene indexed play
• Cymbeline - HTML version.
• Cymbeline - Scene-indexed and searchable version of the text.
• Cymbeline - plain text from Project Gutenberg
• Cymbeline - different plain text edition
• Cymbeline - a musical adaptation by Loreena McKennitt