Until now, I had never before read The Winter's Tale or seen it enacted. As a lover of Shakespeare, picking up The Winter's Tale was like discovering a previously unpublished book by a favorite author. How thrilled I was as I glossed over the introduction in my Folger Shakespeare Library edition and plunged into the play! In my gloss over of the intro, I learned that the story is an adaptation for the stage of a novel, Pandosto the Triumph of Time by Robert Greene (1592). What an honor for Mr. Greene, thought I.(I would say "spoiler alert" at this point were not The Winter's Tale already spoiled to begin with. After reading this review, I doubt anyone will want to waste his time reading the play. However, if you must, as my son had to do for an English lit class, you may want to stop reading here).
The play begins with King Leontes of Sicilia confiding in his servant Camillo that he suspects that his best friend King Polixenes of Bohemia has impregnated Leontes' wife, Queen Hermione. I greedily turned the page in anticipation of the beginning of an interesting investigation ala Hamlet.
Alas, there was to be no investigation, no communion with ghosts, no play-within-play. No. Instead, Leontes orders Camillo to poison Polixenes. Camillo informs Polixenes and escapes to Bohemia with him. Leontes sees this as further proof of Hermione's guilt and imprisons her. In a nod to the gods, he orders two servants to travel to Delphi to consult the oracle. This painfully predictable, boring, and spoon-fed plot takes two entire snooze-festival acts!
In Act III, Leontes ignores the oracle that exonerates Hermione. Predictably, Hermione dies in childbirth and, learning of this, Leontes' son dies of grief. The baby, a girl, is declared a bastard by Leontes and sent to Bohemia to be abandoned in the wilds. Predictably, the girl, Perdita (lost one) is found by shepherds and saved.
In Act IV, Father Time introduces a sixteen-year time skip and reminds the reader that King Polixenes has a son, as though a reminder were needed. Guess who falls in love with whom and must run away to Sicilia? Ho hum.
Having put up with all this disappointment, I was at least somewhat looking forward to the inevitable resolution in Act V. The prodigal daughter returns! The prodigal best friend returns! What a scene this will make! Nope! The whole reunion--the best part of the plot--takes place off stage and is related to the hapless reader second hand through the conversation of three unnamed court gentlemen.
Then, in a final barf, Perdita et al go to the garden to pay homage to her wronged and deceased mother. There, a just completed statue of Hermione awaits. Much is made of the skill of the sculptor, how life-life the statue is, how the artist made the statue appear sixteen years older than the subject was at her untimely death. Cheesily (and creepily), the statue comes to life to make the ending extra happy and extra sappy.
Predicable, boring, hackneyed, melodramatic, and poorly scripted, The Winter's Tale will be a big disappointment to anyone familiar with Shakespeare's more well-known works. And heaven preserve the unfortunate reader for whom the Tale serves as an introduction to the otherwise great Bard.
