A Student’s Guide to Shakespeare presents:

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Background Information……………………………………………….3

Synopsis………………………………………………………………..6

Characters……………………………………………………………...8

Themes, Motifs, and Overall Meanings………………………………11

Commentary………………………………………………………….13

Study Questions………………………………………………………31

Study Questions – Answers…………………………………………..35

Modern Relevance……………………………………………………45
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The Comedy of Errors has no specific date of conception or publication, but was first

performed by Shakespeare’s troupe at the Grey’s Inn during Christmas festivities in 1594. This

performance, although not Shakespeare’s first, was critical to his success as a popular

playwright. His audience was much more distinguished than just an amalgamation of peasantry

from the Elizabethan era; Shakespeare was onstage for a group of higher-ups whose opinion

mattered. He was playing for the late sixteenth century equivalent of the White House

Correspondents’ dinner, in front of the lords and ladies who could make or break his career with

powers only known to Rodger Egbert.

Shakespeare put his earliest comedy before them, seeking their approval. While writing

it, he probably knew that something like this would happen; he would have the chance to

entertain, where the key to success was raucous laughter and an adherence to classical themes.

Therefore, he wrote a play that draws heavily from Greek and Roman writings. First, he made

the decision to rigidly define time and place, and made every action relevant to the plot. This was

based on Aristotle’s three unities—unity of place, unity of time, and unity of action. If Aristotle

was popular with these more learned lords and ladies, this would contribute to Shakespeare’s

likability as a playwright. If not, then Shakespeare was still covered. He borrowed a fundamental

philosophy about storytelling in order to better tell his story. This in and of itself makes the play

more accessible to anyone relatively familiar with the normal concepts of storytelling. That being

said, this also keeps the play on the simple side. With characters named the same name and

confusion and a ruckus going on onstage, The Comedy of Errors is confusing enough without

distorting Aristotle’s unities. Simplicity breeds accessibility, as one must understand something

to identify with it. (Synopsis of…)

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To the same end, Shakespeare stole the basic twins-separated-at-birth story from Plautus,

a Roman playwright. Considering Shakespeare’s extensive education in English and classical

literature, it comes as no great surprise that Shakespeare had read and studied Roman literature,

and as a playwright trying to find new ideas, drawing on the classics was a fantastic way to get

people to love the story. Again, anyone who was well-educated enough to have read Plautus’s

work or to have seen modern interpretations of it would see the parallels between the plots, and

as he was performing this for a group of supposedly educated people, if Shakespeare had read

Plautus at Stratford, where he received his formal education, chances are England’s leadership

probably had some knowledge of this plot. The other parallels Shakespeare draws from Plautus

are the adaptations of chaos onstage and the farcical and slapstick comedy that propels most of

the humor. The decision to write low comedy was probably a mix between a want to follow his

Roman predecessor’s footsteps and a need to make his comedy popular. If Larry, Moe, and Curly

can teach society anything, it’s that people love to see other people get hurt. Plautus knew this,

and Shakespeare used this extensively, specifically with his treatment of the Dromio brothers.

(Synopsis of…)

The basic premise of entertaining over telling a good story leads to much criticism of this

work. It was viewed as less of a work of genius, and more of a botched attempt to create a

Frankenstein’s monster of Christianity and Greco-Roman idealisms. It is regarded as soulless,

based on its origin as a basic retelling of Plautus’s original play, and one critic goes so far as to

say that no work should be interpreted in another, as, “no analysis…can take the place of the

work itself.” More criticism arises from the fact that Shakespeare used primarily static characters

to relay his story, and leaves so much of the soul of any of his characters up to the viewer’s

interpretation that the work loses validity. (Snider)

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To look at these elements of the play and understand the play as simplistic and evidence

of a lack of ability to make art is to misunderstand the point. The point of this work was clearly

identification. Every element that takes the reader or viewer deeper into known territory is

another boost to the longevity of Shakespeare’s acting troupe. The play was not a masterstroke

by any means, but it was the work of a novice “who would soon become a master.” (Synopsis

of…) At the time it was being performed and Shakespeare needed to gain a fan-base, there was

no Globe Theater, no uprising of support for the theater. Storytelling is only really comfortable

when the listener has some idea of what’s going on in the story, so copying a classic that was

probably told before the Greco-Roman era and definitely told far after was the best way for

Shakespeare to achieve his ends of making money and making fans.

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The story of The Comedy of Errors is relatively common in literature—the twins-

separated-at-birth story has been done by everyone from George Lucas to, well, Shakespeare.

The work opens in medias res, with Egeon, a merchant from Syracuse undergoing a trial for

illegally entering Ephesus, a nation warring with Syracuse and the setting of the play. Egeon

describes the story of how he came to Ephesus in the first place, in search of his twin sons. They

were born at the same time as a lower set of twins, who became their servants, and one day at

sea, a great storm split everybody up. Egeon recovered one pair of twins, one of his sons and one

of the servant boys, while his wife presumably recovered the other pair. The two groups are

forced by nature to split up. Eighteen years pass, and Egeon’s son wants to find his long lost

brother, and departs from home. Egeon explains that he is simply trying to find his son on his

journey, and his lost son. Egeon is sentenced to death by the Duke of Ephesus, with a bail of

1000 ducats to save his neck.

As fate would have it, Egeon’s raised son, Antipholus, and his servant, Dromio, appear in

Ephesus. For simplicity’s sake, Antipholus and Dromio of Syracuse will be referred to as

S.Antipholus and S.Dromio, and the pair from Ephesus will be referred to as E.Antipholus and

E.Dromio. S.Antipholus and S.Dromio split up to search Ephesus, and Dromio is instructed to

purchace a hotel room. S.Antipholus soon finds E.Dromio, and mistakes him for S.Dromio. The

two have an exchange that ends in a beating for E.Dromio, and confusion for S.Antipholus.

E.Antipholus’s wife, Adriana, is introduced as a shrew worrying about her marriage.

Luciana, her sister, tries to calm her down, and the two manage to convince S.Antipholus,

mistaking him for E.Antipholus, to come over for dinner with the help of E.Dromio.
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S.Antipholus and S.Dromio end up in E.Antipholus’s house, becoming thoroughly freaked out.

S.Antipholus meets Luciana and offers his hand in marriage.

E.Antipholus buys a gold chain for Adriana as a token of their strong marriage and his

happiness. He then discovers that he has been locked out of his own home, and believes that

Adriana is cheating on him, even though she perceives that she is with her husband, whom she

believes is S.Antipholus. E.Antipholus huffs off and vows to contact a Courtesan, the local

hussy. S.Antipholus, by this time, has had enough and wishes to leave Ephesus. When he leaves

the house, he is greeted by Angelo, the goldsmith, who gives him the gold chain.

Angelo then meets with E.Antipholus. E.Antipholus discovers that he is not going to

receive his chain, but still is supposed to pay for it. He refuses, so Angelo arrests him.

E.Antipholus contacts Adriana, and gets her to bail him out. Meanwhile, S.Antipholus meets

with the Courtesan, and steals her ring. He finds S.Dromio and tries to leave Ephesus, but ends

up being committed as insane in an Abbey of nuns.

Eventually, Egeon explains to E.Antipholus and E.Dromio that he is E.Antipholus’s real

father. The pair don’t believe him, but the Abbess convinces everybody of Egeon’s

trustworthiness when she reveals that she was his wife before the ship crashed. She introduces

the pairs of brothers to each other. All is forgiven, and everybody’s money and gold situations

are straightened out. The play closes when the reunited family enters the Abbey to talk about the

day they got separated and how lucky they are to have gotten back together again.
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Egeon: Egeon is the father to the Antipholus brothers and the husband to Aemelia. He is
sentenced to death by the Duke, and is haggard by age and loss.

The Duke of Syracuse: The Duke is the administrator of justice in Ephesus. He abides
by the letter of the law much more than by the spirit of the law.

Although short on lines, the Duke is incredibly important to the play. Shakespeare’s

decision to go with a more classical and recognizable style meant that the play needed to depend

on time, era, and setting. The Duke provides all three. His assertion that the letter of the law is

the most important part of the law—however ironic in light of the relative injustice he delivers

because of this belief—is essentially an allusion to Roman law. This places the play somewhere

along the Mediterranean coast within three or four hundred years of the birth of Christ. Based on

how the play is set up, he introduces era and setting with this belief. He introduces a rigidity of

time by placing a timetable on Egeon’s life, which is extremely important to the play. Through

this, Shakespeare is able to create a sense of urgency that thickens the plot and helps move the

play’s action along.

The Antipholus Brothers: The Antipholus brothers are sons to Egeon and Aemelia.
They are twins separated at birth. S.Antipholus seeks E.Antipholus, but other than that

difference, they are essentially indistinguishable from one another.

The brothers’ similarities serve to make them foils to each other. E.Antipholus is

sociable, and an upstanding citizen in his community, and a married man while his brother is a

loaner who doesn’t know anybody or have any real attachments. The fact that they were
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described by Egeon as being so similar only their names could tell them apart opened a floodgate

of dramatic ironies where townspeople, and even the Dromios mixed the brothers up, and the

difference between the brothers becomes increasingly evident as the play progresses. It is most

poignant when S.Antipholus begins to fall in love with Luciana, who is so different in

personality from his brother’s wife. Here, not only dramatic irony is present and working, but the

foil is at its peak.

The Dromio Brothers: The Dromios are the servant boys to the Antipholus brothers.
They are a pair of twins separated at birth, bound to their masters. They are basically

indistinguishable from one another.

Adriana: Wife to E.Antipholus. She is afraid that her marriage is collapsing, and that
E.Antipholus is cheating on her with somebody.

Adriana’s stress over her marriage is inexplicable from the play itself. She is distraught

over her husband being a few hours late to dinner, which seems like a huge overreaction. The

only reasonable explanation is that she has been wronged by E.Antipholus before. She even more

strongly represents the shrew of the play in this way, because she cannot trust men, and has a

very ugly view of marriage. All of this is ironic in light of the fact that E.Antipholus is late

because he is trying to save their marriage, as the stress is misspent.

Luciana: Sister to Adriana. She functions as the hopeful, patient person, and presents herself
as the optimist, especially when discussing marriage with Adriana at the beginning of Act II.

Luciana’s optimism in men and marriage serves as a foil to Adriana’s disgust with these

ideas. In light of the irony that characterizes Adriana’s feelings, Luciana’s spirit becomes the
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voice of reason about marriage. It is ironic later that she is so put off when she gets hit on by

S.Antipholus. Dramatic ironies and misplacement of characters aside, her more accurate view of

marriage gets poked and prodded at by conflicting feelings over family, and would crumble if

not for the resolution of the dramatic irony.

Angelo: Goldsmith. He gives E.Antipholus’s gold chain to S.Antipholus by mistake, and

charges E.Antipholus with thievery.

Balthazar: Friend of E.Antipholus. He wisely acts as the social conscience and dissuades
E.Antipholus of crazy behavior due to his anger at Adriana.

Merchant: The merchant keeps the clock running by needing to leave Ephesus. He needs
Angelo to pay him before he can leave, and Angelo needs to get paid by E.Antipholus for the

gold chain he made.

Officer: Arrests E.Antipholus over the Necklace. Employed by the Duke and paid by Angelo.

Abbess: Lost wife of Egeon and mother of the Antipholus brothers. She also runs the Abbey
in Ephesus, and claims that S.Antipholus and S.Dromio are mad.

Luce: A maid to Adriana and E.Antipholus. Married to E.Dromio.

Pinch: A schoolmaster, exorcist and doctor who tries to drive the devil out of S.Antipholus.

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Water and Isolation: Water is commonly referred to as a separating force throughout the play.

Multiple characters express this thought, and even go so far as to put this thought in essentially

the same way, talking specifically about being lost at sea, or being a drop of water in a sea of

loneliness. The play is about a family who was separated at sea, Ephesus is a port town, Adriana

is left alone by E.Antipholus and starts talking about water, people need to sail off and leave

Ephesus; sufficient to say that there’s water, water everywhere, and not a drop to drink. Water is

supposed to symbolize loneliness, among other things, in literature, so Shakespeare sprinkling

these images everywhere enhances the tragic side of the story.

Family Ties: The idea that family ties are stronger, in a cosmic sense, than the forces of earth,

heaven and hell is an overall meaning. S.Antipholus even goes so far as to wonder which of the

three that he must overcome to finish his quest. Egeon is in his own hell, caught and possibly

being beaten half to death, having his liver eaten by the proverbial eagle because he wants to

help his own kind—his family—by bringing them back together. Aemelia is clearly

representative of heaven, based on her status with the church. The Antipholus brothers are on

Earth, and still separated by circumstance. Each of the family members fight through an

impressive amount of setbacks to partake in a freak statistical anomaly where they find each

other again. The very fact that everyone ends up together and happy in the end is evidence in and

of itself that this is the moral that Shakespeare had in mind when writing the play.

Feminism: No serious scholar would analyze this play as a serious calling for women’s rights,

but Shakespeare brought some feminist elements into this work. The very fact that he has

significant female characters holding significant power over high ranking men, and a very high

ranking woman in charge of the church is a testament to female power. The most striking

element is Adriana’s character and her analysis of her own marriage. She takes a stance that
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E.Antipholus is to blame for her unhappiness, and that she needs to change him. She wants to get

out of the marriage at points, and is unsure of his love for her, something that probably was felt

by women at the time, but not taken into serious consideration by men in power. Luciana, in her

more optimistic approach, serves as a foil to Adriana throughout the work, and Adriana’s shrew-

like behavior is emphasized by this.

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Egeon clearly models St. Paul in his story of how he came to Ephesus. As his “helpful

ship” (103) crashed on the rocks of the sea, Egeon’s story of his shipwreck draws biblical

connotations from St. Paul’s shipwreck at Malta, as Egeon was saved by total strangers, as St.

Paul was shown incredible kindness from the Maltans. He journeys around Greece, Asia, and the

rest of the Mediterranean for a rather noble cause of finding his son, as St. Paul journeyed in the

same fashion for the noble cause of spreading the word about God’s son. The scene itself models

Paul’s death, where he is beheaded upon trying to spread Christianity (talking about God’s son)

to Rome, as Egeon is trying to find his son, and is sentenced to death for it.

Egeon speaks in couplets when he replies to the Duke.

“Proceed, Solinus, to procure my fall,/And by the doom of death end woes and all.” (1-2)

Since the Duke speaks in nonrhyming iambic pentameter, and since Egeon is introduced

with rhyming lines, the end rhyme couplets immediately portray Egeon as the protagonist. The

rhyming causes a sort of euphony, which allows the pathos in his interrupted monologue to take

effect on the reader/viewer as well as the Duke. Clearly, his monologue is meant to set the

backdrop for the play. It sets up the separated-at-birth plot, and introduces many of the central

characters. The monologue displays pathos ironically. The story in and of itself causes the duke

to feel sorry for Egeon, hence pathos. Egeon was pleading for his death a few moments before,

so the Duke’s insistence that he tells his tale, and then gives him a sort of loophole/gives him the

benefit of the doubt is ironic. To accentuate this, Egeon sees this irony and reacts with a shudder,

“Hopeless and helpless doth Egeon wend,/But to procrastinate his lifeless end.”(157-158)

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This scene holds the first few examples of dramatic irony in the work. When the

merchant is talking to S.Antipholus (Antipholus from Syracusa, abbreviated for clarity), he

makes a reference to Egeon. S.Antipholus doesn’t know that Egeon is his father, and therefore

doesn’t pay much attention to the warning. Dramatic irony also resides in E.Dromio’s attempt to

lure S.Antipholus to E.Antipholus’s home. Neither of the twins know that they are talking to

their counterpart’s clones here, hence, dramatic irony. These scenes foreshadow the rest of the

plot, in which the reader can expect confusions between the twins, that also raises suspense for

the eventual meeting of the twins. It should also be noted that Egeon exits the stage shortly

before S.Antipholus arrives.

Water also plays a big role in this scene, as it represents an element of chaos. Ephesus is a

seaside town that confuses many characters in the play. S.Antipholus refers to his plight as “a

droplet of water” searching for another droplet of water in an ocean of discourse. It is comically

reminiscent of his birth, where he and his brother were separated by water, but also adds an

element of tension, and a character vs. environment paradigm. This basic concept of water is

evidence of the play’s purpose; to make Shakespeare some easy money. He wanted to create

something easy to understand that people (and purses) would heartily enjoy so that he could get

his theatre troop off the ground, and have ample means to truly express himself.

This need for money is also expressed throughout this scene. S.Antipholus gives 1000

marks to S.Dromio, and then believes that he has lost it. Since the audience understands, at the

point that S.Antipholus may or may not have lost his cash, that S.Antipholus is one of the

protagonists, the plotline of being broke may be trying to convince some audience members to

give Shakespeare some money. Maybe he was just thinking about how much he needed some
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money to eat, and this was expressed in his writing, but a reference to money in this way is a

pretty clear attempt at the 16th century equivalent of subliminal messaging.

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The scene begins with what is essentially a social commentary on marriage. Luciana,

Adriana’s sister, is convinced that men have more freedom than women do, and accepts this

rather passively. She’s not exactly Susan B. Anthony on this, and for the brief few moments

when her and her sister’s argument presides, she represents what an Elizabethan woman should

be. Adriana represents the other school of thought, a more active woman, and against the

idealisms set forward by the age. She questions, “Why should their liberty than ours be more,”

(ln. 10) to which her society’s answer would go along the lines of telling her to get back in the

kitchen. She represents one of the budding Renaissance ideas; equality towards women.

Besides setting this argument in place, this scene characterizes Luciana, Adriana, and

E.Antipholus. Luciana is a starry-eyed, rather immature girl. She criticizes Adriana’s marriage

while having none of her own to back it up and takes the, ‘well, if it were me…’ approach to

making her point as opposed to actually using facts. Through this, she brings up the point that

she wants to marry for love, not simply through duty, but if duty is what her groom wants, that is

what she shall give him, which sets her up as an idealist. Adriana seems to be rather embittered

by marriage in general. She isn’t worrying about her husband being out for days and days

somewhere; she’s pissed that he’s maybe an hour or two late for dinner. Her level of anger far

surpasses a reasonable emotional response, and this is a pretty strong indication that she wants

her freedom from E.Antipholus. The argument says even more about E.Antiphols than either of

the debaters. It indicates that he frequently stays out later than his wife wants him to, which

characterizes him as someone who doesn’t respect his marriage or his wife, and it indicates that

he views his marriage as more of a commodity than a sacred bond between two people.
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This argument also brings up a question about the state of Adriana’s womb. She uses

terminology closely associated with pregnancy throughout the argument, as “bear some sway…

quiet when we hear it cry…burdened with like weight of pain…patience would relieve me…”

(lns. 28-39) She may be pregnant, or she may be simply thinking about having a baby with

E.Antipholus, but she clearly has babies on the brain. It explains her erratic response to her

husband leaving for a few hours in the marketplace, as even if she doesn’t have a bun in the

oven, the idea of reproducing drastically changes the dynamics of a relationship. If she is

pregnant, it certainly sheds light on her belief that she isn’t attractive to E.Antipholus anymore,

but even if she isn’t yet pregnant, her thoughts that she may be too old to be attractive to men

may reflect a fear that she is too old to reproduce, and therefore E.Antipholus is out trying to find

not a more attractive mate, but a more fertile one.

When E.Dromio enters this scene, the characters misinterpret everything he says about

his encounter with S.Antipholus (whom he thinks is E.Antipholus) as Catachresis. Dromio talks

about feeling and his ears in response to getting beaten about the ears. This misunderstanding is

also dramatic irony, as the women judge Dromio before they understand his encounter with

S.Antipholus. Dramatic irony is also present when Dromio refers to S.Antipholus as “horn mad”

(58) which is an allusion to a cuckold. He has no idea that Adriana was freaking out about her

husband cheating on her just moments before, and said exactly the wrong thing at the wrong

time. When the situation is finally explained to Adriana, it essentially confirms her fears about

her husband. She believes that he cares about his gold more than he cares about her (which, in

the case of S.Antipholus who has no idea that his brother has a wife, is completely true.)
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The plot-driving mistaken identity complex is very apparent in this scene, and it more

serves to heighten tensions in the plot than anything else. S.Antipholus is characterized in his

argument with S.Dromio. He contends that he does have a sense of humor, but that when he is

serious, Dromio shouldn’t take advantage of his sense of humor. This is S.Antipholus’s ironic

inversion of himself. He beats Dromio and gets excessively angry over what he believes is a

joke. If he actually had a sense of humor, he would take a joke as a joke, and not resort to

physical violence, unless he was in a Charlie Chaplin flick or one of the Three Stooges. In

reality, he is short-tempered and expresses this with his fists. This also characterizes

E.Antipholus, as the twins are supposed to be alike in every way and distinguishable only by

country.

When the Syracusians dissolve into talking about Father Time, they give rise to a point of

urgency. This is interesting because that sense of urgency was already created by Egeon’s

predicament. Shakespeare is probably reminding the audience that time is actually of the essence

in this play, and through this foreshadows the brothers meeting and everyone, including Egeon,

being together at the end. When they bring up hair, and add the element of age to time, they

reflect Adriana’s fears that she is too old and ugly to be attractive to her husband anymore. By

having multiple characters express the same feelings about time, Shakespeare is accentuating to

the audience an idea of Carpe Diem. He does give light to the paradox of time via the inverse

relationship with hair and wit; he expresses the idea that youth is wasted on the unwise young.

Adriana brings up metaphors to water and to body parts in her monologue/rant. She

reiterates S.Antipholus’s idea that he is a drop of water in an entire ocean by referring to her love

in such a way. She’s trying to say that she’s extremely hurt, and that she feels about as
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significant to him as a singular drop of water. She compares their marriage to being joined as one

being, which adds to this metaphor by making Antipholus the entire body of water while she is

only one drop. While she’s talking about how he defiled her body with lust, she goes back to this

metaphor by saying that by embarrassing her, he’s really embarrassing himself, and then to top

her angry rant off she starts talking about flesh and blood, and how since that is defiled, so is

Antipholus. She even brings God into it, as she invokes the logic of St. Paul in saying that in

marriage a man and a woman become one (even if the woman is subordinate).

The rant itself is little more than Adrana’s justification of her own anger. Aside from the

fact that she’s yelling at the wrong guy, she’s yelling because her husband was gone for like two

hours trying to buy her a necklace. Even when she finds him goofing off with his servant, it still

doesn’t justify that emotional response. If she, say, caught him in bed with Dromio, then

invoking the wrath of God via St Paul might have been appropriate. Still, hanging out with a

buddy for a couple hours shooting the breeze isn’t the same as “cut[ting] the wedding ring/And

break[ing] it with a deep-divorcing vow.” (148-9)

Shakespeare also employs psychological tools in this scene. S.Dromio and S.Antipholus

are both so confused that they believe they are dreaming, or crazy, or both. They drive the plot

forward with this delusion by following the shrew back to E.Antipholus’s home. On the way,

Adriana refers to herself continuously as pure and good, and as the source of Antipholus’s

absolution. She even goes so far as to refer to herself as wronged with this, which almost puts her

on a higher plane, and portrays that she almost believes that she is too holy to be sinned against.

This religious allusion is furthered by S.Antipholus, as he wonders if he is on Earth, or is in the

afterlife being tempted by a siren of sorts.

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E. Antipholus believes that his wife is shrewish, and makes this very evident in the

beginning of the scene. It seems to be a motif of Shakespeare’s to make women nag men, as E.

Dromio’s wife nags S. Dromio, thinking that he is her husband, and later, and the woman E.

Antipholus “converses” with decides to throw him under the bus for a ring. Shakespeare’s

portrayal of almost all of the women in this play is interesting, given the time period’s lack of

respect for women. They have, in this play and many of Shakespeare’s others, seemingly more

power over their husbands and other men than seems historically accurate.

Adriana’s anger and confusion over E. Antipholus’s actions serves as a foil to E.

Antipholus’s anger and suspicion of his wife. It is double dramatic irony in the sense that nobody

knows what is going on, and so much emotion is invested in what each character believes.

Besides a source of humor, this serves as evidence of a crumbling Ephesian marriage. Both

Adriana and Antipholus are ready to believe that each spouse is cheating on the other, at the loss

of a few hours. Antipholus is relatively justified, coming home to a locked door and men’s

voices coming from his home, but the idea of marital infidelity in this couple becomes a sort of

meme, as first Adriana has the thought, then Antipholus has the thought.

Antipholus is probably gifting the chain to his wife as a symbol of his love and marital

fidelity towards her. If she is so convinced that she is cheating on him, then his decision to get

her a gold chain as opposed to any other piece of jewelry means that he’s trying to link himself

to her in an everlasting bond. The gesture itself was probably going to save his marriage with

Adriana, and his belief that she is cheating on him on the very day he decides to be an upstanding

husband and gift her the gift of everlasting love is not only ironic, but since it leads to Antipholus
 21

giving the gold chain to a “hostess,” it is symbolic of Antipholus’s decision to actually cheat on

his wife.

Puns and wordplay are everywhere in this scene, not the least of which is E.Dromio’s

pun-analogy hybrid comparing his skin to parchment, and his bruises to E.Antipholus’s

handwriting. E.Antipholus replies, “I think thou art an ass.” (3.1.17) The juxtaposition of wit and

a comeback that is essentially witless is a miniature linguistic anticlimax, and is meant as a joke.

Other wit comes from Balthazar and E.Antipholus in their exchange concerning meat, and the

difference between a crow and a crowbar. This is a clear reminder to the modern reader of the

play’s purpose, which was to entertain a group of wallets for the necessary funds to create art.

The wordplay is so basic and comprehensible that it seems almost juvenile in a sense.

Shakespeare is playing to the basic premise of modern television; simplicity sells.

Balthazar’s tone when he is convincing Antipholus to not tear down his door morphs

drastically between the first and last part of his monologue. He begins as the logical voice of

reason, and then brings quasi-religious imagery dealing with death at the end to strike an

emotional chord. This is well done on his part, as he appeals to the reader’s left hemisphere with

his reason and to the reader’s right hemisphere with fear. The tone forces a compelling argument,

and emphasizes to Antipholus that his wife is an honest woman. Irony lies in the fact that

Antipholus shuns this well-constructed and compelling argument and decides to do what he feels

is going to get her back the best anyway.

 

The scene opens with a beautiful attempt on Luciana’s part to S.Antipholus trying to get

him to love his wife. She brings up logical points with such a dire tone that the true husband

would understand and listen. It is clearly irony that she has the wrong guy, but more interestingly
 22

bathos that S.Antipholus listens to all of these reasons that he should be with Adriana, and then

goes on to try to pick up Luciana immediately after she closes her compelling speech. Luciana

probably takes this as a parody, as S.Antipholus imitates her elevated tone, and with it does what

she considers to be devilish work. If nothing else, this is evidence that S.Antipholus is altered in

some way, as copying somebody’s tone and blatantly not listening to a word they’re saying

seems to be the work of a drunkard.

S.Antipholus’s speech brings up two different kinds of imagery. The first is a sort of

Adam coming to meet eve tone of treating a woman like a goddess. He refers to Luciana as

“more than earth divine,” (3.2.34) and actually implores of her to teach him about himself

because he is so love-stricken. This kind of imagery seems to be pathos, not only on the part of

Antipholus, but on the part of Shakespeare to the audience. The more easily accessable

emotional response he can get, the better recommendation and pay he will get from the upper

classmen. It also contributes to the recurring idea that women are just as powerful as men.

Antipholus is wooing Luciana, instead of declaring that they should be married, or relying on

parental forces to create a wedding. This emphasizes free will and thought on the part of both

men and women in an equal fashion, because Luciana has the power to turn Antipholus down.

Refering to her as a deity is also conceding that she has great power, which is a belief harbored

less by the Christian community that Shakespeare was performing for than by the Greeks and

Romans. She parallels Aphrodite Ourania, the roman half Aphrodite who is also connected to

water in this speech enough to make Antipholus’s constant reference to water also take on the

tone of allusion to the goddess. The water symbolism and imagery here also connects back to

Adriana’s original idea of being a drop of water in an entire sea of her husband. The watery

thoughts are spreading sufficient to call them a meme.

 23

Antipholus’s thoughts of love are incredibly ironic because at scene’s end, he decides that

he needs to leave the city, in spite of the fact that he found a goddess whom he might have been

able to make his. This irony presents the reality of the day – even a goddess, if female, is not

worth staying in a place one is miserable in, because women do not have the kind of power

necessary to rein over a depressed man. Shakespeare effectively presented feminism, and

presented the idealism of the day with all of this.

S.Dromio discovers that he (rather, E.Dromio) is married to a horrible wretched woman.

He expresses this through puns and metaphors, which are witty enough to contribute to the

comedic aspect of the play. He expresses her weight by comparing her to the entire kitchen,

grease and all, and crudely pillories her by explaining that she’s so fat, if she lived until

doomsday, her fat would burn a week longer than everyone else. This serves many purposes. It is

low humor, as the lampoon is meant to elicit unexpected laughter from the audience, and, again,

entertains instead of serving an artful purpose. It also serves as a foil to the intense love

S.Antipholus is feeling for Luciana. For every gender-equality, purely good and artful thing that

S.Antipholus said about Luciana only a few pages beforehand, S.Dromio multiplied them tenfold

by portraying the photonegative. These two effects are also achieved by the rest of S.Dromio’s

attacks on his wife’s exterior.

 
 24

One of the most essential elements to a play is a sense of time and motion. In order for a

climax of a play to be successful, then, a sense of urgency and time running out must be created.

Shakespeare does this by the addition of the Merchant character’s deal with Angelo. The

merchant, in effect, causes the rest of the plot to happen. The sense of urgency is furthered by

Angelo’s word choice. He uses the word “instant” throughout the act, and when he is telling the

merchant what time he will have the money, he uses a definite time, “5 o’clock.” The word

instant continuously reminds the audience that time is of the essence. The precision with time

contributes equally to this effect because it emphasizes the deadline. This effect of saying 5

o’clock leads one to believe that the play was designed to be performed outside. If the play is

approximately two hours long, and it was started in the afternoon to accommodate light and

people’s schedules, 5 o’clock was probably not too far away from the actual time that this line

was delivered by the actor. The number choice on Shakespeare’s part was brilliant.

In the next few lines, E.Antipholus employs E.Dromio to buy the end of a rope. He

ironically states that he is going to gift the end of the rope to his wife, when in reality, he’s going

to use it to beat her for locking him out of his own home, and possibly cuckolding her. This

characterizes E.Antipholus as a passionately angry person, as someone more passive wouldn’t

beat his wife. It also characterizes E.Dromio as a total servant, as he does what E.Antipholus tells

him to do even though he doesn’t agree with what he needs to do. E.Dromio serves as a foil to

S.Dromio in this facet, because later, S.Dromio is forced to go back to Adriana’s house, much

against his will.

E. Antipholus getting arrested is ironic; he gets put into chains because neither he nor

Angelo can produce one. It is also ironic that he sends for his wife (the woman whom he believes

has cuckolded him) because it seems that he feels that she is a slave to her emotions, and is,
 25

frankly, a bit of a sexist pig. It illuminates the idea that women should be equal, as the only

person Antipholus can rely on to save him, (and deal with the government to free him, no less) is

a woman.

 

In Adriana’s conversation with Luciana, wordplay is, again, abundant. Adriana refers to

S.Antipholus’s assertion that he is a stranger to her home as evidence that he has been acting

strangely lately, connecting “strange.” She is calling him crazy, or even possessed, as she acts

upon later. She feels so slighted and like her marriage is about to fail that she is reduced to

lampooning him. These attacks at his face and body are, as she admits later, petty coping

mechanisms. All of this is evidence that her marriage with E.Antipholus was failing before the

Syracucians showed up, because Adriana clearly has strong feelings for her husband, and it is

clear based on her tone and word choice that this kind of explosion had been happening

frequently for quite some time. It is ironic that S.Antipholus is so similar in his treatment of

Adriana as his brother was, because his brother, via the chain, was trying to change his behavior

and save his marriage, not to mention the lasting dramatic irony that nobody knows that there are

mirror images running around the city.

The sense of urgency central to the play is again, created by S.Dromio upon his arrival.

He sprints in, which implies that he is trying to do something incredibly quickly, and that time is

running out on his task. He then talks quickly, and demands that everything he needs done gets

done with haste. He also makes a reference to the exact time, two o’clock, which implies

urgency, and speeds things up by exclaiming that the clock strikes on. Dromio also uses two
 26

metonyms, referring to the police as Buffs after the clothes that they wear, and chains as a jail.

Expressing his ideas in this way shortens his language, and was intended to speed up

comprehension of his ideas sufficient to say that he was functioning at a high, adrenaline-fueled

level, and in an extreme hurry. This is also supported by the fact that he hates being in Adriana’s

house, and lamented going there. Clearly, someone who doesn’t want to be somewhere is going

to want to leave as soon as is humanly possible.

 

S.Antipholus’s confusion breeds irony. E.Antipholus has a failing marriage, and almost

reacts a few times with no thought as to what others think of him, but S.Antipholus, getting

mistaken for E.Antipholus, gets free stuff, and treated with total respect and friendship, which

emphasizes what an upstanding citizen E.Antipholus is. The irony is that E.Antipholus can

manage his friends and his social standing in his community, but he can’t keep his wife happy, or

even come home on time for dinner. There is also irony by the same coin in that S.Antipholus is

supposed to be just like E.Antipholus, but he ruins his brother’s relationship with the police,

Angelo, and almost Adriana by being careless.

Dromio makes many biblical allusions in this scene. He refers to the officer as Adam

from the Prodigal son parable, and constantly refers to the Courtesan as Satan, or a demon, in

varied, interesting ways. The former is a plot device to confuse S.Antipholus. His confusion

connotes the ideas of identity; the more confused he is, the more unsure he is of his identity, so

his confusion breeds repetition of this theme. The latter is ironic because on the surface, it seems

to imply that she is a harlot, and, by extension, has been sleeping around with the likes of

E.Antipholus, but E.Antipholus claims that he has never cheated on her and doesn’t deserve to be

cheated on and treated as immoral. It is also ironic, then, that she is asking for a chain, which is a
 27

symbol of love, or a ring, which is a symbol of marriage. If E.Antipholus hasn’t done anything

with her, then she has no real right to ask for either of these symbols. The devil doesn’t have

such a grasp on E.Antipholus’s soul, so it shouldn’t expect to gain any of his gold.

 

The scene opens with E.Antipholus telling the guard that he has his servant coming with

bail money, so he has no need to be so nervous about an escape attempt. Then Dromio comes in

with a weapon. It is situational irony at its finest, as E.Antipholus is fully aware that it’s far too

late to regain the guard’s trust about him not breaking out of jail. He also talks about being angry

with his wife before receiving the rope’s end, and therefore, the jailer sees domestic abuse in

E.Antipholus’s near future. This is ironic because the couple is trying to repair their marriage,

not destroy it by way of bruises. E.Dromio then receives a beating from Antipholus, which is

ironic considering the first section of the scene. When E.Dromio goes to complain, he invokes a

biblical allusion to the parable that ‘an ass is known by his long ears,’ by which he means that

Antipholus has been beating him for far too long. This is also verbal irony, because he means

that he is the farthest thing from an ass, and yet Antipholus treats him like one. He also employs

verbal irony to express how much he hates getting beaten, by sarcastically saying how much he

loves it. Dromio, upon Adriana’s arrival, uses another allusion to the parable of the parrot, by

which he warns Adriana to fear her husband’s weapon and beatings. All of this goes to develop a

sort of theme of justice. It happens in a jail cell, and essentially deals with Antipholus physically

harming other people, so the setting is fitting to develop this theme, as is the content of Dromio’s

words. It emphasizes the justice of Antipholus being in chains.

 28

Antipholus threatens to pluck out Adriana’s eyes. This seems to be an inversion of

Agamemnon’s story from the Odyssey, where his wife would not close his eyes when he died,

after she cheated on him. He is calling her a whore here, which is also emphasized by him flat

out calling his wife a harlot. Adriana makes many biblical and religious references when she

talks, so this almost acts as a defense of her honor, as adultery and religion do not mix well.

When the Syracusians show up, there is another double dose of irony. Dromio, who has

not found love at all, and gets continually beat in Ephesus wants to stay there because he thinks

it’s a great place where people are gentle. Antipholus, who has at this point received no beatings,

free food and ale, a free gold chain, and has found a lover wishes to flee the city. This irony

displays two of the themes in the play; that women are underrated by men, and that the justice

system is flawed. The servant keeps getting beaten unjustly, and S.Antipholus hasn’t been

charged with any of the crimes that he has half-committed, however unwittingly. The moral and

in-the-right but punished man wants to stay, and the man who has broken laws and has received

no citation wants to leave. This displays the justice system as hugely skewed. Likewise, the men

clearly don’t care about women, as they aren’t important to society. Otherwise, the want to stay

would be reversed in the men.

 
 29

Some of the most poignant irony in the play comes from this scene. The fact that nuns try

to solve the problems posed by the Syracucians is intensely ironic. The nuns represent religion,

which obviously is deeply connected with God. The irony is that God would see the dramatic

irony that Shakespeare poses in switching the pairs of twins, and therefore would believe in the

sanity of S.Antipholus and S.Dromio. The nuns’ attempt to commit the pair is therefore ironic.

The irony is continued into Adriana’s argument with the Abbess. Adriana holds that it is against

the church’s way to separate a man and his wife in the way that the nuns have separated her and

who is really S.Antipholus. She is arguing that the pair should be set free on the grounds that

Antipholus is her husband, and this is dramatic irony because the reader/viewer knows that

Adriana and S.Antiphouls are not bound by marriage. It is also ironic on the level that if the

church isn’t supposed to separate a man and wife, they effectively committed a sin by

committing Antipholus without letting Adriana see him.

The purpose of this scene is to end the dramatic ironies that have fueled most of the

humor in the play. Clearly, introducing the Antipholai and the Dromios to one another, and

uniting them with the nun and Egeon achieves this goal, bringing a classical resolution to this by-

the-book style of playwriting. The most important effect that this achieves is that it leaves the

audience completely satisfied with an ideal ending. It has enough ambiguity about E.Antipholus

and Adriana’s marriage and with how the characters will live happily ever after to keep people

thinking about the play, and has enough knowledge that everyone should live happily ever after

to be content. In light of Shakespeare’s other works, especially his tragedies where everybody

dies, this ending seems calculated. Since the first performance of this play was a make-or-break

situation for Shakespeare’s writing career, Shakespeare wanted a popular feel-good ending to

create business for himself. He traded complex beauty for simple popularity, lowering his
 30

standards to launch his career of enriching people’s literary vocabularies. With this ending and

the rest of the play, he effectively conformed to a theatrical norm so he could be popular enough

to later destroy that norm and create his own.

 31




1. What is Egeon’s crime in coming to Ephesus?

2. What happened to Egeon that prompted him to break this law?

3. Why is the Duke so (literally) merciless?

4. Why is Antipholus of Syracuse in Ephesus?

5. Why is Dromio so committed to Antipholus?



6. What does the Duke’s commitment to the letter of the law imply about his character?

7. What is the significance of the dramatic irony the reader sees between Egeon and

Antipholus’s mutual lack of knowledge of the other’s presence in Ephesus?

8. What is the significance of the fact that the two sets of twins were separated at sea?

9. Why does Shakespeare employ so many S sounds in the end of Act 1 Scene 2?

10. Why is it ironic that Antipholus refers to himself as a good Christian?





1. Who is Luciana related to?

2. Why does S.Antipholus get so confused by E.Dromio?

3. Why does E.Dromio get beaten by Adriana?

4. Is Adriana angry with E.Dromio?

 32

5. Why is Adriana so angry with S.Antipholus when S.Antipholus is innocent of any

transgression?



6. Why does Adriana overreact to her husband’s tardiness?

7. Is Luciana jealous of Adriana? Why or why not?

8. Why does Antipholus use so many S Sounds when he talks to Dromio?

9. What does Adriana mean when she refers to herself as a drop of water lost in an ocean? Is

this ironic? Why or why not?

10. When Antipholus of Syracuse asks if he is on Earth, in heaven, or in hell, where does he

really think he is? Why or why not?





1. What does Balthazar mean by saying, “Good meat is common; every churl affords”?

(3.1.30)

2. Where is the dramatic irony in this scene most poignant?

3. Why is E.Antipholus locked out of his own home?

4. How does Balthazar contribute to the plot here?

5. Why does S.Antipholus want to leave Ephesus so badly?



6. Why is the dramatic irony throughout this scene so poignant? Why is it important?
 33

7. If S.Antipholus is being told that in this fantasy world, he has Adriana as a fantasy wife,

why is he intent on angering Adriana further by hitting on Luciana?

8. What does S.Dromio’s description of E.Dromio’s wife mean? In what way does this

enhance the effectiveness of the work?

9. How is S.Antipholus’s receipt of the gold chain ironic?

10. Why is it a gold ‘chain’ and not a gold ‘necklace’?





1. How does Shakespeare create a sense of urgency? Why is it important that he do this?

2. Why is E.Antipholus arrested?

3. Why does Adriana agree to post E.Antipholus’s bail?

4. Why does E.Dromio wish to be senseless?

5. Who is Pinch?



6. Why do Adriana and Luciana rhyme at the beginning of scene 2?

7. Why is it important that the Courtesan wants the chain? Is there any irony here?

8. If Adriana and Luciana are so angry with Antipholus, how can they bear to post his bail?
 34

9. Why does this act have less inherent humor than the others?

10. Why is it important that S.Antipholus is being showered with gold?





1. What are the nuns doing in this scene?

2. What is Adriana’s reasoning for trying to arrest the abbess?

3. Why does the Duke trust Adriana?

4. How does Egeon make his case?

5. If Aemelia is Antipholus’s mother, why doesn’t she recognize him when she is the
Abbess?



6. Why is it important to have so much negativity in this comedy?

7. Why is the ending so satisfying?

8. What effect is Shakespeare trying to accomplish by bringing religion into the mix?

9. Why is it important that Aemelia is the Abbess?

 35

10. What is important about Shakespeare’s rigid adherence to time throughout the

play?
 36





1. Syracuse and Ephesus are basically at war. Egeon committed the crime of crossing

warring borders, or more specifically, travelling without a passport.

2. Egeon is in search of both of his twin sons. As the plot goes, he and his wife were

travelling with their sons, and everyone split up in a massive storm. Egeon kept only one

son, and his wife kept the other, but were unfortunately separated. Egeon’s Antipholus

left in search of the wife’s Antipholus, and Egeon is trying to find both Antipholuses.

3. The Duke cares more about the word of law than he does about actually delivering

justice.

4. S.Antipholus is in Ephesus to meet his brother. Really, he’s there as a stop on his journey

and has no idea that his brother is in Ephesus, but the main goal of this journey is to be

reunited with his lost twin.

5. Dromio’s parents could not keep him, so he was committed to be the servant to

Antipholus. This is true in both cases of the pairs.

6. The Duke is meant to represent Roman laws. He embodies the letter, not the spirit of the

laws. This is meant to enhance the Greco-Roman setting by nature of the origin of this

style of speaking, however it also is meant to be identifiable to Shakespeare’s audience.

This style of following the letter of the law was the basis for justice in the monarchy of

Shakespeare’s England, so his audience is supposed to be able to identify with that.

 37

7. The dramatic irony is meant to create a comical effect. It also sets the stage for some of

the plot action, and foreshadows the rest of the dramatic ironies that happen between

Egeon and the two Antipholuses, which all happen in a similar fashion.

8. The separation at sea implies an idea of isolation and alienation. The twins end up

growing up alone, and lost in different worlds as they were torn apart by the sea. This

image also sets the stage for many of Shakespeare’s imagery that has to do with water,

and introduces the aloneness and feeling lost connotations of water, which carry out into

other characters’ dialogues. The water also symbolizes a rebirth here, since it drastically

alters the planned path of each of the twins. The two lead very different lives, which they

were born into on that day in the sea.

9. Shakespeare uses so many S sounds because he wants to give the scene a serpentine

ending. Antipholus is talking about his money, and being worried about its safety. The

serpentine effect caused by the S’s is meant to imply that the money indeed is not safe

and is dually meant to foreshadow much of the misinformation in the rest of the play.

Both of the Antipholuses are about to unwittingly act as the Serpent in the Garden of

Eden, feeding misinformation to Adriana and Luciana, and confusing the plot of the play.

10. There is irony on many levels with this. In the eyes of Shakespeare’s audience, if

Antipholus were really a good Christian, he would be able to follow God’s path and make

his brother’s presence clear. He is confused about this path, and this is therefore ironic.

On a plot-based level, Antipholus is about to unknowingly wrong many people in

relatively unchristian ways by use of misinformation, which is a sin. On a symbolic level,

he is about to allude to the Serpent in the garden, which is the quintessence of sin.
 38



1. Luciana is the sister to Adriana.

2. Antipholus is confused because both of the Dromios look exactly the same, as twins

separated at birth symbolically should.

3. Dromio is beaten because he fails to bring Antipholus home.

4. No, Adriana is really mad with E.Antipholus, and essentially beats Dromio out of her

anger towards her husband.

5. Again, both pairs of twins are identical, so her anger towards S.Antipholus is misplaced.

Naturally, this confuses S.Antipholus to a great degree and the dramatic irony serves as

humor.

6. Adriana probably overreacts because E.Antipholus is a poor excuse for a husband. He

probably stays out fraternizing with women at all hours of the night, or at least has done

something with relative frequency. Otherwise it is incredibly illogical that Adriana would

question her marriage based on a time discrepancy of only a few hours.

7. Luciana is not jealous of Adriana, specifically. She is jealous of the married status that

she carries, but as Adriana is so unhappy in her marriage, Luciana believes that she wants

a better version of what Adriana has, i.e. a marriage with a more loyal and present

husband.

8. Again, Shakespeare is alluding to the snake in the Garden of Eden. Antipholus is clearly

confused over the difference between the Dromios, and was fed misinformation by the

one from Ephesus. S.Dromio, in his mind, must be a liar, much like the manipulative

serpent Antipholus is referring to with his frequent use of a hissing scheme.

 39

9. Adriana is unwittingly referring to the twins’ separation by using water imagery. The fact

that she feels like a drop of water lost in the ocean is ironic in light of the Antipholus’s

feelings of isolation from one another, which based on the twenty-some-odd years that

they spent apart, must be much more prevalent than Adriana’s whining.

10. He probably believes that he is in Purgatory. He is completely confused and feels that he

is being tortured in his mind by demons, which are supposed to be in purgatory as well as

hell in the Catholicism prevalent during Shakespeare’s time.



1. Balthazar is saying that he cares much more about having the company of a friend than

having a good meal to eat, as he can get his hands on a good meal easily, but friends

don’t come quite as often.

2. The dramatic irony is most prevalent when Adriana will not let E.Antipholus in the

house. She suspected him earlier of having a mistress, and now her distresses are calmed

–at least to a degree—where his view of his wife is changing from being loyal and chaste

to being an adulteress.

3. E.Antipholus cannot enter his home because his wife blocked the door with S.Dromio,

and S.Antipholus is already dining inside.

4. Balthazar is the voice of reason to E.Antipholus. He keeps the husband from doing

anything rash and upsetting the social standing, and keeps him from getting angry enough

to actually cheat on his wife.

5. S.Antipholus wants to leave because he is thoroughly freaked out enough by what is

going on around him to ignore the free food, possible free sex, and free gold that he is

being offered at every turn.

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6. In Shakespearian plays, the climax is supposed to happen in the third scene, so it would

make sense that in a comedy where dramatic irony is primarily employed to get laughs

from the audience, the most obvious ironies would happen at the climax. The dramatic

irony is important not only as a plot thickener, but as the meat of the entertainment value

that Shakespeare sought with this work.

7. S.Antipholus may very well be drunk. He has finished dining in a Mediterranean setting,

famous for nice wines and liquors, and is proclaiming his true feelings. His drunkenness

leads him to say things that he would probably regret because he has no ability to control

his mouth, but as the saying goes, drunken words are sober thoughts. However, only a

true idiot would hit on his wife’s sister knowingly, so an altered state of mind is the most

likely cause of this outburst of pathos.

8. Shakespeare has about a page of what would today be interpreted as “yo mamma” jokes.

He makes fun of her weight, comparing her to a globe, and makes fun of her while

making fun of some of the ugliness of countries. This has a comedic effect on the scene,

and was meant to be taken as something of a farce.

9. S.Antipholus receives a piece of jewelry meant for E.Antipholus’s wife. The Ephesians

are clearly having a rough patch in their marriage, and Adriana is almost ready to split.

E.Antipholus wants to make her happy with jewelry as a sort of marital olive branch. The

fact that his alter-ego of sorts gets it is ironic because it ends up going to the man who is

responsible for E.Antipholus’s doubt in his marriage, instead of to his wife.

10. The jewelry is a gold ‘chain’ because it is supposed to link E.Antipholus and Adriana

together stronger. It is meant to be a symbol that they will be together forever, and that

their bonds are strong. A chain has a connotation of strength, where necklaces and other
 41

jewelry have fine and delicate connotations. Gold is also supposed to connote longevity

because out of the metals, it is the most resistant to change. In fact, the reason Gold,

Silver, and Platinum are used in jewelry is because they rust and lose their luster the

slowest, so the Gold represents E.Antipholus’s wish for a long and happy marriage.



1. Shakespeare creates urgency with Angelo and the Merchant. He puts a specific time that

corresponds to a deadline for action in the play by having the Merchant need to leave

Ephesus. It is important that he does this to keep the audience interested in the plot.

2. E.Antipholus is arrested because Angelo has yet to be paid for making his gold chain,

which Antipholus is responsible, as the rightful recipient of the jewelry, for.

3. Adriana agrees to post E.Antipholus’s bail out of his money. E.Antipholus agrees to post

his own bail, even though he believes that he is innocent, because his pride is more

important to him than justice.

4. Dromio wishes to be senseless because he has been beaten by at least three people

throughout the play. He’d rather have no nerves at all than to put up with constant abuse,

and it seems he doesn’t mind being dumb for that end either.

5. Pinch is an exorcist. He also symbolizes religion, and its creeping grip on the plot

developments of the play.

6. The girls rhyme for emphasis. They are speaking in an elevated manner because their

emotional response to the dramatic irony is meant to be more realistic than comical.

Shakespeare uses an AABBCC & etc. rhyme scheme to create a serious tone, rather than

a whimsical farce. He does this primarily as pathos—he needs not only to entertain his

audience to be successful, but he needs to create an emotional response to prove to them

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that he can do more to their emotions than elicit laughter. He also needs to stay true to the

conventions of old plays, and he presents a common marital dilemma theme with the

same attitude as older playwrights and writers would have. This also has an effect of

familiarizing the audience.

7. If the chain was a symbol of marriage and longevity, it is the utmost irony that the

courtesan, meant to play the role of being a hussy, almost receives it. It is ironic because

Adriana and Antipholus’s marriage is actually much stronger than either of them believe,

based on what evidence the reader can gather through dramatic irony. It is also ironic that

S.Antipholus receives an even stronger image of marriage in a ring. S.Antipholus is not

married, and has no ties (other than possibly drunken words to Luciana) to any woman.

8. Adriana, through all of her complaining about Antipholus and his behavior, truly loves

her husband. She clearly values him over herself, as he does to her. Her decision to post

his bail is important because to her, she is letting him go free, as she believes he wishes to

be, from not only the bonds of the officer’s chains, but from the chains of his marriage to

her. She is symbolically doing what she thinks will make him happy because his

happiness is more important to her than her own. This is ironic because the gesture

actually brings the two closer together, and because all of these feelings were spurred in

Adriana out of dramatic irony.

9. This act was intended to be serious. The rest of the play was laughable, but in order for

even a comedy to be successful—and popular, as Shakespeare desired—the audience

needs to be emotionally attached to the characters. Adriana’s struggle with her feelings

over marriage, Luciana’s struggle between family ties and love, and E.Antipholus’s

struggle with the law are three highly symbolic conflicts that are supposed to be
 43

identified with. These stories come up time and again in literature because they are

common experiences in life, so Shakespeare’s decision to address these issues in a

serious manner must have been to make his audience emotionally identify with these

characters and their stories. Furthermore, the fact that it happens so late in the play was

by design. Shakespeare interested his audience with witty banter and dramatic ironies in

the first three acts, and waited until he had his audience wrapped around his finger before

he toyed with this kind of pathos.

10. S.Antipholus believes that he is being tricked by a nation of sirens, and based on all of

the confusion he experiences, the gold symbolizes the gifts and pleasures that Odysseus

was tempted with when he heard their song. S.Antipholus is meant to resemble Odysseus,

notably being sexually tempted by the sirens, and eventually rejecting their temptation.

Also, in the Odyssey, the number of sirens Odysseus passes is two, which are resembled

by Adriana and Luciana, and their proximity to the sea by living in a port town further

ties them to the siren myth.



1. The nuns are acting as nurses of an insane asylum. They are locking up Antipholus and

Dromio of Syracuse in the Abbey, and giving them physical and psychological treatments

for their “madness.”

2. Adriana thinks that since her husband is being committed, she should have the rights to

see him in the Abbey, or to tend to his ailments herself. The Abbess is refusing her this,

and so Adriana feels wronged, alone, and confused about her husband’s actions.
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3. The Duke says that he trusts Adriana because E.Antipholus was such a good man to him,

but part of his decision to be on her side was definitely because she was on her knees

begging and crying for his help.

4. Egeon makes his case, and tries to prove that he is the father to Antipholus and the

rightful guardian of Dromio of Ephesus, by shouting their names and telling his story of

how they were lost at sea.

5. Aemelia joined the order of the nuns after her son and E.Dromio were taken by a

fisherman, so she has no idea what her son and his mate look like as adults, other than

eye color, hair color, and a relative grasp of basic complexions.

6. Shakespeare is using something of a Roller Coaster effect. The reason people can get

emotionally invested in a roller coaster and get off of the tracks at the end laughing is

because it barrages their senses with feelings of panic and peril, and then assuages those

fears quickly. Shakespeare has terrible things, such as Egeon’s beheading, Antipholus

and Adriana’s marriage collapsing, E.Antipholus’s arrest, and S.Antipholus and

S.Dromio’s commitment into an insane asylum almost happen, and then he has the track

swiftly dodge all of these negative things. The result is comedy.

7. The ending is satisfying because no real ambiguity is left. Everyone clearly is going to

live happily ever after—except maybe Aemelia, who has to live the hard, chaste life of a

nun—and again, dodged so much trouble. It’s satisfying as a release of tension and stress

that the reader feels throughout the play. It’s the very first stretch at the end of a long day

of work. The release is confined to a probable total of 45 onstage seconds, and this

contributes to the effect.

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8. Shakespeare brings religion in with Pinch and the abbey of nuns. He has religion solve

everybody’s major problems, which, to a highly religious society, is extremely pleasing.

Shakespeare knew his audience, and by having a priest try to give reason and a nun to

solve problems with logic, he even went so far as to play up a renaissance idealism with a

mesh of logic and Christianity.

9. Aemelia is the abbess both as a plot device to resolve the story and to fill a role as the

parental figure in a retelling of the prodigal son parable. The prodigal sons, the Dromios

and Antipholai have next to nothing, as in one way or another, their freedom has been

stripped. She plays the role of the church in helping them repent for what they’ve

unwittingly done, and helps the people of Ephesus to forgive the brothers.

10. Shakespeare’s attention to time is a step away from his other works. If there is any

mention of time at all in his other works, the story ends up taking place over a few

months, as in Othello, and even then, it wasn’t integral to the plot. Shakespeare has the

entire plot happen over a day, and keeps time rigid up to the setting of the sun at the

resolution. The reason for this is that Shakespeare needed something in his arsenal of

plays that conformed to the classical way of writing plays, to appeal to more of a

mainstream. He was in effect selling out, but he did it respectably, in a way that helped

him gain popularity so he could be respected when he experimented with conventions

like setting and time.

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
Shakespeare’s—or, more accurately, Plautus’s—twins storyline is full of opportunity for

humor, tragedy, dramatic ironies, misunderstandings, and above all, wacky hijinks that end in a

happy family. The separation at birth element is something every alienated person can relate to,

and stories about people being alone and finding happiness in another person are rather uplifting.

It’s prevalent in the movie and television scene—Relative Strangers, Full House, Twins, It’s

Always Sunny in Philadelphia, The Simpsons, and even Family Guy have all had a shot at

relating ideas about people separated at birth. To top all, Luke and Leia were twins in the Star

Wars original trilogy. Star Wars may even be the best example of this idea, as when Luke learns

about his relationship with Leia, it is a very negative occurance. In the grand scheme of

literature, this is an ironic use of the separation setup because usually finding the camaraderie

associated with family is a very positive experience.

However, the most blatant use of Shakespeare’s structure is in the Lindsay Lohan Disney

classic. The Parent Trap most closely follows the Shakespearian comedy in form by transposing

not only the setup but the spirit of the comedy. Intended for younger children, Disney uses the

physical comedy and farcical wit so inherent in Plautus’s original play, and Shakespeare’s

remake. Disney uses it in the same fashion—to lessen the emotional blows of the divorce

storyline with some comic relief. Most strikingly similar is the endings of both of the works,

where the family ends up overcoming incredible odds, including meeting each other across

borders of countries and oceans, to be together in the end. The people in each work end up as

happy as they could possibly be when the family is reunited, as both Shakespeare and Disney

knew exactly how to end a performance to leave everyone in the audience emotionally satisfied.
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Works Cited

"The Comedy of Errors." Shmoop: Study Guides & Teacher Resources. Web. 02 Jan. 2011.

<http://www.shmoop.com/comedy-of-errors/>.

Snider, Denton J. "Comedy of Errors - an Essay on the Play by William Shakespeare." Theatre

Database. Web. 02 Jan. 2011.

<http://www.theatredatabase.com/16th_century/william_shakespeare_004.html>.

"Synopsis of The Comedy of Errors." Shakespeare Theater. Web. 02 Jan. 2011.

<http://www.shakespearetheatre.org/_pdf/first_folio/folio_COE_about.pdf>.