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In the Realm of Love and Language By GILLIAN JACOBS
Eight young royals cavort in a faraway kingdom filled with lusty locals, silly Spaniards, and a constable named Dull. In this kingdom of Navarre, everyone seems intoxicated with language. The characters are young and in love, and much of their energy is channeled into their words. They play with language constantly, using rhyme, creating extravagant new words, and even speaking in sonnets. All this makes Love's Labour's Lost one of Shakespeare's most verbally sophisticated comedies, and an exciting last play for Juilliard's fourth-year actors.
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| Costume sketches by Linda Cho for the roles Katherine and Don Armado in Love’s Labour’s Lost. |
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Love's Labour's Lost is also one of Shakespeare's earliest comedies and the characters are appropriately young. We first meet the youthful King of Navarre as he and his three best friends sign an oath to foreswear women for three years, in order to study and fast. What a curious choice for a young monarch faced with a country to run, and one in a perhaps precarious position. The kingdom of Navarre was a real country, nestled between Spain and France. It straddled the Pyrenees Mountains and was surrounded on all sides by much larger kingdoms. Why then would Ferdinand decide to withdraw from the world, and what man in his 20s honestly thinks he can foreswear women for three years? He seems not yet able to embrace the duties of a monarch and is avoiding his responsibilities. The king and his friends come crashing into this reality almost immediately when they fall in love.The objects of their affection are the newly arrived Princess of France and her ladies. They have come to negotiate a disputed treaty originally signed by her father and the King of Navarre's father. In addition to the overt political wrangling, there is also a subtler level of negotiation going on. Before the king and princess have even met, her advisor Boyet tells her of Ferdinand's suitability as a husband. Boyet flatters the princess and puffs up the king by calling him the "sole inheritor of all perfections that a man may owe." Boyet has realized that it could be very advantageous for France to gain the kingdom of Navarre through marriage to Ferdinand. For kings and queens, the institution of marriage was much more about political opportunity than romantic love.
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A young Shakespeare seems in love with his own power to dazzle, to create complicated puns and metaphors and highly charming characters.
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Luckily for Boyet, the women are in a giddy and flirtatious mood as well. They arrive, in this production, in a hot-air balloon and begin gossiping about the king and his friends. Despite the light mood, the princess is avoiding dealing with something as well. Her father, the king of France, is on his deathbed and everyone knows she will soon assume the throne and become the queen of France.For everyone in the play, the pressures and sadness of the real world are too much to bear. They amuse themselves by flirting and playing verbal games with each other. The men even go so far as to dress in costume and appear before the women as Texan cowboys (in this production, again).Moreover, the writing seems youthful as well. A young Shakespeare seems in love with his own power to dazzle, to create complicated puns and metaphors and highly charming characters. Love's Labour's Lost was probably written in 1594-95 and subsequently published in 1598. It is Shakespeare's most heavily rhymed play, and one of only three (including A Midsummer Night's Dream and The Tempest) not based on a primary source. Although there is no definitive evidence, it is thought that Love's Labour's Lost was written for a private performance for the Earl of Southampton, who subsequently became Shakespeare's patron. Perhaps the private performance accounts for the many topical allusions, inside jokes, and references to actual people and events. Many of these are difficult for modern audiences to understand, although they would have been very current for Shakespeare's audience.For instance, Elizabethan audiences would have found the character of Don Armado, Spanish ambassador to the court of Navarre, particularly entertaining. Their longstanding rivalry with the Spanish would have made Armado's extravagant and often confused language even more amusing. Even his name is a pun on the recently defeated Spanish Armada.Another source of jokes was the longstanding rivalry of the Earl of Essex and Sir Walter Raleigh. Both men sought the affection of Queen Elizabeth and their quarrels divided the court into factions. Shakespeare apparently belonged to the camp of Essex and mocks Raleigh in Love's Labour's Lost.
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Love’s Labour’s Lost
Drama Theater
Thursday, Feb. 12-Monday, Feb. 16
For time and ticket information, please
see
the calendar.
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The most pointed joke comes from one of the king's speeches in which he refers to the "school of night." Many scholars believe this was the name of a group of amateur scholars who gathered in secret to study Copernicus' book of astronomy, published in 1543, which stated that the earth moved around the sun and not the other way, as taught by the church. Shakespeare and many other Elizabethans never adopted Copernicus' view, as it was seen to be contrary to the Bible and the established church. These scholars were therefore thought to be wicked and atheistic. Sir Walter Raleigh was thought to have been a member of this group and consequently Shakespeare, being an Essex man, pokes fun at him in his play.Eleanor Holdridge, the director of this production, believes that beneath all the jokes and wordplay is a fear on the part of the characters to commit fully to love. They hedge their bets by couching their declarations of love in the form of silly songs or absurd behavior. She says, "They play the games of love but don't risk it all, so they can't get it all. They are in search of finding out what love is." Throughout the play the characters become more and more frantic in their attempts to avoid reality and continue to exist in their fantasy world.This world collapses when the lovers are faced in the end with a reality they can no longer avoid. They are sent their separate ways and will face a year of separation before they can be together again. One, Berowne, is sent away with a task he must perform, a sort of penance. Over the course of the year, they will all have to face the task of becoming adults, accepting their duties, and finally paying for the time they have spent having fun.It is not the typical ending of a romantic comedy; as Berowne says, "Jack hath not Jill." But the unresolved and uncertain fates of the lovers resound strongly with audiences, who know that, most often, life does not work out as we intend, despite the best of intentions. Gillian Jacobs, a fourth-year drama student, plays the role of Maria in Love's Labour's Lost.
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