Brad Reviews Shakespeare: All’s Well That Ends Well

Because I am cool, I decided to slowly make my way through Shakespeare’s plays. I wanted to do some writing on each one, but wasn’t sure how to properly go about it, so I may switch up the formula as I find my groove. I understand that this is for a niche audience of me, and only me, but I hope that you all enjoy it.

In All’s Well That Ends Well, Shakespeare’s first play (alphabetically), the bard gives us the story that he probably gave us a half a dozen times about a jilted, untouched maiden who falls in love with the problematic man and has to fake her death in order to make him love her. If this play seems like it may have some problematic messaging, I assure you that it does. Classism, sexism, and toxic masculinity abound throughout the play, as men measure swords over conquests on and off the battlefields, women attach their wellness to their men, and the rich thumb their noises as the poor. The only thing that could make it a true Shakespearean tour-de-force would be some 16th-century bigotry to boot, but as far as I know, he either forgot to put that in this play, or he hadn’t yet reached that stage in his writing.

Like many of Shakespeare’s plays, the rough-edges hide some messages which at the very least mean well (more like All’s Well That Mean’s Well, amirite?), and may have even been progressive in the 16th or 17th century, depending on when he wrote it. This perfectly encapsulates the Shakespearean dilemma. On one hand, the problematic elements are rampant throughout his plays. Without fail, in every one of my Shakespeare classes when I went to school, there was a subset of students who tried to make the bard 21st century woke, when it just wasn’t the case. The most progressive person of 1600 probably had some monstrous views, and we can’t lie ourselves into thinking otherwise. With that said, our goals as readers or viewers is to understand that this is a portrait of another time and understand that the plays faults should neither be forgiven, nor ignored. They are a part of the works. So with that said, I am doing this through a lens which will both judge and gloss over some of the plays major issues.

As far as the story goes, I think that it is an interesting one, even if it isn’t one of Shakespeare’s best. In my opinion, Helena is one of Shakespeare’s weaker (major) female characters. Despite the regressive problems which plague many of his plays, Shakespeare wrote some powerful roles for women. Helena, on the other hand, is something of an empty shell. True to the time, everything she has is through her relationship with a man in her life. She gets to be the King’s doctor thanks to his relationship with her dad. She needs the King’s permission to go after a relationship with Bertram.

At the very center of the play’s main conflict, it is implied that she needs Bertram in order to be truly happy. Putting aside the terrible gender politics at play, this makes her character far less interesting. Even if she practices some agency by making Bertram fall in love with her, the play establishes that the men are her key to happiness — so how much agency does she really have? Perhaps there are performances that I haven’t seen (I read along from the 80’s BBC production), but I felt like I wanted more from Helena. Even her impassioned speeches never truly stood out to me, and like other plays (Measure for Measure, for instance) her power seems to be used through a male gaze, whether or not Shakespeare intended for this to happen. I never quite understood her motivations for going the lengths she did for Bertram. Even when she pours out her soul in this passion-ridden monologue, I am never sure the story justifies it:

I am the caitiff that do hold him to’t;

And though I kill him not, I am the cause

His death was so effected…

My being here it is that holds thee hence.

Shall I stay here to do’t? No, no, although

The air of paradise did fan the house,

And angels offic’d all. I will be gone,

That pitiful rumor may report my flight

To consolate thine ear. Come night, end day!

For with the dark, poor thief, I’ll steal away.” — Helena, (3.2.90–102)

Herein lies my issue with the play as a whole. There are great individual parts, but where other plays so clearly lay out and justify their place within the story as theater, this one seems a little bit less powerful. This is, perhaps, why Shakespeare recycled this format in later plays. Perhaps he saw the lack of humanity, and wanted to fix it later. It is part of what draws me to all his work.

Like Helena, Bertram is not quite as interesting. character as we are supposed to want him to be. He has the arrogance of Benedick, but none of the charm. Nothing in this play makes us want him to end up with Helena. We never see the reasons why Helena would be so head-over-heels in love with a guy like this. Again, this isn’t necessarily a fault in itself, but I also do not find him very entertaining. If anything, he is brought more to life by the nameless Lords and Parolles than he is by his relationships with Helena and Diana. He’s a selfish man who is more into the concept of conquests than of honor. We see this by the fact that his mother, the Countess, is quicker to side with Helena than she is with him:

“I would I had not known him; it was the death of the most virtuous gentlewoman that ever nature had praise for creating. If she had partaken of my flesh, and cost me the dearest groans of a mother, I could not have ow’d her a more rooted love.” — The Countess (4.5.2)

In this way, perhaps, he is an affectively written character. One of my number one complaints in terms of criticism is that someone just doesn’t like a character. Liking a character is fine, but so is disliking him. My issue lies more in the way that this is presented, because it never seems to justify exactly why Bertram has the role he has, and it makes the ending less powerful than a later play like Winter’s Tale.

Some of the typical roles of Shakespeare are turned on their sides. The nameless King of France is not the tyrant that we often see, nor is he a tragic figure. Though sick at the beginning, he doesn’t ever show the violent streak of most of Shakespeare’s Monarchs, and actually proves quite charming in comparison. Where many of Shakespeare’s kings will end a play as a corpse in the background, it is this King who gets the final act’s optimistic final words, which harken back to Helena’s continual declaration of the title: “All yet seems well, and if it end so meet,/The bitter past, more welcome is the sweet” (5.1.303–4). He also gets the epilogue, which is perhaps a play on the way that he gets a happier ending than most of the Kings. He’s neither dead, nor miserable, nor lusting for his power. Instead, he’s ceding power to the audience, who no longer is under his control once the play is finally over:

“The king’s a beggar, now the play is done;

All is well ended, if this suit be won,

That you express content; which we will pay,

With strife to please you, day exceeding day.

Ours be your patience then, and yours our parts;

Your gentle hands lend us, and take our hearts.”

— The King of France (Epilogue)

I like this play on Shakespeare’s form, and the form of so many of his contemporaries. It’s as though the archetype does not know what to do in a play that doesn’t end in tragedy for him, and this meta quality is a fun little addition to the play’s end. I always like when Shakespeare ends his plays by talking to the audience, and this is no exception.

The rest of the characters fill many of the roles we know and love. The Countess is the caring matron, Parolles and Lavatch act as two version of the clown, Diana acts as the “Hero” character whose sexuality is used to manipulate the men, and Lafew is the conniving courtsman who, while not evil like some of the other characters of this mold, is constantly working to get he and his family in the proper position.

All in all, in my first complete go-through of this play, I was fascinated watching it after seeing its more complete forms in the aforementioned Measure for Measure, Much Ado About Nothing, and A Winter’s Tale. If I heavily leaned into the characters for this review, it is because the rest of the play does not necessarily have the same level of world building as some of his more prominent ones. The court, the battlefield, and all the other locations could easily be swapped out, as I am sure they have been in modern retelling. The story, however, is still an interesting tale of deception and the dangers of masculinity. I joked earlier about the way that people prescribe Shakespeare as 21st-century woke, but he does seem to be onto something, even if he goes about it in the entirely wrong way. I’d recommend this play to those who have a fascination with the bard, but I am not sure if it would be my first suggestion to those who are looking to build their interest. Perhaps, the proper title would be Some’s Well That Ends Adequately.

7/10

BONUS: THE BARD’S GLOSSARY (Or words, lines, and phrases that I enjoyed from this play)

SEQUENT- consequential

METHINKS- I Think

“O Lord, sir!”- sign of endearment

SIRRAH- Sir

CAPRICCIO- whim

HIE- go quickly

SUNDER-go away

WHATSOME’ER- whatsoever

LASCIVIOUS-Sexually perverted.

SNIPT-TAFFETA- uneven cut of fabric

NOSE HERBS- scented herbs

SLUTTISH- I think this one is self-explanatory

BY MY LIFE- I swear with my life