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Tag Archives: irony
A love as false as Cressid…
I found the oaths Troilus and Cressida very interesting. They were speaking as if they knew they were a story and that their tale would become an “epic.” The ironic thing is that Panderus’s extra added sentence was the only one to transcend the play and actually become a integral part of the English language. Troilus and Cressida may not be like Romeo and Juliet, who are madly in love and willing to sacrifice everything for each other. Nor are they like cunning Antony and Cleopatra, but they do try in their own way to become something of legend. We also discussed how self-conscious the characters in this play were and that may also be a reason that is holding them back from being true lovers. They seem only to care for their “image” of love than rather the love itself: you can’t love wholly and be self-conscious about it. Another thing is, this relationship does seem rather one-sided. Seems as if Troilus is the one who loves Cressida and Cressida is like, ‘well if this is the best I can do, I’ll take what I can get (a prince of Troy)’ and she doesn’t really have a passionate love for him which is why their bonds and promises and oaths are so easily broken: their love is not true.
The irony of it all
The addition of the induction introduces us to a frame story with no narrator, where the story within the story is the main attraction hence the intentional title The Taming of the Shrew. As with his other comedies, Shakespeare uses the same comedic formula: a ruse, role changes in status and possibly gender, and a dupe. These characteristics would not be complete without the mess of a twist we all call irony which keeps the audience amused, and ties the comedic attributes together. Furthermore, the awareness of a trickery only strengthens the point of the irony as Grumio says, “to beguile the old folks, how the young folks lay their heads together!” Young or old, the characters are being made a fool by someone who is being fooled by someone else. It appears that by the end of this charade the characters will be none the wiser. The irony of it all keeps the story moving forward.