Isaac Asimov - Asimov’s Guide To Shakespear. Volume 1

The Sphinx, in Greek mythology, was a monster with the body of a lion and the head of a woman. It was most notable for propounding riddles (hence it was "subtle"), which it forced those it met to answer. It killed those who could not answer correctly. Oedipus, on his way to Thebes, was faced with the riddle "What has sometimes two feet, sometimes three, sometimes four, and is weakest when it has most?" Oedipus at once answered, "Man, for he crawls on all fours as a baby, walks on two feet in youth, and needs a cane in old age." The Sphinx, in chagrin, killed herself.

Love's Labor's Lost is Shakespeare's tribute, then, to courtly love, and this speech is the clearest expression of it.

Berowne is convincing. The men decide to lay aside subterfuge, forget their resolutions, and woo the women.

Meanwhile Nathaniel the Curate and Holofernes the Pedant are discussing Armado. Holofernes finds fault with Armado, particularly in his fantastic manner of speech (as though Holofernes himself were not infinitely worse). Nathaniel drinks in the other's every word (writing down particularly good ones in his notebook). Nathaniel even tries a little Latin of his own, which Holofernes immediately corrects, saying:

—Act V, scene i, lines 31-32

Priscian is the usual English name for Priscianus Caesariensis, a Latin grammarian at Constantinople about a.d. 500. His book on Latin grammar was the final authority through the Middle Ages, and it was common to say "to break Priscian's head" in characterizing any mistake in Latin. In this case the mistake is so minor (a single letter) that Holofernes is satisfied to say that Priscian was merely scratched.

Armado, Moth, and Costard come onstage. Holofernes and the Spaniard are immediately involved in complicated badinage and Moth comments ironically at their ability to use long words and involved phrases. Costard, with equal irony, wonders why Armado, who is so familiar with long words, doesn't swallow the diminutive Moth. He says:

—Act V, scene i, lines 42-44

This is the longest word in Shakespeare but it is not really used as a word, merely given as an example of a long word. It is Latin, of course, and is the ablative plural of a word meaning "honorableness." It has twenty-seven letters and is thought to be the longest word in Latin and, therefore, the longest word in English-at least in Shakespeare's. time. Nowadays, it is "antidisestablishmentarianism" which is usually cited as longest, with twenty-eight letters. (It means the doctrine of opposition to the disestablishment of the Anglican Church and came into prominence in the nineteenth century.)

Actually, it is only those whose knowledge is limited to what are called the humanities who fall for this hoary old chestnut. In German, it is customary to run words together to make long compound words far longer than any in ordinary Latin or English. Since organic chemistry was almost entirely a German monopoly in the nineteenth century, the habit has persisted in naming organic chemicals, even in English. The intricate structure of organic chemicals requires an intricate naming system and there is, for instance, a chemical called "betadimethylaminobenzaldehyde," which is twenty-nine letters long and which is far from the longest possible.

Apparently the King is planning an entertainment that evening for the Princess. He has consulted Armado on what it should consist of and he, in turn, consults Holofernes. Holofernes makes an instant decision:

—Act V, scene i, lines 118-19

The Nine Worthies (see page II-401) are usually given as Hector, Alexander, Julius Caesar, Joshua, David, Judas Maccabeus, Arthur, Charlemagne, and Godfrey Bouillon.

Holofernes does not go by this standard list, apparently. He starts assigning the different worthies to the people present and after mentioning Joshua and Judas Maccabeus, he says:

—Act V, scene i, lines 128-30

We can only suppose that Pompey the Great is substituted for Julius Caesar, and if this is so, it is a great mistake, for Caesar was far the greater man (see page I-257).

The last scene in Love's Labor's Lost is the longest in the play and, for that matter, in Shakespeare. It begins with the ladies coming together to talk about the fact that they have all received love tokens from the men. Boyet arrives to say he has overheard the men speaking and they have decided to woo the ladies in earnest.

The Princess says, lightly:

—Act V, scene ii, line 87

It is to be a merry war between the sexes in the tradition of courtly love. The men come to woo and the French ladies will resist. Saint Denis, the patron saint of France (see page II-515), will be opposed to the assaults of love, here represented as Saint Cupid.

Boyet tells the ladies that the gentlemen will come to them in exotic costume, for they

—Act V, scene ii, lines 120-21

In Shakespeare's time, Russians were exotic and popular in England because of Chancellor's voyage (see page I-640).

The ladies therefore decide to wear masks and to switch their characteristic ribboned decorations ("favors") with one another, so that each man might think the wrong girl his and court at cross-purposes. This is done and the ladies utterly thwart the men first when they are disguised as Russians and then in their own persons.

Berowne in particular is forced, in frustration, to forswear the complexities of courtly love, at which the ladies win every time, and vows to be an honest lover henceforward. He says:

—Act V, scene ii, lines 413-16

Russet and kersey are the color and material of homemade peasant clothing and Shakespeare thus expresses (as he usually does in his plays) his opinion of the superiority of plain Englishness over foreign ways and customs.

But it is time now for the masque of the Nine Worthies to be presented by the various eccentrics of the play.

Costard comes in with a sonorous Pompey the Great. Nathaniel is a hesitant and easily rattled Alexander the Great, and then in come Holofernes and Moth as Judas Maccabeus and Hercules respectively. Holofernes speaks first for Moth with the expected scraps of Latin, saying:

—Act V, scene ii, lines 586-89

The trite Latin rhyme of canus (dog) and manus (hand) reduces pedantry to its most foolish.

Hercules' twelfth and climactic labor was that of bringing into the upper world the three-headed hound Cerberus (see page I-101), who guarded the entrance to the underworld. He did not kill it, but brought it up alive as proof of the successful completion of the labor, then returned it.