Troilus and Cressida

Synopsis

Troilus and Cressida is set during the later years of the Trojan War, faithfully following the plotline of the Iliad from Achilles' refusal to participate in battle to Hector's death.

Essentially, two plots are followed in this play. In one, Troilus, a Trojan prince (son of Priam), woos Cressida, another Trojan. They have sex, professing their undying love, before Cressida is exchanged for a Trojan prisoner of war. As he attempts to visit her in the Greek camp, Troilus glimpses Diomedes flirting with his beloved Cressida, and decides to avenge her perfidy.

While this plot gives the play its name, it accounts for only a small part of the play's run time. The majority of the play revolves around the leaders of the Greek and Trojan forces, Agamemnon and Priam respectively. Agamemnon and his cohorts attempt to get the proud Achilles to return to battle and face Hector, who sends the Greeks a letter telling them of his willingness to engage in one-on-one combat with a Greek soldier. Ajax is originally chosen as this combatant, but makes peace with Hector before they are able to fight. Achilles is prompted to return to battle only after his friend and (according to some of the Greeks) lover, Patroclus, is killed by Hector before the Trojan walls. A series of skirmishes conclude the play, during which Achilles catches Hector and has the Myrmidons kill him. The conquest of Troy is left unfinished, as the Trojans learn of the death of their hero.

Date and text

The play is believed to have been written around 1602, shortly after the completion of Hamlet. It was published in quarto in two separate editions, both in 1609. It is not known whether the play was ever performed in its own time, because the two editions contradict each other: one announces on the title page that the play had been recently performed on stage; the other claims in a preface that it is a new play that has never been staged. The play was entered into the Register of the Stationers Company on 7 February 1603, by the bookseller and printer James Roberts, with a mention that the play was acted by the Lord Chamberlain's Men, Shakespeare's company. No publication followed, however, until 1609; the stationers Richard Bonian and Henry Walley re-registered the play on 28 Jan. 1609, and later that year issued the first quarto, but in two "states". The first says the play was "acted by the King's Majesty's servants at the Globe;" the second version omits the mention of the Globe Theatre, and prefaces the play with a long Epistle that claims that Troilus and Cressida is "a new play, never staled with the stage, never clapper-clawed with the palms of the vulgar."

Some commentators (like Georg Brandes, the Danish Shakespeare scholar of the late 19th century) have attempted to reconcile these contradictory claims by arguing that the play was composed originally around 1600–02, but heavily revised shortly before its 1609 printing. The play is noteworthy for its bitter and caustic nature, similar to the works that Shakespeare was writing in the 1605–08 period, King Lear, Coriolanus, and Timon of Athens. In this view, the original version of the play was a more positive romantic comedy of the type Shakespeare wrote ca. 1600, like As You Like It and Twelfth Night, while the later revision injected the darker material – leaving the result a hybrid jumble of tones and intents.

The Quarto edition labels it a history play with the title The Famous Historie of Troylus and Cresseid, but the First Folio classed it with the tragedies, under the title The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida. The confusion is compounded by the fact that in the original pressing of the First Folio, the play's pages are unnumbered, the title is not included in the Table of Contents, and it appears to have been squeezed between the histories and the tragedies. Based on this evidence, scholars believe it was a very late addition to the Folio, and therefore may have been added wherever there was room.

Performance history

The play's puzzling and intriguing nature has meant that Troilus and Cressida has rarely been popular on stage, and neither during Shakespeare's own lifetime nor between 1734 and 1898 is there any recorded performance of the play. In the Restoration, it was rewritten by John Dryden, who stated that he intended to uncover the "jewels" of Shakespeare's verse, hidden beneath a "heap of rubbish" (not only some "ungrammatical" and indecorous expressions, but also much of the plot). In addition to his "improvements" to the language, Dryden streamlined the council scenes and sharpened the rivalry between Ajax and Achilles. Dryden's largest change, though, was in the character of Cressida, who in his play is loyal to Troilus throughout. The play was also condemned by the Victorians for its explicit sexual references (though the sex, while explicitly and importantly present, is portrayed satirically and highly negatively). It was not staged in its original form until the early 20th century, but since then, it has become increasingly popular, especially after the First World War, owing to its cynical depiction of immorality and disillusionment. Because certain aspects of the play, such as the breaking of one's public oaths during a protracted wartime and the decay of morality among Cressida and the Greeks resonated strongly with a discontented public, the play was staged with greater frequency during and after this period.

Modern revivals

The BBC broadcast a modern-language and modern-dress version by Ian Dallas as The Face of Love in 1954, which was then staged by RADA at the Vanbrugh Theatre in 1956, providing Albert Finney with his first lead stage role.

In July 2009, the Hudson Shakespeare Company of New Jersey presented a production as part of their annual Shakespeare in the Parks series. Director Jon Ciccarelli set the action in ancient Greece but sought to put a modern twist on the action by comparing the title pair to Romeo and Juliet and posing the question, "would their relationship have lasted if they had lived?". Ciccarelli hypothesized that Shakespeare knew the answer and that it was "no, it would not have lasted". He stated that Troilus and Cressida pine for each other, like their more famous counterparts, and share a passionate evening; however, the morning after Troilus is eager to leave. Cressida is later exiled from Troy and quickly takes up with another man proving "love at first sight" is fickle and fleeting. Other notable departures show that the Greek Heroes are anything but heroic, showing Shakespeare satirized revered figures like Achilles as childish and barbaric and sympathizing with the pragmatic Hector.

The Public Theater has produced three revivals, in 1965, 1995, and 2016.