Troilus and Cressida Reconsidered

Abstract

There are almost as many opinions about the nature of Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida as there are critics; and each critic can fortify his argument by referring to the inability of the play's first editors to see eye to eye about it. In particular, if he wants to claim it as comedy, he can cite the preface of the Quarto of 1609, for whoever wrote that praised the play as "passing full of the palme comicall"; and if he prefers to deal with it as tragedy, he can point to the first plan of the editors of the Folio of 1623, who meant to place it after Romeo and Juliet. To add to the confusion, the Folio text seems to contain two endings to the play, for Troilus's last dismissal of Pandarus is there printed twice, in V.iii, and in V.x. Shakespeare clearly conceived at some time a bitter or "tragic" ending, culminating in Troilus's fine speech in V.x; after one false ending, omitted in the Quarto,