Shakespeare and the Rose of Love. John Vyvyan

is a privilege, and it is granted only under certain conditions:

      For curteys / and of fayre manere

      Wel taught / and ful of gentylnysse

      He muste ben / that shal me kysse… 2006

      And first of o thyng warne I the

      That payne and great aduersyte

      He mote endure / and eke trauayle

      That shal me serue / without fayle: 2012

      In the fifth act, Shakespeare makes, in effect, the same stipulations. And he goes on to strip the last insincerities from love, in order that the quality itself may shine out clearly.

      The young men begin by sending jewels to their ladies, accompanied by:

      … as much love in rhyme

      As would be cramm’d up in a sheet of paper,

      Writ o’ both sides of the leaf, margent and all…

      That will not pass; it is only good for laughter, and the girls dismiss it as:

      A huge translation of hypocrisy…

      The lords then come in person; but they are in disguise, dressed up as Russians. Clearly, this is part of a parable on semblance and reality. Boyet has heard the plan being hatched, and he warns the princess:

      Love doth approach disguised…

      The penalty for this little trick is that the ladies also mask themselves, and exchange the jewels that have just been sent to them. When the men arrive, each woos the girl who is wearing his own gift, and so vows fidelity to the wrong one. The king proposes to Rosaline, assuming her to be the princess; and when asked why he thought her to be so, he replies:

      I knew her by the jewel on her sleeve.

      They are all, in fact, making love to illusions; all…

      Following the signs, woo’d but the sign for she.

      If we accept the hypothesis of the duality of Shakespeare’s heroines, then the undermeaning of this scene is clear: the young men do not yet know what love is. Their conception of it, and their courtship are those of the conventions, they are merely wooing the signs; and that, Shakespeare is saying, goes for the audience as well, until some awakening experience reveals the deeper truth. We should no doubt concede, in view of the diversity of love-conventions in different societies and periods, that this is so, and also that there is a permanent power in the background. Whether Shakespeare succeeded in elucidating its nature, or whether he merely arrayed it in a vision of his own, is another matter: all we can attempt to do is to establish what he believed himself to have discovered, and what he affirmed. It is at least certain that he pursued the enquiry with high seriousness – even in comedy – throughout his work, and reached some astonishing conclusions. And I am sure we ought to grant – as some critics do not – that Shakespeare was sincere.

      Love’s labour is lost in this play because it is a labour of affectation and not sincerity. But it will be won – so we are promised at the end – by service and sacrifice. Shakespeare is winnowing the chaff from the wheat. His present method of doing this is satirical: he makes the protestations of affectation ridiculous, and when they have been laughed off the stage, that which remains can be relied upon. At last, the characters begin to see into themselves; and this is so important to Shakespeare’s future work that it must be stressed. Beneath the fancy-dress is the true self. And when this is revealed, it is not only the ladies who will be reassured: the lords will also have found something, hitherto unknown, that they can rely on in themselves. Their discovery is not, of course, complete; but it is towards this inner simplicity that they are tending: