Love's Labour's Lost

In this section, Shakespeare builds on the comedic genre conventions established in the previous Acts. The Lords’ attempts to prank the ladies by coming in disguise and their counter-prank in dressing as each other creates a light-hearted tone in which love is presented as a comedic game, setting up the twist in the final part of the Act.

These interactions also offer commentary on the key themes of Love’s Labour’s Lost. The Princess explains why she thinks they should meet the Lords’ deception with their own deception: “They do it but in mockery merriment / And mock for mock is only my intent” (5.2.146-47). She points out that the men have established the spirit of the interaction, and the women are building on this, something she reiterates at the end of the scene (5.2.858-59). This illustrates that the popular social expectation of The Masculine Pursuit of Love dictates the characters’ behavior, with the women placed in a responsive role while the men are proactive in their desires.

However, the women take their response as an opportunity to communicate their feelings: The Princess says, “Nor to their penned speech render we no grace / But while ’tis spoke each turn away her face” (5.2.155-56). Their comedic rejection of the Lords’ disguises represents their uncertainty about the integrity of the Lords’ expressions of love: Their pre-penned sonnets represent a linguistic equivalent of a disguise. Shakespeare thus shows the connection between the themes of The Complexities of Language and Fantasy Versus Reality: Language can be used to create a fantasy rather than reveal a reality or genuine emotion. The women turning their back on the men represents an ironic mirroring of the men’s oaths, and foreshadows the separation and abstinence they will instate in the play’s ending, suggesting their renunciation of fantasy as they must engage with reality.

In swapping places, the women expose the potential shallowness and fleetingness of the men’s expressions of love, with the Princess instructing the women to “change you favors too. So shall your loves / Woo contrary, deceived by these removes” (5.2.141-42). Her imagery of change, deceit, and contrariness reflects the fickle nature of love, tying into the imagery of cuckoldry (a woman being unfaithful to a man) that is used throughout the play, often through the mention of horns. She suggests that the men are preoccupied by the women’s outward appearance and a fantastical ideal of their mistress. The women’s banter about make-up reinforces this as they point out its transient ability to hide reality. Rosaline exclaims, “Ware pencils, ho!” (5.2.46): Her use of the word “pencil” aligns make-up with the written word, including the men’s sonnets, as projections of a fantastical self.

The ladies’ analyses of the Lords’ letters to them further explore this idea. They critique the content of the sonnets, observing the length and technical skill of the letters, but suggesting that the words themselves are hollow. Rosaline drily notes that there is “[m]uch in the letters, nothing in the praise” (5.2.43). The Princess describes how the King has written so much that there was no room for his wax seal, which ends up covering the word “cupid” (5.2.9). In his eagerness to express himself, he ends up prioritizing himself (his personal wax seal) over Cupid, the symbol of love, showing that his masculine pursuit of love is actually an expression of his own personhood and identity.

The Lords’ long letters also indicate a potential pitfall in the complexity of language. Whilst it can be used for expression, it can also overcomplicate, obscuring true meaning. The ladies joke that they’d rather have better gifts and shorter letters, comparing the reality of a physical and economic gesture to the fantasy of a poem. The Lords’ verbosity is mirrored by Armado, Holofernes, and Nathaniel, who fulfil the role of the buffoon archetype in this section. Shakespeare satirizes the different ways that all three attempt to use complex language to elevate themselves in relation to others.

Shakespeare presents Holofernes’s verbosity and pride in his own learning as pompous and closed-minded: He criticizes Armado’s wordiness, but then dedicates an entire monologue to criticizing the way he pronounces specific words in accent (5.1.17-28). This shows his pedantry and hypocrisy, and that his obsession with language revolves more around its superficial trappings (such as accent) than its true complexity. Nathaniel is over-awed by Holofernes’s presentation of his own learning, showering him with praise and trying to replicate the way he speaks; however, Holofernes immediately spots the errors in his Latin (5.1.29-30). Shakespeare satirizes Nathaniel’s unmerited deference to Holofernes and his misguided use of language to try to put himself in the same role.

Armado’s pretentious vanity similarly manifests in his unnecessarily complex language. He rejects the word “afternoon” as being beneath him, for example, instead saying “the posteriors of this day” (5.1.89). Shakespeare satirizes the use of complicated words as an attempt to project intelligence or status at the expense of clear communication. Mote and Costard articulate this satire in this scene, joking about their masters’ pomposity. Costard uses the word “honorificabilitudinitatibus,” which was at the time known for being the longest word but which served little practical use, parodying verbal cleverness for cleverness’ sake.

Holofernes, meanwhile, does not comprehend that Costard is mocking him—he takes him at face value, correcting him earnestly when Costard jokingly uses the word “dunghill” in a Latin sentence. Holofernes and Costard speak the same language, but cannot understand each other, due to their different characters and their social and cultural differences. Shakespeare thus comedically develops the idea of the struggle to communicate across a gap in understanding in preparation for the more serious examination of this dilemma, provoked by the final twist in the last section.