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Though Shakespeare is well known for the efficiency and complexity of his plotting, perhaps no other play in his repertoire is as expertly plotted than Cymbeline. And indeed, perhaps no other Shakespeare play contains quite so much plot as this play, which, as many critics have noted, features a mishmash of narrative devices from throughout his storied career. Characterized as it is by so many intricate twists and turns, the play is filled with improbabilities to a degree that often borders on the absurd. As if to help the audience keep things straight, characters frequently give speeches that conveniently summarize the action. And with so many levels of disguise and deception at work throughout the play, Shakespeare is essentially forced to devote Cymbeline’s long final scene to a rapid-fire reconciliation that systematically unties the plot’s numerous knots. All this complexity, though at times bewildering, also produces much of the pleasure to be had in this play, which hasn’t seen many stagings in recent decades despite being popular for many generations after Shakespeare’s death.
Cymbeline opens with the play’s inciting incident already having taken place. The king’s daughter, Imogen, has decided to thwart her father’s wishes by secretly marrying Posthumus—a man whom Cymbeline has cared for like a son ever since he was orphaned at birth. Though universally beloved at court, the king exiles Posthumus for his betrayal. For indeed, Cymbeline wanted Imogen to marry Cloten, the foolish son of his second wife, the Queen. As we quickly learn, it is the Queen who architected the marriage between Imogen and her son. Ever since the king’s two sons, Guiderius and Arviragus, were stolen when they were young, Imogen has been Cymbeline’s only heir. The Queen’s wicked plan, then, is to marry her son to Imogen and then poison the princess. With her stepdaughter out of the way, Cloten will become sole heir to the throne, which will in turn cement the Queen’s power. But Imogen’s covert marriage to Posthumus has scotched this plan, which leads to her beloved’s exile to Italy.
Posthumus’s departure has two main consequences. First, it marks the beginning of a series of deceptions and feints that will lead to a conflict between the play’s central heroes. Duped by the devious Italian go-between, Iachimo, Posthumus will come to believe that Imogen has betrayed him sexually, which will then lead him to order Imogen’s death. This romantic conflict radiates outward in such a way that leads to a general pattern of dispersion, which is the second consequence of Posthumus’s departure. With Pisanio’s help, Imogen leaves court, disguises herself as a boy, loses herself in the Welsh countryside, and eventually ends up serving a Roman general in the war against Britain. Cloten sets off to kill his rival and win his would-be bride, only to meet his death. (Note that his beheading takes the “dispersion” pattern to a particularly absurd height.) At the disappearance of her son, the Queen grows ill and eventually dies. As for Posthumus, he gets caught up in the war—at first recruited to the Roman army, then fighting against the Romans in defense of Britain.
As this brief outline of the play’s motif of dispersion indicates, the complication of the romance plot grows increasingly entwined with the erstwhile political conflict between Britain and Rome. This conflict arises out of a dispute regarding the payment of a tribute. As a province of the Roman Empire, Britain is expected to pay an annual tribute to Rome in exchange for security. However, under the wicked influence of the Queen and her son, Cymbeline adopts a rhetoric of national pride and, under the sign of an independent Britain, refuses to pay the tithe. A war between Britain and its imperial overseer ensues, and over the course of the play the action of the political conflict slowly becomes more entangled with the action of the romantic conflict. By act 5, then, the characters are all dispersed and completely disconnected from one another.
The falling action of the play is therefore focused on reunion and reconciliation. In the briskly paced final scene, with Britain having declared victory, everyone converges at Cymbeline’s court. Iachimo is forced to confess his deception of Posthumus, which in turn prompts Posthumus to confess the order he gave to murder his wife. At this point, Imogen removes her disguise and reunites joyfully with her beloved. No longer under the Queen’s influence, Cymbeline is then able to embrace his daughter and her chosen husband. Next, the aging exile Belarius reveals that the boys he raised as his own sons are in fact the princes that had long ago been stolen from court. With Guiderius and Arviragus now reunited with their father and sister, the royal family is fully restored. As such, the strength of the British throne is secured. Having won the war against Rome, Britain has symbolically affirmed its national identity and independence. Yet the play’s concluding emphasis on reunion and reconciliation isn’t complete until Britain restores peaceful relations with Rome. Thus, the king decides to release all the Roman prisoners and resume paying the tribute—a symbolic act meant to establish a new era of Pax Romana.
