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Summary
Making their way back from Delphos, the lords Dion and Cleomenes discuss events in their native Sicilia and express their hope that the message they bring from the oracle will vindicate the unfortunate Hermione.
Meanwhile, Leontes convenes a court for his wife’s trial, with himself as judge. She is brought from the prison to appear before him, and the indictment, charging her with adultery and conspiracy in the escape of Polixenes and Camillo, is read to the entire court. Hermione defends herself eloquently. She says that she loved the Bohemian king “as in honor he required” (3.2.67), but no more, and certainly not in a sexual fashion. She also claims to be ignorant of any conspiracy and insists that Camillo is an honest man. Leontes, paying little heed to her words, declares that she is guilty, and that her punishment must be death. Hermione laughs bitterly at this and says that given her sufferings so far, death would be a blessed release.
At this juncture, the two lords arrive with the oracle’s message. It is unsealed and read aloud. “Hermione is chaste,” it reports, “Polixenes blameless, Camillo a true subject, Leontes a jealous tyrant, his innocent babe truly begotten; and the King shall live without an heir if that which is lost be not found” (3.2.142–46). Leontes refuses to believe the oracle’s pronouncement. At that moment, however a servant rushes in with word that Mamillius has died, and Leontes immediately recognizes the severity of his mistake. Hermione faints at this same news, and her ladies quickly carry her away, frantically attempting to revive her. Leontes, now grief-stricken, pours curses upon his own head. Paulina then re-enters and tells him that Hermione, too, has died, and that he has murdered her. One of the lords rebukes her, but Leontes accepts her accusation as no more than his due. Ordering a single grave for the body of his wife and son, he pledges to spend the rest of his life doing penance for his sin.
Unaware of the oracle’s revelations, Antigonus has arrived on the desolate Bohemian coast, bearing the infant princess. He tells the audience how Hermione appeared to him in a dream, telling him to name the babe Perdita, and declaring that he would never see his home or his wife again. He lays the infant down in the woods, placing gold and jewels beside her. He also leaves a note with the child’s name before preparing to depart. However, a storm has churned up, and as the blare of hunting trumpets mingles with the blasts of thunder, a bear appears and chases him off stage.
After a time, a Shepherd comes in and finds the baby. He is joined by the Shepherd’s Son (in some editions referred to as a “Clown”), who reports seeing a man (Antigonus) killed by a bear, and a ship (Antigonus’s vessel) go down in the storm. The two men then discover the wealth left with Perdita. They rejoice in their good fortune and vow to raise the child themselves.
Read a translation of Act 3: Scenes 1 & 2.
Analysis
The first two scenes of act 3 bring the conflict between Leontes and Hermione to a head. Yet it’s striking that virtually everyone in the Sicilian court considers Leontes’s accusations baseless. His mounting tyranny stands in sharp contrast to Hermione’s perceived innocence and creates conditions for her sympathy. It’s notable, then, that the short opening scene emphasizes hope for her acquittal. “If th’ event o’ th’ journey / Prove as successful to the Queen—O be ’t so!” (3.1.14–15) says Dion, and Cleomenes echoes him: “These proclamations, / So forcing fault upon Hermione, / I little like” (3.1.19–20). This general sentiment of sympathy plays out in opposition to a general emphasis on Leontes as a “tyrant”—a word that is used repeatedly in scene 2, which culminates in the Delphic oracle’s verdict. The interplay of tyranny and innocence here recalls other major works in Shakespeare’s canon. For instance, the way Leontes’s madness relates to a perceived betrayal that is at once personal and political recalls a similar situation in Hamlet. There, the queen’s sexual betrayal of her husband leads to the son’s madness. Yet in this case the betrayal isn’t real. In this sense, the king’s tyrannical madness recalls King Lear, where the king’s perception of his daughter’s betrayal leads to great tragedy.
The great tragedy of The Winter’s Tale arrives with the revelation of the oracle, which also marks the climax of act 3. This is a moment of awful illumination for Leontes, and the moment of greatest disaster, since it leaves us with Mamillius and Hermione dead, and the baby seemingly lost forever. Hermione’s final speech before she passes away is a masterpiece of pathos and wronged innocence. She lists all the terrible things that have befallen her, and then asks, “Now, my liege, / Tell me what blessings I have here alive, / That I should fear to die?” (3.2.113–15). She dies soon after delivering these words, and her death comes to have even greater dramatic force in the sharp words Paulina has for Leontes. Just as she did in act 2, Paulina shows herself an impressive orator who possesses a clear sense of justice. No longer able to defend her mistress in life, she unleashes a powerful and damning testimony against Leontes. Despite being the one to convene the court against his wife, the king turns out to be the guilty one.
But even amid all this woe, the playwright offers a suggestion that this is not a truly unhappy, tragic play. Things seem dark now, but the oracle’s prophecy contains a seed of hope in that the lost infant may yet be found. So, when Leontes goes out, saying “lead me / To these sorrows” (3.2.268–69), one has hope that the sorrows will not be permanent. And indeed, as the action shifts from Sicilia to Bohemia, the third act’s final scene marks a decisive shift in the play’s mood. The scene on the fictional seacoast of Bohemia begins darkly, with the abandonment of Perdita, followed by Antigonus’s death at the hands of Shakespeare’s best-known stage direction: He exits, pursued by a bear. But the sudden appearance of the Shepherd and his son suddenly infuses the play with comic dialogue. Likewise, their discovery of the baby provides the first hint that the play may not be a tragedy after all. It may well turn out to be a classic fairy tale, complete with a lost princess raised in ignorance of her heritage.
