An Exploration Of The Love Stories In Shakespeare's Comedies

William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was the greatest playwright and poet in the period of English Renaissance. All his life he wrote 39 plays, 2 long poems, and 154 sonnets, which enlist him among the masters of the world literature. One reason that his works are so attractive is when we read his works we are always meeting our own experiences and are constantly surprised by some phrases which express what we think to be our own secret or discovery, especially in the appreciation of those beautiful love stories.My paper gives a collective study of the love stories in Shakespeare's comedies through detailed analyses of some typical examples. This dissertation is divided into three parts.In part one, various types of love are discussed. Shakespeare presents us with different tales of wooing and wedding his comedies. Though it is not easy to categorize them, we still can find some trace of love forms repeatedly emerge. Generally speaking, there are four types of love: love at first sight, antagonist lovers, Cinderella legend and true love.In part two, I summarize the dominant characteristics of Shakespeare's love stories. Though he shows us varied types of love, there are two apparent characteristics. One is that women in those stories are at the center of the action. The other is that marriage is the natural fulfillment of love between man and woman.In the third part, I focus on Shakespeare's ideals of romantic love in his comedies. Seemingly he thinks of love, as many other men have done, in terms of poetic imageries such as the sun, the moon, the sweet dawn, and the things like that. Beyond them are his profound acknowledgement and realization of love. To give a systematic study, I summarize them into four parts: love's wealth, love's truth, love's order and love's ordeal.In the concluding part, I give a general review of the main points discussed in this paper and indicate that by analyzing love stories in Shakespeare's comedies we may get a better understanding of his vision of love and further appreciate his works.