Cymbeline by William Shakespeare
Published 1611 · 360 pages · 118,874 words · about 10 hours at an average pace · Drama, Romance
How hard is Cymbeline to read?
Cymbeline scores 73 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it very challenging. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 85 out of 100
- Shakespeare's language is replete with archaic terms and now-uncommon usages, such as 'intendment,' 'withal,' 'misprised,' 'roynish clown,' and 'bonny priser.' While not as dense with invented words as 'Finnegans Wake,' the frequent need for glossaries places it significantly above 'Moby-Dick' in lexical challenge.
- Sentence structure: 80 out of 100
- The text features long, convoluted sentences with frequent inversions, embedded clauses, and parenthetical asides that demand careful parsing. For example, Imogen's soliloquy in Act 1, Scene 6, or Posthumus's extended lament in Act 2, Scene 5, showcase complex hypotaxis, similar to Proust, though not reaching the extreme length of Faulkner's 'Absalom, Absalom!'.
- Abstraction: 75 out of 100
- Beyond the immediate plot, the play frequently delves into philosophical debates on nature vs. nurture, the essence of love, and the nature of identity, particularly through characters like Jaques and Touchstone. These digressions, such as Jaques' 'All the world's a stage' monologue, elevate the content beyond concrete narrative, akin to the philosophical undercurrents in 'Brothers Karamazov'.
- Information density: 78 out of 100
- Shakespeare packs each scene with multiple layers of meaning, character development, and thematic exploration, often through dense poetic language and rapid-fire dialogue. The audience must track intricate plotlines, shifting alliances, and complex emotional states, requiring sustained attention comparable to '2666' but without its sheer volume of historical detail.
- Narrative indirection: 75 out of 100
- Readers must constantly infer meaning due to pervasive dramatic irony and mistaken identities. Imogen's disguise as Fidele, Posthumus's swift belief in Iachimo's lies, and the Queen's hidden malice all require the audience to understand more than the characters themselves. The play's resolution hinges on the gradual revelation of these concealed truths.
- Symbolic density: 70 out of 100
- The play employs significant symbolic elements, such as the ring and bracelet representing marital fidelity, Posthumus's garments leading to mistaken identity, and the natural world of the forest contrasting with the corrupt court. The oracle's prophecy, with its lion's whelp and stately cedar, serves as a central allegory for the play's overarching themes of restoration and reconciliation. These symbols enrich the narrative without entirely overshadowing the literal plot.
- Ironic distance: 78 out of 100
- A substantial ironic distance exists, primarily through extensive dramatic irony where the audience possesses crucial information unknown to the characters. Cymbeline's blindness to his wife's treachery, Imogen's unwitting interactions with her brothers and later Posthumus while disguised, and her tragic misidentification of Cloten's body for her husband's, all create a profound gap between what is presented and what is truly understood. This constant tension underscores the characters' follies and the play's thematic concerns.
- Resolution withholding: 60 out of 100
- While 'Cymbeline' ultimately provides a comprehensive resolution, the journey to it is marked by significant withholding of clarity and numerous near-tragic ambiguities. The audience is kept in suspense regarding Imogen's fate, the true identities of the forest dwellers, and the outcome of the war, with the final act serving as a rapid unraveling of these complex, interwoven mysteries. The oracle's prophecy, delivered early but interpreted only at the very end, exemplifies this delayed gratification of understanding.
- Structural complexity: 65 out of 100
- The play exhibits notable structural complexity through its multiple, interwoven plotlines involving the court, the forest, and the Roman war, alongside extensive use of disguise and mistaken identity. The narrative features a supernatural apparition scene with Jupiter and the Leonati ghosts, adding a formal experiment to the dramatic structure. The final act orchestrates a highly intricate series of revelations and reconciliations, demanding close attention to connect all the disparate threads.
How Cymbeline is regarded
Cymbeline holds a literary regard score of 81 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.