All's Well That Ends Well, written in the early 1600s, is considered one of Shakespeare's "problem plays," meaning that it doesn't fall neatly into the category of tragedy, comedy, or even romance. Helen, daughter of the late legendary doctor Gerard de Narbon, is the ward of the Countess of Rossillion and deeply in love with the woman's son, Bertram. When Bertram is sent to the court of the gravely ill King of France, Helen follows him with a remedy her late father devised. When she cures the King, he offers her any man in his court to marry. She selects Bertram, but he refuses her, saying that she is low-born and he cannot love her. The King insists on the marriage, but Bertram...
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