Reversal in The Two Noble Kinsmen Sara Manlowe College

Shakespeare’s The Two Noble Kinsmen is a play, primarily, about reversal: reversal of circumstances, reversal of relationships, overwhelming emotion juxtaposed against a complete dearth of emotion. The plot is an interplay of these reversals from various angles, and how they collide against one another. This is seen most keenly through the character arcs of Palamon and Arcite, and then in Emilia, whom they both profess to love. Palamon and Arcite are always at extremes: loving or loathing, occasionally tempered by the friendship they feel towards one another, while Emilia’s arc extends from lack of emotion towards either Palamon or Arcite to being flooded with emotion towards the both of them. In this they play against one another, always juxtaposed, always at an extreme end of the scale. In love, there is no moderation, except in friendship, though romantic love will override the love of a friend every time. Finally, the story at the heart of the play The Two Noble Kinsmen is a woman who never asked to be loved, who has no choice but to be complicit in the power games of the men around her; whose sudden, convenient decision to love both Palamon and Arcite both diminishes and exacerbates the tragedy at which she is the...