Even though the testy Ben Jonson named

as one of the “mouldy” outdated plays that continued to hold sway in popular taste for many years after Shakespeare's death – and at the expense of Jonson's own more classicized productions – that popularity had waned by the early-eighteenth century. Even with some renewed interest in it during the twentieth century,

is still only rarely seen on stage. In this play, without real antecedents in the canon, Shakespeare appears to strive for effects that seem almost alien to his previous work, and therefore cannot easily be assessed. Its parlous textual status has further obscured it by casting doubt on its authenticity -- there is, unfortunately, much in the play that is “far from happy or clear”, in the words of a recent…

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Citation: Preston, Claire. "Pericles". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 21 March 2003; last revised 16 October 2019. [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=2878, accessed 26 November 2024.]