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What You’ll Love about… Measure for Measure by William Shakespeare
Measure for Measure is a comedy by definition — there are no tragic deaths at the end, and there is a marriage proposal — but it’s not particularly funny, and the conclusion fails to adequately resolve the problems raised in the play. The main action of the play — Angelo’s attempts to sexually assault Isabella, who is training to be a nun — is deeply unpleasant, as are the subplots, one of which features the apprehension and imprisonment of one of Vienna’s pimps. In spite of its general unpleasantness, it’s one of my favorite plays, and I think it deserves more prestige in the canon.
The title seems to have been inspired by a passage from the Gospel of Matthew: “Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged, and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured unto you again” (Matthew 7:1–2).
But just as with All’s Well That Ends Well, the title can be taken several ways, some of which are at odds. A benign interpretation of the title could invoke the link between human justice and divine justice and affirm the idea that divine justice is perfect and therefore infallible. A more complicated interpretation would point out Matthew’s allusion to the retributive “eye-for-an-eye” justice expressed in Exodus 21:23–25, and we might observe that the play doesn’t deliver on…
