Love and Virgin Word Counts" in All's Well That Ends Well
Love and Virgin Word Counts in
All's Well That Ends Well
Scholars make much of the 38 times the word blood appears in Macbeth. A few other key words are also noticed in a few other plays. Such studies should be taken throughout the canon. Mike has done this for All's Well That Ends Well and found the number of times the words Love and Virgin appear to be revealing. The results with comparisons to Shakespeare's other plays are below.
Thirteen of the plays deploy love more often than AWW but most of these are love stories or love tragedies, so high counts are expected. AWW ranks number four if you exclude love stories and love tragedies. AWW is not a love story, but better fits the steadfast woman genre. The plays The Island Princess by John Fletcher and Patient Grissel by Thomas Dekker, Henry Chettle, and William Haughton are examples of this genre. With the love stories and love tragedies removed, the occurrence of love in AWW is very high indeed. Love in AWW without the other forms beat Macbeth's 38 bloods by eight. Below is a ranking of all of Shakespeare's plays in the standard canon that include the word love.
Love Count
Two Gentlemen of Verona (104)
Romeo and Juliet (94)
As You Like It (82)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (79)
Othello (66)
Love's Labour's Lost (62)
Twelfth Night (56)
Richard III (54)
Taming of the Shrew (52)
Troilus and Cressida (52)
Hamlet (50)
The Merchant of Venice (49)
All's Well That Ends Well (46)
King Lear (43)
Henry VI, Part III (38)
Antony and Cleopatra (37)
The Merry Wives of Windsor (33)
King John (32)
Timon of Athens (32)
Henry V (30)
Julius Caesar (27)
Measure for Measure (27)
Richard II (27)
Coriolanus (26)
Cymbeline (23)
Pericles, Prince of Tyre (22)
Titus Andronicus (22)
Henry IV, Part I (21)
Henry VI, Part I (21)
The Winter's Tale (21)
Henry IV, Part II (20)
Henry VIII (20)
Macbeth (16)
The Comedy of Errors (15)
Henry VI, Part II (15)
The Tempest (12)
One variant form, Loved, is found nine additional times in AWW, more than any other play expect three of the love comedies and, curiously, Coriolanus.
LOVED COUNT
As You Like It (16)
Much Ado About Nothing (13)
Coriolanus (12)
The Two Gentlemen of Verona (10)
All's Well That Ends Well (9)
Henry VIII (9)
Othello (9)
Antony and Cleopatra (6)
Cymbeline (6)
Troilus and Cressida (6)
The Winter's Tale (6)
The Merchant of Venice (5)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (5)
Pericles, Prince of Tyre (5)
The Tempest (5)
Henry VI, Part 2 (4)
Julius Caesar (4)
Titus Andronicus (4)
Romeo and Juliet (3)
Timon of Athens (3)
The Comedy of Errors (2)
Hamlet (2)
Henry IV, Part 1 (2)
King John (2)
Macbeth (2)
Measure of Measure (2)
Henry IV, Part 2 (1)
Henry V (1)
Henry VI, Part 3 (1)
Love's Labour's Lost (1)
The Merry Wives of Windsor (1)
Richard II (1)
Richard III (1)
Twelfth Night (1)
Virgin and Virgins
The words virgin and the plural virgins is another major theme in AWW, as evidenced by the fact that at nine uses it appears more times than in any of Shakespeare's other plays. Pericles, Prince of Tyre is an odd case with six uses. This is due to Marina's captivity in a brothel where ending her virginity is prized. This skews the number in Pericles though it should be acknowledged that the brothel scenes were not written by Shakespeare.
Virgin(s) Count
All's Well That Ends Well (9)
Pericles, Prince of Tyre (6)
Henry VI, Part I (4)
Henry V (3)
The Merchant of Venice (3)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (3)
Coriolanus (2)
The Tempest (2)
Timon of Athens (2)
As You Like It (1)
Hamlet (1)
Henry VIII (1)
The Winter's Tale (1)
Virginity also has a high count in AWW, 10 uses compared to two or fewer in all other plays.
Virginity Count
All's Well That Ends Well (10)
Pericles, Prince of Tyre (2)
The Merry Wives of Windsor (1)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (1)
Timon of Athens (1)
From Helena's first scene with Paroles through the bed trick and on to Bertram's final declaration, love and the ending of virginity are central to the meaning of this play.
