Pericles by William Shakespeare | Introduction & Overview

Pericles Introduction

Pericles is the first in a group of Shakespeare's last plays called romances or tragicomedies. This group of plays, which also includes Cymbeline, The Winter's Tale, The Tempest, and The Two Noble Kinsmen is characterized by improbable situations, and often includes the discovery that characters presumed dead are, miraculously, still alive. In Pericles, for example, the title character thinks both his wife Thaisa and his daughter Marina are dead and suffers terribly in his grief over their deaths. There is great joy and celebration at the end of the play when he is reunited with first Marina and then Thaisa. The audience, however, knows throughout that Pericles's wife and daughter are still alive. Shakespeare brings characters back from the dead with similar, perhaps greater, dramatic effect in The Winter's Tale when a statue of Hermione comes to life and surprises both the audience and her husband Leontes, who has presumed...
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