Two Gentlemen of Verona • ONLINE • Moutain Time

The Two Gentlemen of Verona is one of Shakespeare’s earliest plays—but it already contains the DNA of everything the playwright will later do at full power.

At its center are two close friends, Valentine and Proteus, whose bond is tested—and nearly destroyed—by love, ambition, betrayal, and self-deception. When both men fall for the same woman, the play exposes how easily friendship collapses when desire, jealousy, and social aspiration take over. Shakespeare is already probing a question that will haunt the later tragedies: What happens when loyalty to another human being yields to appetite and self-interest?

The play is also a laboratory for ideas Shakespeare will refine again and again: exile and return, the moral cost of inconstancy, women who are more emotionally intelligent than the men who pursue them, and love as both a civilizing and a destabilizing force. Julia—who disguises herself as a page to follow the man who betrays her—anticipates a long line of resourceful Shakespearean heroines, from Viola to Rosalind.

Though often labeled a “juvenile” work, The Two Gentlemen of Verona is important precisely because it shows Shakespeare thinking out loud—testing the ethics of friendship, the psychology of desire, and the uneasy fit between romantic idealism and human weakness. It’s the sound of a great mind warming up, already asking big questions, even before it has learned all the answers. (written by ChatGPT)

Join us to read this play in what we call a "close-enough" read, which is faster than our regular close read but not as fast as reading it straight through. There will be plenty of discussion.

No one has to read aloud—feel free to join in and listen and discuss! If you DO want a role, please rsvp and answer the question by 9 p.m. the evening before to get in the lottery.

There is a small fee of $4.75: When you click the RSVP button, it takes you to PayPal where you can pay with your account OR your own credit card.

AFTER you pay the fee, the LINK is visible on the right side of the page.

See you there!
Robin & Edie & Jean & Jenny