In collaboration with William Shakespeare
This problem comedy is believed to have been written c. 1603-1604. The play deals with issues of mercy, justice and truth and their relationship to pride and humility. A virtuous maiden is given the ultimatum of surrendering her chastity in return for saving her brother’s life, thus revealing the play’s controversial and problematic dilemma. The plot deals with Vincentio, the Duke of Vienna, who makes it known that he intends to leave the city on a diplomatic mission. He leaves the government in the hands of a strict judge, Angelo.
Measure for Measure draws on two distinct sources. The original is The Story of Epitia, a story from Cinthio’s Hecatommithi, first published in 1565. Shakespeare was familiar with this book as it contains the original source for Othello. Cinthio also published the same story in a play version with some small differences, which Shakespeare may have been aware of.
In their book Shakespeare Reshaped, 1606–1623, Gary Taylor and John Jowett argue that part of the text of the play does not survive in its original form, but rather is the product of a revision after Shakespeare’s death by Thomas Middleton. They present stylistic evidence that patches of writing are by Middleton, suggesting that he changed the setting to Vienna from the original Italy. The scholar David Bevington disagrees, noting that the text can be stylistically credited to the professional scrivener Ralph Crane, who is usually credited for some of the better and unchanged texts in the Folio, such as The Tempest.