Much Ado About Nothing

  • Don Pedro; Prince of Aragon
  • Leonato; Governor of Messina
  • Don Juan; Don Pedro's half-brother
  • Claudio; a Florentine Count
  • Benedict; a nobleman of Padua
  • Antonio; Leonato's brother
  • Balthasar; Don Pedro's servant
  • Borachio and Konrad; Don Juan's companion
  • Holzapfel and Schlehwein; silly usher
  • Hero; Leonato's daughter
  • Beatrice; Leonato's niece
  • Margaret and Ursula; Heros maids
  • Father Francis; monk

Much Ado about Nothing (English Much Ado About Nothing) is a comedy about love and intrigue of William Shakespeare; it differs from Shakespeare's other novelistic comedies by the more realistic reference to love. Claudio is particularly interested in for Heros inheritance, Benedict and Beatrice do not succumb to the conventional eyes love, but can be found only after interference of the other figures. Particularly striking is the game with the being and appearance, as already indicated the pun in the title indicates - and nothing Noting ( "nothing" and " perceive, recognize "). Thus, on the one hand the intrigues against Hero, on the other hand, the manners of the courtly self-presentation, particularly in Benedict and Beatrice, meant. Was written the piece in 1599 and first printed in the Quartoausgabe of 1600.

Action

Claudio and Benedict returned from a successful campaign in which they have struggled with Don Pedro to his step-brother Don Juan. Leonato, governor of Messina, welcomes you to his house. He invites them to stay for a month in Messina, and Don Pedro accepts the invitation. Claudio sets out to win the hand of Leonato's daughter Hero. Meanwhile Leonatos eloquent niece Beatrice and Benedict deliver verbal battles. Both are known to take in dealing with their fellow human beings not mince words. And both cherish for a long, albeit baseless dislike for each other.

Claudio and Hero are engaged quickly and decide, along with others, to shorten the time up to the wedding in order to lure Benedict and Beatrice in the love trap. Claudio, Leonato and Don Pedro leave Benedict overhear a conversation in which they discuss how much Beatrice suffer because they love him really. Benedict decides to take pity on her and return her love. Hero and her maid Ursula hold an appropriate conversation within earshot of Beatrice. Immediately she chooses to be friendly to Benedict.

Don Juan, Don Pedro's half-brother wants to make mischief by preventing the wedding. To prove Heros infidelity, he staged in the window of Hero's chamber a love scene between his henchman Borachio and Heros maid Margaret, in which she is wearing hero clothes, and ensures that Claudio and Don Pedro observe the scene. Both fall for the drama and keep Hero for unfaithful. The following wedding Claudio accuses her in church in front of everyone of infidelity and denied the marriage. Hero faints. After Claudio, Don Pedro and Don Juan have left the church, advises the monk is restored to her honor, to leave all in the belief that Hero had died in the light of shame.

After also Leonato, Hero and the monk are gone, the remaining alone in the church, Benedict and Beatrice confess their love. Beatrice is convinced of Hero's innocence and takes Benedict to promise, for the damage he has done to kill his friend Claudio.

However, before the duel can take place, hero honor is restored: In the night when the staging of Don Juan took place, the guards Borachio and its allies have taken Konrad. Despite its comic inability guards have heard, as the two discussed their evil plans, and understood that Hero was wronged. After hearing her testimony, Leonato is fully convinced of Hero's innocence.

Claudio experiences deep contrition over the supposed death of his bride. Leonato promises to marry him to his niece, who look just like Hero. Of course, it turns out that it is indeed the living Hero itself. At the wedding Benedict and Beatrice fall back into their old patterns, with much wit to deny their mutual love, to Hero and Claudio love poems bring out who wrote mutually Benedict and Beatrice. The piece ends in a joyful double wedding, complete with the announcement that Don Juan was arrested on the run from Messina.

Expenditure

The translated into German original text is freely accessible as a web output at DigBib.org and Project Gutenberg -de.

A theater processing as Western is documented at Thiele, Michael ( ed.): Calico.doc. Documentation for Shakespeare Western ' Calico ', formerly ' Much Ado About Nothing'. A Theatre Project, With photographs by Margret Herdt, Festschrift Tilman Westphalen, Regensburg: bvs Bavarian publisher for talking science 2004, ISBN 3-922757-79-0.

Opera

Films

The piece has been already repeatedly filmed for TV:

Productions

The play was performed at the 2006 Salzburg Festival in a production of David Boesch. A special feature of this production was that the piece is not a double wedding ended like the original, but with two women who have lost their husbands. Lyrically, the performance remained very close to the original.

Early texts of Shakespeare's works Marcus Stone Remorse Sender Freies Berlin Ludwig Berger (director) Joachim Hansen (actor) Jan Hendriks Deutsche Film-Aktiengesellschaft Christel Bodenstein Kenneth Branagh Much Ado About Nothing (2012 film) Nathan Fillion Stephen Greenblatt Romeo and Juliet Macbeth Titus Andronicus Antony and Cleopatra Coriolanus Troilus and Cressida Timon of Athens All's Well That Ends Well Cymbeline The Merchant of Venice Pericles, Prince of Tyre The Tempest The Two Noble Kinsmen Richard III (play) Henry V (play) Henry VI, Part 2 Venus and Adonis (Shakespeare poem) The Passionate Pilgrim The Phoenix and the Turtle A Lover's Complaint Integrated Authority File
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