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Metaphor and Symbol

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Implicit Double-Function Terms in

Shakespeare's Use of Setting: A Brief
Meta-Metaphorical Note
Howard R. Pollio

Available online: 17 Nov 2009

To cite this article: Howard R. Pollio (2002): Implicit Double-Function Terms in Shakespeare's Use of
Setting: A Brief Meta-Metaphorical Note, Metaphor and Symbol, 17:2, 141-144

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 METAPHOR AND SYMBOL, 17(2), 141–144
Copyright © 2002, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Implicit Double-Function Terms in

Shakespeare’s Use of Setting: A Brief
Meta-Metaphorical Note
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Howard R. Pollio
Department of Psychology
University of Tennessee

Could Macbeth take place in Italy, the Taming of the Shrew in Scotland? The psy-
chological feeling of surprise, or even discomfort, that comes from considering
Macbeth in Padua or Petruchio in Inverness would seem to arise from a source
deeper than simply knowing where Shakespeare located his protagonists and their
stories. For the Shakespearean audience, as for present-day audiences, tragedy
seems naturally to belong to a certain locale just as surely as comedy belongs to an-
other. Such relations between dramatic plot and geographical setting are not hard
to understand, especially if we think about them in terms of double function terms
such as hot and cold and/or dark and sunny. For example, almost any dictionary,
such as Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate (1990), will provide the following set of
cliched meanings for the four specific terms mentioned above: cold (third defini-
tion): “depressing, gloomy” (p. 258); dark (third definition), “showing evil traits or
desires, dismal, gloomy” (p. 324); hot (second definition) “ardent, vibrant, raging,
lustful” (p. 583); sunny (second definition), “merry, optimistic” (p. 1182). Such
pairings suggest that gloom, depression, and evil may be instantiated by meta-
phoric connections to a climate that is dark and cold. On the other hand, dou-
ble-function terms such as hot and sunny would seem to yield two possibilities: the
sunny, merry, optimistic aspect of comedy, farce, or romance and the hot, raging
lust of tragedy. Based on metaphoric relations between climate and emotion, it
makes good sense that different climatic settings would be used by Shakespeare to
cue his audience as to what type of play to expect, especially because scenic design
was largely absent when these plays initially were performed.

Requests for reprints should be sent to Howard Pollio, Department of Psychology, University of
Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996–0900.
 142 POLLIO

Putting these considerations in the form of a more general hypothesis, it is pos-

sible to predict that Shakespeare’s tragedies, histories, and dramas will take place
largely in northern Europe (Scotland, England, Denmark, and so on) and that his
comedies, farces, and romances will take place largely in southern Europe (Italy
and Greece). Using these categories as an organizing principle, Shakespeare’s
work falls into two groups, one consisting of 20 plays and the second of 17 plays.
Table 1 presents all 37 of Shakespeare’s plays, in approximate order of date of pro-
duction, partitioned into the categories of Tragedy, History, Drama and Comedy,
Romance, Farce. Parenthetically, it is important to note that a partition of Shake-
speare’s plays into these categories is not unique to this analysis but is one used in
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almost all anthologies of his dramatic work.

Because the purpose of this study is to consider implicit metaphoric relations be-
tween plot and setting, a 2 × 2 schema was used to evaluate the relation between loca-
tion (North vs. South Europe) and dramatic type (tragedy vs. comedy). Results of
this analysis indicate that 13 tragedies are located in Northern Europe whereas only 2
comedies (The Merry Wives of Windsor and Cymbelline) clearly take place there.
Three comedies, however, do not fall clearly north or south: As You Like It takes place
in an imaginary forest in France; All’s Well That Ends Well also takes place some-

TABLE 1
Standard Division of Shakesperean Plays According to Dramatic Type

History/Tragedy/Drama Comedy/Romance/Farce

Henry VI P1 The Comedy of Errors

Henry VI P2 Taming of the Shrew
Henry VI P3 Two Gentlemen of Verona
Richard III Love’s Labor Lost
Richard II Mid-Summer’s Night Dream
King John Much Ado About Nothing
Henry IV P1 As You Like It
Henry IV P2 Merry Wives of Windsor
Henry V All’s Well That Ends Well
Julius Caesar Measure for Measure
Hamlet The Tempest
Othello Merchent of Venice
King Lear Twelfth Night
Macbeth Cymbelline
Henry VIII The Winter’s Tale
Timon of Athens Troilus and Cressida
Anthony and Cleopatra Pericles
Romeo and Juliet
Titus Andronicus
Corriolanus
 DOUBLE-FUNCTION TERMS IN SHAKESPEARE 143

where in France; and Measure for Measure takes place in Austria. For the purpose of
statistical analysis, the plays were divided on the basis of a random procedure (flip-
ping a coin) that resulted in placing two comedies in the north and one in the south.
When a χ2 test was performed over the resulting table—tragedy 13/7, north/south;
comedy 4/13, north/south—a value of 6.36 was obtained, p < .02.
One way to construe this result is to cast it in the form of an if–then statement: If a
Shakespearian play is set in southern Europe, it is likely a comedy or farce; if it is set
in northern Europe, it is likely a drama or history. In terms of southern Europe, there
are two exceptions: plays dealing with tragic passion (Othello, Romeo and Juliet,
and Anthony and Cleopatra) and plays dealing with historical events with Rome as
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their locale (Julius Caesar, Titus Andronicus, and Corriolanus). Although the rela-
tion of tragedy to northern Europe (13/20) is less obvious than that of comedy to
southern Europe (13/17), the exceptions for tragedy yield two clear subpatterns: (a)
where the events actually took place in history and (b) where the play concerns tragic
outcomes associated with passionate love affairs.
Regarding double-function terms, these findings may be understood in one of
two ways: One which the relevant metaphoric connections between settings and
emotion are linguistically mediated as in a phase such as “depression is cold, Scot-
land is cold, therefore ….” A second way to construe the results, and one suggested
by Asch (1955, 1958) and Kohler (1947/1975), does not arise from linguistic con-
siderations but from more perceptual ones concerning the Gestalt principle of
physiognomic equivalance. For this type of analysis, metaphoric pairings do not
require verbal mediation but are experienced in terms of a direct perceptual equiva-
lence between climate and emotion. Although it is easier, in text, to explicate dou-
ble-function terms on the basis of semantic mediation, it would seem that audience
members scarcely, if ever, go through such a complex cognitive process. Rather,
the effect is more immediate and they—and we—are able to experience meaning-
ful relations between Macbeth and Scotland and Petruchio and Italy simply on the
basis of physiognomic equivalences.
Regardless of the mechanics by which metaphors of setting are interpreted, one
significant psychological implication is to be noted: Shakespearean plays, no less
than other dramatic forms, make use of the fact that human life always takes place
in some environmental context. Within contemporary philosophy, this fact is often
rendered by the phrase “being in the world,” and whether we start with behavior (as
Skinner did), with personal experiences (as William James did), or with dramatic
art (as in this case), we must always be aware that no human act or event ever
emerges as figural except as part of some larger environment in which it is located.
Shakespeare’s use of setting as dramatic context only indicates what the novelist
Eudora Welty (1958), some three and a half centuries later, would note about the
role of setting in narrative: “Even the best plot will fly to pieces if imagination does
not touch ground with at least one toe” (p. 14).
 144 POLLIO

REFERENCES

Asch, S. E. (1955). On the use of metaphor in description of persons. In H. Warner (Ed.), On expressive
language (pp. 29–38). Worcester, England: Clark University Press.
Asch, S. E. (1958). The metaphor: A psychological inquiry. In R. Tagiuri & L. Petrullo (Eds.), Person
perception and interpersonal behavior (pp. 86–94). Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.
Kohler, W. (1975). Gestalt psychology. New York: Liveright. (Original work published 1947)
Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary. (1990). Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster.
Welty, E. (1957). Place in Fiction. New York: House of Books, Ltd.
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