The History of Troilus and Cressida is a play by William Shakespeare. This is one of the playwright's three problem plays, so-called because they cannot be easily classified as tragedy or comedy.

The play dates from Shakespeare's mid-career. It is believed to have been written around 1602, shortly after the completion of Hamlet. It was published in quarto in two separate editions, both in 1609. It is not known whether the play was ever performed because the two editions say different things: one announces on the title page that the play had been recently performed on stage; the other claims in a preface that it is a new play that has never been staged. It is not known which claim is true, or if both are true.

Shakespeare drew on a number of sources for the play, notably the medieval pastiches of ancient Greek writers that were very popular in his time, including Chaucer's version of the tale, Troilus and Criseyde.

In terms of structure the play falls between a number of recognised genres. Presented as a historical action-romance it also has elements, if not the structure, of a tragedy as well as comic themes.

The main characters are Troilus, a Trojan prince; Cressida, the daughter of a Trojan priest and defector; Pandarus, Cressida's pandering uncle; Thersites, an acid-tongued servant of Achilles; Diomedes, a Greek soldier; and a number of more recognised characters from the Iliad - Achilles, Agamemnon, Ulysses, Hector, Priam, Ajax etc.

Much of the plot is reasonably close to traditional accounts of the siege of Troy. It begins with Troilus in discutation with Pandarus before Priam's palace. "Why should I war without the walls of Troy," cries Troilus, "That find such cruel battle here within?" The 'cruel battle' is his inability to make progress in arranging a romantic rendezvous with Trojan princess Cressida. Pandarus reassures him by comparing love to baking a cake. Pandarus quickly grows angry with Troilus' complaining, and exclaims "I care not an she were a black-a-moor; 'tis all one to me." We are then introduced to Cressida, who holds a lively conversation with one 'Alexander' concerning the qualities of various Trojan heroes. Pandarus appears and attempts to sell her on the sundry excellencies of Troilus, concluding "Hector is not a better man than Troilus." He entertains her with a ribald joke about Helen and Troilus' beard. The Trojan heroes file by in parade, as the pair comments upon each of them, and then Pandarus departs, promising to bring Cressida "a token from Troilus."

We are then taken the Grecian camp, where Agamemnon, Ulysses, and other famous names debate political theory and decry Achilles and Patrochlus for amusing themselves by staging satirical skits about the Greek leaders. Meanwhile, at Ajax' tent, Ajax and his slave Thersites are piling crude insults upon each other. Ajax calls him, 'dog,' 'bitch-wolf's son,' 'vinewedest,' 'toadstool,' 'porpentine,' and other old chestnuts from the arsenal of calumny; Thersites tells Ajax, "I would thou didst itch from head to foot and I had the scratching of thee; I would make thee the loathsomest scab in Greece." Thersites soon leaves Ajax and puts himself into the service of Achilles, who appreciates his bitter, caustic humor.

The scenes switch between the relationship and the political. However, the Greek and Trojan leaders depicted (most notably Achilles) are markedly different in character from their portrayals in the Homeric epics.

External link

• The History of Troilus and Cressida (http://william-shakespeare.classic-literature.co.uk/the-history-of-troilus-and-cressida/) - HTML version of this title.
• Troilus and Cressida (http://www.gutenberg.net/etext/1790) - plain vanilla text from Project Gutenberg

Troilus and Cressida is also an opera by William Walton; see Troilus and Cressida (opera).