The Two Gentlemen of Verona is a comedy by Shakespeare from early in his career. It is dismissively regarded by most critics as a "problem play," and seldom performed. The highlight of the play is frequently considered to be the comic servingman Launce and his dog Crab.
The two gentlemen of the title are Valentine and Proteus. Valentine leaves Verona to visit Padua (or possibly Milan, the context is often unclear), where he soon finds his lustful affections engaged by an aristocratic lady who is not at all averse to his favors. Proteus, joining him several scenes later, falls for the same high-born lady. The classical triangle is sent spinning when Proteus' lady love puts on man's attire to pay an unexpected visit. Even Launce finds romance, whereupon he devises a comic resume of the attributes of a lower-class girl "whose faults exceed her hairs."
The TwoGentlemen of Verona is a comedy by William Shakespeare from early in his career.
A major theme of the play is the contest between friendship and love: that is, the question of whether the relationship between two male friends is more important than that between lovers.
Valentine's attempt at rescuing Silvia from her controlling father, and his subsequent banishment, is distantly reminiscent of what happens to Romeo in Romeo and Juliet.
Verona is in Veneto, a province in northeastern Italy.
The climax of The TwoGentlemen of Verona occurs, according to the first definition, in Act V, Scene IV, when Valentine defends Silvia against the advances of Proteus, shames him, and causes him to repent his untoward behavior, both to Silvia and to Julia.
Shakespeare wrote The TwoGentlemen of Verona very early in his career, about 1592 or 1593, when he was still in his twenties and his writing was in its formative stage.
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