A Tea Time Quiz - Ten Shakespearean 'T's

Answer: Thurio

The play in question is 'The Two Gentleman of Verona', one of Shakespeare's earliest works that is believed to have been written between 1589 and 1593. The eponymous characters were Valentine and Proteus, while Thurio was the wealthy but foolish suitor whom the Duke of Milan favoured as a potential son-in-law. Valentine was the first to travel to Milan and fall in love with Silvia, as Proteus had initially remained in Verona with Julia, the woman he loved. Once Proteus turned up in Milan he forgot all about his first love, transferred his affections to Silvia and betrayed Valentine's secret plan to escape from the city with Silvia to her father. Proteus, having abandoned both his best friend and his former love, then descended further into villainy by attempting to force Silvia to accept his advances.

At this point, you'd be forgiven for not identifying this story as one of Shakespeare's comedies. However, the play concluded with a neat happy ending: Valentine forgave Proteus and their friendship was salvaged; the Duke approved Silvia's marriage to Valentine; Proteus and Julia were reunited (despite the fact that she had witnessed his infidelity first-hand); and Thurio's poor character and cowardice were exposed.

Answer: Timon

Timon was the title character of 'Timon of Athens' and Athens was the city that Timon was forced to flee after he lost his wealth. The play was written by Shakespeare around 1605, probably in collaboration with fellow playwright Thomas Middleton. Although it was historically classified as one of Shakespeare's tragedies, some later critics have chosen to describe it as an additional 'problem play' due to its mix of tragic and comic content.

Timon's generosity backfired on him as, instead of gaining him real friends, he in fact simply attracted people who wanted his money and gifts. After the same 'friends' refused to assist him when he fell into financial distress, Timon realised that he had made a serious error in his judgement of them and vowed revenge. Having fled the city he was forced to take shelter in a cave and miraculously discovered a plentiful source of gold. He returned to his habit of giving away the wealth, but this time he gave it to causes likely to bring about the destruction of Athens and its people - a rebel who intended to raise an army to attack the city and two prostitutes intended to spread sexually transmitted diseases amongst the population.

Answer: Titus Andronicus

'Titus Andronicus' is the only one of Shakespeare's plays set in the Roman Empire to be based on a fictional story rather than historical events. It is believed to have been written around 1590, although Shakespeare's authorship of the play has been questioned by literary critics for centuries.

The eponymous character Titus Andronicus was the Roman general who returned victorious from a lengthy war against the Goths. After refusing to become Roman Emperor and recommending the previous Emperor's son, Saturninus, for the job instead, Titus killed the eldest son of Tamora, Queen of the Goths as revenge for the loss of some of his own sons in the war. He also murdered his own son, Mutius, for refusing to support his decision to marry off his daughter Lavinia to Saturninus (breaking her betrothal to Saturninus' brother Bassanius in the process). This set off events which resulted in the murder of Bassanius, the rape and mutilation of Lavinia, the execution of two more of Titus's sons, Titus having his hand chopped off, a threat to hang a baby, an unpleasant incident of cannibalism, Titus killing four more people (including Tamora and Lavinia), Saturnius killing Titus and finally Titus's son Lucius killing Saturnius and becoming the new Emperor.

Early printed versions of the play gave it the title 'The Most Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus', which seems something of an understatement once the body count is totted up.

Answer: Titania

'A Midsummer Night's Dream' tells the story of how Oberon, the King of the Fairies, managed to influence the love lives of a group of young Athenians with the help of a magical flower. At the start of the play, Lysander was in love with Hermia (who was betrothed to Demetrius), while Hermia's friend Helena was in love with Demetrius. Oberon's servant, Puck, had created a potion from the "love-in-idleness" flower that could be rubbed onto the eyelids of his unsuspecting victims and cause them to fall in love with the next person they set eyes on. After the group of lovers wandered into the fairies' forest, various comic mishaps resulted in both Lysander and Demetrius being made to fall in love with Helena, before Lysander was returned to his original state of being in love with Hermia. Luckily that meant everyone was then successfully matched up and the ubiquitous happy ending was secured.

However, Oberon didn't just happen to have a magic love potion ready to use on the Athenian lovers. He had actually had it produced in order to humiliate Titania, the Queen of the Fairies, by making her fall in love with an animal. She ended up falling in love with Bottom, whose head had been transformed into that of a donkey. Bottom was a weaver who was one of the 'mechanicals' group of jobbing actors. The play is believed to have been written by Shakespeare around 1595 or 1596 and is one of his most popular stories.

Answer: Tybalt

Shakespeare's classic tragic love story 'Romeo and Juliet' is the play that features Tybalt. It is set in the northern Italian city of Verona and is believed to have been written in the early part of the 1590s. However, the characters and basic plot were not the product of Shakespeare's imagination - his play was clearly heavily influenced by a mid-16th century poem called 'The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet' by Arthur Brooke and the poem itself was based on an older French or Italian story (whose exact provenance is unknown).

The play tells the story of the warring Montague and Capulet families. Romeo Montague meets and falls in love with Juliet Capulet and the couple eventually have to get married in secret because it is clear that their respective parents will never agree to the match - in particular Juliet's father is busy making arrangements for her to marry Count Paris, a relative of the Prince of Verona. It is at this point that an enraged Tybalt (enraged because Romeo dared to gate-crash a Capulet party) challenges Romeo to a duel, kills Romeo's friend, Mercutio, and is slain by Romeo in revenge. The Prince of Verona duly banishes Romeo from the city and Juliet (with the help of Friar Laurence) comes up with a desperate plan to be with Romeo by pretending to be dead. Unfortunately Romeo isn't informed of the plan, kills himself when he discovers Juliet's 'dead' body and Juliet then kills herself when she discovers Romeo's. The tragedy brought the two warring families back together, but at an incredibly high cost.

Answer: Troilus

'Troilus and Cressida' is essentially about the Trojan Wars and most of the scenes relate to the battles that take place as a result of the ongoing conflict between Priam, King of Troy and Agamemnon, King of the Greeks. Many of the characters that appear in the play would be familiar to audience members with even a basic working knowledge of Homer's 'Iliad' or Greek mythology in general - particularly the Greek princes Achilles and Ajax; the Trojan princes Hector and Paris; and King Menelaus of Sparta and his wife, Helen of Troy.

However, the play takes its name from a minor plot point involving two of the other characters, Prince Troilus of Troy and Cressida, the daughter of a Trojan priest who had defected to the Greeks. When Cressida is sent to the Greeks in exchange for a Trojan prisoner of war, she is separated from Troilus, who has secretly become her lover. The heartbroken Troilus then hotfoots it over to the Greek camp to see her, only to find her agreeing to be the lover of the Greek prince Diomedes instead. He therefore ends up even more heartbroken and distinctly vengeful. Although the play is commonly classified as a tragedy, it is one of the three major 'problem plays' as it also contains a significant number of comedic moments.

Answer: Thaisa

Pericles, the Prince of Tyre, is forced to abandon his home city after the King of Antioch sets an assassin after him. (Pericles had deliberately failed a competition set by the king to find a husband for his daughter, mainly because he didn't want to have to accuse the king of incest - an act that would have meant certain death anyway.) Caught in a storm, Pericles is shipwrecked and he (and his now slightly rusty suit of armour) are washed up on the coast of Pentapolis. The King of Pentapolis is also looking for a husband for his daughter, Thaisa, and holds a tournament with Thaisa as the prize for the winner. Pericles duly wins the event and Thaisa becomes his wife. However, when the couple attempt to return to Tyre, a massive storm threatens the ship at the same time as Thaisa gives birth to their daughter Marina. Pericles believes Thaisa to have died in childbirth, agrees for her body to be cast overboard and leaves his new-born daughter in the care of the governor of the nearby port of Tarsus.

The authorship of this first part of 'Pericles, Prince of Tyre' is disputed, with many modern literary scholars attributing it to a pamphlet writer named George Wilkins. The second part of the play - where an adult Marina is sold off to a brothel by her uncaring guardians, Pericles is wrongly informed that his daughter has died and a somewhat unlikely dream message from a goddess results in the whole family (including Thaisa) eventually being reunited - is generally accepted as the work of Shakespeare himself.

Answer: Touchstone

At the beginning of 'As You Like It', Duke Frederick had overthrown his elder brother, Duke Senior, taken over his court and had him exiled from his home. Duke Senior's daughter - the play's heroine, Rosalind - had been allowed to remain as she was particularly friendly with her cousin Celia, Frederick's daughter. However, it is not long before she attracts both the attention of a young man, Orlando, and with it the ire of her uncle. Rosalind and Celia therefore agree to flee the court together and head for the Forest of Arden, where Rosalind's father has also taken shelter. They also take Touchstone the court fool (otherwise known as a jester) along with them - a fact that eventually leads to the utterance of the famous line "A fool, a fool! I met a fool i' the forest". Once in the forest, the court exiles mix freely with the local country people and love blossoms between various couples. Rosalind and Orlando (who has also fled there) are reunited; Celia falls in love with Orlando's elder brother, Oliver; and Touchstone ends up with a simple shepherdess named Audrey.

The Forest of Arden, the main setting of 'As You Like It', is a fictional location in France. It is unclear whether Shakespeare meant it to represent the genuine Forest of Ardennes, which covers parts of France, Belgium and Luxembourg, or whether the name came from the wooded area of central England often known unofficially as the Forest of Arden. The English 'Forest of Arden' is located close to Shakespeare's birthplace in Stratford-on-Avon and shares its name with Shakespeare's mother, Mary Arden.

Answer: Trebonius

In Act I Scene II of William Shakespeare's 'Julius Caesar' (also known as 'The Tragedy of Julius Caesar'), a soothsayer approaches the play's ill-fated title character and utters the famous line "Beware the Ides of March". Caesar rather foolishly dismisses the advice and on the 15th of March, 44 BC, is assassinated by a group of conspirators led by his friend Brutus and a Roman senator named Cassius, along with Caius Ligarius, Casca, Cinna, Decius Brutus, Metellus Cimbus and Trebonius. The latter distracts Caesar's supporter, Marc Antony, off stage while the others stab Caesar to death. Afterwards, Antony eloquently rouses public opinion ("Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears") against the conspirators and succeeds in driving them out of Rome. Brutus and Cassius later fight against Antony's forces at the Battle of Philippi and Brutus - particularly troubled by his actions in the murder of his friend and the appearance of Caesar's ghost - commits suicide.

'Julius Caesar' is generally dated to 1599 and is a reflection of true events in Roman history - although unsurprisingly these events are portrayed with a great deal of artistic license!

Answer: Tullus Aufidius

In the early scenes of 'Coriolanus', the successful Roman general Caius Marcius was fighting against the Volscian army led by his sworn enemy, a man by the name of Tullus Aufidius. After Marcius defeated the Volscians, captured the city of Corioli and fought Aufidius in hand-to-hand combat he returned to Rome a hero and was granted the use of the name "Coriolanus". However, Coriolanus's popularity proved short-lived and his attempt to gain the high-ranking political position of Roman consul ended when he spectacularly lost his temper and was exiled as a traitor. In a bid to gain revenge, Coriolanus joined forces with Tullus Aufidius to attack Rome, but was eventually persuaded to spare the city by his mother. Unfortunately, this change of heart meant the end of his unlikely truce with the Volscian leader and Tullus Aufidius duly arranged to have him executed.

'Coriolanus' - one of Shakespeare's later tragedies - is probably based on real events and real people in Roman history. Although Shakespeare's tale matches up with the historical story of a Roman general called Gaius Marcius Coriolanus, some historians doubt the accuracy of the ancient records of his life and whether or not he was actually just a mythical figure. The Volsci definitely did exist though - they were an Italian tribe who inhabited an area to the south-east of the city of Rome prior to around 300 BC.