Comedies of Errors: Shakespeare, Indian Cinema, and The Poetics of Mistaken Identity

The Comedy of Errors, as Shakespeare himself recognized when he adapted his play from the Plautine originals and called it The Comedy of Errors, is a reductio ad absurdum of the narrative of mis-taken identity. By creating a plot around two sets of twins, Shakespeare self-consciously draws attention to the role of the twin conceit in generating misrecognition. For Aristotle, tragedy was based on anagnorisis or recognition that arises from a failure of understanding or misrecognition that can be tragic in its consequences. The Comedy of Errors is also a play about misrecognition but, unlike tragedy that has profound consequences for the protagonist’s self-understanding, The Comedy of Errors invites us to take pleasure in the incongruous and inappropriate emotional responses that are solicited by situations that are erroneously appraised and understood, from mistakenly placed or seemingly inappropriate affection to misplaced anger or rage.