In "The Two Gentlemen of Verona" Shakespeare makes similar youthful
mistakes in portraiture to those we noticed in "Love's Labour's Lost";
mistakes which show that he is thinking of himself and his own
circumstances. At the beginning of the play the only difference between
Proteus and Valentine is that one is in love, and the other, heart-free,
is leaving home to go to Milan. In this first scene Shakespeare speaks
frankly through both Proteus and Valentine, just as he spoke through
both the King and Biron in the first scene of "Love's Labour's Lost,"
and through both AEgeon and Antipholus of Syracuse in "The Comedy of
Errors." But whilst the circumstances in the earliest comedy are
imaginary and fantastic, the circumstances in "The Two Gentlemen of
Verona" are manifestly, I think, taken from the poet's own experience.
In the dialogue between Valentine and Proteus I hear Shakespeare
persuading himself that he should leave Stratford. Some readers may
regard this assumption as far-fetched, but it will appear the more
plausible, I think, the more the dialogue is studied.
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