Love's Labour's Lost

In Love’s Labour’s Lost, William Shakespeare examines the value and legitimacy of the masculine pursuit of love. The initial oath sworn by the men devalues the pursuit of love compared to pious intellectual pursuit. However, Berowne argues against this, and later all four Lords commit to the notion that pursuing love should be their paramount aim. Berowne suggests that love is the most valuable type of knowledge, arguing that women “are the books, the arts, the academes / That show, contain, and nourish all the world” (4.3.346-47). Shakespeare leans into the romantic idea central to many of his works that love enriches and inspires.

The four Lords embody a masculine pursuit of love typical of the literary and theatrical conventions of the period: They write sonnets and gift the women tokens of their affection. They hyperbolize the beauty of the women they are pursuing, and the way this love has altered their lives. For example, in the sonnets they read in 4.3, Berowne highlights the absurdity of Dumaine and Longaville’s heightened language, describing a romantic ideal to which a real person could never live up: “This is the liver vein, which makes flesh a deity” (4.3.74-75). However, this is laden with dramatic