The trappings of 'All's Well That Ends Well'

All's Well That Ends Well belongs to a period of the London stage dominated by problem plays that depend on trickery and reversals, most often sexual trickery combined with familial, economic, and sociopolitical calculation, played out for gain as contests of wit. All's Well's style too focuses on witty proverbial language to sum up wisdom, stimulate thought, analyze actors and actions, embody abundant intellectual and emotional energies, and provide rhetorical display. The play's characters predominantly and repeatedly employ such language with other stylistic techniques such as recurring image references, linguistic trappings, to challenge and counter-challenge and ultimately entrap each other. Moreover Shakespeare replicates and varies the dominant patterns of intrigue plotting notable in problem plays by offering a series of reversals that constitute false temporary endings before presenting the extensive climactic set of surprising and revealing reversals that reaffirm his heroine's extraordinary witty victory in the battle of the sexes and society. This reading thus tries to illustrate the importance of analyzing style for understanding the inseparably intertwined narration and theme.