Pericles

Pericles, Prince of Tyre, written around 1608, is a sprawling romance of adventure, loss, and miraculous reunion. The play follows Pericles across the ancient Mediterranean as he flees the wrath of the tyrant Antiochus, whose incestuous secret Pericles has discovered. His wanderings take him through shipwrecks, tournaments, and foreign courts. In Pentapolis, he wins the hand of the virtuous Thaisa, but on a sea voyage, Thaisa apparently dies in childbirth during a storm. Pericles places her body in a sealed chest and casts it overboard, then leaves his newborn daughter Marina in the care of the governor of Tarsus.

Years pass. Thaisa, revived by a physician, has become a priestess of Diana. Marina, grown into a young woman of extraordinary grace and virtue, survives a murder attempt and captivity in a brothel through sheer force of character, converting everyone she encounters to virtue. The aged, grief-stricken Pericles, believing both wife and daughter dead, is restored to life by the miraculous recognition scene with Marina, one of the most moving passages Shakespeare ever wrote. A vision of the goddess Diana then directs him to Thaisa's temple, where the family is reunited at last.

Pericles is widely believed to be a collaboration, with Shakespeare writing the final three acts and an unknown author (possibly George Wilkins) responsible for the first two. Despite its uneven texture, the play's later scenes achieve extraordinary emotional power. Its themes of patience in suffering, the redemptive power of innocence, and the grace of unexpected reunion make it an important precursor to Shakespeare's final masterpieces.