Shakespeare’s most famous stage direction–exit, pursued by a bear–seals the fates of just about every character in The Winter’s Tale:

  • Antigonus, who is gobbled up
  • Perdita, left in a strange place with no human connection to her birth
  • Leontes, who already regrets abandoning Perdita but now has no way to find her
  • the shepherd and clown, who are enriched by finding and raising her
  • Florizel, who later falls in love with her
  • Polixenes, who disinherits him for it but later reconciles with Leontes on account of it

Exit, pursued by a bear–it sets up for tragedy, but it also sets up for comedy. In what other genre can a man being chased by a bear eventually bring about resolution to a 16-year breach of trust?