SOURCE: Laroque, François. “Pagan Ritual, Christian Liturgy, and Folk Customs in The Winter's Tale.” Cahiers Élisabéthains, no. 22 (October 1982): 25-32.

In the following essay, Laroque asserts that possible correlations exist between The Winter's Tale and the cycles of the year associated with pagan, Christian, and folk traditions.

In traditional Christianity the religion is learned less from the Bible than from the cycle of the Christian year, which is a ritual re-living of the life of Christ. Within this cycle the events of the Old Testament are interwoven in such a way that they form, not a continuous story, but a system of oracles or prophecies.

(Alan Watts)¹

With its “solstitial title”,² its rich and syncretic religious vocabulary and its multiple allusions to ancient myths and to both Old and New Testaments, The Winter's Tale may well appear as the happy hunting ground of allegorical or ritualistic approaches...