Metaphor, Empowerment, Enslavement, and Transformation: The Thing-Narrative in The Winter’s Tale

Previous studies on Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale tend to lay emphasis on an anthropocentric perspective, with little attention to different “things” that come through in the play. This essay discussed the agency of objects through the lens of thing-narrative so as to glimpse into their hidden features. This essay constellates four functions of things, namely metaphor, empowerment, enslavement, and transformation to elucidates how things construct human identity, advance the story, and change the tone. It also reveals how things are uniquely placed to enhance their subjectivity, create an organic unity in which humans and non-humans interact with each other, and further give the play a deeper vitality.