The language-world of early modern England was thick with oaths and vows, from casual profanity in taverns to the solemn undertakings of those marrying or accepting public office. Moralists urged the seriousness of oaths, casuists advised on how to undo them. There were religious and legal debates about what it meant to swear and how firmly one should keep a promise. The literature of the time reflects the prevalence of oaths and vows and the arguments about their status. But Shakespeare was exceptional in the density, depth and subtlety with which he explored these issues. His plays are full of oaths and vows doing structural, psychological and verbally minute, inventive work. Ranging across the output, but paying particular attention to Troilus and Cressida and The Winter's Tale, this talk aims to rectify scholarly neglect of the topic, using historical, philosophical and stage-related arguments to highlight Shakespeare's awareness of the paradoxes of oath-taking and vowing and their potency in performance.

John Kerrigan is Professor of English 2000 at the University of Cambridge. Among his books are Revenge Tragedy: Aeschylus to Armageddon (1996), On Shakespeare and Early Modern Literature (2001) and Archipelagic English: Literature, History, and Politics 1603-1707 (2008). He is currently completing a book on British and Irish poetry since the 1960s.