Original: His company must do his minions grace,
Modern: He has to entertain his favorites and flatterers,

Original: Whilst I at home starve for a merry look.
Modern: While I’m stuck at home, desperate for just one happy glance from him.

Original: Hath homely age the alluring beauty took
Modern: Has old age stolen away my attractive beauty

Original: From my poor cheek? then, he hath wasted it:
Modern: from my face? If so, then he’s the one who destroyed it.

Original: Are my discourses dull? barren my wit?
Modern: Is my conversation boring? Is my mind empty of clever thoughts?

Original: If voluble and sharp discourse be marr’d,
Modern: If quick and clever talk has been damaged,

Original: Unkindness blunts it more than marble hard:
Modern: cruelty dulls it more than the hardest stone.

Original: Do their gay vestments his affections bait?
Modern: Do their fancy clothes attract his love?

Original: That’s not my fault; he’s master of my state:
Modern: That’s not my fault—he controls my finances and position.

Original: What ruins are in me that can be found
Modern: What flaws can be found in me

Original: By him not ruin’d? then is he the ground
Modern: that he didn’t cause? Then he’s the source

Original: Of my defeatures. My decayed fair
Modern: of all my lost beauty. My faded looks

Original: A sunny look of his would soon repair;
Modern: would quickly be restored by just one loving look from him.

Original: But, too unruly deer, he breaks the pale
Modern: But like a wild deer that jumps the fence,

Original: And feeds from home: poor I am but his stale.
Modern: he goes elsewhere for satisfaction—I’m just his leftover, his backup.

Original: Adr. Unfeeling fools can with such wrongs dispense.
Modern: Only heartless fools can ignore such terrible treatment.

Original: I know his eye doth homage otherwhere,
Modern: I know he’s giving his attention to someone else,

Original: Or else what lets it but he would be here?
Modern: otherwise what would prevent him from being here with me?

Original: Sister, you know he promis’d me a chain:
Modern: Sister, you know he promised me a necklace—

Original: Would that alone, alone he would detain,
Modern: I wish that was the only thing he was keeping from me,

Original: So he would keep fair quarter with his bed!
Modern: as long as he would stay faithful in our marriage!

Original: I see, the jewel best enamelled
Modern: I see that even the most beautifully decorated jewel

Original: Will lose his beauty; and though gold bides still
Modern: will lose its beauty; and even though gold lasts longer

Original: That others touch, yet often touching will
Modern: when others handle it, constant touching will still

Original: Wear gold; and no man that hath a name,
Modern: wear down even gold; and no man with a reputation

Original: By falsehood and corruption doth it shame.
Modern: can avoid damaging it through lies and dishonesty.

Original: Since that my beauty cannot please his eye,
Modern: Since my beauty can no longer catch his attention,

Original: I’ll weep what’s left away, and weeping die.
Modern: I’ll cry away what little beauty remains, and die from grief.

In Act II, Scene i of The Comedy of Errors, the scene opens at the house of Antipholus of Ephesus, where Adriana and her sister Luciana are waiting for Antipholus to return home for dinner. Adriana grows increasingly frustrated and impatient at her husband’s absence, while Luciana counsels patience, arguing that husbands are by nature the masters of their wives and that women should defer to them. The two sisters engage in a back-and-forth debate on the subject of marriage, duty, and the freedom of men versus women, with Luciana urging Adriana to accept her husband’s authority, and Adriana pushing back, lamenting that she does not enjoy the same freedoms that her husband does.

The scene takes a turn when Dromio of Ephesus returns to the two women after having been sent to fetch Antipholus. He reports, in great confusion, that Antipholus denied having a wife, denied knowing his own home, and even struck Dromio when pressed on the matter. Adriana becomes increasingly distraught and suspicious upon hearing this account, growing convinced that her husband’s strange behavior may indicate that his affections have turned elsewhere. Luciana again attempts to calm her sister, but Adriana is deeply unsettled, and the scene closes with the two women heading out, determined to find Antipholus and get to the bottom of his bewildering conduct.

The Comedy of Errors centers on two sets of identical twins separated in infancy during a shipwreck. Antipholus of Syracuse and his servant Dromio of Syracuse arrive in Ephesus, unknowing that Antipholus’s twin brother (Antipholus of Ephesus) and his servant (Dromio of Ephesus) live there. The Syracuse visitors are unaware of local laws that condemn Syracusans to death unless they pay a heavy fine, though the Duke grants Antipholus of Syracuse until evening to find the money.

The confusion begins immediately when the wrong Dromio approaches Antipholus of Syracuse, speaking of dinner and a wife waiting at home. Meanwhile, Antipholus of Ephesus’s wife Adriana and her sister Luciana encounter what they believe is Adriana’s husband (actually his twin), leading Adriana to drag the bewildered Syracuse twin home for dinner. The errors multiply as both masters beat the wrong servants, money and gold chains are given to and demanded from the wrong people, and Antipholus of Syracuse finds himself locked out of his own home while his twin dines inside with his wife.

The chaos escalates when a goldsmith demands payment from Antipholus of Syracuse for a chain delivered to his twin, leading to an arrest. Adriana, believing her husband has gone mad, calls for Dr. Pinch to exorcise him, while both Dromios suffer beatings and confusion from their mistaken identities. The resolution comes when old Egeon, condemned to die at sunset for being a Syracusan in Ephesus, recognizes both Antipholus twins as his sons. The Abbess of the local priory reveals herself to be Emilia, Egeon’s long-lost wife and the twins’ mother, reuniting the family and resolving all the mistaken identities. The Duke pardons Egeon, the twins are reconciled with their respective lives, and order is restored to Ephesus.