Marriage for Marriage

What struck me about Measure for Measure--a play I had not seen or read or knew very much about--were the different ways that marriage was used. It seemed to involve both pain and punishment on the one hand, and pleasure and reward on the other.
Angelo is instructed to marry Mariana as a punishment for his deceit; Lucio must marry his whore as punishment for slandering the Duke. No wedded bliss for these four. There were condemned to look at each others' ugly mugs as payback for carnal knowledge.
But, lest we think marriage merely be a death sentence among the Elizabethan set, The Duke provides the only romantic spark by, improbably, asking Isabella to marry him. His offer is, by the parlance of today, a companionate union: " What's mine is yours and what is yours is mine."
Charming, I guess, but what can't help but wonder what the good Duke thinks of an institution that he can banish people to for crimes against the state

"Why art thou thus attired, Andronicus?" or Do Clothes Make the Man?

On the subway on our way to see "Measure for Measure" at the Duke Theater, David was rereading "Catcher in the Rye" in honor of Salinger's recent death. Emerging in Times Square's hubbub, he noted how little people seem to care about presenting themselves in public. It's certainly true that a lot has changed since the porkpie hat, the Saturday tie, the bolero suit and heels, the bonnets and canes. But Shakespeare still has a lot to say about dressing up.

While Titus rather foolishly dresses up to look a lot like the Swedish chef (this was in a performance the next day at the American Globe Theater--upstairs in a church that bizarrely reeked of incense(it was Episcopal)) by the time Shakespeare got round to writing "Measure for Measure," he was taking clothes a lot more seriously.

The play is filled with "seemers." Isabella berates Angelo "Seeming! Seeming," and echoes of seams and schemes resound. Lucio describes Friar Ludowick (the Duke) of being "Honest in nothing but his clothes..." What can we take of Shakespeare's sartorial universe when we're back on the streets and riding the subways?