Note 7 — Chapter IV · TERENCE AND HIS SUCCESSORS

The Merry Wives of Windsor, though it contains no prologue, is fully as explicit in the preparation of every incident—even the two basket-scenes—as any play of Plautus. Indeed most of Shakespeare’s plays give more attention to preparation than is customary on the stage today even though his plots were usually familiar ones. The Romeo and Juliet even has a prologue which goes so far as to disclose the outcome.