What's the symbolism of the flowers in The Winter's Tale?

Question

In Act IV, Scene IV of *The Winter's Tale*, Perdita is "mistress o' the feast", playing hostess at the sheep-shearing feast, when King Polixenes and Camillo arrive in disguise. Perdita gives them both flowers, accompanied by the following short speech: > Give me those flowers there, Dorcas. Reverend sirs, For you there's rosemary and rue; these keep Seeming and savour all the winter long: Grace and remembrance be to you both, And welcome to our shearing! But it doesn't end there. She and Polixenes, along with Florizel and Camillo, talk at *length* about flowers for the next 60-odd lines. (I won't quote all those lines here, since the full text of the play is freely available and easy to find online, for example [here](http://shakespeare.mit.edu/winters_tale/full.html).) When I saw *The Winter's Tale* performed in the theatre, this conversation was actually cut out, as were some later sections of the sheep-shearing feast in this very long scene. But I remember hearing that the conversation about flowers had some special significance and symbolism relating to the plot. **Is there more to this conversation than just idle chat about flowers?** If so, what is the hidden meaning and/or symbolism?

Answer 1

A good edition of the play with footnotes will provide a specific history for each flower referenced: I'd recommend the Penguin or Folger editions for ease of accessibility, and the Arden edition if you really want to get into the details. Generally though, Perdita is associated with flowers to associate her seasonally and symbolically with spring. Spring brings an end to winter, it is a season of rebirth, of hope, of things that once seemed dead coming back to life, much as she does later in the play from her birth-father's perspective. In performance of the play, this sequence is often more about music and imagery than about the particular individual floral references, so I am not surprised that some productions may cut individual dialogue details for time.