Antipholus of Syracuse

Play

The Comedy of Errors

Summary

Antipholus of Syracuse arrives in Ephesus with his servant Dromio searching for the twin brother he has never known. He is a melancholy wanderer whose sense of self is repeatedly dissolved as strangers treat him as someone they know intimately. His bewilderment takes on an almost metaphysical quality — he wonders if he is dreaming or bewitched — while he simultaneously and comically falls in love with Adriana's sister Luciana, the one person in Ephesus who is actually a stranger to him.

Notable Quotations

"I to the world am like a drop of water / That in the ocean seeks another drop." *(1.2)*

"Am I in earth, in heaven, or in hell? / Sleeping or waking, mad or well-advised?" *(2.2)*

Cross-references

• The Comedy of Errors — the play
• Comedies
• character_antipholus_of_ephesus — his twin brother
• character_dromio_of_syracuse — his servant
• character_luciana — whom he courts
• character_egeon — his father, the play's framing figure