Parolles 'Self-Discovery In All's Well That Ends Well'

Parolles’s Self-discovery
One of the most intriguing and discussion worthy characters in William Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well is the braggart Parolles. He fills every scene he is in with a vital energy and is always talking up himself and his accomplishments. He has a major change of character at one point however. For the first half of the play Parolles acts like he truly believes himself to be a man worthy of a high position in court. He considers himself to be socially above Bertram and he loves to be crude both about and to women, but he is serious about it. He cannot see he is truly a fool. With these factors in mind it can be argued that it is not until Act IV Scene iii that Parolles, after being forced to face the reality

In this moment Parolles is fully shedding ties to the old version of himself. He is ditching his need to impress people and embracing his role as a fool. He is consciously becoming the clown that is strictly talk. This realization that he truly a man of only words and never actions causes him to truly embody the name, which means “words” in French, that is was so aptly given to him by Shakespeare. Parolles goes on to qualify this in his next few lines by explaining that he “Who knows himself to be a braggart, let him fear this, for it will come to pass that every braggart shall be found an ass” (4.3.405-335-336). In this beat he is clearly regretting all of his wasted efforts in approving to seem fashionable. He realizes that what has just occurred was inevitable and he is sounding the alarm for any other braggarts to be aware of their fate. The next line builds on this idea of the things that are inevitable happening. “Rust, sword! Cool, Blushes! And parolees, live safest in shame!” is Parolles attempting to compare the unavoidable fact that a sword will rust and an embarrassing blush witll eventually cool to his now stupidly obvious understanding that his place in the world is to live as the idiot he truly is(4.3.405-339-340). He is now happy that he has had such a nasty trick played on him. He states “Being fooled, by fool’ry thrive!” on line 340, essentially meaning that this deception that the soldiers have committed has given him new life (4.3.405-340). Parolles finishes off this reflective passage by announcing to the audience that he is not yet done, and that his presence is still needed on stage for the remainder of the play. He does this by saying “There’s place and means for every man alive. Ill after them” (4.3.405-340). This line is also making the point that there will be room for Parolles in this plot until