Shakespeare's plays are still around because his characters experience life so much like we do still. Discuss these questions with your friends and jot down some of your ideas about some of the following situations. You might realize you have a lot in common with the characters in The Comedy of Errors.

• Have you ever visited a foreign country and felt like you—or maybe everybody else—was just a bit crazy, because of the differences between you and the way everybody thought and acted? What was the situation? What experiences made you feel particularly out of tune? Did the situation—or your feelings about it—ever change, and if so, how?
• Have you ever had the experience of people taking you for somebody else—not literally confusing you with another person, but rather thinking that you were somebody that you don't really see yourself as being? In other words, has your own perception of the kind of person you are been quite different from the perceptions of people looking from the outside in? What did you see, and what did they see? Why the difference? And how did it make you feel?
• Have you ever been in a situation with a close friend or family member whom you trust when there's been a total breakdown in communication—you're both telling the truth but you're both positive that the other person is lying to you? What were the circumstances? What made you think the other person had to be lying? How did the two of you figure out what was going on—and how did the whole mess make you feel?
• Have you ever felt that being in love changed you, that the person you were in the past was somehow transformed in some very real way? What about you seemed different? Was it your feelings? Your appearance? Your personality? The way others viewed you? The way you viewed yourself? Describe the sense of transformation you experienced, and talk about how it made you feel.

Extra Challenge
Ask your parents about these situations. They might surprise you with their answers!