The character in A Winter's Tale that intrigued me the most was Paulina. I was first intrigued by her blatant honesty and fiery words in her initial confrontation with Leontes. I found it extraordinary that a female character would be allowed to speak such harsh and direct words and go unpunished for it.
As the play went along, I started to question her relationships with both Leontes and Hermoine. After her first confrontation with Leontes, I found it curious that he punished her husband rather than her. Don't get me wrong, I understand that during that time husbands were responsible for keeping their women in line. This explains why Leontes burdens her husband Antigonus with the task of abandoning the baby. However, she is merely a gentlewoman, and she told off her King, whom she should respect perhaps even MORE so than her husband. Particularly looking at how she basically added fuel to the fire with her words and the showing of the baby, howcome Leontes didn't punish her, imprison her, or have her killed? He sure didn't show any mercy for his own wife, and Hermoine was nothing but respectful and obedient to him the whole time!
Later in the play, the relationship between Leontes and Paulina seems even weirder. Although they do not say this directly, you can tell that she has been harping him for the past 16 years. Howcome he puts up with it? He also swears to her that he will not marry another person, that the only person he would ever be with again would be Hermoine. Ummm... why is he swearing to her? What authority does she have? Howcome she has always had such a control over him?
The relationship between Paulina and Hermoine is also very strange. I noticed something suspicious in scene III of Act 5. If you look at the stage direction in italics, it says "Pauline draws a curtain, and discovers Hermoine standing like a statue." Since Shakespeare gives it away here that it is not really a statue, I think he is trying to point out that Paulina knew that what was behind the curtain was a real person. Even though she says things like "You'll mar it if you kiss it (V:iii:82)," I think she is merely playing along. The explanation that Paulina has been secretly harboring the Queen is the only one that makes sense to me. Initially, I had thought it was so stupid that a statue would just magically turn into a human out of nowhere when there have been no elements of magic in this play (and I didn't forget the Oracle but that person isn't so much magical as they are blessed by the higher power). If you look at the end of Scene III of Act 5 though, it would only make sense that she has known all along. Unless we went as far as saying that Paulina has magic powers (which I really don't think she does), she was pretending to have magic powers so that she wouldn't get in trouble for harboring the Queen for 16 years. Because if Leontes knew, he would probably feel pretty angry (and I wouldn't blame him) that this woman has been making him feel extremely guilty for the past 16 years while she's known all along that the Queen has been alive. Maybe my theory is radical, but I just think Paulina and the Queen plotted this whole thing, from the swoon in court, to the statue, to get revenge. (The only thing I can't really make sense of with this theory is the ghost of Hermoine that Antigonus saw on the ship)
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In response to your question "how come he puts up with it?" when talking about Paulina "harping" on Leontes for all these years, I, too, have wondered the same thing. I think one possible reason is that Leontes sees his wife in Paulina because of the strong bond the two women had. For instance, as you metioned, when the king swears to Paulina that he will not ever marry again, he might feel as if he’s swearing to his wife—promising her, via Paulina, that he won’t ever marry again—he won’t ever replace her. Maybe in order to deal with his guilt he treats Paulina well and succumbs to her authority because for him, Paulina represents Hermione and he is trying to deal with his guilt.
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