apuntes asignatura shakeaspeare segundo eeii, Apuntes de Literatura Clásica

¡Descarga apuntes asignatura shakeaspeare segundo eeii y más Apuntes en PDF de Literatura Clásica solo en Docsity! 11. Women in Shakespeare’s plays. One of the persistent topics of interest in the field of Shakespeare studies is that which considers the various roles that women play in the bard’s comedies and tragedies. Literary and historical scholars affirm that women did not enjoy political, economic, or social parity with men during Shakespeare’s time and this historical reality is important to keep in mind when analyzing the variety of female characters in the plays of Shakespeare. In this Shakespearean society, it was men who held exclusively the official posts of authority and power, and men who possessed the agency and influence to direct the outcome of events. Nevertheless, the careful reader notices a curious trend in many of Shakespeare’s plays: many of Shakespeare’s female characters exercise a rather great deal of subtle forms of power and influence, and often do so in unusual and even subversive ways that challenge traditional gender roles. Falsely Accused of Adultery Women in Shakespeare’s plays are sometimes wrongly accused of adultery and suffer greatly as a result. For example, Desdemona is killed by Othello who supposes her infidelity and Hero falls terribly ill when she is falsely accused by Claudio. It seems that Shakespeare’s women are judged by their sexuality even when they remain faithful to their husbands and husbands-to-be. Some feminists believe that this demonstrates a male insecurity about female sexuality. The Married Off Woman Many of Shakespeare’s comedies end with an eligible woman being married off – and therefore being made safe. These women are often very young and passed from their father’s care to their new husband’s. More often than not, these are high-born characters such as Miranda in The Tempest who is married to Ferdinand, Helena and Hermia in A Midsummer Night’s Dreamand Hero in Much Ado About Nothing. 12. Courtly love in Shakespeare’s plays. By the time that Shakespeare began to deal with courtly love, courtesy meant more than the medieval idea of a willingness to undertake love-service. It meant gentlemanly conduct, refined manners, intellect, and a high moral purpose. When Shakespeare took up the courtly theme, it had been refined considerably. In an early treatment of the theme, Shakespeare satirizes the folly connected with courtly love and the courtly ideal. This is seen in Love's Labour's Lost where the ladies only toy with the men and where love is not triumphant. In The Two Gentlemen of Verona the satirical vein is continued and the weaknesses inherent in courtly love are exposed in the struggle between love and friendship. As You Like It is another play in this group where courtly love is satirized. Rosalind becomes the spokesman for sincerity and faithfulness in love and condemns artificiality and sham. In a group of plays which treats the courtly theme as comedy (A Midsummer Night's Dream, Twelfth Night, Henry IV (Part I), and Henry V) Shakespeare is more fun-loving and gentler in his presentation than he was in the plays where courtly love was treated satirically. No serious issue mars the comic atmosphere as we see the humorous side of love in each of these plays. In another group, Romeo and Juliet, The Winter's Tale, and Cymbeline, we see the strength derived from romantic love which is presented as a genuine passion leading to permanence. Such love gives strength in adversity and though love ends tragically in Romeo and Juliet and nearly ends tragically in the other two plays, we see that it enables the lovers to meet their fate, even when it is death. Shakespeare reverses the theme in the following plays: All's Well that Ends Well, Much Ado about Nothing, Measure for Measure, and Richard II. In the first three the lady uses a trick to win her man, and in Richard II she pleads for love but is rebuffed. The scheming and trickery of the first three plays in this group brings the theme close to unpleasantness and degrades the courtly lover. Shakespeare here probes the realistic aspects of the theme and shows men and women as they really are. This treatment is followed through in the tragedies Troilus and Cressida, Hamlet, and Othello, where the unpleasant, realistic aspects of courtly love lead naturally to tragedy. In these tragedies the gaiety and idealism of the conventions of courtly love have disappeared completely and the true possibilities have been exposed. After these plays, courtly love no longer could supply a valid pattern for loving and living. In The Tempest the theme is subverted and love is seen as the force of renewal in the world. The lovers are no longer of interest as courtly lovers but appear as mature people whose marriage becomes the hope of a better world. The conventional suffering for love is gone and in its place is a mature, reasoned attitude to the most basic of man's emotions. With this play Shakespeare has come all the way from artificiality and sham to a lasting, satisfying type of love. 13. Villains in Shakespeare’s plays. Shakespeare certainly knew how to write a great villain. Packing them full of contradictions and the most human of flaws, he ensured that audiences can relate to characters that might also be viewed as monsters One of the reasons Shakespeare’s plays remain so popular and are, in many ways, timeless is because the Bard of Avon was a master of creating fascinating, rounded characters. Among his most intriguing and enduring creations are his villains. While many of them display some inhuman actions, they are motivated by the most human of emotions: jealousy, revenge, heartache and ambition, to name just a few. The following is a list of just some of my top five Shakespearean villains. Iago (Othello) – Othello’s lieutenant and the man who engineers his downfall by persuading Othello that his wife is having an affair. Iago is an arch manipulator who is responsible directly or indirectly for all the deaths in the play. Interestingly, Iago is one of the few major villains who does not die at the end of the play. Villainous quote: “But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve for daws to peck at. I am not what I am.” (!!!!!!) Antonio (The Tempest) Antonio is the real villain in the play. He never ceases to be cynical and mean and continues to plot evil schemes throughout, trying to convert others to villains. At no time is he nice to anyone or does he change his mind about what he has done. As Alonso repents in the end, Antonio does not budge or show indemnity or guilt about his actions, even though Prospero forgives him and spares his life. Antonio is the one that started the whole argument in the first place by banishing Prospero, Antonio is the one that should be punished, the one that should be repenting, but he does not show a single sign of remorse. Caliban (The Tempest) — Son of the witch Sycorax, a half-human monster and slave to Prospero. Another one that will probably get some people’s hackles up, Caliban is more often portrayed as a victim than a villain. However, don’t forget that he attempted to rape Miranda and willingly plots Prospero’s death with Stefano and Trinculo (who should probably also be on the hit list if space permitted). Villainous quote: (cursing Miranda and Prospero) “As wicked dew as e’er my mother brush’d with raven’s feather from unwholesome fen, drop on you both! a south-west blow on ye, and blister you all o’er!” 14. Violence in Shakespeare’s plays Prospero- he shows a lesson to the rest of the characters through a wise plan and forgives like a hero. Hamlet Romeo 19. Shakespeare’s heroines. Viola- She fights and persists to achieve what she wants in life and makes her happy. Juliet 20. The concept of punishment in Shakespeare’s plays. During Shakespeare's times, criminal action was divided into three main categories: treason, felonies, and misdemeanors. The punishments to these actions in Shakespeare’s plays are represented in various ways. In many of his tragedies the punishment is indicated by death (Othello- murderer; Iago- treason, lies…). In some other plays punishment comes through a more personal, moral and spiritual way (Alonso, Antonio, Sebastian and Gonzalo are scared off by spiritual powers as a punishment which leads them to confess their crimes and amend their sins and crimes). 21. Father-daughter relationship in Shakespeare’s plays. Many of Shakespeare´s earliest plays have, at their heart, the relationship between fathers and their daughters, exploring the emotions and decisions of rebellious daughters, leaving fathers raising their hands in despair. In these plays women are modern in that sense that they choose who they want to love and the fathers are rendered impotent by this powerful drive in their daughters. Shakespeare never lost his keen interest in this theme and plays like Othello, with Brabantio’s anger at his daughter’s decision to marry a black man, explore it again. In other of his play, for example in The Tempest, Miranda has grown from a baby to a beautiful fifteen-year-old without ever having even seen a man, apart from her elderly father. In this case, now, although her father, Prospero, still controls her every movement, he steers her towards Ferdinand, with whom she falls in love. Throughout the process Prospero piles his blessings on to the couple, even though Ferdinand is the son of his enemy. 22. Shakespeare’s use of the play-within-the-play. In Shakespeare's play, art is taken from the past and it's meant to change the future. Hamlet sees theater as didactic: he uses it to teach a lesson to his usurping Uncle, and he's not very subtle. The author’s skillful development and juxtaposition of these simultaneously unfolding plays serves the function of reiterating some of the principal themes of the play. Similarly, the utilization of this multiple play structure also situates Shakespeare in relationship to the creative process and his own work. We can find this technique in plays like Hamlet or A Midsummer Night’s Dream. 23. The comic-relief in Shakespeare’s plays. William Shakespeare deviated from the classical tradition and used comic relief in many of his plays. Clowning in Shakespeare's plays may have been intended as "an emotional vacation from the more serious business of the main action" (comic relief). Clowning scenes in Shakespeare's tragedies mostly appear immediately after a truly horrific scene. Shakespeare's clowning goes beyond just comic relief, instead making the horrific or deeply complex scenes more understandable and "true to the realities of living, then and now. Shifting the focus from the fictional world to the audience's reality helps convey "more effectively the theme of the dramas" 24. Language in Shakespeare’s characters. He uses the difference of language between his characters depending on their social class, genre, condition and origin. In Othello for instance, Shakespeare gives him a language in which we can understand that although he is originally Turk, he has been raised in an upper class.