WilliamShakespeare

AN INTRODUCTION

William Shakespeare was an English

poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet.

Shakespeare’s plays continue to be performed on stages and resonate with audiences around the world, and have yielded a vast array of film, television and theatrical adaptations.

Furthermore, Shakespeare is believed to have influenced the English language more than any other writer in history!

Who was Shakespeare?

His surviving works consist of about:

38 plays,

154 sonnets (14-line poems),

two long narrative poems, and several other poems.

His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright.

Shakespeare’s Works

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80

Edmund

Richard

Anne

Joan

Gilbert

William

Margaret

Joan

Age

Age

William Shakespeare was born to John and Mary Shakespeare on or around April 23, 1564, and baptized on April 26.

He was raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, a town around 100 miles northwest of London.

His father, John, was a prosperous glove-maker and eventually became bailiff (mayor) of the town.

His mother, Mary Arden, was from a prominent local family, and had money and land of her own.

Shakespeare's brothers and sisters• Joan, born 1558, died before 1569. (11)• Margaret, born 1562, died 1563. (5 months).• William, born 1564, died 1616. (52)• Gilbert, born 1566, died 1612. (42)• Joan, born 1569, married William Hart, died 1646. (77)• Anne, born 1571, died 1579. (8)• Richard, born 1574, died 1613. (33)• Edmund, born 1580, died 1607. (27)

Beginnings

We know almost nothing about Shakespeare’s

childhood.

He probably attended the local school and studied Latin and classic literature, including Ovid’s Metamorphosis, which is a Latin narrative poem filled with ancient Greek and Roman Myths and stories from the Bible.

While his father was bailiff, William probably also was able to see many traveling theatrical companies that passed through town, whose plays his father would be required to preview in order to grant a license for public performances.

Shakespeare’s Childhood

At the age of 18, William married Anne

Hathaway, (who was 26 at the time) They had three children: Susanna, and

twins Hamnet and Judith. In 1596, Shakespeare’s only son, Hamnet,

died at the age of 11. Judith married Thomas Quiney, and they

had three children, but each of them died young.

Susanna married a local physician, John Hall, and they had one daughter, Elizabeth.

Elizabeth grew up and married twice, but she had no children, thus ending Shakespeare’s family line.

Marriage & Family

One of the biggest mysteries about William

Shakespeare is that he disappears completely - twice -from documentary record for several years.

First, in 1578-1582, from the ages of twelve to eighteen, Shakespeare leaves school and probably helped his father, who began to experience financial difficulties.

The second disappearance occurred between 1585-1592. When he was 21 years old, Shakespeare was married with three children and living in the small town of Stratford in England. Seven years later, he was living in London as resident playwright and part owner of a theater company.

Apocryphal stories have Shakespeare leaving Stratford with a traveling troupe of actors, or working as a soldier, law clerk, schoolmaster, butcher, glover, scribe, or merchant.

The Lost Years (1578-1592)

When Shakespeare arrived in London,

England was on the cusp of a theatrical revolution, and William would be at the forefront of it.

Between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part owner of a acting company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men,

This company spanned the reigns of Queen Elizabeth and King James.

The troupe would perform before thousands of people every week, and occasionally be invited to perform before royalty at private functions.

Shakespeare in London

Shakespeare changed how plays were written

and performed. Before Shakespeare, plays were mostly staid

morality tales, containing religious or moral lessons – to edify audiences about the value of virtues and the dangers of sin.

Also, classic Roman and Greek plays were performed (in Latin), with long speeches directed at the audience.

But Shakespeare and his contemporaries began to merge the two forms, and more importantly, borrow stories from past English history, as well as adapting new, popular stories.

Shakespeare wasn’t interested in teaching a lesson to his audiences – he wrote to excite, to enflame their passion, to grab them by the throats and make them feel something.

His plays were the rock ‘n’ roll of his generation.

The Plays

The Comedy of Errors 1589-1594 The Two Gentlemen of Verona 1589-1593 King John 1590-1595 Henry VI, Part 1 1590-1592 Henry VI, Part 2 1591 Henry VI, Part 3 1592 Richard III 1593 The Taming of the Shrew 1593-1594 Titus Andronicus 1593-1594 Romeo and Juliet 1594 Love's Labours Lost 1594 Richard II 1595 A Midsummer Night's Dream 1595

The Early Plays (1589-1595)

Shakespeare’s earliest plays show that he borrowed ideas from classic Greek and Roman playwrights (The Comedy of Errors, Titus Andronicus);

He expertly mined stories from England’s history (King John, Henry VI parts 1, 2 & 3, Richard III, Richard II);

He also experimented with comedies (The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Taming of the Shrew, Love’s Labours Lost) and wrote two indisputable masterpieces of tragedy and comedy (Romeo and Juliet, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream).

He proved himself to be a talented playwright, capable of rapidly composing intelligently-plotted plays, using densely-written prose and poetry.

The Merchant of Venice 1596 Henry IV, Part 1 1596 Henry IV, Part 2 1597 The Merry Wives of Windsor 1597 Much Ado About Nothing 1598 As You Like It 1599 Julius Caesar 1599 Henry V 1599 Hamlet 1600 Troilus and Cressida 1600-1603 Twelfth Night 1601 All's Well That Ends Well 1601-1602

The Middle Plays (1596-1602)

The middle part of Shakespeare’s career finds him stretching the boundaries of his craft, and beginning to write psychologically complex characters who break out of the one-dimensional portrayals of earlier works.

He painted conflicted, nationalistic heroes giving stirring speeches in Julius Caesar and Henry V.

He created a memorable, beloved character in the fat, funny Falstaff (Henry IV, Part 1 & 2, The Merry Wives of Windsor); a richly drawn sympathetic villain in Shylock (The Merchant of Venice); and empowered female characters (Rosalind in As You Like It; Portia in The Merchant of Venice) He also created the most human character in all literature, in the sensitive, tortured Hamlet.

His writing also became more mature and masterful, as he began to mix comedy and tragedy in new, daring ways (The Merchant of Venice; Twelfth Night; All’s Well That Ends Well).

Othello 1602-1603 Measure for Measure 1603 Timon of Athens 1604-1606 King Lear 1605 Macbeth 1606 Pericles 1606-1607 Antony and Cleopatra 1607-1608 Coriolanus 1608 Cymbeline 1609 The Winter's Tale 1609 The Tempest 1610 The Two Noble Kinsmen* 1611 Cardenio* 1612 Henry VIII* 1613

The Late Plays (1602-1613)

The final years of Shakespeare’s career reveal a master at the height of his powers composing stark, intensely psychological tragedies (Othello,Macbeth, King Lear, Antony and Cleopatra).

At the same time, he explores challenging new territory with plays examining morality and injustice (Measure for Measure); misanthropy and greed (Timon of Athens); and class warfare (Coriolanus).

His final three plays, Cymbeline, The Winter’s Tale, and The Tempest, see him taking another thematic turn, mixing bleak tragedy with hopeful, “fairy tale”-like endings in his ‘late romances’.

Before his retirement, he collaborated with young playwright John Fletcher on three plays: The Two Noble Kinsman, Cardenio (lost) and Henry VIII.

* (co-written with John Fletcher)

The Globe Theatre was a permanent

playhouse build by Shakespeare’s company, The Lord Chamberlain’s Men, in London in 1599.

It was destroyed by fire on 29 June 1613 when a prop cannon set fire to the thatch roof during a performance of Henry VIII.

A second Globe Theatre was built on the same site by June 1614 and closed in 1642.

A modern reconstruction of the Globe, named "Shakespeare's Globe", opened in 1997 approximately 750 feet from the site of the original theatre.

The Globe Theatre

Shakespeare’s plays were published seven

years after his death by two of his colleagues in a collection called a “folio” which is a term for large sheets of paper which are folded, then bound into a book.

Eighteen of Shakespeare’s plays were previously published individually in smaller, pirated versions called “Quartos”, and the quarto texts can differ quite a bit from the Folio versions.

The First Folio is the only reliable source for twenty of Shakespeare’s works, and contains 36 of the 38 known plays.

The First Folio

It is not known exactly when

Shakespeare wrote his sequence of 154 sonnets, but the poems’ language suggests that they originate from the early 1590s. It is believed that Shakespeare was sharing his sonnets with his close friends.

It’s possible that he wrote the sonnets during 1593-1594, when all the theaters in London were closed due to an outbreak of the bubonic plague.

It wasn’t until 1609 that the sonnets first appeared in print in an unauthorized edition by Thomas Thorpe.

They are considered to be some of the most beautiful poems in the English language.

Shakespeare Sonnets

Why has Shakespeare’s works

continued to thrive?

He eloquently wrote about the human experience, i.e.; what it feels like to fall in love, to hate, to be ambitious, or jealous.

He told great stories that still have the power to entertain audiences.

He created vivid characters who come alive on stage.

He wrote startlingly beautiful prose and poetry.

Why Shakespeare?

Additionally, recent studies show

that reading and studying challenging authors like Shakespeare are like “rocket boosters” to the brain, increasing self-esteem, and literally “super-charging” your brain power -MUCH more than reading modern-day books or magazines!

Brain Rockets!

The English language owes a

great debt to Shakespeare. He invented over 1700 of our common words by changing nouns into verbs, changing verbs into adjectives, connecting words never before used together, adding prefixes and suffixes, and devising words wholly original.

Words, Words, Words

Lonely

Hurry

Gloomy

Laughable

Blanket

Bedroom

Drugged

Excitement

Dawn

Critic

Bump

Blushing

Worthless

Advertising

Addiction

Assassination

Luggage

Champion

Bloodstained

Elbow

Deafening

Lower

Mimic

Noiseless

Fashionable

Mountaineer

Compromised

Caked

Rant

Radiance

Generous

Bandit

Outbreak

Secure

Torture

William Shakespeare also

contributed more phrases and sayings to the English language than any other individual, and most of them are still in daily use.

Here's a collection of well-known quotations that are associated with Shakespeare. Most of these were the Bard's own work, but he wasn't averse to stealing a good line occasionally and a few of these were 'popularized by' rather than 'coined by' Shakespeare.

Phrases and sayings

• A sorry sight

• All of a sudden

• All’s well that ends well

• As dead as a doornail

• As pure as the driven snow

• Fair play

• Fight fire with fire

• Forever and a day

• Foul play

• Good riddance

• High time

• Hot blooded

• Love is blind

• Off with his head!

• Rhyme nor reason

• Set your teeth on edge

• The game is afoot!

• The game is up

• The long and the short of it

• Too much of a good thing

• Up in arms

• Vanish into thin air

• A wild goose chase

Evidence indicates that William Shakespeare

was born on April 23 and died on April 23. Boys and men played all the parts in

Shakespeare's plays in Elizabethan times. Shakespeare was said to have enjoyed

playing the part of the ghost in Hamlet. U.S. President Abraham Lincoln and

inventor Thomas Edison enjoyed reading Shakespeare.

Shakespeare had an extensive vocabulary. While most English speakers can boast of a 4,000-word vocabulary, Shakespeare's vocabulary spanned over 29,000 words!

The motto of the Globe Theatre was totusmundus agit histrionem (all the world's a stage).

Shakespeare Trivia

One of the fun things about

Shakespeare was the stinging insults he created.

They were lengthy, highly descriptive, and funny!

Thou logger-headed, fat-kidneyed flea!

Thou lump of foul deformity!Richard III (1.2.58)

[You] cowardly, giant-like ox-beef!A Midsummer Night’s Dream (3.1.185)

You witch, you rag, you baggage, you polecat, you runnion!The Merry Wives Of Windsor (4.2.170-172)

Thou crusty botch of nature!Troilus and Cressida (5.1.5)

Thou drone, thou snail, thou slug, thou sot!The Comedy Of Errors (2.2)

Peace, ye fat guts!Henry IV (1.2.772)

Thou cream-faced loon!Macbeth (5.3.190)

Was Shakespeare, Shakespeare?

Over the last 100 years, some doubters (including Mark Twain, Walt Whitman, Ralph Waldo Emerson and others) have questioned whether Shakespeare was actually the author of the plays attributed to him.

Despite an abundance of contemporary evidence that Shakespeare wasunquestioningly the author of his plays and poems, alternate theories include:

Francis Bacon – author and playwright

Edward DeVere – the 17th Earl of Oxford

Christopher Marlowe – poet and playwright

William Stanley – 6th Earl of Derby

In recent years, there has been extensive studies

that indicate that Shakespeare worked with other playwrights on some plays.

In Elizabethan times, it was common for playwrights to collaborate on plays, sharing the duties – and, using modern computer textual analysis, several plays indicate the presence of Shakespeare’s talents:

The Spanish Tragedy by Thomas Kyd Sir Thomas More (which has an entire scene

written in Shakespeare’s penmanship) Edward III – also by Thomas Kyd Arden of Faversham Other period plays are currently being

examined to see if Shakespeare may have had a hand in them.

Shakespeare & Co.

Shakespeare’s final solo-authored

play was The Tempest, which has become one of his most popular.

Shakespeare became quite wealthy due to his success. He bought land and was awarded a coat-of-arms.

He appears to have retired to Stratford around 1613, where he died three years later at the age of 52.

William Shakespeare is buried in the Holy Trinity Church, Stratford-on-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The church stands on the banks of the River Avon.

All’s Well That Ends Well

Every year, hundreds of productions

of Shakespeare’s plays are performed around the world.

In addition, dozens of books are published about Shakespeare each year, as well as movies, operas, ballets, and other media.

Ben Jonson, a rival and friend of Shakespeare, wrote of him:

“He was not of an age,

but for all time.”

Epilogue