Transcript shakespeare intro - Cherokee County Schools

Shakespeare: His Life and Times
Adapted from
http://www.public.asu.edu/~muckerrm/English_321_S2005/Introduction.ppt
Early Life
• Born 1564—died 1616
• Stratford-upon-Avon
• Parents: John and Mary Arden
Shakespeare
• Mary—daughter of wealthy landowner
• John—glovemaker, local politician
Location of Stratford-upon-Avon
From: http://www.where-can-i-find.com/tourist-maps.html
Stratford-on-Avon in Shakespeare’s Time
As reproduced in William Rolfe, Shakespeare the Boy (1896).
Stratford-upon-Avon Today
From Stratford’s web site: http://www.stratford-upon-avon.co.uk/index.htm
Shakespeare’s Birthplace
From: http://perso.wanadoo.fr/danielle.esposito/
Education
• Probably attended King’s New School in
Stratford
• Educated in:
• Rhetoric
• Logic
• History
• Latin
King’s New School
From: http://perso.wanadoo.fr/danielle.esposito/
Married Life
• Married in 1582 to Anne Hathaway, who
was pregnant at the time with their first
daughter
• Had twins in 1585
• Sometime between 1585-1592, he moved
to London and began working in theatre.
The Plays
• 38 plays firmly attributed to Shakespeare
• 13 comedies
• 10 histories
• 10 tragedies
• 4 romances
• Possibly wrote three others
• Collaborated on several others
• His works rival the King James Bible (also
produced in the 1600s) as a source of oftquoted English phrases.
The Poetry
• Two major poems
• Venus and Adonis
• Rape of Lucrece
• 154 Sonnets
• Numerous other poems
Shakespeare’s Language
• Shakespeare did NOT write in “Old English.”
• Old English is the language of Beowulf:
Hwaet! We Gardena in geardagum
Þeodcyninga Þrym gefrunon
Hu ða æÞelingas ellen fremedon!
(Hey! We have heard of the glory of the SpearDanes in the old days, the kings of tribes, how
noble princes showed great courage!)
Shakespeare’s Language
• Shakespeare did not write in “Middle English.”
• Middle English is the language of Chaucer, the
Gawain-poet, and Malory:
We redeth oft and findeth y-write—
And this clerkes wele it wite—
Layes that ben in harping
Ben y-founde of ferli thing… (Sir Orfeo)
Shakespeare’s Language
• Shakespeare wrote in “Early Modern
English.”
• EME was not very different from
“Modern English,” except that it had some
old holdovers.
Shakespeare’s Language
• Shakespeare coined many words we still use
today:
• Critical
• Majestic
• Dwindle
• And quite a few phrases as well:
• One fell swoop
• Flesh and blood
• Vanish into thin air
See http://www.wordorigins.org/histeng.htm
Shakespeare’s Language
• A mix of old and very new
• Rural and urban words/images
• Understandable by the lowest
peasant and the highest noble
Elizabethan Era
•
•
•
Known for theater, but Elizabethans
considered drama a lower form of literature
than poetry.
English Renaissance called Elizabethan Age
(1485-1660), after Queen Elizabeth I (reigned
from 1558-1603).
Elizabeth – shrewd and charismatic
Controlled religious conflict, helped the nation
from foreign enemies, helped the economy
grow
Elizabethan Era
• English women had limited rights.
• Commoners suffered from poor diet and crowded
living conditions.
• The people were vulnerable to outbreaks of the
bubonic plague.
• In 1564, the plague killed nearly a third of the
people in Shakespeare’s hometown.
• Queen Elizabeth died in 1603, and King James of
Scotland assumed the English throne.
• He was a supporter of the arts and literature.
He renamed Shakespeare’s theater company
to the King’s Men.
Theatre in London
• Traveling troupes of actors
performed in courtyards of
inns
• The Theatre-first public
theater-1576
• Daytime/open air
• Limited set design
• Relied on music, sound,
costumes, props and great
description
The Globe Theatre
• Built in 1599
• Across the Thames River- “Wrong side of
town”
• King’s Men - Shakespeare’s company
The Globe
Theatre
• Capacity 2,0003,000 spectators
• The theatre stood
until the 29 of
June, 1613. The
thatched roof was
set ablaze by a
cannon firing
during Henry
VIII;1614
reconstructed,
shut down in
1642, and torn
down in 1644
Admission
• 1 shilling to stand
• 2 shillings to sit in the balcony
• 3 shillings to sit in the Lord’s Rooms
• 1 shilling was 10% of their weekly income
Broadway today:
• $85 Orchestra
• $60 Balcony
• 10% of a teacher’s weekly salary
The Groundlings
• Poor audience members
• Stood around stage in
“the pit”
• Theatre was open-air; pit
became mud when it
rained
• Women not allowed (had
to dress up as men to
attend)
• Threw rotten vegetables
at bad performances
Actors
• All men; theatre/acting
considered too
“dangerous” for women
• Actors looked down upon
in society
• Female parts played by
young boys who had not
yet hit puberty
• No actual kissing or
hugging on stage
Elizabethan
Theatrical
Conventions
A theatrical convention is a
suspension of reality.
 No electricity
 Women forbidden
to act on stage
 Minimal, contemporary
costumes
 Minimal scenery
These
control the
dialogue.
 Soliloquy
 Aside
 Blood and gore
 Use of supernatural
Types of
speech
Audience
loves to be
scared.
 Use of disguises/
mistaken identity
 Last speaker—highest in
rank (in tragedies)
 Multiple murders
(in tragedies)
 Multiple marriages
(in comedies)
Tragedies
• End in the death of
one or more of the
main characters.
• Most of
Shakespeare’s
tragedies involve
historical individuals
and events
Tragic Hero
• Often a man of high
rank, such as a king or
prince
• Creates, or is put into,
a difficult situation
which he must try to
resolve.
Tragic Hero
• A combination of bad
luck and bad decisions
lead to his death.
• Often a relatively
sympathetic figure. His
soliloquies show his
feelings and motives, and
show the audience how
easy it would be to make
similar mistakes.
Doom and Destiny
• Many people believed in fate, or destiny, and in
the power of the stars to foretell the future.
• Shakespeare uses the idea of fate or destiny to
add excitement and anticipation to the tragedies
– Uses a prophecy as a way of holding the audience’s
interest, because everyone wants to see if it will be
fulfilled.
Tragic Endings
• Tragedies give a very bleak view of the world.
• At the end, the hero (and usually several other characters)
are dead, and the survivors are left to start again without
them.
• Although most tragic heroes are partly to blame for their
own fates, death can be a very high price to pay for what
may have seemed initially like a small failing.
Tragic Endings
• In most tragedies, there is also a feeling that some good
may have come out of the terrible suffering.
-At the end of Romeo and Juliet, because the
families’ fighting has partly caused the tragedy, they
finally resolve to end their feud.