Style and age in english drama of the late 16-th and early 17-th centuries

Whichever argument one chooses to accept, it is fact that Shakespeare, a minor at the time, married Anne Hathaway, who was twenty-six and already several months pregnant. Anne was the eldest daughter, and one of the seven children of Richard Hathaway, a twice-married farmer in Shottery. When Richard died in 1581, he requested his son, Bartholomew, move into the house we now know as Anne Hathaway's Cottage, and maintain the property for his mother, Richard's second wife and Anne's stepmother. Anne lived in the cottage with Bartholomew, her step-mother, and her other siblings. No doubt she was bombarded with a barrage of household tasks to fill her days at Hewland Farm, as it was then called. After her marriage to Shakespeare, Anne left Hewland Farm to live in John Shakespeare's house on Henley Street, as was the custom of the day. Preparations for the new bride were made, and for reasons unknown, her arrival greatly bothered John Shakespeare's current tenant in the house, William Burbage. A heated fight ensued, and John refused to release Burbage from his lease, so Burbage decided to take the matter to a London court. On July 24, 1582, lawyers representing both sides met and resolved the matter -- John would release William Burbage from his lease.

The Shakespeares' first child was Susanna, christened on May 26th, 1583, and twins arrived in January, 1585. They were baptized on February 2 of that year and named after two very close friends of William -- the baker Hamnet Sadler and his wife, Judith. The Sadlers became the godparents of the twins and, in 1598, they, in turn, named their own son William. Not much information is known about the life of Anne and her children after this date, except for the tragic fact that Hamnet Shakespeare died of an unknown cause on August 11, 1596, at the age of eleven. By this time Shakespeare had long since moved to London to realize his dreams on the English stage (a time in the Bard's life that will be covered in depth later on) and we do not know if he was present at Hamnet's funeral in Stratford. We can only imagine how deeply the loss of his only son touched the sensitive poet, but his sorrow is undeniably reflected in his later work, and, particularly, in a passage from King John, written between 1595 and 1597: 

Young Arthur is my son, and he is lost:

I am not mad: I would to heaven I were!

For then, 'tis like I should forget myself:

O, if I could, what grief should I forget!

Preach some philosophy to make me mad,

And thou shalt be canonized, cardinal;

For being not mad but sensible of grief,

My reasonable part produces reason

How I may be deliver'd of these woes,

And teaches me to kill or hang myself:

If I were mad, I should forget my son,

Or madly think a babe of clouts were he:

I am not mad; too well, too well I feel

The different plague of each calamity....

I tore them from their bonds and cried aloud

'O that these hands could so redeem my son,

As they have given these hairs their liberty!'

But now I envy at their liberty,

And will again commit them to their bonds,

Because my poor child is a prisoner.

And, father cardinal, I have heard you say

That we shall see and know our friends in heaven:

If that be true, I shall see my boy again;

For since the birth of Cain, the first male child,

To him that did but yesterday suspire,

There was not such a gracious creature born.

But now will canker-sorrow eat my bud

And chase the native beauty from his cheek

And he will look as hollow as a ghost,

As dim and meagre as an ague's fit,

And so he'll die; and, rising so again,

When I shall meet him in the court of heaven

I shall not know him: therefore never, never

Must I behold my pretty Arthur more. (III.iv.45-91)   

 

Had not his worship one deer left?

What then? He had a wife

Took pains enough to find him horns

Should last him during life. (Levi, 35)  

Shakespeare's daily activities after he left school and before he re-emerged as a professional actor in the late 1580s are impossible to trace. Suggestions that he might have worked as a schoolmaster or lawyer or glover with his father and brother, Gilbert, are all plausible. So too is the argument that Shakespeare studied intensely to become a master at his literary craft, and honed his acting skills while traveling and visiting playhouses outside of Stratford. But, it is from this period known as the "lost years", that we obtain one vital piece of information about Shakespeare: he married a pregnant orphan named Anne Hathaway.  

Shakespeare's work as a playwright is subdivided into 3 periods. Written in the first period, Shakespeare's plays are mostly history plays like "Henry VI", and comedies with strong elements of farce. His masterpiece of this period is "Romeo and Juliet". In the second period Shakespeare wrote a number of comedies where he moved away from farce towards romance. In the third period, after 1600, appeared his major tragedies - "Hamlet", "Othello". They presented a clear opposition of order to chaos, good to evil. Shakespeare was a great poet and would be well known for his poetry alone. His major achievement as a poet is his sonnets, first published in 1609. A sonnet is a poem consisting of 14 lines, with a moral at the end. The sonnets are addressed to some "W.H.", and to mysterious "Dark Lady of Sonnets". The sonnets deal with the great themes of love, friendship, death, change and immortality. Shakespeare looks at his own poetry as a means of immortality. Shakespeare's sonnets are excellent. They are full of harmony and music; they praise love, friendship and beauty, though there is no sentimentality in them. Shakespeare's poetry is at the summit of human achievement. Many centuries have passed since his death in 1616, but Shakespeare is still considered to be the greatest of all playwrights and poets. The prideses of Shakespeare. The most brilliant period of English literature was in the second half of the 16'th and begining of 17'th centure.Sometimes it's called "Elizabethen age" after quen Elizabeth 5. England had become a geat world power. It had established wide commercial contact with countries And rich trading company had been organaized. The english people were now a great nation and the english language inriched was now not unlike the language of Chaucer. Many famous poetical and prose works appeared. Among those who inriched the literary haritage of this period ere sir Philip Sydney, Adnond Spenser and Christother Marlowe. There were fine works of poetry and prose in the Elizabethen age but the greatest hight's of literature of this period were riached in drama. 2. Life of Shakespeare. The great poet and dramatist William Shakespeare is often called by his people "Our National Bard", "The Immortal. Poet of nature" and "The Great Unknown". More than two hundred contemporary references to Shakespeare have been located amoung church records, legal records, documents in the Public Record Office, and miscellaneous repositories. When these owe assembled, we have at least the sceleton out line of his life, begining with his baptist on April 26, 1564, in Trinity Churche, Stratford-on-Avon, and ending with his burial there on April 25, 1616. Shakespeare native place was Sratford-on-Avon, a little town in Warwickshive, which is generally described as beign in the middle of England. Shakespeare's father, John, was a prosperious glove maker of Stratford who, after holding minor municipal offices, was elected high bailiff of Stratford. Shakespeare's mother Mary Arden, came from an affluent family of landowners. Shakespeare probably recieved his early education at the exellent Stratford Grammar School, supervised by an Oxford graduate, where he would have learned Latin smattering of Greek. In 1582 Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway, who lived in a neighboring hamlet. The first child born to Ann and William was their daughter Susanna. In about two years Ann bore him twins a boy and a girl, Hamlet and Jidith. Then life in Stratford became intolerable for William Shakespeare and he dicided to go to London and began a theatrical career. Shakespeare major activity lay in the field of drama. He became a full shaveholder in his acting company, he was partowner of "the Globe" theatre and later of "the Blackfriars" theatre, and in 1597 he purchased property in Strarford. Including new place, one of the largest houses in the town. He probably refired there about 1610, travelling of London when necessary to take cave of his theatrical business. In all, 154 sonnets seguence. The sonnets were probably written in the 1590 but were first published in 1609. 3. Shakespeare's works. Shakespeare's literary work is usually divided into three periods. The first period of his creative work falls between 1590 and 1600. Shakespeare's comedies belong to the first period of his creativ work. They all are written in his playfull manner and and in the brilliant poetry that conveys the spectator to Italy. Some of the first plays of the first period are: "Richard 3" (1592), "The comedy of errors" (1592), "Romeo and Juliet" (1594), "Julius Caesar" (1599), "As you like it" (1599), 1600 - "Twelth night". Shakespe-are's poems are also attributed to the first period, "Venus and Adonis" and "Lucrece", and 154 sonnets. "Venus and Adonis" was the first of Shakespeare's works that came off the press. The second period of Shakespeare's creative work during from 1600 to 1608. His famous tragedies appeared at this time. In the plays of this period the dramatist reaches his full maturity. He presents great humans problems. His tragedies and historical plays made Shakespeare the greatest humanist of the English Renaissanse. Some plays of the second period: 1601 - "Hamlet", 1604 - "Othello". Shakespeare's plays of the third period are called the "Romantic dramas". There is no tragic tension in these plays. This period lasted from 1609 till 1612. 1609 - "Cymbeline", 1610 - "The Winters Tale", 1612 - "Henry 8".  

State of the art of Shakespeare’s authorship problem: attempt at bibliographic analysis 

    The problem of Shakespeare’s works authorship remains as a subject of new hypotheses and controversies. A significant resuscitation of activity in this direction was invoked by the publications of Ch. Оgburn's (USA, 1984) and I. Gililov's (Russia, 1997) fundamental researches, correspondingly devoted to the hypotheses of the Earl of Oxford's and the Earl of Rutland's authorship, and also the usage and perfecting of computer analysis of Shakespeare’s texts and those of his contemporaries. During the last three decades over 700 articles and monographs on the given problem have been published in Russia and abroad.

    The perspectives of such studies and their usefulness for the introducing in a scientific usage of all new historical and literary realities of Shakespeare’s epoch (under condition of the scientific approach to the facts) is evident. In the review we attempted an analysis and systematization of the last decade’s (1994-2003) publications on the "Shakespeare’s question". The bibliographic basis of the browse is founded on World Shakespeare Internet-bibliography (WSB Online), data of Shakespeare’s sites in the Internet and periodicals of some foreign Shakespeare’s societies, specializing in this or that hypothesis, and also works published in the recent years in Russia.

    Special attention is given to roughly explicating linguistic methods of analysis of the literary texts on the basis of computer technologies permitting to assign real hopes for a scientific solution of the authorship problem. 

Psycho-phonetics in Shakespeare’s sonnets as a translator challenge 
 

    Psycholinguistic analysis argues that efficacy in speech is gained partly through special arrangement of phonemes, each of them contributing to the emotional effect. People of letters have employed these effects to an artistic advantage, combining and repeating them, as means of providing the emotional setting. Several of Shakespeare’s sonnets illustrate this.

    To name Sonnet 71, we bring to light the repeated sound [w] and its function as accompaniment to sorrow and suffering (cf. surly sullen bell in line 2, where [s] and [l] repeated sound solemn and pompous – public grief as contrasted to the lover’s innermost grievances). Line 4 alliterates world and worms, but this is frequently overlooked by translators who will painstakingly render worms but fail to see the phonetic logic here. These repetitions culminate in the end-rhymed woe in line 8. The 3^rd stanza abounds in [s]’s – pacifiers and healers. And the abrupt couplet strives to overcome the spiritual crisis, once more resorting to [w] (wise world), which yields to the triumphant [m]’s.

    Psychophonetics gives the translator options of selecting his equivalents in ways he considers proper, to render the mood of the original in the best way. To resort to Russian translation attempts, we can see that Shakespeare’s jewel from Sonnet 27 has been translated as diamond, gem, crystal, and pearl.

    The discussion of honour and dignity in Shakespeare’s drama 
 

    Among other evils of the world, Sonnet 66 discusses “gilded honor shamefully misplac'd”. In feudal times, knightly honour proved a major ethical asset, a foundation for the whole social and economic system. The Renaissance turned to utilitarian thinking, and honour was disputed as a natural, inborn value; in this light, the degraded knight Sir John Falstaff is truly representative of his era, when he pursues personal safety and cynically argues, “What is honour? A word”.

    For Isabella in Measure for Measure, honour is absolute and universal, therefore requires observance by each and everyone. When this quality loses universality, one starts doubting whether it has any inherent value at all.

    A true “victim of honour” is presented in Desdemona, although the honour concerned is not specifically hers, but rather her husband’s. Othello’s concerns are about his honour from his first appearance on the stage; moreover, they are formulated in the title: the Moor of Venice, since the hero is immediately recognized as an alien in his professional field, and the able general needs constant references to his noble origin, which is not taken for granted by others.

    Othello belongs to people for whom honour is more than a mere word. Iago senses this, and employs the notion as a bait for his over-honest commander. In the resolution of the play, honour is the culprit of the tragic happenings: “But why should honor outlive honesty? Let it go all”. 

    “Imagination” and “cool reason” in Shakespeare’s sonnets 

    The poet’s eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,

    Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;

    And as imagination bodies forth

    The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen

    Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing

    A local habitation and a name.

    A Midsummer Night’s Dream (5.1.4-20)

    In these lines of Shakespeare we read the report of a meditative path, by which one follows the poet up to the realm of unformed, pure imagination, and then back down to everyday experience, spontaneously marrying “imagination” to “cool reason”, along a continuous chain of links from unknown to body, to form, to shape, and finally to the down-to-earth attributes of name and address . This meditation in relation to the challenge confronting the Poet is fully manifested in The Sonnets, considering that the basic subject of the Sonnets is the Poet brooding on Time, Love, Beauty, Fortune, Nature, Life and Death, as well as on his work, his gift and his verse, on poetry and arts in general.

    The foundation of the Poet’s knowledge is his personal earthly life experience. But this is not all. The Poet stands at the hub of the universe. He possesses the supreme knowledge (in the Plato sense), which he has acquired by his gift of observation and from the world treasure of letters and the sacred writings of the past. By means of imagination the earthly and timely happenings are reflected in the universal symbolism, whereas the universal symbols are being filled up with everyday facts and events. This kind of interaction is possible only in the realm of imagination, thus uniting heaven and earth.

    But to see these links is only one task of the Poet. Another is to trap heaven-and-earth within a visible form, forcing the creation onto the tip of his pen, to choose from among the ideas and place them in order, to scrutinize the expressions and put them where they belong. Or, in other words, “to shroud in beautiful language”, to gather a fine diction, “to test the sap of the words”. Words in the Sonnets expand the theme, provoke its development, make the thought more profound. Shakespeare uses a myriad of variations to express one idea. His metaphors are arranged in sequences, his language abounds in synonyms, and at the same time there are many key-words, repeated numerously.

    The paper will offer a close analysis of a number of sonnets from this point of view. 

    Shakespeare’s “lunar heroes” in dialogue with providence: tragedies “Romeo and Juliet” and “Hamlet” 

    Astrological beliefs of the age of the Renaissance were rather strong. They influenced conflicts and characters of Shakespearean plays and formed so called astrological-associative characteristics. It involves the hero through astral images into a chain of associations connected with some astrological type, and the hero acts like a person of this type.

    Romeo and Hamlet have “lunar” astrological-associative characteristics which help Shakespeare to represent a tense dialogue of the heroes with Providence because “lunar” heroes have such features as intuition and ability to perceive the irrational side of existence. This paper analyzes a device, by means of which Shakespeare shows the complexity and semantic polyvalence of this dialogue: representation of the hero’s state which can be considered as inadequate from a conventional point of view through the versions of different personages and self-characterization.

    At the beginning of the tragedy different personages (Romeo’s parents, Benvolio) give their own description of the symptoms of Romeo’s state. His friends accept his own version (an unhappy love). But the hero’s words about his fatal presentiments sound as alternative self-characterization. This impression is reinforced by a pair of star-crossed lovers in Prologue, echoed in Romeo’s some consequence, yet hanging in the stars.

    In the first act of “Hamlet” the personages classify the hero’s state as grief, woe, transformation. Then Polonius, who is the first to use the word mad, come up with his hypothesis of Hamlet’s love obsession. The motive of madness appears also in the scene of meeting with the Ghost. Hamlet’s self-characterization allows us to speak about his fictitious mask of a madman (mad in craft), as well as about his real deep shock after contact with the Ghost, who embodies the forces of Providence.

    So Romeo’s and Hamlet’s dialogue with Providence is represented with a specific effect of “twinkling senses” which is based on “lunar” astrological-associative characteristics of the heroes so as on Shakespearean technique of using different versions.