1. Shakespeare

2. Shakespeare: some facts
Baptised 1564 in Stratford upon Avon
First 12 years well to do
Good school
The Classics (Ovid)
Memorising
Latin
Father:
a glover and mayor of town
probably a Catholic
brushes with law

3. Shakespeare: dates (2) 1582: Married Anne Hathaway, he was 18
(she was pregnant)
1592: Henry IV, part one performed in London
1597: buys house in Stratford (doing well)
1599: Globe Theatre
1613: Globe burns down
1615: More legal problems
1616: dies, age 52

4. Shakespeare’s times
Here are a few themes to explore that will help you understand Shakespeare, his work and his time:
Elizabeth I
Catholic  Protestant
Lord Chamberlain’s Men
Mummers’plays and Mystery Plays
Sonnets
Renaissance

5. Rulers, religion, politics
Shakespeare lived during the reigns of
Elizabeth I and James I.
What went on before:
Henry VIII, a Tudor is married to Catharine of Aragon, a Catholic, they have a daughter Mary (no son).
Henry falls in love with Anne Boleyn, wants a divorce because he loves her and/or hopes for a son.
Henry falls out with the Pope over this and starts his own religion. He becomes a Protestant, divorces Catharine, marries Anne. They have a daughter Elizabeth.

6. Rulers, religion and Politics (2)
Henry later has Anne executed (beheaded and marries a number of other girls). He manages to have one son.
After Henry dies his son becomes King, but he dies fairly soon.
Next in line is Mary, the Catholic. She is very fanatic and prosecutes and executes a number of Catholics.
Mary dies young as well. Elizabeth, a Protestant, is the next Queen. During her reign many Catholics manage to remain faithful by keeping quiet, many others however were prosecuted. Being a Catholic did not help your career (Shakespeare’s father found out apparently).

8. Rulers, religion and politics
Conclusion:
This division between religions influenced all aspects of people’s lives in Shakespeare’s time. So, if you were a writer and a Catholic (which Shakespeare probably was according to some), and you wanted to be critical you had to be VERY CAREFUL.

9. Plays in Shakespeare’s time
What went before:
No theatres (or royalties) like we know today.
People performed religious plays like the Mummers’ Plays (about St George) and the Mystery Plays (Biblical scenes), in town squares, barns. There were also Morality Plays about good and bad.
Groups of players travelled the country to perform and had a patron like a lord who supported them. These groups played in inns, castle halls, big rooms etc. Shakespeare himself joined a group called “Lord Chamberlain’s Men”.

10. Mystery Play

11. Something new: a theatre
In Shakespeare time, there were for the first time real theatres. These were built specially for groups to perform plays and their architecture was inspired by the architecture of the inns.
Plays themselves were changing, no longer just about religion, but about action, love, wit and learning.
The people, the audience loved and wanted more.
Shakespeare was one of the people who could take care of this!

12. Medieval Theatre
Illustrations

13. Shakespeare’s work 154 sonnets About 30-40 plays:
Comedy (e.g. Midsummer night’s dream)
History plays (e.g. Henry IV)
Romance (E.g. Romeo and Juliet)
Tragedy (e.g. Hamlet)

14. A sonnet
Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd; But thy eternal summer shall not fade Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou growest: So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

15. Sonnets Shakespeare wrote Italian 14 lines
Rhyme pattern: abab cdcd efef gg
Rhythmic pattern:
daDUM daDUM daDUM daDUM daDUM
5 times = 5 feet = pentameter
Stress on second syllable = iambic pattern
So: iambic pentameter
A turn in the third stanza = volta
Last two lines: often summary or surprise ending

16. About structure Shakepeare’s plays mostly in blank verse (= unrhymed).
Plays in 5 scenes:
Act 1: introduction of characters and setting story.
Act 2: Getting better acquainted with the characters.
Act 3: So called pivotal scene: heroes make mistakes, decisions have to be made, confusion.
Act 4: Action unfolds. Things go wrong.
Act 5: all the pieces come together. Heroes learn their lessons.

17. Shakespeare’s plays What was new? The theatre as a building.
Shakespeare didn’t follow the old
rules, set up by Aristotle, all the time.
So, not only one story line,
one day, one place.
Shakespeare invented many new words and phrases. The language was changing dramatically at the time, after having been suppressed for about 300 years.
Themes: not just biblical themes and moralistic tales, but plays for entertainment about love, hate, war etc.

19. A note on language
The longest word in Shakespeare’s plays: Honorificabilitudinitatibus (meaning: "the state of being able to achieve honours“). It’s from a dialogue between two pedantic characters.
“Thee, thy” are the same as “je, jij” in Dutch. These words dropped out of use.
Shakespeare still uses words like “doth, goeth” etc. This too disappeared from the language. In fact, it was already disappearing in Shakespeare’s time.