Q: William Shakespeare LIFE AND WOKS?

William Shakespeare was great English playwright, dramatist and poet who lived during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Shakespeare is
considered to be the greatest playwright of all time. No other writer’s plays have been produced so many times or read so widely in so many countries as his.
William Shakespeare was born in Stratford in 1564. He was one of eight children. When William Shakespeare was about seven years old, he probably began
attending the Stratford Grammar School with other boys of his social class. Students went to school year round attending school for nine hours a day.
The teachers were strict disciplinarians. Stratford was an exciting place to live. Stratford also had fields and woods surrounding it giving William the
opportunity to hunt and trap small game. The River Avon, which ran through die town, endowed him the title the Bard of Avon.
Shakespeare’s poems and plays show love for nature and rural life which reflects his childhood. In London, Shakespeare’s career took off. It is believed that
he may have become well I known in London theatrical life by 1592. By that time, he had joined one of die city’s repertory theatre companies.
These companies were made up of a permanent cast of actors who presented different plays week after week. The companies were commercial
organisations that depended on admission from their audience. Scholars know that Shakespeare belonged to one of the most popular acting companies in
London called ‘the Lord Chamberlain’s Men’.
Shakespeare was a leading member of the group from 1594 for the rest of his career. 1594 had produced at least six of Shakespeare’s plays; During
Shakespeare’s life, there were two monarchs who ruled England. They were Henry the eighth and Elizabeth the first. Both were impressed with Shakespeare,
which made his name known.
There is evidence that he was a member of a traveling theatre group. In 1594, he became an actor and playwright for Lord Chamberlain’s Men. In 1599, he
became a part owner of the prosperous Globe Theatre. He also was a part owner of the Black friars Theatre as of 1609. Shakespeare retired to Stratford in
1613 where he wrote many of his excellent plays. There are many reasons as to why William Shakespeare is so famous.
He was able to find universal human qualities and put them in a dramatic situation creating characters that are timeless. Yet he had the ability to create
characters that are highly individual human beings. Their struggles in life are universal.
The world has admired and respected many great writers, but only Shakespeare has generated such enormous continuing interest. Shakespeare’s plays are
usually divided into their major Categories. These are comedy, tragedy and history.
Three plays, which are in the category of comedy, are The Comedy of Errors, The Taming of the Shrew and The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Three plays, which
are in die category of tragedy, are Romeo and Juliet, Titus Andronicus and Julius Caesar. In the category of history, three plays are Henry V, Richard II and
Richard III.
Shakespeare produced most of his known work between 1589 and 1613. His early plays were mainly comedies and histories and these works remain
regarded as some of the best work produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until about 1608, including Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, and
Macbeth, considered some of the finest works in the English language. In his last phase, he wrote tragicomedies, also known as romances, and collaborated
with other playwrights.
Shakespeare's plays remain highly popular today and are constantly studied, performed, and reinterpreted in diverse cultural and political contexts
throughout the world.

Q: Shakespearean Comedy / Comedy Characteristics

Shakespeare brought perfection to the writing of romantic comedy. His comedies are classified into the following three categories.
i) The Early Comedies: They are The Comedy of Errors, Love‘s Labour Lost and The Two Gentlemen of Verona. The plays show sings of immaturity. The plots
are less original, the characters are less finished and the style is also vigorous. The homour lacks the wide human sympathy of his mature comedies.
ii) The Mature Comedies: Shakespeare‘s comic genius finds expression in Much Ado About Nothing. Twelfth Night, The Merchant of Venice and As You Like
It. These plays are full of love and romance, vigour and vitality, versatility of homour, humanity and well-portrayed characters.
iii) The Somber Comedies: All‘s Well That Ends Well, Measure for Measure and Troilus and Cressida belong to the period of great tragedies. These comedies
have a serious and somber time.

Characteristics of Shakespearean Comedy :

Shakespearean comedy is pre-eminently romantic. His predecessors – Lyly, Greene and Peele influenced his art of writing comedy. The main characteristics
of Shakespearean comedy are given below:
i) Romance and Realism: Shakespearean comedy is romantic. The classical unities of time, place and action are not observed in it. The settings are all
imaginative. The action takes place in some remote far off place, and not in familiar surroundings. According to Raleigh Shakespearean comedy is a
―rainbow world of love in idleness. What distinguishes Shakespearean comedy is the fine and artistic blend of romance and realism. All his comedies are
related to real life. There are contemporary figures and contemporary fashions in Love‘s Labour Lost. Bottom and his companions exist with fairies; Sir Toly
Belch and Sir Andrew are companions of Viola and Olivia.
Shakespeare‘s characters are real. His dramatic personages are ordinary human beings and incidents are such as occurring in every day life. The romantic
main plot and the realistic sub plot are harmoniously put together in As You Like It, Twelfth Night and A Midsummer Night‘s Dream. Charlton writes:
―Shakespearean comedies are not satiric; they are poetic. They are not conservative, they are creative.‖
ii) Love: Shakespearean comedy is essentially a comedy of love, which ends with the ringing of the marriage bells. Wooing distinguishes it from classical
comedy. The entire atmosphere is surcharged with love. Not only the hero and the heroine are in love but all are in love. The Shakespearean comedy ends
not with the celebration of one marriage but with many marriages.
Shakespeare has vividly exhibited carried manifestations of love in his comedies. In As You Like It he has described the love at first sight between Orlando
and Rosalind, thoughtful love between Celia and Oliver, pastoral love between Phebo and Silvius. The men and women who love truly have become superb
representations of human nature. True love is spiritual. It is a union of minds and hearts.
iii) Shakespeare’s Heroines: Heroines in Shakespearean comedy play leading roles and surpass their male counterparts. Ruskin‘s remark that ―Shakespeare
has only heroines and no heroes‖ is certainly true to his comedies. Shakespeare‘s heroines Rosalind Portia, Viola, Beatrice etc. are endowed with wit,
common sense, human feelings and noble qualities of head and heart. They are wise, winning and charming. They have beautiful feelings, thoughts and
emotions. They radiate joy, peace and spirit of harmony. Male characters in Shakespearean comedy only play a second fiddle. His heroines know how to
fulfill their desires and resolve crisis. All heroines in Shakespearean comedy are guided by infinitive insight.
iv) Disguise: The use of dramatic device of disguise is common to all the comedies of Shakespeare. In The Merchant of Venice Jessica disguises herself in
―the lovely garnish‖ of a boy, and Portia and Nerissa likewise donmasculine attire. This devise is also employed for instance, in I As You Like It Rosalina and
Celia become Ganymede and Aliena, and in All‘s Well That Ends Well. Helena passes off in bed as Diana.
v) Homour: Homour is the soul of Shakespearean comedy. It arouses thoughtful laughter. It is full of humane and genial laughter. Shakespeare‘s wit lacks
malice and his mockery has no bite. Brilliant wit mingles with kindly mirth and genial humour.
Shakespeare‘s humour is many sided. He can arouse laughter from the mumblings of a drunkard and the intelligent repartees of leading women. The alert
wit and bright good sense of a Rosalind arouse exquisite pleasure. His all pervasive spirit of mirth gains much from the presence of the Fool. Bottom and his
companions, Feste, Sir Andrew, Sir Toby, Touchstone, Dogberry, Verges and Falstaff are Shakespeare‘s memorable fools, who not only create humour and
laughter, but they also interlink the main and the subplots, and provide a running commentary on character and action. Falstaff is a superb comic character
of Shakespeare.
vi) Admixture of Tragic and Comic Elements: Shakespearean comedy differs from the classical comedy in the sense that in it the comic and the tragic
elements are commingled. However, the tragic note does not dominate and the play ends on a note of joy. For example, The Merchant of Venice is
pervaded by the tragic element from the signing of the bond to the end of the trial scene. Ultimately the play ends happily, as Antonio, whose life has been
threatened by Shylock, feels happy at heart as his life has been saved.
vii) Music and Song: Since music is the food of love. Shakespearean comedy is abundantly full of song and music. The Twelfth Night opens with a note of
music which strikes the keynote of
the play. Several romantic songs are scattered all over A Midsummer Night‘s Dream, Twelfth Night, As You Like It and Much Ado About Nothing.
viii)The Role of Fortune: ―The course of true love never runs smooth.‖ Lovers have to face the hostilities of parents, friends or relatives; and consequently,
there are much tears and sighs, before the final union takes place. But all these difficulties and complications are unexpectedly removed by the benign
power of Fortune.
Shakespearean comedy radiates the spirit of humanity and a broad vision of life. It is large – hearted in the conception, sympathetic in its tone and
humanitarian in its idealism. Shakespeare created his own hallmark on the comedies in English drama.