Some of the most famous lines in the history of literature come from the writings of

William Shakespeare. As well, some of the most famous literary devices also come from
William Shakespeare. He produced many highly-praised stories of human drama, comedy,
and romantic sonnets and his work continues to influence writers to this day.

Shakespeare created the majority of his popular plays and stories in the late 16th century.
For many years he enjoyed writing comedies and historical plays until he found his true
love: writing tragedies and dark dramas, such as Hamlet and Macbeth.

Background Information
The playwright, poet, and actor, William Shakespeare, was born in Elizabethan England in
the 16th century. He wrote plays that appealed to both the commoner and the queen, and
he wrote as well as performed in his plays. His plays were performed in London at
the Globe Theater and in Stratford at The New Place Theater. He is referred to as William
Shakespeare, Shakespeare, or the Bard by countless fans of his work around the world.

Shakespeare wrote his earlier plays in the traditional style of the time. He relied heavily on
using drawn out—sometimes extravagant—metaphors and narcissisms. His style often
sounded pompous and pretentious. Shakespeare’s first original comedy called “The Two
Gentlemen of Verona” (1590) shows an undeveloped and conflicting writing style.

Iambic Pentameter
Shakespeare wrote in iambic pentameter. The results were plays and sonnets that had ten
syllables per line and with his plays, these lines were unrhymed. The simplest way to
describe the rhythm of iambic pentameter is to liken it to a heartbeat, which means a series
of stressed words, then unstressed words. In the case of the heartbeat, it would sound
like bump BUMP, bump BUMP. Using an example from Shakespeare’s sonnets, this
would be:

When I do count the clock that
tells the time

This style of writing lent itself to the theatricality of a play, which was as much about
using the language beautifully as it was about telling a good story or furthering the plot.
While writing such classics as A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Romeo and Juliet,
and Richard II in the late 16th century, Shakespeare gradually developed and changed his
writing style from the traditional form to a more self-expressive style. He progressively
used his metaphors and tropes to the desires of the melodrama itself.

The Soliloquy

“To be or not to be, that is the question.”

These famous lines from Shakespeare’s play “Hamlet” are the opening lines to his most
famous—although not the only—soliloquy. The soliloquy or monologue was a common
device that the famous playwright used to tell his stories. This monologue served to reveal
the character’s thoughts—as in the “Hamlet” example—as well as to create the play’s
setting or advance the plot. It serves to bring the audience into the story and let it in on
secrets that the rest of the characters in the play may not know.

The narrator character in the play “Our

Town” by Thornton Wilder uses monologues extensively to let the audience in on the
secrets of the town and to set the stage since typically this play features a mostly empty
stage with the actors creating the settings with their words. This shows Shakespeare’s
strong influence as his plays relied on the same devices and often through the soliloquy of
a single character, although not always.

After completing Hamlet, Shakespeare adopted a more centered, swift, distinct, and non-
repetitive writing style. He began to use more run-on lines, uneven pauses and stops, and
excessive alterations in sentence length and structure. Macbeth, his most darkest and
dynamic plays, shows this refined writing style in which Shakespeare used wording that
sprinted from one unconnected analogy or metaphor to a different one, forcing the reader
to complete the “sense” and subliminal meaning.

Depth of Character
Shakespeare wrote about people who seemed real instead of using stock characters as was
common in the theater during his days and in the generations that came before it. This
literary device allowed him to make characters like MacBeth or Hamlet sympathetic even
though they did some terrible things throughout the course of the play. It is because the
Bard made them seem real and human, but flawed that he was able to do this. This
influence can be seen in works from the 20th and 21st centuries in both movies and plays
by writers like Sam Shepard or Arthur Miller.

Additionally, Shakespeare’s work deviated from that of his contemporaries in that he

wrote for every type of person who came to the theater or read poems, not just for the
upper class as was common. His plays like “Henry the 4th, part 1” featured not only a
king and prince, but also one of the Bard’s most famous comedic characters, Falstaff,
which brought a comedic and common touch to the play and appealed to the members of
the lower class who attended the plays—often sitting in the same theater as the nobles of
the day and during the same performance.

Romeo and Juliet shows Shakespeare’s witty writing style and his creative mastery. At
this point in his life (around 1595), he favored a more theatrical structure, such as
changing between comedy and tragedy to increase suspense. He expanded minor
characters and developed sub-plots to amplify the story. Shakespeare also associated
various poetic styles to different characters, occasionally evolving the style as the
character developed.

Conclusion
William Shakespeare was the most influential writer of all-time, bringing a lyrical element
to plays about great kings and poor paupers alike. His iambic pentameter verses utilized a
natural rhythm of the English language and his themes as well as his literary devices
continue to inspire and influence writers even now in the 21st century

christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare were contemporaries

of the age.    There are many similarities in their literary styles; so
many, in fact, that it has often been speculated that Marlowe wrote
some of Shakespeare’s plays.  Marlowe definitely had an influence
on Shakespeare.  One of the most obvious similarities between the
two was that they both wrote in blank verse.  Marlowe took the idea
of blank verse common to his time and changed its conventional
form to a more flexible structure known as “the Mighty Line.” 
Shakespeare then perfected Marlowe’s form into the blank verse
that we know in his plays today.
Both men also wrote tragedies following Aristotle’s idea of the tragic
hero who has an inherent tragic flaw. Although their tragic heroes
were very similar, however, there were some differences in their
tragedies.  Shakespeare was very fond of using supernatural
elements in his plays in order to produce mystery, but Marlowe’s
plays did not contain the supernatural and were more
straightforward.  Shakespeare was also known for using characters
as foils (contrasts to the tragic hero to show his flaws), but Marlowe
did not use this technique.  Both men also used comedy in their
plays, but comic scenes in Marlowe’s plays did not contain the
genuine comic relief so apparent in Shakespeare.