Shakespeare wrote about 17 comedies, e.g. A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Merchant of Venice, As You Like It, Twelfth Night, and late romances like The Winter's Tale and The Tempest. His comedy is called romantic comedy, different from Ben Jonson's satiric comedy.
Love is the main theme – young lovers face obstacles but are united in the end.
Happy ending – often several marriages.
Two worlds – the court/city and a green world (forest of Arden, Athenian wood, Bohemia) where problems are solved.
Strong, witty heroines – Rosalind, Portia, Viola, Beatrice; often disguised as men.
Disguise and mistaken identity create fun.
Clowns and fools – Touchstone, Feste, Bottom; the wise fool comments on life.
Mixing of comic and serious – Shylock's threat, Hermione's suffering.
Music, songs and poetry; mixture of verse and prose.
No strict classical unities of time and place.
Humanity and forgiveness – villains are often forgiven.
Characteristics of Shakespearean Tragedy
Major tragedies: Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth (the "big four"), and Romeo and Juliet, Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra. A. C. Bradley's Shakespearean Tragedy (1904) is the classic study.
Tragic hero – a man of high rank and noble qualities (king, prince, general).
Tragic flaw (hamartia) – one weakness leads to his fall: Macbeth's ambition, Othello's jealousy, Hamlet's delay, Lear's pride.
Inner conflict – struggle in the hero's mind; outer conflict – with other persons.
Fall from happiness to misery, ending in death of the hero and many others.
Supernatural elements – ghosts, witches.
Fate and chance play a part, but character is destiny.
Comic relief – the Porter in Macbeth, the Gravediggers in Hamlet.
Unit II: Representative Literature of the Age – Shakespearean Tragedy: Macbeth
Syllabus topics (RTMNU)
Shakespearean Tragedy – Macbeth
Macbeth – William Shakespeare
Macbeth (c. 1606) is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy. It was written in the reign of James I, who was interested in witchcraft and was believed to descend from Banquo. Source: Holinshed's Chronicles.
Summary (our own words)
Act I: Three Witches meet on a heath. Macbeth and Banquo, Scottish generals, return victorious. The Witches hail Macbeth as Thane of Glamis, Thane of Cawdor and "king hereafter", and say Banquo's sons will be kings. King Duncan makes Macbeth Thane of Cawdor. Macbeth writes to his wife. Lady Macbeth fears his nature is "too full o' the milk of human kindness" and calls on evil spirits to "unsex" her. When Duncan visits their castle, she persuades her hesitating husband to kill him.
Act II: Macbeth sees an imaginary dagger and murders Duncan in his sleep. He hears a voice cry "Macbeth does murder sleep". Lady Macbeth places the daggers with the grooms. The Porter scene gives comic relief. Macduff discovers the murder. Duncan's sons Malcolm and Donalbain flee; Macbeth becomes king.
Act III: Fearing Banquo, Macbeth hires murderers. Banquo is killed but his son Fleance escapes. At a banquet Banquo's ghost appears to Macbeth, who loses control.
Act IV: The Witches show apparitions: beware Macduff; no man "of woman born" can harm Macbeth; he will not be defeated till Birnam Wood comes to Dunsinane. Macbeth has Macduff's wife and children killed. In England Malcolm and Macduff prepare an army.
Act V: Lady Macbeth sleepwalks, trying to wash imaginary blood from her hands, and later dies (suicide is suggested). Macbeth speaks the "Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow" speech. Soldiers carry branches of Birnam Wood. Macduff reveals he was "from his mother's womb untimely ripped" and kills Macbeth. Malcolm becomes king.
Themes
Ambition – unchecked ambition destroys the soul.
Appearance vs reality – "Fair is foul, and foul is fair"; "look like the innocent flower, but be the serpent under't".
Guilt and conscience – blood, sleeplessness, hallucinations.
Fate vs free will – the Witches predict; Macbeth chooses.
Order and disorder – murder of a king disturbs nature (storms, horses eating each other).
Characters
Macbeth – brave soldier, imaginative, ambitious; moves from hesitation to cruelty and despair. A tragic hero whose flaw is "vaulting ambition".
Lady Macbeth – strong-willed, drives the murder; later broken by guilt (sleepwalking scene). She and Macbeth change places: he grows harder, she grows weaker.
Banquo – honest foil to Macbeth; hears the same prophecy but does not act on it.
Macduff – loyal patriot, avenger.
The Witches – supernatural agents of evil; they tempt but do not force.
Imagery
Blood, darkness/night, sleep, ill-fitting clothes (Macbeth's borrowed title), and disease.
RTMNU BA Sem 1 · English Literature T-2 · Unit III
Unit III: Pertinent Literature of the Period – Shakespearean Comedy: The Winter's Tale
Syllabus topics (RTMNU)
Shakespearean Comedy – The Winter's Tale
The Winter's Tale – William Shakespeare
The Winter's Tale (c. 1610–11) is one of Shakespeare's late plays called romances or tragicomedies (with Pericles, Cymbeline, The Tempest). Source: Robert Greene's prose romance Pandosto (1588). The first half is tragic (Sicilia, winter); the second half is comic and pastoral (Bohemia, spring), after a gap of 16 years.
Summary (our own words)
Jealousy in Sicilia: Polixenes, King of Bohemia, visits his childhood friend Leontes, King of Sicilia. Leontes' wife Hermione persuades Polixenes to stay longer. Leontes suddenly becomes madly jealous and believes Hermione and Polixenes are lovers. He orders Camillo to poison Polixenes; Camillo instead warns him and they flee to Bohemia.
Hermione's trial: Leontes imprisons pregnant Hermione. She gives birth to a daughter. Paulina, a brave lady, brings the baby to the king, but Leontes orders Antigonus (Paulina's husband) to leave the baby in a wild place. At the trial the Oracle of Apollo declares Hermione innocent and says the king will have no heir till "that which is lost be found". Leontes denies the oracle. Immediately news comes that his son Mamillius has died; Hermione faints and Paulina reports that she is dead. Leontes repents.
Bohemia: Antigonus leaves the baby, named Perdita ("the lost one"), on the coast of Bohemia and is killed by a bear ("Exit, pursued by a bear"). A Shepherd and his son find and raise her.
Time (as Chorus) tells us 16 years pass. Perdita and Prince Florizel, son of Polixenes, are in love. At the sheep-shearing feast Polixenes in disguise forbids the match. With Camillo's help the lovers flee to Sicilia. Autolycus, a rogue pedlar, adds comedy.
Recognition and reunion: Perdita's identity is discovered; Leontes and Polixenes are reconciled. Paulina shows a "statue" of Hermione, which comes to life – Hermione had been hidden for 16 years. The family is reunited; Paulina is married to Camillo.
Themes
Jealousy and its destruction.
Repentance, forgiveness and reconciliation.
Time as healer – loss and recovery.
Nature vs art (Perdita and Polixenes' debate on flowers; the "statue").
Rebirth – winter to spring, death to life.
Characters
Leontes – sudden irrational jealousy; later 16 years of penance.
Hermione – patient, dignified, innocent queen.
Paulina – bold, loyal, outspoken; the moral voice of the play.
Perdita – natural grace and nobility though raised by a shepherd.
Autolycus – merry thief and singer; comic spirit.
Remember: Source = Greene's Pandosto · 16-year gap · Oracle of Apollo · "Exit, pursued by a bear" · statue scene · a romance/tragicomedy.
Likely exam questions
(Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) Discuss The Winter's Tale as a romance (tragicomedy).
(Long, Long answer (about 16 marks)) Examine the theme of jealousy, repentance and forgiveness in The Winter's Tale.
(Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Write a character sketch of Paulina.
(Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) Write a note on the statue scene.
(Short, Short note (about 4 marks)) What is the role of Time as Chorus in the play?