Shakespeare 's Twelfth Night, And Marlowe 's The Tragical History Of Doctor Faustus

I will show understanding of the plot, character and themes and Shakesperes use of language and dramatic devices within the play.

People tend to judge others based on many aspects. Sometimes they may try to force people to act upon certain rules that define their place in society. They often try to meet expectations that society has made for them based on gender and social status. William Shakespeare reinforces these ideas in his play Twelfth Night, which introduces many meaningful messages about situations that still occur in society today. He clearly develops important themes worthy of analysis. A few of these strong themes are about stereotypes and society’s expectations and rules, which he proves to be irrelevant most of the time. Many situations in the play falsify commonly held stereotypes about gender and social status by showing how they are sometimes invalid. He also shows how these stereotypes can affect the way people behave towards and judge others.

Shakespeare’s King Lear and Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus are two examples of early modern texts, one a tragedy and the other a morality play respectively, which deal with the theme of power at the crux of its narrative. Between both texts it is evident that different characters utilize their power or authority differently – some ‘unwisely’ whilst some ‘maliciously’. In either case, the use of power progresses the plays and drives the majority of main characters.

King Lear and Hamlet, by William Shakespeare, are two plays that reveal similar thematic elements, yet possess fundamentally different plot structures. Driven by the suffering and rage of two complementary characters, both plays suggest injustice through ‘good’, but ultimately flawed characters. This shared overarching theme is, however, conveyed differently within each of the works, as one employs two mainly disparate plot threads, while the other relies more heavily on the interaction between the two central plots. Yet the ultimate purpose of this dualism remains the same within both King Lear and Hamlet, in that Shakespeare’s use of the double plot illuminates the tragic elements within both plays, emphasizing core injustices through

The differences in styles of language truly brings alive the plays' various characters, from the lowliest drawer to the noblest knight. The playwright's audience would have been composed of a similarly diverse spectrum of society, from the groundlings at the foot of the stage, to the members of the court in attendance, and these disparate members of the audience might very well have come away from the plays with different interpretations of

Shakespearean Drama SHAKESPEARE, William, Hamlet, New Cambridge Shakespeare, Cambridge University Press, 2003; or Cambridge School Shakespeare, 2006)

Shakespeare lights a candle of conflict in the beginning of his plays and appeals to individual opinions throughout his plot, only to cause the fire of confusion to engulf the reader’s mind at the end. He uses the themes of violence, bravery and lust in his plays, the Titus Andronicus and Henry IV Part 1, to show the masculinity of the characters. Moreover, he portrays societal expectations and the father’s prejudices as the main culprits for the ill understanding between the father and the son.

Shakespeare's first tragedy has been a topic of discussion since the day it was written. Titus Andronicus "was staged on 24 January 1594 by the Earl of Sussex's Men at the Rose Theatre" (Welsh 1). Though this tidbit of information seems somewhat irrelevant to Titus, we must note that there are certain standards and practices established by a play from its first performance. It is also important to establish the general attributes that audiences attribute to Shakespearean performance.

There are few names as commonplace, ubiquitous, and recognizable as that of William Shakespeare. His enchanting story telling, complex plot twists, and brilliant usage of rhetoric make it easy to understand why connoisseurs of the English language are devotees to his style of writing. However, it is his extremely portable themes that endear him to today’s audience – plotlines that resonate with the modern everyday human just as much with someone from the 1600s.

One can find many similarities between most of Shakespeare’s works, however, this may only be because of the shear amount of plays he had written. As we see today, much of Hollywood can be broken down to the same bare bones structure of story, and Shakespeare is no different. Although these similarities may be noticed only within the context of the theatrical arc – comedies full of love and pranks, tragedy ending with a pile of bodies - two plays stick out far above the rest in their likeness; Romeo and Juliet and Much Ado About Nothing. These shows, although very different, have an uncanny and alarming amount of similarities spread all throughout the acts. The strongest connections these plays have to each other lie within the characters and the themes and relationships included in the plot and they only differ in the way the story unfolds.

There is no denying that Shakespeare is a definitive playwright. He has presented us with classic works that have set the precedent for drama and the theatre. Among Shakespeare’s more notable plays are his tragedies. In the tragedy his protagonists are often given flaws in their character and hence, are suitably named tragic heroes. The downfall of these protagonists is often a result of their own character flaws and unfortunately, they suffer a doomed and unhappy ending. While the tragic hero is flawed they must also be honorable and worthy of the audience’s understanding and sympathy. On a quest for righteousness the tragic hero often goes through immense suffering which is why the audience can feel bad for him. For the most

On the 113th day of the year, William Shakespeare, a great author, died on the same day as his birth. To read or not to read, that is the question. Not only does Shakespeare teach his readers about modern life problems, he teaches his readers about historical events that have occurred. Whether it is a tragedy or a comedy, Shakespeare has always accomplished to make his readers think out of the box. Throughout all his writings’, William Shakespeare has never failed to prove a point. In The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, betrayal is made and in Romeo and Juliet, sacrifices are made. Both plays show a series of tragedies made due to modern day problems.

In my third semester, I was privileged to attend the course History of Literatures in English: Reading the Canon and Beyond at the same time as when the world celebrated Shakespeare’s 400th anniversary. The focus of this lecture was three of Shakespeare’s tragedies: Hamlet, Othello, and King Lear. Despite having read and analyzed Hamlet in my AP English class, I found it delightsome to partake in a class that focused specifically on the features of Shakespeare’s plays and how they have influenced later generations. The examination of Tom Stoppard’s play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead underlined the significance of Shakespeare’s impact. As with Hamlet, I had already studied this play during my AP English course; however, I valued reading

Shakespeare has a difficult task entertaining the rowdy Elizabethan audience, especially during the exposition of the play, which sets up the entire plot. The audience needs to be engaged and invested in the play, otherwise many of the Elizabethan audience would throw food and furniture on stage or vandalize the theatre in response. Shakespeare employs a variety of techniques throughout the exposition of the play in order to do this, by creating tension between characters, introducing scandalous plots and unresolved issues right at the beginning of the play leaving the audience waiting for an answer. This essay will explore Shakespeare’s techniques and methods of engaging his Elizabethan audience.

In the play Doctor Faustus, the theme of good versus evil is one of the most apparent as well as one of the most important themes throughout the play. Good and evil are represented as a battle or struggle in many ways such as constantly battling over winning various individuals souls, the concept of God versus the Devil, and the idea of religion versus science. This war between good and evil creates both internal conflicts for Faustus along with the external conflict between Faustus and various characters. The struggle between good and evil is also represented in the topic of damnation with the struggle to save Faustus’s soul from hell versus fighting to ensure Faustus’s soul is condemned to hell even with the idea of predestination.