Everyman Play Outline

The English morality play “Everyman” uses allegorical characters to represent what Everyman holds onto and values during his life. Everyman has neglected his spiritual life, but as the play develops Everyman repents of his sins on time. Summoned by Death, Everyman realizes that he is not ready and does not want to die alone. Thereafter, Everyman seeks to find a companion to go with him on the journey to give account of his life to God but to no avail, Everyman soon realizes that all of those who accompanied him on earth soon abandon him.

Abstract The author’s perception and treatment of Everyman are that each individual need to prepare for it by repenting, following God, and doing good works. The author’s perception is that at the end of the day one cannot take anything or anyone with them when they die. The only entity someone can take is their actions and how they use the resources that are given to them. Those who put God before everything and perform good works will enjoy eternity with Him, but those who enjoy only the pleasures of life and forget God, will not. The author’s main message throughout the play is to not fearful of death but know that one day everyone will die, so do as much good as one can, repent of one’s sins, and to put God first. Keywords: author, perception, treatment, death The Author’s Perception and Treatment of Death in Everyman In the late fifteenth century, an unknown author wrote a morality play called Everyman. According to Pearson, a morality play during the Medieval period would communicate a moral lesson and make it so simple that both illiterate and well-educated audiences could both understand the lesson (Adu-Gyamfi, 2016). One may believe that the author of Everyman want to communicate to the audience that everyone will receive judgment the actions they commit on Earth. The author’s perception of death is that God is the only one who has the power to control when each individual die, so if one has a relationship with Him one should not be fearful death. The author

When faced with the inevitable fate of death, the reaction of the population is very different because of their relation to life. Some men did not stop for death; they “hurried to and from” grinding their teeth in anger, which indicated their frustration in their inability to change the inevitable. Some “hid their eyes and wept” because of their unwillingness to accept the end while others rested “Their chins upon their clinched hands.” The latter watched their world fall apart bravely and smiled at their fate.

Even though people have been dying since the start of life, we can never get use to the idea of leaving our loved ones behind. Therefore humans choose to disregard death and get pleasure from life, and consequently we tend to stray away from righteousness. Two works; Everyman by an unknown author, and The Pardoner’s Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer have been written to preach humans toward Christianity-the right way of living. These authors utilize plot to reveal the role of death in understanding life. This is achieve by drawing on the foolishness of mankind, their response to the inevitable death and the effect of death on protagonists which altogether helps the readers understand worldly treasures are temporary.

The play Everyman is a perfect representation of public literature from the Renaissance period. The anonymous author reveals through the morality play that 'everyman' should be prepared for judgment at any time because, "Suddenly, [Death] come[s]." (Scene 1, Line 81) This, as with all allegorical works of that period, was constructed under the direction of the Roman Catholic Church to strike fear in to the hearts of men and, in doing so, have power over them. The church succeeded by censoring all works and designing them to fit their purpose.

In the late Medieval morality play Everyman, the unknown author reveals the dilemma each man may face, should they delay in living a life pleasing to God. The primary theme of this allegorical play covers death, which comes upon every living creature. The unfolding of the roles each character plays delivers a strong message about death’s inevitability that should awaken every man. Everyone reaches a point of understanding that death is a normal part of life that no one can escape. There have been numerous interpretation analysis and explications written on this famous fifteenth-century morality play.

The Parable of the Talents therefore refers to the metaphor "life is a precious possession." If you have many talents, you must "invest" them wisely--use them as you should use material goods, in a charitable way. If you have a few talents, you must invest them wisely as well. Even if you have only one talent, you must invest it wisely and do good in the world with that talent.<br><br>In an important way, the play Everyman demonstrates the ways in which a person who does have talents (Good Deeds that are trapped in the ground) wastes them, like the servant who buries his one talent in the ground and is cast into the dark, the "place of wailing and grinding of teeth." According to the play's allegory, what forces in everyday human life

This essay will address the theme of death in Shakespeare’s Sonnet 12 (1609) and George Herbert’s poem Virtue (1633). Both Shakespeare and Herbert explore notions of death in their poems, in terms of the tension between the psychical and the spiritual in a religious context. However, where they differ is that Shakespeare places emphasis on the importance of the corporeal, and of what is left behind on earth after death. In contrast, Herbert focuses on the impermanence of the physical, instead advocating a focus on the eternal life of the soul in heaven.

Everyman, who is the main character in this play, represents every human being: man, woman, and child; hence Everyman. The play

Thesis Statement: Everyman is a play that is deeply tied to the human condition. The author had a perception death and a direction of death that they wanted to share with the world. I aim to show and reveal the authors intention so that we may better understand death more.

Quite often Death is portrayed and perceived as dark, ominous, dangerous, and foreboding just to name a few. In this particular drama, death does play a serious role and does possess some of the above mentioned characteristics, but not the stereotypical role associated by many with death; here Death is cast as an obvious servant of God, not the typical servant of evil. Certain uncommon qualities are given to Death in this play as well; Death clearly demonstrates fairness and mercy in his allowance of Everyman to take a companion with him to the grave. Ron Tanner, writing in the Philological Quarterly, illustrates another, borderline, humorous quality in Everyman, specifically Everyman’s negotiation with Death:

The author uses Death as Gods mighty messenger to summon Everyone to him to pay for their sins. “Where art thou, Death, thou mighty messenger?” (line 63). “The reason that God has Death as his messenger is that mankind drowned in sin that God is obliged to command Death to summon Everyman to his final reckoning” (Kaula, D., 10)

The protagonist who can also be referred to as the agent of “everyman” is the main character. When all is said and done, it appears that everyman has driven a wild and wicked life. Over the span of the play, he is informed that he is going to bite the dust and subsequently be judged, he also experiences a journey which himself of sin, he is left by the greater part of his companions separated from good deeds and passes on (everyman character list 2015:1). This is when the climax of the play takes place (good deeds agrees to enter the afterlife with everyman) (Westwood

The play “Everyman”, was written in the late 15th century and is the only play that is based totally on morality. The play is meant to look at moral lessons and is written about a person, no one even knows his name, who is standing for all men and looks at the journey of his life. This play has a lot of different characters that come and go out of Everyman’s life. Characters that he wants to go on his journey, but they are not able to go. This play offers some humor as well, which may hard to tell when reading it. One of them is when Everyman tries to make a deal with the Devil for his life, which does not turn out well. Everyman has been compared to different plays including “Mankind “and “Youth.” (Tanner 1991). Both plays also deal with the journey of life from youths to their death. It has also been compared to “Pilgrim’s Progress”, which is a novel, that looks at humanity and religion and how the death of Jesus can wash their sins away. (Adu-Gyamfi and Schmidt 2011, 265). Everyman also has a similar theme with “Dance of Death”, which looks at the black death and plaques in England and France in the fourteenth and fifteenth century (Moran 1972, 324). This of course was a very hard death and was used for retribution of sins. Everyman was not like that at all.

The play “Everyman” is a morality play created sometime around the late 15th century. Unfortunately, the author is unknown. A morality play is a type of drama that has a main character which offers several teachings and life lessons on integrity and overall character to the reader. The drama has several characters but it only has one main character, which is Everyman. Everyman portrays a representation of mankind or humankind. This morality drama “Everyman” explores the idea between life and death, and how each man must face a time when death will be knocking at the door of his existence.