Stereotypes Of William Shakespeare In The 21st Century

Shakespeare uses language to explore the controversial gender roles. His use of two distinctively opposing female

Shakespeare's works have persistently influenced humanity for the past four hundred years. Quotations from his plays are used in many other works of literature and some common phrases have even become integrated into the English language. Most high schoolers have been unsuccessful in avoidance of him and college students are rarely afforded the luxury of choice when it comes to studying the bard. Many aspects of Shakespeare's works have been researched but one of the most popular topics since the 1960s has been the portrayal of women in Shakespeare's tragedies, comedies, histories and sonnets.

All throughout Illyria, there is romance, passion, royalty, and an immense amount of gender stereotypes. William Shakespeare imagines the kingdom of Illyria to have very traditional norms for both women and men in his play Twelfth Night. In Scene 2 of Act 1, Viola, recently rescued from a shipwreck, hears about a duke named Orsino and instantly comes up with a plan to get closer to him. Her plan is to disguise herself as a boy who she will name Cesario and become one of Orsino's’ attendants. Right off the bat, we begin to see gender stereotypes. Why must Viola become a man in order to work for the duke? Elizabethan society “molded women into the form of the dutiful wife and mother” (Elizabethan Women). Viola could not have served duke Orsino as a woman because as a woman she was expected to work at home and be either a “dutiful wife [or a] mother”. Scene two prepares the audience for the idea of gender throughout the rest of the play. Shakespeare's Twelfth Night is very traditional play due to its ideas of gender stereotypes in Elizabethan society.

The play is thought to have been written between 1598 and 1599 as Shakespeare was approaching the mid of his career. It was the time when renaissance touched England. Though the period witnessed tremendous growth in science and learning but it was a male dominated society. Women had very little rights. Despite the fact that England was ruled by a female monarch Queen Elizabeth I for over four decades, most women had little or no power over their own lives. Women were denied formal education, the right to speak and the opportunity to hold office. Women were considered as weak and inferior to men and in need of always being protected. Women were expected to get married, bear children and look after the household. They were expected to obey the male members without question. They were expected to learn how to govern a household and become a skilled housewife. Single women were looked upon with suspicion. It was a solely patriarchal society with institutions such as marriage solely vested in elderly male authority. During that time the father chose whom his

Shakespeare writes about themes that are still relevant because his theme of gender is still seen in modern societies. In Macbeth gender is explored when Lady Macbeth questions her husband’s manhood in order to persuade him to kill Duncan. She says that if he can kill in war, he can kill now. Lady Macbeth also wishes that she could be unsexed. In modern societies we see that many people question their own gender and wish that they too could be of

Whether playfully resolved in the comedies or brutally exposed in the tragedies, at some level, all Shakespeare's works symbolically explore the conflict between male and female, or control and emotion, within society and the individual self (Novy 3); however, it is in the tragedies that Shakespeare moves beyond merely reflecting a woman's need to transcend socially imposed limitations to an in depth exploration of the dangers inherent in a worldview that prescribes the extreme devaluation and expulsion of the feminine in order to maintain masculine power and domination (200). In particular, Shakespeare's Macbeth is a play in which the masculine-centred world of the protagonist metaphorically and literally reflects the miserable alienation of both men and women when a fear of the feminine within society and themselves leads to chaotic disorder and the death of the soul.

Imagine living 400 hundred years ago and you were thought less of a man. Man that would be hard for us 20th century girls! During the time of Shakespeare women were be seen as the weaker sex. They had little control over there destinations and always depended on males. Men on the other hand were seen as tough beings and expected to take care of everything. Shakespeare's prove these gender roles wrong throughout his writings. One of his writings is Macbeth. All through this play women were looked as fragile and insulted each other not being manly enough. Over all Shakespeare saw women as extremely powerful beings even if society neglected them. He act knowledge them throughout his work and proved they were not always scapegoats or the tools

reflect the ideas of gender roles in Western society. To the extent that they reflect existing

A common theme in Shakespeare’s writings is the exploration of gender and sexuality (Gerlach et al.; McManus). His cleverly crafted and complex characters challenge the audience’s expectations of what it means to be masculine or feminine by displaying traits of each gender in single beings and questioning gender roles and standards (Gerlach et al.). This often playful consideration of gender norms was enhanced by the practice of men playing the female parts; in fact, theatres of Shakespeare’s era used costume and makeup to tease the audience who knew it was boys playing the female roles (McManus). Shakespeare portrayed women in a way that showed them to be more than passive, dainty little things (Gerlach et al.). They are often the characters who tell the truth about what is going on, demonstrating self-awareness, using reason, and controlling the action (Gerlach et al.; O’Brien). Beatrice from Much Ado About Nothing is a perfect example of the interplay of feminine and masculine qualities and behaviors. She is opinionated and witty, and stands up for what she believes in, all while falling in love, traits that at the time of Shakespeare would have been quite radical for a woman to display. It is the powerful and complex women in Shakespeare’s works that make his plays the perfect place to explore more modern views on gender still today, especially now that women actually play the parts.

Shakespeare is often criticized or analyzed over his perceptions and representations of Elizabethan gender roles in his works. Many describe Shakespeare as a misogynist, while others argue that he is, in fact, a feminist. Gender roles play a large role in many of Shakespeare’s works, with one in particular being his tragedy of the Prince of Denmark, Hamlet. In this work, Shakespeare uses both male and female characters to comment on and represent Elizabethan gender roles in the play, through syntax, word choice, and character relationships. Each of his characters, either male or female, are tied to a different take on Elizabethan gender roles, such as Hamlet not fulfilling the expectations of being a man, and Ophelia wanting to be more than the roles of her gender would allow.

William Shakespeare is one of the world 's most influential people to ever live. “BBC audience survey names Shakespeare as Britain 's Man of the Millennium.” (Andrews 2) Shakespeare’s works continue to be evident globally in modern society. Hundreds of years after William Shakespeare’s death, his influence continues to make an effect in the modern day English language, modern movies and film, and authors or artists today.

It is true that through the eyes of the modern woman, Shakespeare’s portrayal of women can appear misogynistic. Several of his famous plays (The Merchant of Venice, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet), depict the women with a submissive and obedient attitude towards their husbands. However, the exact opposite transpires in King Lear, even though there are many critics like Aleena Bonk for example, who said that the women were portrayed as “biased, misogynistic and (they) leave a bitter taste in the mouth” (Bonk 2). On the contrary, it is remarkable that the women in King Lear live in an extremely patriarchal society and yet they hold the most power throughout the play. It is important to note that the term feminism was not coined until the 19th century,

Plays tend to reflect the politics and social issues of the time they were written, which can educate people in modern day about philosophy further back than the 17th century. The plot of the play, Macbeth shows how dark and hostile Shakespeare’s writing became after King James took the throne in 1605 (BBC, 2014). The way the play speaks about women can reflect on the way Shakespeare thought of gender roles, and can display how far society has come in four centuries. In the 17th century, women had few rights, and followed orders from men, at the time the world depended on men (Alchin, 2012). Shakespeare wrote about men as superior and strong, yet women were weak, but he almost challenged those roles even in the 17th century

Main Idea: Shakespeare was not a sexist: All though the main three females in the play were seen as important and contributed tremendously towards the plot of the play. The readers see Shakespeare pushing the ideology of men and women being equal with the slow occurrence of many plots towards the play, and how it all unravels itself. These were proven in the play by when;

William Shakespeare is known to be the “greatest English-speaking writer in history” and an England’s national poet, actor, and an extremely successful playwright. During Shakespeare’s acting career in London, he started writing all about “European geography, culture, and diverse personalities (History.com).” Willm Shakspere or William Shakspeare, as written by him, then went on to write plays. His first three plays were all created around or a little before 1592 and captured the core studied categories; tragedy (Titus Andronicus), comedy (The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Comedy of Errors and The Taming of the Shrew), and history (Henry VI trilogy and Richard III). He wrote plays and sonnets for many theater companies, was one of the main playwrights for the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, which was renamed the King’s Men when James I was in charge, and formed the Globe theater in 1599 with other partners. Shakespeare’s unique language, themes, verses, format, characters, and plots makes his writing universal to every culture and time period. Shakespeare is still taught in school nowadays due to its’ educational and transitional purposes. Shakespeare continues to influence modern-day life and I believe will for a long time to come.