DOCSLIB.ORG

A Play of Human Frailty: Shakespeare’S Measure for Measure

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
A Play of Human Frailty: Shakespeare’S Measure for Measure Corso di Laurea magistrale ( ordinamento ex D.M. 270/2004 ) In Lingue e Letterature Europee Americane e Postcoloniali Tesi di Laurea A Play of Human Frailty: Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure Relatore Prof. Valerio di Vianino de Scarpis Correlatore Prof. Shaul Bassi Laureando Sara Rusconi Matricola 822708 Anno Accademico 2012 / 2013 Contents Introduction 2 1. The Genre of Comedy in Shakespeare’s time 5 1.1. Shakespeare’s comedy 9 1.2. Introduction to the “Problem Plays” 13 2. Labeling Measure for Measure 22 2.1. Sources 35 3. The Characters 54 3.1. The Disguised Ruler 54 3.2. The Duke’s Surrogate 84 3.3. Women in Measure for Measure 104 3.4 . Comic Characters 132 Conclusion: A Failed Happy Ending 151 Bibliography 155 ~ 1 ~ Introduction William Shakespeare wrote most of his works toward the end of the sixteenth century, including tragedies, comedies and history plays. Nevertheless, toward the last part of his career, in the first years of the seventeenth century, his style changed, offering a range of plays which differ from the traditional canon. It’s in this period that Measure for Measure (Fig.1) made its first appearance, seemingly on the 26 th December 1604, as part of the Christmas royal entertainments, just shortly after the accession to the throne of England of King James I 1.The following work deals precisely with Measure for Measure . The nature of this play is quite ambiguous, because it cannot be listed among the tragedies or the comedies, nor is it a history play. So what? This dissertation is going to try to throw some light on this question. First of all, an introduction to the world of comedy, and in particular Shakespeare comedy, will make clear what the main features of this kind of play are; furthermore, some considerations about the so called “problem plays” will be the frame of reference for the object of this dissertation, which is an analysis of the main characters and topics in Measure for Measure , along with some comparisons with other plays by Shakespeare, such as Hamlet and All’s Well That Ends Well . Thus, in defining what kind of play Measure for Measure is and what are its sources, also what Shakespeare’s aim was and what he wanted his audience to perceive, will become clear. In the chapter that follows, the main characters are taken into consideration, analyzing their behavior, their role and function in the play. The first section of the third chapter focuses on the disguised Duke of Vienna, Vincentio, who decided to leave his dukedom to Angelo, his Deputy, for a while, in order to let him mend the situation, which was getting out of hand. Indeed, the Duke had been too lax with his people up to that time and, as a consequence, Vienna had become a city of corruption and licentiousness. This topic leads us into the following section, which 1 Kevin A. Quarmby, The Disguised Ruler in Shakespeare and His Contemporaries , Ashgate Publishing Ltd., Farnham: Surrey, 2012, p.105; ~ 2 ~ Fig.1. Photo of the first page of Measure for Measure from a facsimile edition (1996) of the First Folio of Shakespeare’s plays, published in 1623. ~ 3 ~ is dedicated to the character of Angelo; this man has received the hard task of ruling Vienna when almost no rules existed any more. Further on, another section is dedicated to the women of this play, especially to the character of the pure Isabella; then, also there are: the sweet Mariana, Claudio’s mistress, namely Juliet and the lecherous Mistress Overdone, a brothel keeper. The last section of the third chapter focuses on the figures of the clowns and the way they differ from those we find in Hamlet or Twelfth Night . Eventually, we shall come to learn that this play’s finale is nothing but “a failed happy ending”, because notwithstanding the apparent status of solved things through a series of marriages, the real truth is that beyond these fictional resolutions, there is something obscure, the gloomy significance of the play that Shakespeare may have wanted to convey to his audience. In the end some conclusions are drawn that focus on the listing of the play, on its deep significance and its impact on the Jacobean audience. ~ 4 ~ 1. The Genre of Comedy in Shakespeare’s Time The first thing that comes to the mind when we talk about comedy is something that makes people laugh. Yet, this is not enough, because the question that arises as a consequence is: what is it that makes people laugh? Laughter is generally caused by the familiarity of the situation; this means that the audience identifies with the character and thinks: “What would I do in that situation?”. As Penny Gay points out, “the community recognises its own passion for drama, and laughs, not in contempt like the on stage audience, but in delighted acknowledgement of that irrational need – and of the courage of the actors who would respond to it, whatever absurdity that may involve.” 2 Another reason can be found in the situation in which a snobbish character is taken down, punished by making him look funny. In general, we laugh at people who are in a difficult situation that the audience knows will be solved, and that makes them look funny. These are examples of what Penny Gay calls “visual comedy, that is, the undermining of seriously intended speech with bodily incongruities or indignity.” In her essay “Comedy as Idea and Practice”, she also refers to another reason people laugh, namely the so called “aural laughter-producing mechanism”, that is set in motion “when a character mangling and misapplying the English language tickles the collective funnybone because of his departure from the norm” (such as Constable Elbow’s malapropisms in Measure for Measure ). However, apart from laughter, comedy is a narrative form based on some precise expectations: notwithstanding the apparently tragic beginning of the story that is usually characterized by a situation of disorder, at the end, the denouement has to bring happiness, at least among the main characters. Indeed, its happy ending is precisely one of the fundamental features in a comedy; many things can happen during the unfolding of the plot; but whatever may happen, the result has always to 2 Penny Gay, The Cambridge Introduction to Shakespeare’s Comedies , Cambridge University Press, 2008, p.3. ~ 5 ~ be the same: at the end, the audience expect an image of happiness, at least for some characters, generally achieved through marriage, family reconciliations, and/or feasts. Marriage is very important for the happy ending of comedy, since it gives the idea that harmony has been achieved, and the children begot as a result of this union constitute the certainty that society will develop and grow. This consideration leads to reflect on an interesting point: comedy does not imply only laughter and happiness; comedies show that human life is nothing but a farce and even if we can have the impression that society has achieved a certain order, in the end, people are naturally inclined to overturn that order by acting stupidly. In general, comedies are characterized by some fixed features that of course can change from situation to situation: the leading force of a comedy is clearly love; people in love, but not only them, usually do stupid things, act foolishly and often behave in a ridiculous way. The difficult situations the characters have to face are taken too seriously, showing how generally people react when in trouble; in other words, people tend to cross their bridges before they come to them. Another feature of comedy is the caricature, that is “a description of a person or thing that makes them seem ridiculous by exaggerating some of their characteristics” 3. Caricatures in comedies are a means to show a society’s flaws. The structure of comedy is based on three main moments: exposition, complication and then resolution. Exposition is necessary to show the audience what is going to happen. The complication phase is characterized by the development of the problems the characters will have to face throughout the story; this stage is generally the moment in which disorder prevails. At the end of the play, all the problems are solved in the denouement of the plot. The three main models of comedy in England, before Shakespeare’s theatre, are something that is worth attention before moving to Shakespeare’s comedy in particular. The first one is Roman comedy, that included the plays of Terence and Plautus; their comedies were used in schools in order to teach the Latin language. 3 Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English, edited by Sally Wehmeier, Oxford University Press, 2005. ~ 6 ~ Roman comedies were usually based on the love between two youths who, thanks to their witty servants’ help, were able to stay together notwithstanding their vexed fathers’ opposition. Some typical characters of Roman comedy are the boastful soldier, the doctor and the nagging wife (models that Shakespeare later used in his plays). Later, in the sixteenth century, Italian comedy developed into two different branches: the commedia erudita and the commedia dell’arte . The first one was conceived for the higher classes and for academies, while the commedia dell’arte is not exactly a genre of drama, since the performance of the plot is not based on written texts, but on sketches or scenarios; as a matter of fact, it is an improvised comedy. These scenarios, Louise Clubb points out, “memorialize several decades of experience in the Italian professional theatre and demonstrate much of its range. They attest to a continual mining of the kinds of fictive material also used
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Downloading a Movie to Watch Together on a Saturday Night
    ADMISSION: FIGURING THE EARLY MODERN THEATRE by EVE PREUS B.A. (Honors), The University of Washington, 2004 M.A., The University of British Columbia, 2008 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULLFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTDOCTORAL STUDIES (English) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) December 2017 © Eve Preus, 2017 Abstract Drawing from theories of the theatre that interrogate the master image/metaphor of theatre-as-life, my thesis “Admission: Figuring the Early Modern Theatre” develops a poetics of admission, or a theory of early modern theatrical form that takes into account its penchant for metatheatrical device and its obsession with the incorporation of strangers. What is a stranger? What might it mean to integrate the Other into the self and into society? The theatre stages a face-to-face encounter between two ostensible strangers—the performers and the audience. At the level of the medium, then, is an interest in the ways we come to know and let others in. The early modern stage was extremely interested in this process, self-consciously experimenting with, interrogating, and evaluating the tensions and possibilities inherent in the articulation of the human via live illusion. While the influx and management of strangers were growing concerns in the burgeoning metropolis of early modern London, the theatre became a sight to organize these concerns in a way that, perhaps unconsciously, returned them to their metaphysical origins. My thesis examines several early modern characters that are strangers, or become strangers, within the communities of their respective play realities: the deposed King Richard II; the outcast Jewish money-lender, Shylock; the bastard son of Troy, Thersites; and the revenge tragedians and madmen, Hieronimo and Hamlet.
    [Show full text]
  • The Validity of Hybridity in Derek Walcott's a Branch of the Blue Nile
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Academy Publication Online ISSN 1798-4769 Journal of Language Teaching and Research, Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 97-107, January 2018 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/jltr.0901.12 The Validity of Hybridity in Derek Walcott’s A Branch of the Blue Nile Zohreh Ramin Department of English, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran Monireh Arvin Department of English, Alborz Campus, University of Tehran, Alborz, Iran Abstract―With A Branch of the Blue Nile (1983) Derek Walcott makes a strong statement for the validity of a hybrid West Indian culture. He portrays the relation between European, specifically English, as well as American and African culture as one that should not be marked by a hierarchy, placing the central culture and languages at the top and African or mixed cultures/languages at the bottom. Walcott’s strategy here is to show that the so–called standards, Shakespeare’s ‘classical’ plays and their language are already of a hybrid nature, and any attempt to characterise them as homogenous entities and preserve them as such may ultimately result in their inertness. What threatens a civilisation or culture, according to Walcott, is not some form of hybridity, but rather the closing off or preservation of artistic forms from other foreign influences because it makes these artistic forms incapable of interacting with the surrounding cultural environment. The authors of this paper while appreciating all the orchestrated bonus of the existing relevant criticisms on hybridity towards Walcott’s A Branch of the Blue Nile intend to examine the use of Bakhtinian notions with regard to language exemplifying Bakhtin’s view of linguistic interanimation and his insights into the “polyglotic” and “heteroglotic” nature of the play.
    [Show full text]
  • 1. Shakespeare's Fools Costume Design
    1. Shakespeare’s Fools Costume Design - Oliver Cronk, London College of Fashion Director - Caroline Williams Museum Location - The Dorothy and Michael Hintze Galleries The Fool questions, probes and provokes. He disrupts form to reveal truth. He is an agent that bends or gnaws at the ear of the powerful. Our Tribe of Fools revels in unearthing the hidden through lucid observation. It whispers, laughs and dances through the constraints of environments in which it exists. Our Tribe of Fools draws on characters from across Shakespeare’s plays (Feste, Touchstone, the Gravediggers and Lear’s Fool). Analysis of the characterization and narrative function of these figures has allowed us to essentialise a ‘stock’ fool, which serves a performative model for our work. As the Shakespearean fool disrupts and alters the narrative mechanics of the plays it inhabits, so our performance seeks to distort experience and question the environments in which it occurs, be they in provincial England, the V&A Sculpture Galleries or beyond. In addition to our live performance, we also present a short film interpretation of a journey made by Shakespeare’s own ‘fool’ collaborator, William Kempe. In 1601, Kempe danced the entire way from London to Norwich. In response, our fools dance the entire way back. 2. The Merry Owls of Windsock Costume Design - Max Johns, Bristol Old Vic School Museum Location - The John Madejski Garden “Why not reclaim our distinctively human heritage as creatures who can generate their own ecstatic pleasures out of music, colour, feasting, and dance?” (Barbara Ehrenreich) When designing costumes for Shakespeare’s Merry Wives of Windsor Max was persistently drawn to the final scene at Herne’s Oak.
    [Show full text]
  • Shakespearean Supernatural Elements the Vast and Diverse
    Shakespearean Supernatural Elements The vast and diverse powers in many forms of fiction feature characters attributed with superhuman, supernatural, or paranormal abilities, often referred to as ―superpowers‖ (also spelled ―super powers‖ and ―super-powers‖) or ―powers‖. The supernatural has been claimed to exist, which cannot be explained by the laws of nature, including things characteristic of or relating to ghosts, gods, or other types of spirits and other non-material beings, or to things beyond nature. Supernaturalism, as opposed to naturalism, is a belief in the supernatural in interpreting the world or attempting to control it. It can vary from those who believe that supernatural powers or entities are constantly or continuously intervening in the natural world to those who like Deists. Shakespeare‘s specific scenes focus the suspense and involvement of the supernatural. The use of witches, apparitions and ghosts are an important element in making the play interesting. Shakespeare has created immortal characters whose characteristics transcends those of the normal supernatural beings, but most students of literature agree that his uses of the supernatural aren‘t merely figments of his creative imagination. Every man, woman, and child is influenced by the age into which they are born and Shakespeare was no exception. Not only does his use of supernatural elements within his works reveal the Elizabethans‘ obsession with mythical beliefs, but it also reveals his attitude toward these beliefs at different points of his writing career. Witches appear in Macbeth, a ghost appears in Hamlet, and fairies appear in A Mid- Summer Nights Dream. In addition, magic cures are given in All‘s Well, evil curses are chanted in Richard III, and prophecies are told in Julius Caesar.
    [Show full text]
  • Fools, Clowns, Jesters: an Attempt to Understand Certain Low Comic Héroes in Shakespeare
    BIBLID 1136-3169 (2004-2005) pp. 283-294 FOOLS, CLOWNS, JESTERS: AN ATTEMPT TO UNDERSTAND CERTAIN LOW COMIC HÉROES IN SHAKESPEARE TERESA GUERRA BOSCH Universidad de Las Palmas Gran Canaria RESUMEN Shakespeare creó tantos personajes cómicos —no sólo en sus comedias sino también en sus obras más trágicas— que intentar clasificarlos parece una tarea imposible. Sin embargo, con la ayuda de parte de la reciente investigación en las comedias de Shakespeare, y limitándonos en este ensayo al estudio de los "héroes cómicos" que podríamos denominar "fools", (el "fool" oficial que suele ser más inteligente y cuerdo que el resto de los personajes, y que aparece en King Lear o tal vez Feste; el simplón, aquel upo de personaje más limitado mentalmente como los "mecánicos" en Midsummer Night's Dream, los "tedious fools" tipo Pollonius y finalmente todos aquellos que no pertenecen a ninguna de las tres clases mencionadas). ABSTRACT Wüliam Shakespeare drew so many different comic héroes —not only in his comedies but also in his tragedles and histories— that to attempt a classification of them seems a daunting task. However, with the help of much of the recent research on Shakespeare's comedies and comic héroes, and limiting myself in the present essay to the study of some of his comic characters that wiU qualify as fools, (the so-called fools who happen to be wiser than anybody else, the type of fool we see in Ki»g Lear or perhaps Feste; the simpletons, the simplest of them all like the mechanicals of Midsummer Night's Dream, and those "tedious fools," those fools that are merely in- between), this essay will clarify Shakespeare's use of low comic humour.
    [Show full text]
  • Umidissertation Information Service
    INFORMATION TO USERS This reproduction was made from a copy of a manuscript sent to us for publication and microfilming. While the most advanced technology has been used to pho­ tograph and reproduce this manuscript, the quality of the reproduction is heavily dependent upon the quality of the material submitted. Pages in any manuscript may have indistinct print. In all cases the best available copy has been filmed. The following explanation of techniques is provided to help clarify notations which may appear on this reproduction. 1. Manuscripts may not always be complete. When it is not possible to obtain missing pages, a note appears to indicate this. 2. When copyrighted m aterials are removed from the m anuscript, a note ap- pe£irs to indicate this. 3. Oversize materials (maps, drawings, smd charts) are photographed by sec­ tioning the original, beginning at the upper left hand comer and continu­ ing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each oversize page is also filmed as one exposure and is available, for an additional charge, as a standard 35mm slide or in black and white paper format. * 4. Most photographs reproduce acceptably on positive microfilm or micro­ fiche but lack clarify on xerographic copies made from the microfilm. For an additional charge, all photographs are available in black and white standard 35mm slide format.* *For more information about black and white slides or enlarged paper reproductions, please contact the Dissertations Customer Services Department. Dissertation UMI Information Service University Microfilms International A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 N. Zeeb Road, Arîn Arbor, Michigan 48106 8625211 Drew, Anne-Marie TRAGICOMIC FOOLS IN SHAKESPEARE AND BECKETT The Ohio State University PH.D.
    [Show full text]
  • Shakespeare's Wise Fool
    CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, NORTHRIDGE "MOTLEY'S THE ONLY WEAR": SHAKESPEARE'S WISE FOOL A thesis submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in English by Deborah Kay Dixon May 1988 The Thesis of Deborah Kay Dixon is approved: Arlene Stiebel Rob~,rt Noreen Lesley Johnstone, Chair California State University, Northridge ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Table of Contents .. • . iii Abstract . i v Introduction . 1 Chapters: I. The Major Conventions of the Fool . • • • 3 II. A Definition of the Wise Fool • . 22 III. The Language of the Wise Fool • . • • • 4 3 IV. The Functions of the Wise Fool •• . .72 Conclusion . • . 103 Works Cited. • • 106 Works Consulted. 110 iii ABSTRACT "MOTLEY'S THE ONLY WEAR": SHAKESPEARE'S WISE FOOL by Deborah Kay Dixon Master of Arts in English This thesis defines the character and function of the wise fool in Shakespearean drama. The opening chapter traces the major historical and literary conventions and functions on which Shakespeare was able to draw in order to create his fool characters. Chapter Two presents a definition of the wise fool, differentiating him from clowns and other comic characters. The four wise fools who are the subject of this thesis--Touchstone, Feste, Lavache, and Lear's Fool--are then individually described and a possible progression in the their development from the most clownish to the most wise is suggested. The analysis of the wise fool continues in the third and fourth chapters with a close examination of his language iv as well as his dramatic and thematic functions, with particular emphasis on his function as a teacher.
    [Show full text]
  • Feste and Twelfth Night
    Claremont Colleges Scholarship @ Claremont Scripps Senior Theses Scripps Student Scholarship 2016 Playing the Fool: Feste and Twelfth iN ght Brooklyn D. Robinson Scripps College Recommended Citation Robinson, Brooklyn D., "Playing the Fool: Feste and Twelfth iN ght" (2016). Scripps Senior Theses. Paper 865. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/865 This Open Access Senior Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Scripps Student Scholarship at Scholarship @ Claremont. It has been accepted for inclusion in Scripps Senior Theses by an authorized administrator of Scholarship @ Claremont. For more information, please contact [email protected]. PLAYING THE FOOL: FESTE AND TWELFTH NIGHT by BROOKLYN ROBINSON SUBMITTED TO SCRIPPS COLLEGE IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE DEGREE OF BACHELOR OF ARTS ARTHUR HOROWITZ GLENN SIMSHAW CAROLYN RATTERAY THOMAS LEBHART APRIL 22nd 2016 “Fools and fooling complicate perceptions, disrupt meaning, confound and compound perspective.” Robert H. Bell, Shakespeare’s Great Stage of Fools 1 | P a g e TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgments ……………………………………………... 3 Introduction ……………………………………………………. 4 Chapter 1: A History of the Fool ……………………………. 8 Chapter 2: Feste and Viola …………………………………… 15 Chapter 3: Feste and the Rest …………………………………. 22 Chapter 4: The Function of the Fool …………………………... 31 Chapter 5: Playing the Fool …………………………………… 35 List of Works Cited ……………………………………………. 38 2 | P a g e ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my readers and everyone who supported me through this process. Thank you, Art, for the opportunity to be Feste in your production. You have guided and encouraged me on my journey as a developing theatre artist and I am forever grateful. Professor Simshaw, you have been an invaluable resource for this work and I so enjoyed our conversations about Shakespeare.
    [Show full text]
  • Parody of the Shakespearean Fool Tradition in an African Society Durotoye A
    © Kamla-Raj 2007 J. Soc. Sci., 15(1): 35-42 (2007) Parody of the Shakespearean Fool Tradition in an African Society Durotoye A. Adeleke Department of Linguistics and African Languages, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria E-mail: [email protected] KEYWORDS Parody; Shakespearean fool; Yoruba playwrights; Yoruba fool genre; ironic trans-contextualization ABSTRACT There is always a precursor in any well-established institution, and artistic institution is no exception. The fool tradition itself has its origin in Dionysian phallic rituals, or Greek, Roman and English festivals in general, thus serving as the springboard for the Shakespearean fool. Shakespeare then popularises the fool character in his plays whereby he turns it into an institution. The Yoruba playwrights, like others from any part of the world, seem to have been influenced by the Shakespearean fool tradition to a large extent. This paper, therefore, sets out to draw the Shakespearean parallel that is visible in the Yoruba fool genre with special reference to the appearance, the role and language of fool. Copious examples are drawn from the written and film genres to back up the issue of parody. The paper concludes by paying attention to the mark of departure and what account for such a disparity. INTRODUCTION productions of some creative artists, the Yoruba writers being no exception. A number of critics, such as Wiles (1987), Richmond (2002) have noticed that some texts THE FOOL’S DESCENT produced by many playwrights do have Shakespearean semblance. For instance, it is It is necessary to say that just as a number of observed that Marston’s Antonia’s Revenge writers are said to be indebted to William Shakes- produced by the Paul’s boys shared a similarity peare, so also is he (Shakespeare) indebted to with Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
    [Show full text]
  • An Adaption of Shakespeare's Fool in The
    The University of Akron IdeaExchange@UAkron Selected Papers of the Ohio Valley Shakespeare Literary Magazines Conference March 2019 You’re Never Too Old to Laugh: An Adaption of Shakespeare’s Fool in the Modern Era Tina Kramer Bucknell University, [email protected] Please take a moment to share how this work helps you through this survey. Your feedback will be important as we plan further development of our repository. Follow this and additional works at: https://ideaexchange.uakron.edu/spovsc Part of the Literature in English, British Isles Commons Recommended Citation Kramer, Tina (2019) "You’re Never Too Old to Laugh: An Adaption of Shakespeare’s Fool in the Modern Era," Selected Papers of the Ohio Valley Shakespeare Conference: Vol. 10 , Article 5. Available at: https://ideaexchange.uakron.edu/spovsc/vol10/iss1/5 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Literary Magazines at IdeaExchange@UAkron, the institutional repository of The nivU ersity of Akron in Akron, Ohio, USA. It has been accepted for inclusion in Selected Papers of the Ohio Valley Shakespeare Conference by an authorized administrator of IdeaExchange@UAkron. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. You’re Never Too Old to Laugh: An Adaption of Shakespeare’s Fool in the Modern Era Tina Kramer, Bucknell University The Shakespearean fool has been utilized in various forms of adaptions in the modern era. However, there is marked T development over the course of Shakespeare’s plays even in his own time. Earlier works catered to “slapstick” style humor while later plays, including King Lear, feature fools that introduce wisdom through humorous episodes.
    [Show full text]
  • Shakespeare's Clowns and Fools - Introduction
    Shakespearean Criticism: Shakespeare's Clowns and Fools - Introduction Shakespeare's Clowns and Fools - Introduction ©2010 eNotes.com, Inc. or its Licensors. Please see copyright information at the end of this document. Shakespeare's Clowns and Fools INTRODUCTION Appearing in most of Shakespeare's dramas, the clown or fool figure remains one of the most intriguing stage characters in the Shakespearean oeuvre and has frequently captured the interest of contemporary critics and modern audiences. Taking many forms, Shakespearean fools may be generally divided into two categories: the clown, a general term that was originally intended to designate a rustic or otherwise uneducated individual whose dramatic purpose was to evoke laughter with his ignorance; and the courtly fool or jester, in whom wit and pointed satire accompany low comedy. The dramatic sources of Shakespeare's simple-minded clowns are at least as old as classical antiquity. In the plays themselves, such figures as Bottom of A Midsummer Night's Dream and Dogberry of Much Ado About Nothing are typically classified as clowns, their principal function being to arouse the mirth of audiences. The history of the courtly fool or jester in England is somewhat briefer, with these fools making early appearances in the courts of medieval aristocracy during the twelfth century. By the time of Queen Elizabeth's reign, courtly fools were a common feature of English society, and were seen as one of two types: natural or artificial. The former could include misshapen or mentally-deficient individuals, or those afflicted with dwarfism. Such fools were often considered pets—though generally dearly loved by their masters—and appear infrequently in Shakespeare's writing.
    [Show full text]
  • The Journal of Shakespeare and Appropriation 2/28/20, 11(15 PM
    Borrowers and Lenders: The Journal of Shakespeare and Appropriation 2/28/20, 11(15 PM ISSN 1554-6985 VOLUME VII · (/current) NUMBER 1 SPRING/SUMMER 2012 (/previous) EDITED BY (/about) Christy Desmet and Sujata (/archive) Iyengar CONTENTS Shakespeare, Humanity Indicators, and the Seven Deadly Sins Peter (/783091/show) (pdf) (/783091/pdf) Holland Shakespeare in Stained Glass: The Shakespeare Memorials of Brian Southwark Cathedral and "Local" Bardolatry (/783058/show) Walsh (pdf) (/783058/pdf) Regula Hamlet's Soliloquy: An Eighteenth-Century Genre Hohl (/783057/show) (pdf) (/783057/pdf) Trillini Playing the Fool with Shakespeare: Festivity, Falsity, and Feste Giselle in Twelfth Night and King of the Masquerade (/783056/show) Rampaul (pdf) (/783056/pdf) B OOK REVIEWS Shakespeare and Contemporary Fiction: Theorizing Foundling Julie and Lyric Plots, by Barbara L. Estrin (/783054/show) (pdf) Sanders (/783054/pdf) http://borrowers.uga.edu/7163/toc Page 1 of 2 Borrowers and Lenders: The Journal of Shakespeare and Appropriation 2/28/20, 11(15 PM The Reel Shakespeare: Alternative Cinema and Theory, edited Lisa by Lisa S. Starks and Courtney Lehmann (/783055/show) (pdf) Bolding (/783055/pdf) C ONTRIBUTORS Contributors (/783042/show) (pdf) (/783042/pdf) © Borrowers and Lenders 2005-2020 http://borrowers.uga.edu/7163/toc Page 2 of 2 Borrowers and Lenders: The Journal of Shakespeare and Appropriation 2/28/20, 11(15 PM Shakespeare, Humanity Indicators, and the Seven Deadly Sins (/current) PETER HOLLAND, UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME ABSTRACT | I | II | III
    [Show full text]