Louisiana State University LSU Digital Commons LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses Graduate School 1966 Shakespeare's Use of the Sea. Tony Jason Stafford Louisiana State University and Agricultural & Mechanical College Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_disstheses Recommended Citation Stafford, Tony Jason, "Shakespeare's Use of the Sea." (1966). LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses. 1138. https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_disstheses/1138 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at LSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of LSU Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. This dissertation has been microfilmed exactly as received 6 6-6458 STAFFORD, Tony Jason, 1935- SHAKESPEARE'S USE OF THE SEA. Louisiana State University, Ph.D., 1966 Language and Literature, general University Microfilms, Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan Cop'/right by Tony Jason Stafford 19B6 SHAKESPEARE’S USE OP THE SEA A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in The Department of English by Tony Jason Stafford B.A., Wake Forest College, 1957 January, 1966 TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. INTRODUCTION................................ 5 I I. OCEANIC CONCEPTS .................................................................. 26 I I I . THE SEA AS DRAMATIC DEVICE.......................................... 48 Structuring P lo t .............................................................. 48 Suspense . ............................................................. 6l S e t t i n g ................................................................................ 64 B ackground ................................................................. 71 A tm osphere............................................................................ 79 E m o t i o n ................................................................................. 91 Characterization .............................................................. 95 IV. IMAGISTIC PATTERNS OF THE S E A ......................................114 V. THEMATIC REINFORCEMENTS FROM THE SEA ........................160 Groping fo r U n i t y ...............................................................162 A Progression in Development ................................. 174 Unifying the Theme . .....................................................197 VI. SEA SYMBOLISM AND THE LAST ROMANCES.......................228 BIBLIOGRAPHY.............................................................. 264 i i ABSTRACT The sea constitutes one of the largest sources for the raw material of Shakespeare’s art. By isolating this one element of nature, one can gain an insight into his method of refining the raw materials of nature into rich artistic devices, learn something of his imagistic habits, discover some of his dramatic techniques, understand his means of ac-hieving unity of theme and image, observe his tendency toward symbolism in his last years, and trace his development as a craftsman, dramatist, and artist. Shakespeare drew upon various properties of the sea as a source for his many uses of it, some of which are common in art, such as its enormous size, its rhythmical ebb and flow, and its sounds and colors. Other qualities, its potential for cleansing, its’ reflection of the order of the universe, and its possibilities of great wealth and treasure, seem to arise from a less universal view of it. An examination of the ideas suggested by the sea which are the most metaphorically productive leads to an understanding of certain imagistic patterns which evolve in his work as a whole. Sea images appear as a means of conveying ideas about human activities, dilemmas, relations, 1 2 and emotions. Sea images also occasionally express con­ ceptions of battles, fame, fate, or time. The sea is vital to Shakespeare as a dramatic device. In structuring plots, he uses it to separate persons, to remove a character from the scene for a while until ensuing events have occurred and the plot is ready for the character to reappear, and to provide a means for the working of for­ tune and fate. As an instrument of suspense, the sea brings danger to English shores as in the history plays, or it threatens to take someone away by a sea departure. The sea provides settings, either for on-stage occurrences or for off-stage action, or it furnishes a background to present action. In exploiting the sea for the atmosphere of a play, Shakespeare sometimes used it merely to give a play a genuine atmosphere of the sea, while at other times he elicited from it an atmosphere of horror, at other times mystery, and at others yet tragedy and pathos. In using the sea for characterization, he depicted characters through a central sea image, through sea imagery appropriate to the character using it, or through a person's attitude toward the sea. As Shakespeare's art matured, he developed the tech­ nique of using a comprehensive, dominant, or recurrent central image as a means of elucidating themes, clarifying the major 3 forces and problems involved in a theme, enriching the con­ tent and implications within a play, and strengthening through visual and auditory suggestions the poetic effects of a play. The sea becomes one of the most sig n ific a n t of these central images. In the history plays, it is used to reinforce patriotic themes. In other plays, the sea and attendant associations with sailing, merchandizing, and riches becomes an effectiv e means of depicting love stories. His use of this image as he moves from one play to another through these years reveals his restless search for perfecting his craft, the type of experimentation he conducted, and the development he experienced as an artist. In the final years, Shakespeare's use of the sea reveals his continuous search for the perfection of his art. From one play to another in the last years, he grad­ ually develops the sea as a symbol of the regeneration, restoration, and reconciliation available to man. The cli­ max of this development appears in The Tempest, in which the poet concerns himself exclusively with regeneration and reconciliation and in which he places the action in the midst of the sea, begins the action with a storm and ends it with the promise of calm seas, permeates the essence of the play with the sound and atmosphere of the sea, and leaves the characters and audience convinced that "though the seas threaten, they are merciful." CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION England Is a country whose every side is washed by the pounding seas and whose national consciousness has been per­ meated by the rhythms of the restless.sea, the beauty of boundless stretches of water, and the lure of navigable ship roads. Since pre-historlc Celtic days, the national psyche of England has been molded and Influenced by the varied moods of this overwhelming facet of nature. Moreover, the people of England have turned to the sea for many benefits: mili­ tarily, the encircling seas have provided an aquatic barrier for aggressive peoples who would vent their wills on the islanders; commercially, the oceans have provided food and avenues of trade with distant countries, as well as paths to undeveloped lands which were open for ex p lo itatio n ; p o l i t i ­ cally, the insulation caused by the surrounding waters helped early to establish a national identity and to intensify the patriotic zeal of the people. When the poets of England, therefore, desired to express the ideals, emotions, thoughts, and actions of the people, it was only natural that these artists should turn to the sea as a source for their poetic language and as settings for their action, as an influence on the people, as subject matter for their concerns, and as 5 6 atmosphere and mood for the impact of their statements. As Alfred Noyes points out, "the sea . has been used by almost all the English poets incidentally, as an image, a symbol, a means of 'representing much in little ,1"1 The oceans, with their tidal rhythms, their measured waves, and their immeasurable horizons, have been one of the chief sources of power by B ritish w riters in the exercise of th e ir a r t. The deep roots of the effect of the sea on English poets reach back as far as the writers of Anglo-Saxon poetry. The sea passages of this early literature reflect the cold and misty northern sea, the grey bleak coastlines washed by the waves "that shoulder one a n o th e r,"2 and the screeching birds that skim the frothy surfaces. The moods are rather homogenous in character: There is the mood of dominance, when man struggles to subdue the sea and is pitted against an element; the mood of endurance combined with longing for the bright mead-hall and the giver of bracelets; and the mood of exaltation, when the poet enters into the w ildness of the wind over the sea, as i f he were breath of its breath.3 Cynewulf views life as a voyage on the raging seas and cre­ ates a portrait of the surging waves and the bobbing ships Shakespeare and the Sea," Some Aspects of Modern Poetry (New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 19ST), p. 221. ^Anne Treneer, The Sea in English Literature from Beowulf to Donne (London: Hodder and Stoughton LimitecTT 1925), p. 1. 3Treneer, p. 1. 7 while painting word-pictures of the "stallions of the sound" and "old sea-steeds" anchored in Heaven. Othere and Wulfstan, who provide the earliest personal chronicle of sea-voyaging in English, offer insights into the nature of seafaring in their day. Beowulf. the finest early statement of the national ideals of the English people, also offers the clearest depic­ tion of the sea-spirit in Old English poetry. The poem is "framed" with the sea as it opens with an account of how Scyld came to his people as a gift from the sea and when he dies his people return him whence he came, and closes with the building of Beowulf’s barrow overlooking the sea.