Shakespeare: A Complete Introduction

Some definitions of ‘isms’

CATHOLICISM

Christianity provided a central authority, located in Rome under the figure of the Pope, and a unifying intellectual and spiritual influence in Western Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire. By the fourteenth century, however, the Church’s increasing worldliness and its venal abuses led to growing dissatisfaction. The Renaissance, or Early Modern period, heralded a re-examination of Christianity by humanists (such as Erasmus and More) who nevertheless rejected wholescale reform when radical clerics such as Martin Luther and his Protestant supporters sought to diverge from traditional teaching. The Roman Catholic Church, which places an emphasis on sacramental liturgy and ‘historic’ episcopal papal authority, initiated a movement (1545–63) to counter the Reformation that had been initiated by Luther in 1517. After Henry VIII’s break with Rome (1533), papal authority was briefly reinstated in England in the reign of Mary I (1553–8), but when Elizabeth I became queen a Protestant settlement was engineered and her role as head of state and supreme governor of the Church of England was affirmed.

HUMANISM

This is the general term for the renewed interest in classical ideas and literature that developed in Italian city-states during the fourteenth century, and particularly after the fall of Constantinople in 1492, spread throughout Europe in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, helped by the invention of the printing press (c.1450). Inspired by a desire to access knowledge of the ancient world, it emphasized the use of primary sources, encouraging intellectual curiosity and self-improvement. Renaissance humanists believed that ‘the new learning’ created good Christians, good citizens and a deep appreciation of humankind and the created world. It transformed European thought, leading to an expansion in the curriculae of schools and universities. Italian writers like Pico della Mirandola (1463–94), Marsilio Ficino (1433–99), the poet Petrarch (1304–74) and others were influential in emphasizing the centrality of man in the universe. These beliefs have been subsequently modified in modern times by other linked ideologies such as Christian humanism and liberal humanism.

PROTESTANTISM

Protestantism originated in the protest by a German theologian from Wittenberg, Martin Luther (1483–1546), who in 1517 attacked church practices he felt needed to be reformed and who (it is generally believed) nailed his 95 theses to the church door in that town. Luther’s protest was inspired by the ideals of humanism. Protestantism based its authority not on tradition or on the primacy of papal interpretation of the Scriptures but on the Bible as the only source of truth, and placed much greater emphasis on the individual conscience. Protestantism soon divided into a number of denominations that championed differing theological emphases. In England, Henry VIII did not embrace Protestantism but seceded from papal authority to create an anglicized Catholic Church of which he was the supreme head. A more Protestant theology was introduced under Edward VI, who produced the influential Book of Common Prayer, and was consolidated by Elizabeth I, but elements of Catholic theology remained enshrined in Church of England doctrine, causing conflict with some forms of extreme Protestantism, particularly Puritanism, in the reigns of Elizabeth I and the early Stuart monarchs.

NEOCLASSICISM

This movement emanated mainly from the 1660s and became prominent throughout the eighteenth century. It promoted the concepts of order and decorum necessary within a work of art, deriving its inspiration from the classical age for definition and interpretation. There was an understanding that literature concerned itself with form, with ‘What oft was thought but ne’er so well expressed’ (Alexander Pope (1688–1744): An Essay on Criticism [1711]). The neoclassical rules for that expression worked with established generic principles rather than allowing the writer the freedom of the imagination or the individualism fostered in Renaissance humanism, although Elizabethan writers such as Sir Philip Sidney (1554–86) were drawn towards such formal rules.

ROMANTICISM

Romanticism developed in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It regarded art and literature in the context of its ‘organic nature’, developing from laws within itself. It looked towards the ideal, found in myths and also in the innocence of ordinary people expressed in simplicity of language. It thereby rejected the neoclassicism of the eighteenth century. It also privileged a free autonomous individualism. For the Romantics, Shakespeare’s art came from his ‘natural genius’, a view advocated particularly by the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834).

REALISM

Realism was a reaction against the Romantic notion of the ideal, and was evident in the realist novelists of the nineteenth century, for example Charles Dickens (1812–70) and George Eliot (1819–80), who depicted as clearly as possible what they considered to be the realities and experiences of life in all strata of society. It is a mimetic form that could easily be transferred to the stage, with the plays of Henrik Ibsen (1828–1906) in particular. Realism influenced dramatic criticism in its concentration on characters that behave as they would do in real life.

ARCHETYPAL CRITICISM

This movement grew out of Jungian psychology in the early twentieth century, taking realistic and psychological aspects of Shakespearean criticism into a new dimension. Primordial myths and patterns within the collective unconsciousness could be detected in, and aroused by, a variety of different texts: for example, Hamlet displays a similar pattern of myths that can be found in the plays of Aeschylus (525–456 BCE) or Sophocles (496–406 BCE), and the play could reveal similar archetypal modes of behaviour, as represented in figures such as Orestes and Oedipus in mother–son relationships or in the concentration on the taboo of incest, and on the subsequent retribution of the gods.

MODERNISM

Modernism rejected the nineteenth-century concept of the ‘organic nature’ of art, and in the early twentieth century also rejected realism. Modernist writers such as James Joyce (1882–1941) and Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) made the reader aware that they were ‘reading’ something that had been ‘written’, thereby forcing the reader into a self-conscious acknowledgement of the role that language played in the shaping of literary response. In the theatre, modernist-influenced movements such as constructivism arose around the same time as communism and the Russian Revolution. In Germany they were followed by the politically oriented theatre of Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956), although modernism was not politically partisan since it also had exponents on the right such as Ezra Pound (1885–1972) and T. S. Eliot (1888–1965).

POSTMODERNISM

Postmodernism arose out of modernism and the experience of a war-torn Europe, which led to the rejection of authority by some. Like modernism, this movement rejected the linearity of an artistic product and worked through presenting patterns of experience that did not have to express a ‘sense of meaning’. It conveyed a vacuity of existence and an absence of purpose, exemplified in drama such as Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett (1906–89).

NEW HISTORICISM

This approach questions contemporary interpretations that look for the ‘relevance’ of drama, insisting that Shakespeare can be understood only by being located within the period of the plays’ inception and composition. It draws on historical evidence from outside the text, including sources not necessarily connected with the text, such as medical cases, historical tracts, tax records and gravestones, and aims to locate common structural patterns in all forms of narrative. It sought to combine elements of materialism with the poststructuralist writings of Michel Foucault (1926–84), and emphasized the various ways in which power operated to contain resistance.

FEMINIST CRITICISM

Shakespearean studies as well as literary studies were influenced the feminist movement of the mid- to late twentieth century and its antecedents. There are broad definitions and differing expressions of feminism in literary criticism generally. Nevertheless, significant areas can be discerned: the first relates to politics, feminist philosophy and gender as seen in the work, for example, of Marilyn French, who exposes in cultural terms how gender determines the identity of the ‘female’ who is subordinate to the ‘male’. A second approach is related to the location of women within Shakespeare’s society, as found in the work, for example, of Lisa Jardine, Juliet Dusinbere, Catherine Belsey and Germaine Greer. A third is concerned with Shakespeare in performance in theatre and film. In this, the growing voice of many female directors and actors in both experimental and mainstream theatre became prominent from the 1970s onwards.

CULTURAL MATERIALISM

Cultural materialism attempts to understand the ‘materiality’ of a work of art within the context of its historical production and location. It denies the universality of truths contained in the text and emphasizes areas of resistance that the text privileges or disguises. It argues that texts do not mean something in themselves but have meanings conferred upon them and those meanings have a political charge. Cultural materialism anchors meaning in an overtly stated political understanding of material reality. It draws heavily on the philosophies of writers such as Raymond Williams (1921–88) and Louis Althusser (1918–90), but also makes some reference (like new historicism) to the writings of Jacques Derrida (1930–2004) and Michel Foucault.

STRUCTURALISM

This is a complex idea that takes the structure of language as a model for the structure of all forms of human endeavour. It is concerned to establish patterns that can be replicated across the human sciences in order to establish hitherto obscure connections. In literary discourse it distinguishes between the ‘word’, or ‘signifier’, that is comprised of arbitrary elements, and ‘the signified’, which is the concept that lies behind it. In literary criticism structuralism divides texts according to the tension between binary elements that derive meaning from their relation to each other. Meaning is generated by selecting elements from language (la langue) and combining them into meaningful units (la parole). So, ‘put crudely, structuralism is (at least in its early or “pure” form) interested rather in that which makes meaning possible than in meaning itself: even more crudely in form rather than content’ (Hawthorn, J. [1992: 174]).

POST-STRUCTURALISM

As Hawthorn says, this is a term ‘that is sometimes used almost interchangeably with Deconstruction’ (Hawthorn J. [1992: 137–8]). In literary criticism it follows on from structuralism’s attempt to discover mechanics of meaning but it questions the overt distinction between ‘the signifier’ and ‘the signified’. For structuralists, the ‘death of the author’ represents a challenge to the principle of a single controlling authority of meaning. For post-structuralists, the relative stability of any ‘structure’ is undermined by what is perceived to be a constant deferral of meaning. Any structure, according to post-structuralism, can be undermined or reduced to the conditions under which its structure is formulated.

Unlike modernism, which is content to reflect the fragmentary nature of reality, post-structuralism challenges all attempts to anchor knowledge, and asserts that there are only ‘knowledges’ whose authorities are always capable of being undermined. Consequently, post-structuralism rejects attempts to interpret texts which claim to have a finality of meaning or any authority that cannot be deconstructed (see Hawthorn, J. [1992: 137–8]). Post-structuralists consider texts as asking questions rather than giving answers, and as revealing the conditions under which meanings are produced. They look for ‘the differences between what the text says and what it thinks it says’ (Selden, R. [1985: 102]). Thus post-structuralism opens the way for other forms of criticism such as new historicism and cultural materialism. The title of Malcolm Evans’s Signifying Nothing: Truth’s True Contents in Shakespeare’s Text (1986) not only references Macbeth’s soliloquy following the news of the Queen’s death (5.4.28), but points also to Evans’s own post-structuralist approach to be found in his book that you, maybe, are about to read, whether as a whole or in parts.

For definitions of the Renaissance and the Reformation, see Chapter 4.

Glossary

Anagnorisis: The moment of discovery or recognition.

Aporia: When characters ruminate on issues that are irresolvable. An example is Hamlet in the opening lines of the soliloquy ‘To be, or not to be’ (3.1.56–88), but it isn’t just a simple weighing up of alternatives. It points also to those moments in a text where gaps appear and meaning risks falling into a void. In that respect, it is an area of interest in post-structuralism whereby deconstructivist critics are ‘centrally concerned with looking for the aporias, blind spots or moments of self-contradiction where the text begins to undermine its own presuppositions’ (Peck, J. and Coyle, M. [1993, 2^nd edn: 135]).

Catharsis: A purging or release of emotions of pity and fear in the audience.

Hamartia: The fatal or tragic flaw within the protagonist, arising usually from an error of judgement but often interpreted wrongly as weakness of character.

Hubris: Excessive or outlandish pride, which in Greek tragedy tries the patience of the gods too far and leads to nemesis.

Nemesis: The retribution of the gods and the cause of the resulting downfall.

Onomatopoeia: A term denoting words that imitate what is being expressed, e.g. ‘fizz’ or ‘sizzle’ or ‘shiver’; so Bottom’s humorous ‘The raging rocks,/And shivering shocks’ (A Midsummer Night’s Dream, 1.2.28–9).

Pathos: Stimulating pity or sorrow in the audience for the ‘casualties’ of an event; distinct from the downfall of the protagonist.

Peripeteia: A reversal of fortune leading to the downfall of the protagonist.

Pentameter: The poetic line of five feet, each foot characterized by two stresses – that is, iambus (soft/strong) or trochee (strong/soft). Shakespeare predominantly employed the iambic pentameter but he often varied both line length and the position of the stresses for effect.

Soliloquy: A substantial speech in which a character voices his or her innermost thoughts to the audience or provides them with important information. As these are ‘private’ thoughts being exposed, the character is ‘alone’, so Hamlet’s ‘O what a rogue and peasant slave am I!’ is prefixed by the words ‘Now I am alone’ (2.2.549). But it is not always the case that no one else is on the stage. Directors and actors in contemporary productions tend, for example, to decide whether they wish Ophelia to be on stage in the ‘background’ for Hamlet’s ‘To be, or not to be’ (3.1.56) soliloquy. Desdemona, asleep, is on the stage for Othello’s ‘It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul!’ (5.2.1f.). Lady Macbeth’s soliloquy ‘Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be/What thou art promis’d’ (1.5.14f.) is preceded by her reading a letter from Macbeth.

Stichomythia: Short, sharp, quick-fired repartee or banter between characters. For example:

QUEEN	Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.
HAMLET	Mother, you have my father much offended.
QUEEN	Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.
HAMLET	Go to, you question with a wicked tongue.
	(Hamlet, 3.4.8–11)

Selected recent biographies

This introduction to Shakespeare has taken its structure from a desire to look at how the dramatist’s plays work. Another way to introduce Shakespeare is to look at his life and what we know about the man himself.

To a great extent the work of Samuel Schoenbaum, in his Shakespeare’s Lives (1970) and William Shakespeare: A Documentary Life (1975), has provided the basis for a number of lively and interesting biographies over recent years. Bill Bryson’s Shakespeare: The World as a Stage (2007) is an entertaining introduction to the dramatist’s life. Michael Wood’s In Search of Shakespeare (2005) is a tremendously enjoyable read, written with the enthusiasm of an accomplished historian who has the skill to engage his readers and television viewers in the historical stories he tells. Here he draws out the influence of Mary Arden, Shakespeare’s mother. Jonathan Bate’s The Life, Mind and World of William Shakespeare (2008) and Stephen Greenblatt’s Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare (2004) come from literary critics whose lives have been steeped in Shakespearean scholarship and research but who in their wide-ranging forms of biography make the dramatist highly accessible.

Katherine Duncan-Jones, in her Shakespeare: An Ungentle Life (2010), thinks that Bate and Greenblatt stray into the realms of the historical novel in their approach. She attempts to be more objective, though she often still has to qualify her views with admissions of speculation. In her determined objectivity, Duncan-Jones work is a useful warning and corrective to any sentimentalism.

Peter Ackroyd is an accomplished biographer–author, writing, for example, a weighty biography of London. His Shakespeare: The Biography (2005) demonstrates the professionalism that you would expect to find, locating Shakespeare particularly within the city and town environments where he lived. Anthony Holden’s William Shakespeare (1999) is a sympathetic and at times forgiving biography. His journalistic background allows his enthusiasm to be unfettered and yet sound, providing a good read.

Germaine Greer’s Shakespeare’s Wife (2007) takes a different line of enquiry, writing an informative book on Anne Hathaway, but it is a book also seen by Duncan-Jones as an example of a tendency towards novel writing. In order to shape a biography of Hathaway, Greer has to comb records of how women made their way in Elizabethan and Jacobean society. She is one of the few biographers, however, who has recourse to the anthropological and demographic research of writers such as Peter Laslett, in The World We Have Lost (1983). In the same year as Greer’s book appeared, Charles Nicholl’s The Lodger: Shakespeare on Silver Street, and René Weis’s Shakespeare Revealed were published. The first looks at Shakespeare particularly in London with the Mountjoys, with whom he lodged, and the second considers the context and influence of his family and friends.

Work on detailed aspects of events or years in Shakespeare’s life have provided some excellent studies by James Shapiro: 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare (2005) and 1606: William Shakespeare and the Year of Lear (2015), while Chris Laoutaris’s Shakespeare and the Countess (2014) approaches an aspect of Shakespeare’s life from the perspective of a particular event, the opposition of Elizabeth Russell to the Blackfriar’s Theatre, which had a knock-on effect in the building of the Globe and the subsequent development of Shakespeare’s plays. Shapiro’s work, and that of Laoutaris, provide a fresh approach but in an area which over recent years has produced an excellent array of biographies.

Another biography that might be of interest is by Ian Donaldson about one of Shakespeare’s contemporary playwrights: Ben Jonson: A Life (2011). Finally, Stanley Wells’s Shakespeare for All Time (2002) is not a biography as such but is a good introduction to Shakespeare’s life and subsequently his reception across the centuries and, in the final chapter, worldwide.

The next chapter considers two plays that in the past have had the label ‘problem’ linked to them.