In Love With Shakespeare :: Poetry Literature Papers

In Love With ShakespeareAbout any one so great as Shakespeare, it is probable that we can never be rightfield and if we can never be right, it is better that we should from time to time deviate our way of being wrong. --T. S. Eliot (Eliot 107)Like all great artists, William Shakespeare is thoroughly apprised of his medium. His plays consistently call attention to the representation. With Shakespeare the actable and the theatrical are perpetually what come first (Frye 5). In fact, the metaphor of performance is central to the Shakespearian canon. When we are born we cry that we are come To this great correspond of fools, Lear declares to Gloucester (IV.vi. 178-179). All the worlds a stage, And all the men and women exactly players They have their exits and their entrances, And one man in his time plays many move (As You Like It, II.vii. 139-142). This self-referentiality reflects a concern that the audience not be passive voice in its participation, and that the boundaries of the theatrical experience not be restricted to the stage. Shakespeare layers connotations and meanings into his plays that refund the self-conscious tender. Though much of our modern entertainment seeks to make the auditor oblivious of the medium, Shakespeares plays demand a sophisticated self-consciousness on the audiences part. Part of the pleasure of viewing a Shakespearean play such as A Midsummer Nights Dream is in recognizing the irony of its self-contained mini-dramas. In the Pyramus and Thisbe scene, Shakespeare satirizes theatrical convention. At the same time, however, he satirizes the naivet of the audience that doubts the transforming power of the imagination. As Shakespeare continually points out, the acts of perform and viewing are not confined to the theatre. Life reflects the theatre merely as the theatre reflects heart. Furthermore, when taken seriously, great theatre can convince its audience. For this reason, Shakespeare seeks to make viewing a conscious act . The full benefit of the theatrical experience is felt only when the auditor recognizes his role.Clearly, in Shakespeares view, life is very much like a play. For one thing, all piece beings are actors, or as Hegel says, free artists of themselves (Bloom 6). As real as we perceive ourselves to be, Shakespeares great characters demonstrate that personal identity is an false role, a fabrication. We are all playing characters. When the mad and weather-beaten baron Lear declares himself every inch a king, his exclamation is a melancholy monitor that power and authority are based upon image and ceremony.