William Shakespeare - Assignment

        William Shakespeare was the greatest writer in the English and the world’s greatest dramatist.

According  to Emrys Jones, 

“The life of Shakespeare presents a challenge to the

biographer which shows no sign of losing its power.”

(The origin of Shakespeare, page-1)

Birth:-

        William Shakespeare was born in Stratford – upon – Avon and  baptised there on 26 April 1564. His actual date of birth remains unknown, but traditionally observed on 23 April.          

                                                                                      Early life:-

          William Shakespeare was the son of John Shakespeare and Mary Arden. He was the third child of john Shakespeare. He was the first son and the first surviving child in the family, two earlier children Joan and Margaret had died early .

         Johan Shakespeare and Mary Arden married around 1557 and eight children. Their name was Joan, Margaret, William, Gilbert, Joan, Anne, Richard  and Edmund .

          Before Shakespeare’s birth his father became a successful merchant and held official positions as alderman and bailiff, an office resembling a mayor.

Education:-

          Shakespeare probably began his education at the age of six or seven at the Stratford grammar school which is still standing only a short  Distance from his house on Henley street.

        John Shakespeare was having financial problems by the time. Shakespeare was a teenager and Shakespeare and his brother were forced to leave school as their father could no longer pay for it. Shakespeare was 14 at the time before went to school. 

        Shakespeare’s education would have started at home. His mother Mary  Arden would have told him fables and fairy tales during his childhood. Mary was certainly literate. Shakespeare‘s home education would also have included reading the bible . 

         There is no record of Shakespeare going to University only a few of Shakespeare’s contemporary playwrights attended University. Including Christopher Marlowe who was at Cambridge Ben Jonson who prided himself on his learning , did not.

Married  life  :-

        William Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway in November 1582. At the time of their married William was 18, While  Anne was 26 and pregnant with their first child. 

        Six month after the marriage Anne gave birth to a daughter Susanna , baptised 26 may 1585. Shakespeare had two other children twins, son Hamnet  and daughter Judith, followed almost two years later and were baptised 2 February 1585. Hamnet died  of unknown causes at the age of 11 and was buried 11 august 1596.

        After the death of the twins, Shakespeare left few historical traces until he is mentioned as part of the London theatre scene in 1592.

Literary career:-

        William Shakespeare was one of the best authors. Playwrights of all time William Shakespeare also called ‘bard of Avon’ or Swan of Avon :He is often called  England’s  national poet. His extant  works. Including collaboration, consist of some 39 plays, 154 sonnets. Two long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. 

         His  play have been translated  into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright.  

According to W. Nicholas knight,

  “Shakespeare sighed the lack of one thing he sought;

 all losses were not to be restored.”

(Shakespeare’s Hidden Life, page-27)

London and theatrical Career:- 

         The first reference to Shakespeare in the literary world of London comes in 1592 .

         In Shakespeare’s time a stage wasn’t just one type of space: play had to be versatile The Globe Theatre was a theatre in London. It was associated with William Shakespeare It was built in 1599 by Chamberlain’s Men.

      Shakespeare live a simple life in London While he owned at least one house there he did not maintain a London household but lived in lodgings with landlords and other Lodgers. Shakespeare probably lived quite a full Social life in London.

      Shakespeare worked very hard at his trade while in London producing plays at un believable speed He was a big box-office Success and came to be one of the most famous name in the theatre.

Shakespeare as a dramatist:-

            Shakespeare is a great dramatist of the world . his works are still considered  remarkable and significant  . he is recognized because of his immense  variety of his works. Shakespeare’s dramas were performed in theatres and people were always very anxious to see the performances of his dramas.

            Shakespeare had provided his audience all pleasurable emotions and enlarged our knowledge and understanding of human psyche. Moreover  Shakespeare had a marvellous understanding of human life and human psychology.

             A dramatist always true to nature, when we read and watch his dramas we find that man has to act under the given circumstance and he acts exactly his fate allowed him to do . human passions and emotions were closely  observed by him.

       We find gems of practical wisdom and philosophical  truth which are as true and valuable today as when they were written by Shakespeare. we find generalized reflections on human life and tragedy.

        In Midsummer Night’s  Dream Shakespeare even derides the undeniably satisfactory definition of a tragic action as one which ends unhappily :

‘And tragical, my noble lord, it is ;

         For Pyramus therein doth kill himself.’

                    (A History of English Dramatic Literature, vol.-2, page-270)I

      Shakespeare’s characters are types as well as individuals  they have their own individual peculiarities and personal idiosyncrasies and they also present certain class, profession and passion.

        For example Othello, hamlet   and king lear have highly  individualised  peculiarities . Othello stands for jealousy hamlet stands for the philosophical temperament and king lear stands for pattern of intemperance . Edmund,  Edger, Iago , and Desdemona are all portrayed with the even handedness, completeness and originality.

          The first well- known play by Shakespeare is the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet written in 1594-95. A midsummer night’s are the dream the Merchant of Venice, Hamlet, Troilus and Cressida are the greatest tragedies of Shakespeare. The tragic-comedy dramas are king lear , Macbeth , Othello, Antony and Cleopetra, the winter’s tale and tempest.  

     Although his dramas certain virtue happiness and chastity but these Contain virtue, happiness, evil, ugliness and misery too. His stories are of the evil caused hatred jealousy and treachery and the conquest of this evil in the course of time by in integrity, constancy and courageous love aided by good fortune. Thus many of his contemporaries showed great discrimination and insight in appreciating his real Superiority.

According to Laurie E. Maguire,

  “Shakespearean comedy typically has a tripartite structure: an opening predicament, a central section of confusion and dissolving identities, followed by restoration.” 

(Studying Shakespeare, page-12)

Shakespeare as a Poet  :-

     While William Shakespeare’s reputation based primarily on his lays he became famous first as poet. His first two bocks of poetry venus and Adonis and Rape of lucrece were reprinted many times. In fact they were more popular in print than any of Shakespeare’s play.

      Many of the earliest literary critics and anthologists of English language verse cite these two narrative poems because of their exemplary lines. His play his poems were probably sold unbound or in flimsy paper bindings making their survival unlikely unless an early owner bound them up with other booklets in sturdy bindings.

According to Laurie E. Maguire, 

“Shakespeare is celebrated as the poet of romantic love.”(Studying Shakespeare, page-50)

Later life :

    Shakespeare’s elder daughter Susanna married a physician John Hall in Stratford in 1607. Their only child a daughter Elizabeth was born in 1608, the year in which Shakespeare’s mother died Judith Shakespeare his younger daughter married a vintner Thomas Quiney  in 1616.

    Sometime after  1611, Shakespeare retired to Stratford. on 25 march 1616, Shakespeare revised and signed his well. Shakespeare’s widow, Anne died in 1623 and was buried beside him.

Death:-

     William Shakespeare died on 23 April. He was buried at holy trinity church in Stratford he died at the age of 52. 

      On the stone slab covering the grave, which bears no name, these word were carved:

“Good friend for Jesus' sake for bear,

    To dig the dust enclose’d here!

Blessed be the man that spares these stones,

And cursed be he that moves my bones.”

                                            -S.Schoenbaum                                                  (Shakespeare’s lives, page-3)

Bibliography

• Emrys Jones. “The Origin of Shakespeare”. Oxford at the claredon Press,1977.

• S.Schoenbaum. “Shakespeare’s Lives". Claredon Press : Oxford University press, 1970.

• Adolphus William Ward. “A History of English Dramatic Literature”.vol.-2, Frederick Ungar Publishing, 1970.