Shakespeare for Every Night of the Year (eBook)

INTRODUCTION

No other author has had such an impact on the cultural life of a nation, or indeed the world, as William Shakespeare. His plays remain staples of the theatrical repertoire, in English and in translation and have inspired works in other media, from paintings of beloved characters to entire operas. His 154 sonnets, most written to an unidentified ‘fair youth’ or a ‘dark lady’, are bywords for the poetic expression of love. Turns of phrase coined by him are so embedded in the English language that most of us don’t even realise that he invented them. The course of true love never did run smooth. Neither a borrower nor a lender be. All the world’s a stage. All that glitters is not gold.

What’s so great about Shakespeare? First of all, we still speak the language Shakespeare wrote in. Some of his vocabulary is a little unfamiliar to twenty-first century readers, and some of his grammar can be a bit upside down and back to front, as he shoehorns his dialogue into strict lines of iambic pentameter. Essentially however, he writes in an English that is still comprehensible today. Compare him with Geoffrey Chaucer, author of the celebrated Canterbury Tales, who was living and working two hundred years before Shakespeare; those Tales are foundational works of English Literature, but quite difficult to read in the original medieval text.

Shakespeare shaped the way that the English see themselves, and the way the world sees England. He is still a central attraction for tourists visiting Great Britain. He also has much to say about England’s relationship with the other countries that are now part of the British Isles. By the time Shakespeare was born Wales had long been a principality of England; and Wales and Welshmen are frequently a source of comedy in his plays (1 March).

Ireland had historically been an enemy of England, and it is hard to find a good word about the Irish in the Shakespearean canon. Shakespeare lived to see the union of the English and Scottish crowns under James VI of Scotland and I of England, and his tone towards ‘north Britain’ changes notably after the event. Scotland had always been an enemy of England – and worse than that, an ally of England’s other old enemy France. But after James – who was of Scottish descent – ascended the throne, Shakespeare’s tone softens. In Macbeth, written after James became king, the Scots are honourable warriors and only Macbeth himself is a villain.

A fine volley of words, gentlemen, and quickly shot off.

The Two Gentlemen of Verona | Act II, scene 4

It is still possible, not only to read Shakespeare, but to be dazzled by his virtuosity with words. He can be richly descriptive: many of his plays use introductory speeches or prologues to set the scene with such vivid imagery that the audience is transported to another place and time (23 March). This so-called ‘suspension of disbelief’ is vital for the performance of theatre; theatregoers to a production of Hamlet know perfectly well that they’re not on the battlements of Elsinore Castle in Denmark, and that the characters they’re watching are only actors, and that it’s not really a ghost emerging from the fog. They pretend to believe it for the sake of being entertained; and Shakespeare makes it easy, even with the scenic limitations of theatrical production in Elizabethan England.

His descriptive powers are immense. But, more than description, he sees patterns of behaviour and parallels of circumstance. His imaginative development of metaphor and simile is unique. He suggests that inner beauty enhances outer beauty in the same way that the invisible scent of a rose adds to its pretty appearance (25 April) and compares Macbeth’s ferocity in battle to that of eagles attacking their prey (2 October). He seamlessly elevates ideas and turns words into pictures.

All this verbal dexterity would be mere waffle if it weren’t for Shakespeare’s remarkable grasp of the human condition. Shakespeare knows what makes us tick, and in showing us what makes his characters act as they do, he holds up a mirror to our own vices and virtues. The lines he writes for his characters not only describe their intentions and emotions but illustrate their inner workings. Juliet’s nurse, for example (6 November) is more than a plot device to deliver news and move the story on: her lines show that she is flustered, she is breathless, she is unhurried, she cares for Juliet, she is teasing. Macbeth and his wife (14 August), speaking just after he has killed the king, show by their fragmented speech how shaken they are by the act of murder, despite their earlier bravado. It is this capacity to understand humanity, and capture it, that make Shakespeare’s works universal and timeless.

Nay, then, God be wi’ you, an you talk in blank verse.

As You Like It | Act IV, scene 1

Shakespeare writes using the conventional format of the time, in lines of iambic pentameter – a five-beat rhythm of ‘da-DAH da-DAH da-DAH da-DAH da-DAH’ – for example, ‘If music be the food of love, play on’ (28 March). A sonnet consists of fourteen rhyming lines of this rhythm, and although it is not a naturalistic way of speaking, he uses it in his plays to great effect. It is more useful than a four-beat rhythm, which is too musical and rigid. Five beats are flexible: the fifth beat often contains the important word of a line and Shakespeare will regularly conclude a scene or a significant speech with a rhyming couplet – two rhyming lines of iambic pentameter – to indicate the end.

Shakespeare exploits iambic pentameter to the full. An audience accustomed to the convention can be deliberately caught off-guard by a change in the rhythm; for example, in the line ‘To be, or not to be, that is the question’ (26 July). Breaking the rhythm draws attention to a line. Interrupting the rhythm, by dividing a line between two speakers (30 June), has a similar effect. And just to keep an audience on its toes, every now and then Shakespeare will slip in a short line, forcing a pause (19 July).

Not all of Shakespeare’s speeches are in iambic pentameter. He makes a distinction between high-born characters (kings and queens and nobles) and low-born ones (tradespeople and figures of fun). For the latter, who are usually played for laughs, comic timing is more important than adherence to convention and their scenes are often written in straightforward prose (8 November).

The restricted format of iambic pentameter gives Shakespeare challenges in getting his message across. It sometimes forces him into unconventional grammatical constructions, the most frequent source of complaint among students trying to understand him. It’s often the case that hearing actors speak the lines, or reading them aloud for oneself, can clarify their meaning. The same constraints sometimes force Shakespeare into his most imaginative and dextrous use of language.

My library was dukedom large enough.

The Tempest | Act I, scene 2

Shakespeare’s preeminence is assisted by the large number of publications of his work during, and of course after, his life. Many of his plays were printed while he was still alive, and seven years after his death two actor friends of his drew together a compendium of most of them, now known as the First Folio. There are variations between the First Folio and other editions of his works, but it is considered the most authoritative single text, being based on either shorthand transcriptions of actual performances or on the stage manager’s books of each script.

It’s four hundred years since the First Folio was printed. It contains thirty-six of his plays, only nineteen of which had been previously published. A further three – Pericles, The Two Noble Kinsmen and Edward III – are derived from other sources, while two more – The History of Cardenio and Love’s Labours Won – are lost, their existence known only from contemporary references to their performance. Seven hundred and fifty copies of the First Folio were printed, and 235 survive, eighty-two of them in the highly respected research facility of the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC. Further copies of the First Folio are still discovered in dusty corners of libraries from time to time.

Shakespeare’s sonnets were collected during his lifetime and first published in 1609, in a volume which includes the longer poem A Lover’s Complaint. Shakespeare’s published career began with two other long poems, Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece – works were written out of necessity when epidemics forced the closure of London’s theatres in 1593–4. The Passionate Pilgrim appeared in an unauthorized anthology of his poetry in 1599, and there are doubts about its status as an authentic work of Shakespeare. I’ve included one or two examples here from which readers can make their own minds up. His last extended verse work, The Phoenix and the Turtle, was published in 1601.

So full-replete with choice of all delights.

Henry VI, Part 1 | Act V, scene 5

I hope that I’ve captured some of Shakespeare’s infinite dexterity in this book. It includes sonnets, verses from the long poems, and extracts from plays. Famous soliloquies are interspersed with less well-known speeches and sections of dialogue which convey either the comedy or the tragedy of the scene. Purists may be upset to find that some of the...