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William Shakespeare and the world of theatre

By Andrea Barresi, Valentina Gaudio,

Federico Maffei,

Giulio Stabilito

Liceo E.Majorana

Scientifico scienze applicate

Classe 3M

The development of drama

ORIGINS

  • In the Elizabethan age drama was adressed to a mixed public.
  • The city of London authorities were hostile to public performances, but the Queen and the Privy Council supported them
  • Theatres were built in suburbs
  • New theatres could prosper as commercial enterprises

Italian plays

•Italian plays become the sources of much Elizabethan theatre

•Influence of Italian "commedia dell'arte" companies.

Greek plays

Many features with the Greek

  • It was a public theatre
  • Division of the play into five acts
  • Thomas Ryd added the "play within the play"

PLAYHOUSES

The permanent playhouse

The building of permanent playhouses in London was a break with the past.

Towards the and of 16th century, several theatres were built:

  • The Theatre (by James Burgage 1576)

  • The Curtain (by James Burgage 1577)

  • The Rose (by Philip Henslowe 1587)

  • The Swan (by Francis Langley 1595)

  • The Curtain (by Cuthbert Burbage 1599)

  • The Fortune (Philip Henslowe 1600)

The architecture of theatres

THEATRES

The playhouse:

•were round or octagonal in shape

•were 12 metres high

•had a diameter of 25 metres

•had a rectangular stage

Internal layout

Internal layout

The some basic structure consisted:

•A stage partially covered by a thatched roof supported by two pillars and projected into a central area.

The structure included:

•Three tiers of galliers around the stage with the actor's dressing room at the back

The audience

The audience

The "box-offices" offered a wide range of prices:

  • a penny (=1/2 of a London worker's weekly salary) granted entrance to the PIT ( standing room around the stage)

  • Six pence granted access to seated places in the covered galleries. Only city merchants and the nobility could afford the price

The actors

The actors

  • They had to vary their repertoire
  • They had no more than two weeks to prepare a new play
  • They often found themeselves playing several roles in the same performance
  • They should have excellent memory

Female roles

  • Comanies included 6-5 boys to play female roles until their voices broke.

  • They learnt feminine gestures and intonation from a vary young age

Female roles

The Globe Theatre

THE GLOBE

THEATRE

  • The Globe Theatre was founded by the acting group Lord Chamberlain's Men in 1599
  • On June 29, 1613, a fire erupted during a performance of King Henry VIII
  • in 1949 Sam Wanamaker searcheas for the remains of the Globe
  • On June 7, 1997, the New Globe Theatre is officially opened.

Old

vs

New

The Globe Theatre now

The New Globe Theatre

"GLOBE"

Everyone in the world is an actor.

The motto is "Totus mundus agit histrionem" = "the whole world's a playhouse"

"The Globe"

Virtual Tour

Take a look inside the Globe Theatre

http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/about-us/virtual-tour

Virtual Tour

DRAMA

Drama as a literary genre

The origins of drama lie in classical Greece where it was a collective and ritual phenomenon. It lie in the solemn chorus accompanying the sacrifices to propitiate fecundity in nature.

Drama implies a real moment of comunication from author to audience through the actors, and it depends on the immediate response of the public.

The tragic playwright

In Shakespeare

In Greek and Latin

classical tragedies

  • the protagonist acts against inexorable destiny;
  • the action is limited to one place and one day;
  • the turning point is where the goals of the tragic hero seem whitin reach.
  • real balance between fate and human choices, based on characters' flaws. Human beings in control of their own destiny;
  • Shakespeare freely braks the rule of place and time unities;
  • the catastrophe at the end spells disaster for the tragic hero, responsible for his own fall, although his plan was noble.

The comedian

  • Shakespeare's comedies include:
  • disguise;
  • frustrated love;
  • mistaken identity;
  • marital and romantic misunderstandings.
  • They end in multiple marriages.
  • They trace the passage of young people out of their parents' control and into marriage.

Dramatic techniques

The language is vivid and intense.

  • "Dialogue" is the main support of drama

  • "Soliloquy" and "monologue" are special convention of Elizabethan drama

  • "Asides" are short comments made by a character for the audience alone

Shakespeare the dramatist

SHAKESPEARE

Shakespeare produced most of his works between 1589 and 1613.

His early plays were primarily comedies and histories.

Until about 1608, he wrote mainly tragedies, among them Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth.

In the last phase of his life, he wrote tragicomedies (also known as romances) as The Winter's Tale.

Dating the plays

Only half of Shakespeare's plays were printed during his lifetime.

In order to date Shakespeare's plays, experts used a combination of 3 methods:

•EXTERNAL EVIDENCE

•INTERNAL EVIDENCE

•STYLISTIC EVIDENCE

A Shakespearean play

General features:

The first striking feature of Shakespear's plays is the variety of interpretations they allow.

Characters

Shakerspeare's characters come from different social classes.

There are kings, princes, but also the lower classes are present.

Stage directions

At the beginning or during a scene, the reader finds stage directions.

An active co-operation of the reader is necessary to make the play alive.

Directions and descriptions are given indirectly, hidden in a question o a metaphor.

Double illusion

Shakespeare enables the reader to see the action both on the stage and in the distance.

The play in given an unusual dimention of height and depth.

The play is extended beyond reality into a universal perspective.

The structure

Shakespeare doesn't give great significance to the division between the acts.

In the Elizabethan theatre there was no curtain fall between the acts and plays were performed without an interval.

In a Shakespearean play a scene is over when oll the charaters have left the stage.

Variety of style and language

Different styles are used to portray the characters from different point of view. Symbolic and realistic actions are present in the same play and often Shakespeare used songs, music and magical transformations.

The language is characterised by multiple linguistic levels and an impressive variety in the verse structure.

Plot

The plot is discovered progressively.

At the beginning, everything is mysterious and the real meaning becomes clear later.

Shakespeare doesn’t consider important the three unities of time, place and action. In some plays certain aspects are not clearly explained so that the reader continue to think about it over and over.

A very popular play

Romeo and Juliet is one of Shakespeare's best-known tragedies. It's the most famous love story of all times.

There are several film versions.

ROMEO

AND

JULIET

  • The setting in place--> Verona
  • The setting in time--> four days and nights
  • The protagonists--> two rival families, the Montagues and the Capulets; their children, Romeo and Juliet

1) The plot

Act I-II

The first two acts are a love comedy:

  • Romeo and Juliet meet at Capulets' ball and it is love at first sight

  • they are secretly married by Friar Laurence

2) The plot

Act III-IV-V

  • The real tragedy starts in the third act with Mercutio's and Tybalt's deaths; Romeo is bannished from Verona
  • In the fourth act Juliet drinks a potion to avoid her marriage with Count Paris
  • In the fifth act tragic conclusion of the play with the deaths of the two lovers

Genre

A comedy or a tragedy?

It is a comedy--> the istant attraction of the young lovers;

the masked balls;

the comic servants;

the surface life of street fights

It is a tragedy--> the tragic role of chance leading up to the deaths of the two lovers

Themes

Themes

  • The lack of knowledge coming from bad comunication
  • The feud between the two families
  • Old hate vs young love
  • Speed as the medium of fate
  • The reflection upon the language made by Juliet--> appearance vs reality

Characters

The two lovers

  • Romeo--> the typical courtly lover

intense adoration of a chaste woman

  • Juliet--> though she is set whitin the courtly love convention, she is unconventional because she:
  • returns Romeo's love
  • stands for innocence
  • belongs to no characterisation
  • is a real women

Style

Style

  • Regular rhythm

  • Use of rhymes

  • Use of sonnets in dialogues

  • Imagery of light--> linked to life and the courtly love convention
  • Imagery of darkness--> linked to death

Literary works

LITERARY

WORKS

The great

ball

The great ball

JULIET Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,

Which mannerly devotion shows in this;

For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,

And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.

ROMEO Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?

JULIET Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.

ROMEO O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do;

They pray, grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.

JULIET Saints do not move, though grant for prayers' sake.

ROMEO Then move not, while my prayer's effect I take.

Thus from my lips, by yours, my sin is purged.

ROMEO O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!

It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night

Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope's ear;

Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!

So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,

As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows.

The measure done, I'll watch her place of stand,

And, touching hers, make blessed my rude hand.

Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!

For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night. [...]

ROMEO [To JULIET] If I profane with my unworthiest hand

This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this:

My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand

To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.

JULIET Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,

Which mannerly devotion shows in this;

For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,

And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.

1)The balcony scene

The balcony scene pt.1

JULIET: ‘Tis but thy name that is my enemy. Thou art thyself, though not a Montague. What’s Montague? It is nor hand, nor foot, Nor arm, nor face. O, be some other name Belonging to a man. What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other word would smell as sweet. So Romeo would, were he not Romeo called, Retain that dear perfection which he owes Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name; And for thy name, which is no part of thee, Take all myself.

ROMEO: I take thee at thy word. Call me but love, and I’ll be new baptized; Henceforth I never will be Romeo.

JULIET: What man art thou, that, thus bescreened in night, So stumblest on my counsel?

ROMEO: By a name I know not how to tell thee who I am. My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself Because it is an enemy to thee. Had I it written, I would tear the word.

2)The balcony scene

The balcony scene pt.2

JULIET: Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face; Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek For that which thou hast heard me speak tonight. Fain would I dwell on form (–fain, fain deny What I have spoke; but farewell compliment! Dost thou love me? I know thou wilt say “Ay;” And I will take thy word. Yet, if thou swear’st, Thou mayst prove false. At lovers’ perjuries, They say Jove laughs. O gentle Romeo, If thou dost love, pronounce it faithfully. Or if thou thinkest I am too quickly won, I’ll frown and be perverse and say thee nay, So thou wilt woo, but else, not for the world. In truth, fair Montague, I am too fond, And therefore thou mayst think my havior light; But trust me, gentleman, I’ll prove more true Than those that have more cunning to be strange. I should have been more strange, I must confess, But that thou overheard’st, ere I was ware, My true love passion. Therefore pardon me, And not impute this yielding to light love, Which the dark night hath so discovered.

With a kiss I die

With a kiss I die

JULIET What's here? a cup, closed in my true love's hand?

Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end:

O churl! drunk all, and left no friendly drop

To help me after? I will kiss thy lips;

Haply some poison yet doth hang on them,

To make die with a restorative.

[Kisses him]

Thy lips are warm![...]

Yea, noise? then I'll be brief. O happy dagger!

[Snatching ROMEO's dagger]

This is thy sheath;

[Stabs herself]

there rust, and let me die.

[Falls on ROMEO's body, and dies]

ROMEO Ah, dear Juliet,

Why art thou yet so fair? shall I believe

That unsubstantial death is amorous,

And that the lean abhorred monster keeps

Thee here in dark to be his paramour?

For fear of that, I still will stay with thee;

And never from this palace of dim night

Depart again: here, here will I remain

With worms that are thy chamber-maids; O, here

Will I set up my everlasting rest,

And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars

From this world-wearied flesh. Eyes, look your last!

Arms, take your last embrace! and, lips, O you

The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss

A dateless bargain to engrossing death![...]Here's to my love!

[Drinks]

O true apothecary!

Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.

[Dies] [...]

Hamlet

HAMLET

Major characters

Major characters

  • Hamlet: The Prince of Denmark, educated, son of the late King Hamlet, at times indecisive and at other times makes rash decisions.
  • Claudius: The King of Denmark, antagonist and uncle to Hamlet, married Hamlet's mother after Hamlet's father died.
  • Gertrude: Hamlet's mother, Queen, asserts her sexuality and makes Hamlet angry.
  • Polonius: Lord in Claudius' court, father of Laertes and Ophelia.
  • Horatio: Hamlet's best friend, loyal and supportive.
  • Ophelia: Hamlet's love interest, dependent on the men in her life (her father Polonius, her brother Laertes).
  • Laertes: Polonius' son, passionate and impulsive.

Mind map

To be or not to be

To be or not to be

HAMLET (16019, Act III, Scene I

"Here is Hamlet's most famous soliloquy on life and death. Only a few minutes have passed since the audience heard Hamlet's plan to prove the King's guilt by means of a play to be performed by actors who have come to Elsinore. Shortly before Hamlet enters, the King and his chancellor Polonius hide to spy on him. What will Hamlet reveal?"

To be or not to be

The insolence of office and the spurns

That patient merit of the unworthy takes,

When he himself might his quietus make

With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,

To grunt and sweat under a weary life,

But that the dread of something after death,

The undiscover'd country from whose bourn

No traveller returns, puzzles the will

And makes us rather bear those ills we have

Than fly to others that we know not of?

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;

And thus the native hue of resolution

Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,

And enterprises of great pitch and moment

With this regard their currents turn awry,

And lose the name of action.

HAMLET To be, or not to be: that is the question:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,

And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;

No more; and by a sleep to say we end

The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks

That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation

Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;

To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause: there's the respect

That makes calamity of so long life;

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,

The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,

The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,

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