THE GREAT AUTHORSHIP DEBATE

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Shakespeare's Representation In The Media

Shakespeare in his own time surprisingly was not even close to as famed as he is today. Back in the day, Shakespeare was actually hated by many because of his unconventional writing style, sadly this led their being a lack of social and personal records of him around so there wasn't much talk about him in his time. However, this is just simply not the case in todays world. Shakespeare now is thought to be one of the greatest writers of all time, his name is incredibly famous. Little known fact, Shakespeare is the largest single contributor in history to the words in the oxford dictionary. Shakespeare is represented today as a brilliant visionary. And rightfully so, we so so many stories that are his in todays world.

Below, I've found a video that points out but a few movies that have nearly the exact same plot lines as some of Shakespeare's plays, especially the Lion King and Hamlet.

Shakespeare is incredibly popular as many high schoolers study his works of art, he's become so much of a household name that people have even begun making internet memes about him, here's an example of two I found particularly amusing below:

I don't think I need to explain these two.

-Omar

Is Shakespeare Still Relevant?

Over the years an uncountable amount of teenaged students have desperately searched for reasons pertaining to why they shouldn't be forced into studying the dreaded Shakespeare! And in my professional (not really) opinion I believe the main reason given is that Shakespeare and his writing is no longer relevant. Sure we can study him but why do we have to study his works? History tells us that in many cases, as years go along, humanity's skills get better. And it makes logical sense, Shakespeare was a splendid writer and in this day and age we have many other splendid writers, why don't we study something we understand? Those are all points against, but personally, I believe Shakespeare is highly relevant today. Not only are the incredibly interesting themes insightful into writing skills but it gives us a chance to look into the past and make connections between modern writing and the immortality of Shakespeare's works.

One thing that must be said is that the plots of Shakespeare were completely and totally way ahead of his time. It's interesting to read and his expert writing ability livens up dull moments with fights and jokes at the perfect time. To quote Marchette Chute in her explanation in why Shakespeare is one of the all time greats in literature:
       
          "William Shakespeare was the most remarkable storyteller that the world has ever known. Homer told of adventure and men at war, Sophocles and Tolstoy told of tragedies and of people in trouble. Terence and Mark Twain told comedic stories, Dickens told melodramatic ones, Plutarch told histories and Hand Christian Andersen told fairy tales. But Shakespeare told every kind of story – comedy, tragedy, history, melodrama, adventure, love stories and fairy tales – and each of them so well that they have become immortal. In all the world of storytelling he has become the greatest name. (Stories from Shakespeare, 11)"

Shakespeare's plays and stories are transcend (my favorite word) through time and culture. Even today storytellers try and take some of Shakespeare's greatest stories and fit them into the modern world. 

The one point I feel strongest about is how applicable to real life they are. The characters that are portrayed in Shakespeare's plays go through affairs that are in essence how what people will go through in their life, albeit in a more modern way but I don't necessarily mean that we're all gonna have to murder the king one day but the message and characteristics are applicable. For instance, "think about dysfunctional families, think about King Lear. Think about teenagers who imagine they're in love, think about Romeo and Juliet. Think about sneaky swine spreading gossip and ruining other people's lives, think about Othello. Think about indecisive introverted types creating havoc, think about Hamlet. Think about religious prejudice, think about " the Merchant of venice"".

I found this awesome video talking about why Shakespeare still matters, take a look :)

-Omar

Shakespeare's Plays

Shakespeare was a master with his pen, his poems themselves were spectacular but his plays were simply outstanding. I've only studied one of Shakespeare's 37 plays and from what I've read so far, Im pleasantly surprised. I've heard stories of "the dreaded Shakespeare" and have heard many a tale of high school 'survivors' ranting on about the horrors they encountered trying to just comprehend the words nonetheless understand the meaning and metaphors. I'm praying that next year isn't going to be a sudden shock as to how difficult Shakespeare's plays truly are... I guess I'll just have to wait and see...

Shakespeare has written many plays, that much is a given, some of his most acclaimed are: Romeo and Juliet, the tale of two young, star-crossed lovers whose deaths ultimately reconcile their feuding families; Hamlet, a tale set in the Kingdom of Denmark, the play dramatizes the revenge Prince Hamlet is instructed to commit on his uncle Claudius, who murdered King Hamlet - brother of Claudius and father of Hamlet - and then succeeded to the throne and took as his wife the murdered king's wife Gertrude; and Macbeth a play set in Scotland, "the play dramatizes the corrosive psychological and political effects produced when evil is chosen as a way to fulfill the ambition for power." These are just a few, for a full link of all the plays click here.

Romeo And Juliet
First of all, let's break down Shakespeare's earliest play of the three mentioned, Romeo and Juliet. Since it'd be pretty boring and standard for me to just sit here and give the rundown/ synopsis of his plays I'd rather just talk about what they meant and things like that! Well for starters, Romeo and Juliet was Shakespeare's 10th ever play written and may have been his most popular. In fact it's inline with Hamlet as his most frequently performed plays. And since I personally have not yet had the pleasure of reading Romeo and Juliet, I'll just be forced to trust a few online 'critics', because if there's one thing I know about the internet, it's that EVERYTHING online is absolutely, undoubtably true. As I was saying, as per what I have discovered online, scholars have found it very difficult to find one 
underlying theme to the entire play. One opinion about the theme is that it is a discovery by the characters that human beings are neither wholly nor wholly evil but are instead more or less alike. But obviously this is not the only suggestion for a possible main theme, there are many that don't have much support in any direction but instead there is a general consensus that instead, Shakespeare used a plethora of individual themes intertwined complexly. These themes include: love, fate and chance, duality and time. Generally many critics favor Romeo and Juliet is because of Shakespeare's poetic 

This is Samuel Johnson, and in my opinion, the greatest
Coincidence ever. Out of the hundreds of critics, I
randomly selected a meme.

 dramatic structure, such as his ability to shift between comedy and tragedy to implement tension, his use of minor characters in the play, and his use of sub-plots to enrich the entire storyline. In the early times of it's release, there were a substantial amount of critics in fact, one critic even said "it is a play of itself the worst that I ever heard in my life." and the focal reason was that it did not follow the rule that all dramas at that day and age did, this was that "the tragedy must occur by some character flaw, not merely by fate" wrote Samuel Johnson


Macbeth
Now let's move on to the one play I actually read and saw live, although, I'm not sure it really counted as it was musical... NEVERTHELESS, we shall continue. Personally I've heard of people talk about their distaste for Macbeth, but maybe because of it's short length making the play fast paced, I thoroughly enjoyed Macbeth. In fact, Macbeth is surprisingly, Shakespeare's shortest play and shows us the dangers of picking evil as a way to obtain great power. Just to quickly summarize it, the play is about a brave scottish soldier, Macbeth, who is corrupted by evil and is spurred on by his wife to murder to get to the throne. Soon after, Macbeth becomes filled with guilt and paranoia and soon becomes a tyrannical leader of his kingdom and results in committing more and more murders to remove doubt and safeguard his throne. The bloodbath and war that followed take Macbeth and Lady Macbeth into the realms of arrogance, madness and death. The play actually has a background history in theater as being "cursed" and it's title is not addressed, rather it is referred to as "The Scottish Play", apparently this is because some believe the curse of the three witches was true! And thus if the name is spoken aloud in the theater, other than in rehearsal, the play is destined for disaster.

Next is the interesting bit, the themes. After reading the play, all three themes I discovered online are all equally accurate. The first being the corrupting power of unchecked ambition, the second being the relationship between cruelty and masculinity and finally, the difference between kingship and tyranny. I'll address the theme

Macbeth Murdering King Duncan

I find most interesting. The theme of how unchecked ambition leads to corruption is seen in the two main characters. Macbeth begins the play as a brave and noble Scottish general who doesn't seem capable of committing evil deeds, however it's clear how is lust for power and advancement leads to his demise. Against his better judgement he chooses to murder King Duncan to rise to the throne but is then eaten away by guilt and paranoia. By the end of the play he is led to a state of almost "frantic, boastful madness". Lady Macbeth, on the other hand, attempts to complete her goals with greater aspiration, however she seems to be less capable of withstanding the repercussions of her treasonous actions. Apparently she is one of Shakespeare's "Most forcefully drawn female characters" as she edges on her husband to commit murder after murder and urges him to be strong but she is eventually led to distraction and goes mad and guilt ridden, so much so that she ends up murdering herself at the end of the play.

Hamlet
Next let's move on to Shakespeare's next play, Hamlet. Hamlet was Shakespeare's longest play and is performed the most around the world. And again, I am yet to read Hamlet so a fair amount of research will be required for the following exert. the play centers around Hamlet's indecision in how he plans to avenge his father (The King)'s death Shakespeare's most famous quote is in the play as well, the fabled "To be or not to be, that is the question" I think the big deal about Hamlet is how many scholars adore Hamlet because of it's new form of storyline, instead of the common idea of struggles with multiple individuals, it showcases struggles within himself. Most novels in this day and age see this kind of portrayal all the time, but this was really the beginning of having such a developed and mysterious character.

The Ghost in Hamlet

As was the case with Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet', Hamlet featured many themes however I think the one that was most quintessential theme was the impossibility of certainty. That's what sets this play apart, in most plays the action you expect to see revolves around conflicts between others while in Hamlet it centers around his own indecisiveness, for instance there are many questions like Can we certain knowledge about ghosts? Is this ghost what it claims to be or an evil fiend? Moving into more reality based questions: How can we know things about a murder that had no witnesses? Moreover, this play is seen as a testament to how indecisiveness led to Hamlet's failure to act appropriately. Personally I find this most interesting as it makes us ponder how much of our lives are built and based on things we don't know. Me being the chemistry/ physics nerd I am find this very insightful in the basis of science and what we REALLY know, I mean to be honest, there are so many things that we take for granted as "facts" that are really theories. The reason why I mentioned physics and chemistry is, as a perfect example, just look at all the scientific facts that were once that to be absolutely true and we then later found out were completely false. Just a few hundred years ago, chemists believed that the atom was the smallest thing in the universe, WRONG! Only a 3 years ago did we believe the expansion of the universe was slowing down, WRONG!  I mean for pete's sake, gravity is just a theory! I find this interesting and I ponder this matter quite frequently in the sanctity of my own mine, "Is anything that we know today true"? I guess the best way to answer this is to quote the great Socrates, "True knowledge is knowing that you know nothing." 

Elizabethan Times and the Theatre

Queen Elizabeth I, her reign was so important to English history she even has her own era named after her! The Elizabethan times for England was a BIG deal. As of right now, personally, what I know about this Era is little to nothing but praise the lord for internet. Queen Elizabeth's reign spanned out over 45 years (1558-1603). It's known as the golden age of England's history. Britannia's symbol was first used in 1572 and marked the age as a renaissance that inspired much national pride and classical ideal, not only that but in this period Britain sustained great naval success over the dreaded Spanish and expanded their influence internationally. It truly was a great and prosperous time for England.

Probably the biggest influence in the English renaissance was their huge step forward in navigation and exploration, as if this accomplishment wasn't good enough the best thing was how well off England was compared to so many of the other European nations like Italy and France. After Sir Francis Drake's circumnavigation (1577-1580[learned that in a video game! who would've thought]) and England's triumph over Spain's armada, England was at the forefront of  international trade and the race for colonization. England's renaissance in terms of it's thought and art is epitomized (my word) by the recognition given by Queen Elizabeth I to Oxford and Cambridge. These universities quickly became recognized as the country's centre for learning and scholarly activities. England's invention of the printing press made literature more available to the people.

Now let us move on to the theater at that time where I have some nice pictures lined up!
To clear things up, London was separated by the River Thames, and on the southern side of the river was the city Southwark. at the time there was no bridge connecting London and Southwark so if one wished to cross they needed to hire a boat man to take them across. Southwark was not held under the same laws that London was, so naturally people went there to do things disallowed in London.

This painting by William Hogarth depicts Southwark about 100 years later but it gives you an idea,
There were taverns filled to the brim with people getting drunk on beer and ale, there was gambling, prostitution, pick-pockets and other criminals as well as animal cruelty the most people today would find barbaric, I won't be going into that however.

Theatre was another thing that was surprisingly illegal in London as it wasn't seen as the high class art form we see it as today, instead it was seen as common and crude compared to the poetry recitations which the higher class folk in London preferred. So London theaters were closed in 1596 by the church of England under the influence of the puritans who believed that plays, along with everything else that didn't worship the lord explicitly, was immoral. But there was also the fear of the bubonic plague (aka the black death), they feared that large gatherings of people would spread the disease more rapidly. So Shakespeare had to dismantle his theater, board by board and rebuild it in Southwark.

Shakespeare famously called his theater "The Wooden "O""

Shakespeare's theater was named "The Globe". Like a stadium the theatre was open aired in the middle and the one thing they didn't have was artificial lighting so all of Shakespeare's plays had to take place in the day. The inside of the theatre had an elevated stage, A balcony above, mainly used as a gallery over the back of the stage where all the audience members could be seated or musicians, it had a cannon that could be fired for battle scenes, there were what we call flies which was the area above the stage where the actors could be hoisted up to give the appearance of them flying and there was at least one trapdoor so that an actor could give the appearance of disappearing or appearing.

Now to advertise these shows they raised a colored flag so that people across the river could tell what genre was being played. A white flag meant they were putting on a comedy, a red flag meant they were showing a history, and a black flag meant they were putting on a tragedy.

The wealthy viewers of the plays had to pay money to sit in shaded seats while the poorer spectators were forced to watch directly in front of the raised stage platform vulnerable to sunlight. This period was also when the trend of cheering when the hero entered the scene and booing when the villain entered began, also, if the spectators where not pleased with the performance they would start throwing rotten food and such at the actors (personally, I believe we should implement this strategy in schools for boring class presentations). Moving on, down in the area for commoners, people would try selling roasted hazelnuts, oranges and beer, kind of like the equivalent to buying hot dogs and peanuts at baseball games today.

Something I personally find humorous is that back in the Elizabethan times, there were no women allowed on stage, women were normally played as young boys in costumes. This is because at the time plays were considered something women should not attend, in fact when women did come to watch the plays they even wore masks to conceal their identity! This explains why Shakespeare's plays had a lack of kissing and things of the sort.

Now what do I think...
Personally I think that the theaters back in the day sound pretty exciting and fun, and if I had the choice, I'd probably be down with the groundlings (Name for commoners bellow the stage) mainly because I'd get a better shot at hitting the actors and I hate to admit it but whenever I go to stage performances back in the US, the child in me still immensely enjoys tossing popcorn at the antagonist. In fact, I think me and Karim would fit right in to a group of loud and often obnoxious individuals. I think also a lot is to be said about Shakespeare really pursuing his dream of being a play writer and even when his theater was closed he completely rebuilt it by moving the parts across the river! That takes a lot of work and commitment.

Omar

Who Was Shakespeare

Unless you've lived your entire life under rock, you probably know who William Shakespeare was. I'm just going to assume however that you don't to make this whole explaining thing a little easier. Well for starters, William Shakespeare was a poet/ play writer, but not just any play writer, this guy supposedly wrote a whopping 37 plays! Consisting of art such as Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Othello and so on (Full list here). And plus he came up with the famous "To be or not to be, that is the question". But let's go deeper than just what he did.

William Shakespeare was born on April 26th, 1564 and was brought up in Stratford-apon-Avon. Interestingly enough, the man considered to be the best poet of all time did not even attend college as his dad could not afford it. When Shakespeare was young he attended the Stratford Grammar School, which, is still standing today. Like Many other poets, Shakespeare learned his basic reading and writing skills from an ABC or horn book. Robert Speaight in his book, Shakespeare: The Man and His Achievement, describes this book as

a primer framed in wood and covered with a thin plate of transparent horn. It included the alphabet in small letters and in capitals, with combinations of the five vowels with b, c, and d, and the Lord's Prayer in English. The first of these alphabets, which ended with the abbreviation for 'and', began with the mark of the cross. Hence the alphabet was known as 'Christ cross row' -- the cross-row ofRichard III, I, i, 55. A short catechism was often included in the ABC book (the 'absey book' of King John, I, i, 196).

After Shakespeare left his school what he did afterwards in the mid 1580s is impossible to trace. Still there are few who have suggested that he worked as a Schoolmaster, lawyer or even a glover with his father and brother, Gilbert. Another theory floating around is the Shakespeare spent this time mastering his literary skills and honing in on his acting. This period has been suitably named the "lost years" One thing that we can however conclude from this specific section of Shakespeare's life is that he married a pregnant orphan who went by the name of Anne Hathaway.

At the time of the marriage (November 28th, 1582) Shakespeare was 18 years of age and Anne Hathaway was 26 years old. Over the nest two year's Anne gave birth to their eldest, Susana and later, two twins, one boy (Hamnet) and one girl (Judith). From the information I've gathered online it appears that Shakespeare's private life, to this day, remains a mystery. This has attributed to many of the myths associated with Shakespeare regarding such things as his appearance, sexuality, religious beliefs and perhaps the grandest myth of them all, whether or not Shakespeare's works attributed to him were actually written by him.

Over the following years William had achieved great success in London for his play writing and poems. Though he was famous in his time, his popularity did not raise to it's current level up until the 19th century. His Romantic works were in a class of their own and the Victorians worshipped him highly at the time even though his works were published a time that seems to be worlds apart from us today, his poems and plays have  been admired and studied across the globe, it seems as though his work is eternal and shall not fade, in contrast to a Summer's day.

Now what do I think...
Personally I think the story of Shakespeare is one of, if not the, most interesting stories I've read, which fuels my admiration even more. I guess to all college drop outs Shakespeare is an idol, I mean the man didn't even have a college education and look how highly his work is regarded now! But that is besides the point, what I'm trying to get at is how story-like his life seems. A boy from humble beginnings marries an orphan, and is unable to attend college turns into one of England's best poets/ play writers, it almost seems to good to be true. I can certainly see the argument against Shakespeare being the author of his work but at the same time I love how mysterious his history is, there's no REAL evidence for whether or not Shakespeare did write his plays but that's the best thing about it, I mean we can only assume and I can't help but wonder what took place in the "lost years" he seems a very interesting man and whether or not you believe he of all people wrote his plays you have to at least admire that he got away with it!

Anyway that's it for now (This is more fun than I thought)

Omar