Features of Shakespeare's Tragic Vision - Coursework Example

Shakespeare’s Tragic Vision Shakespeare was a popular dramatist who wrote for the public stage, and his art was conditioned by the tastes of thepeople and the limitations of the stage. It was in the glorious age of Queen Elizabeth, covering the last quarter of the 16th century and the first few years of the 17th that Shakespeare, “reached his full stature, and became not only great and wise, but famous, rich and happy”. In order, therefore, to understand his works, it is essential to have a clear idea of his age. Shakespeare’s plays Hamlet, Othello, Julius Caesar, Macbeth and King Lear are considered to be Universal because Shakespeare was not only a poet, a dramatic poet, working for stage, actors, and audience as he know them. Ben Jon son, a contemporary Play Wright said about Shakespeare that, “He was not of an age but for all times” who with his dramatic genius has established and underlying reputation for himself which he lived. Shakespeare’s age was a period of ignorance and superstition. Despite the advancement of science and learning, the majority of the people still believed in witchcraft and charms omens of all sorts’ .The frequent appearance of the supernatural can be seen like ghost in Julius Caesar and Hamlet, witches in Macbeth. Medical science was still rudimentary, and all sorts of fantastic lures were prescribed. Hamlet is considered as a tragedy has all the typical features of a Shakespearean tragedy. A Shakespearean tragedy is essentially the tale of one man- the hero .Hamlet is the prince of Denmark, frank, noble hearted man. That is why he is popular with the people, and Ophelia and Fortinbras praise him so highly. The suffering of the tragic hero is also exceptional; he suffers so terribly the hearts of the readers filled with pity and sympathy. Hamlet has all the chief Characteristics of a typical Elizabethans Revenge ply. The Revenge motif is strong in it. Hamlet’s father is murdered in a most foul manner. It is an unnatural crime, for the criminal is the real brother of the murdered King. His queen has been unfaithful to her husband during his life time and soon after his death she marries the murderer. Thus there is murder, adultery, and incestuous marriage. In the manner of revenge play, it is the ghost of Hamlet’s father who reveals to the young prince the horrible truth about his father’s death, and lays upon him the duty of revenge. The supernatural motif has been fully exploited, eg. The ghost speaks only to the prince. In Hamlet there is much of fighting, bloodshed and violence. First Hamlet kills Polonius hidden behind the curtain. Not only had that he dug his body down exclaiming: This man will set me packing; I will lug the guts into the neighboring room . The revenge motif has been fully exploited, and thrills and sensations, for which the “grounding” longed, have been provided in ample measure. It is not merely an object of horror, but also the representation of the hidden, mysterious forces that lurk around us. It is an instrument of justice to punish the evil doer. Hamlet is one of the greatest tragedies of the world. As Goggling is points out, Hamlet, “is not to be regarded as a tragedy of revenge, but as a universal figure; he is every man. In his suffering, melancholy, hesitations in his inaction at a crucial moment in his life he typifies some one or the other phase of human nature”. Hamlet is a tortured soul and it is through his soliloquies that the dreamiest has laid bare his soul before us. Without the soliloquies the drama would be more husks without a Kernel. One can say that Hamlet is Soul’s tragedy and raise above a crude Melodrama or Revenge play. According to Samuel Johnson on Hamlet, “The play of Hamlet is opened, without impropriety, by two sentinels; Iago bellows at Brabantio’s window, without injury to the scheme of the play, though in terms which a modern audience would not easily endure; the character of Polonius is seasonable and useful; and the grave-diggers themselves may be heard with applause”. In Julius Caesar, it is clear the Brutus is the principal character the chief interest in Brutus’s career lies in its futile opposition to the idea of Caesar’s; it is really Caesar’s presence and his conception of government (imperial Idea) that dominate the tragic story. The great Caesar is also portrayed as being highly superstitious, and a credulous believer in magic rites. Though he tries not to show it, he is really impressed by his wife’s cries in her sleep; he consults the oracles and has recourse to sacrifice. Shakespeare, in short, shoes that Caesar had to live up to an impossible standard; he represent the dawning of the Roman Empire, and must be fearless, omniscient, and infallible; there is no room in the ideal Caesar for timidity or fickleness. Shakespeare builds up the character of Brutus trait by trait, depicting in him the failure of a noble personality under the test of action, in this, Brutus closely resembles Hamlet. Brutus strives to direct his life by reason, and this is reflected in all his actions and talk. He has to determine his conduct, not by instinct, but by impersonal, unprejudiced reason. This is very apparent in the soliloquy at the beginning of Act Two, Scene 1: he sees that if the personal rule of Caesar is to be averted, half measures will not suffice- there are no safeguards that can prevent the supremacy of so great a man if he is allowed to live; this is his starting point- “It must be by his death”; but then the question arises: “In such a death permissible?” and in answering it Brutus displays admirable intellectual can dour; He acquits Caesar of all blame and argues that a future contingency (tyranny) justifies the present infliction of death. In his personal character, therefore, Brutus approaches Plato’s ideal of the Philosopher- statesman, disinterested, devoted to the welfare of his country, which he is ready top defend, no matter what the cost. No one can doubt that he joins the conspiracy through devotion to his reputation principles which, he honestly believes, are jeopardized by Caesar’s continued existence, and despite his friendship and admiration for the Dictator. What Brutus feels about Caesar as a man may be gathered from his incidental tributes to him: “O that we then could come by Caesar’s spirit And not dismember Caesar” (2.i.169); “I that did love Caesar when I struck him” (3.i.182); “The foremost man of all this world” (4.iii.22) Cassius is an Epicurean, i.e. a follower of a doctrine that frees him from the bonds of superstition and the degrading fear of death; free from all superstitious scruples, he stands out bold and self-reliant, confident in his own will power. He is not deceived by shows, but looks quite through. Cassius is obsessed by one idea. He is imbued with a thorough love of freedom and equality, and groans under the prospect of a monarchial regime. There is no doubt, then, that Cassius takes pleasure in detecting the weakness of his fellows. Yet he also turns his remorseless scrutiny on his own nature and his own cause, and neither maintains that the one is not noble nor that the other is honorable (of 1.ii.312) He is jealous of excellence and will not tolerate it. It is on this characteristic that Shakespeare lays stress. Caesar finds him “very dangerous” just because of this grudge against greatness in others; and Cassius own avowal that the “would as life not be as live to be in awe”. Stresses the same unnamable trait. While Brutus’ motives for joining the conspiracy are unselfish and his integrity is unblemished, yet he is infatuated with his own supreme self confidence, and it is this trait which ultimately betrays him. Once in the conspiracy, his reputation and his sublime assurance of his own rightness impose him as a leader .Brutus’ tragedy, therefore, is that he has the virtue of disinterestedness without the wisdom-that is, the understanding of himself and other men- necessary to give this disinterestedness political effectiveness of his fault. At the end of the play Brutus remains unchanged by all that has happened: his motives, his principles, and his actions are all of apiece throughout ,and he dies in defense of the same principle of Roman Liberty that had led him in the first place to join the conspirators. He commits suicide against his code but this is to avoid what for a Roman was unbearable disgrace, to be led as a prisoner in chains. A.C. Bradley in his lecture states that a Shakespearean tragedy is more than ‘a story of exceptional calamity leading to the death of a man of high state’. Human beings are placed in certain circumstances; and certain actions arise from the co-operation of their characters in these circumstances. These actions beget others, and this series of inter-connected deeds build up the catastrophe. The ‘story’ or ‘actions’ of a Shakespearean tragedy is a combination of human deeds and acts or omissions thoroughly expressive of the doer- characteristic deeds. Work Cited A. C. Bradley, The Shakespeare’s Tragedies.London, Oxford University Press, 1904. D. J. Enright Ernst De Chickera,”English Critical Texts”. England, Oxford University Press, 1988. Dr. Raghukul Tilak,” Hamlet”. New Delhi, Eurasia publishing House (pvt) ltd 1990. Wallace& Mary Stegner,”Julious Caesar”. New Delhi, S. Chand & Company, 1987. Read More