10. William Shakespeare

Violence – Although violence is not the dominant motif, it is still an ensuring motif. It occurs due to the predictions of the witches. In fact, the play starts with the violent atmosphere where three witch sisters appear to weave a spell. However, the actual violence starts when the King Duncan is killed and Macbeth immediately kills the guards. Banquo, along with his children, is also murdered. This leads to a spiral of violence that ends with Macbeth’s musings.

Gender – Although very difficult to trace, the third recurrent and dominant motif in Macbeth. Gender has played an important role by instigating Macbeth. It is a result of a spell woven by three witches which are female in gender. Then when Macbeth does not take courage to move forward, it is Lady Macbeth who urges him. It is also that Lady Macbeth plays her role until the end of the play even chiding Macbeth “Why have you left the chamber?” to ensure his protection. In other words, it shows that even patriarchy is under the spell of feminism.

Weather – It is stated that weather is a way of predicting future course of action or circumstances. This could be a use of a foreshadowing. It is quite surprising that weather does not become significant though the witch sisters announce that they would be meeting again in a story weather. The symbols of thunder, lightning, rain, and bad storms are indicators of turbulent circumstances in Scotland. Moreover, the situation is always bad when the witches meet.

Symbols:

• vision and hallucinations, blood, sleep

• A very important figure plays Lady Macbeth who is the reason why Macbeth kills Duncan. She is embodied masculinity and cruelty in woman’s body. (unsex me my Lord).

William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

• drama – tragedies (Hamlet), historical (Henry the III.), comedies (The Merchant of Venice), weddings and wit;

• fairy-tales/romances (The Tempest)

• wrote about 37 plays

• poetry – sonnets (express sexual desire/love)

• he borrowed a lot of words from other languages (Dutch, Italian, Latin, French etc.) → shifting a

• little bit, making new English words

• he wanted to be famous, wanted to play to the gallery, wanted famous people (especially Elizabeth I.) to watch his plays

• he appealed to all social classes

THE MERCHANT OF VENICE

• the Merchant of Venice was probably written in either 1596 or 1597, after Shakespeare had written such plays as Romeo and Juliet and Richard III, but before he wrote the great tragedies of his later years

• it was probably never played during Elizabethan rule

• basic plot outline – the merchant, the fair lady and the villainous Jew, is found in a numbers of contemporary Italian story collections.

• the presence of marriage and the wit make it a comedy

• Jews in Shakespeare’s England were a marginalized group, and Shakespeare’s contemporaries used to be familiar with portrayals of Jews as villainous and objects of mockery. For example, Christopher Marlowe’s The Jew of Malta, a bloody farce about a murderous Jewish villain, was a great success of the time.

  • However, the characters of Portia, Shakespeare’s first great heroine, and the unforgettable villain Shylock whose occasional humane moments must have been quite surprising for the audience elevated this play to a new level.