{"id":162,"date":"2024-04-13T17:53:46","date_gmt":"2024-04-14T00:53:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/?page_id=162"},"modified":"2025-10-02T08:51:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T15:51:07","slug":"shakespeare-intro-language-1","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/shakespeare-intro-language-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Shakespeare’s Language and Art – I"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Shakespeare’s Language and Art, Part 1 of 2<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Themes and Scope of the Plays<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We might expect an active playwright like Shakespeare to deal directly with the flow of modern life, but for the most part he doesn\u2019t. London\u2019s mercantile class was increasing, and nationalism was beginning to flex its muscles. So why don\u2019t we find London\u2019s social structure \u201cripped from the headlines\u201d in Shakespeare? He deals with courtly environments and characters, and often at historical distance, spanning from ancient Greece and Rome to the late Middle Ages in Europe. He represents monarchs as nearly unconstrained. Kings and nobles are at the center of his plays. This may be due in part to his propertied station. There\u2019s also the fact that censorship was part of life in England.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Method of Composition<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shakespeare wrote comedy, history, tragedy, and romance. He was probably aware of basic theories about what a comedy or tragedy ought to be like, but he doesn\u2019t seem to have spent much time worrying about conforming to them. <\/em>As Coleridge says in a lecture on Shakespeare, \u201cNo work of genius dares want its appropriate form\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s romantic organicism: we respond to a work of art as we create it, so that it \u201ccreates itself\u201d processively. Form and meaning aren\u2019t merely imposed upon the material. They develop in accordance with the inner laws of the work itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The romantic theorists and poets understood the creative process well: imagine a sculptor facing his or her medium of blank stone. Soon, the first creative act is performed, and then the sculptor stands back and beholds the results in altered stone. This prompts another act, and on it goes in a sustained dialectic between mind and medium, until the demand for a \u201cproduct\u201d halts the process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What does this mean for us, as readers and interpreters? We need not seek a facile coherency in the material. Rather, we should look to tease out potential of whatever sort we find in one textual location and connect it to other locations in the same or other plays, or indeed any relevant material. What drives WS\u2019s plays is the sympathetic, imaginative connections he makes between character and character, event and event, predicament and predicament. His brand of realism is psychological, <\/em>not the realism of historical happening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Language: Grammar and Rhetorical\/Literary Devices.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A. Inverted or Otherwise Altered Syntax:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf\u2019t be so, \/ For Banquo\u2019s issue have I filed my mind, \/ For them the gracious Duncan have I murdered\u2026\u201d (Norton Tragedies <\/em>930, Macbeth <\/em>3.1.64-66). Sometimes, just reordering the words can work wonders for comprehension.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

B. Literary Devices Such as the Following:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alliteration:<\/strong> \u201cWhen to the s<\/u><\/strong>essions of s<\/u><\/strong>weet s<\/u><\/strong>ilent thought \/ I summon up remembrance of things past\u2026.\u201d (Sonnet 30, Norton Romances and Poems <\/em>666). The repetition of initial consonant sounds in words close to one another. There\u2019s also consonance, <\/em>in which the repeated consonantal sounds don\u2019t have to be at the beginning of the words in question: \u201cI acknowledge that Jack is back.\u201d And there\u2019s assonance, <\/em>which involves repetition of vowel <\/em>sounds rather than consonants: \u201cGet it through your head that Freddy<\/em> isn\u2019t ready<\/em>, Neddie<\/em>!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Allusion:<\/strong> \u201cO Jephthah, judge of Israel, what a treasure hadst \/ thou!\u201d exclaims Hamlet in his mocking encounter with the king\u2019s counselor Polonius.(Hamlet <\/em>2.2.329-30) The prince alludes to the Bible\u2019s Judges <\/em>11-12. Jephthah of Gilead had promised Jehovah that if He would grant victory to the Israelites over the Ammonites, he would willingly sacrifice whatever exited his door first. Alas, \u201cwhatever\u201d turned out to be his daughter, and he ended up having to sacrifice her just as he had promised. Hamlet is warning Polonius not to be like Jephthah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aside from biblical allusions, Shakespeare ranges from references to classical mythology, persons, and history to Gothic lore like that of the faerie lords Titania, Oberon and their helpers in A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream.<\/em> There are allusions to various professions and practices: heraldry, hunting, falconry, horticulture, farming, moneylending, etc. Plenty of allusions to English history, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another allusion worth noting is a classical Latin citation from Horace in Act 4, Scene 2 of Shakespeare\u2019s intense revenge tragedy Titus Andronicus. <\/em>The boy Lucius delivers to the two sons of Goth queen turned Roman empress Tamora some weapons along with a scroll that reads, \u201cInteger vitae, scelerisque purus, \/ Non eget Mauri iaculis, nec arcu\u201d (Norton Tragedies<\/em> 178, 4.2.20-21). Translated freely, this means, \u201cHe that is pure of life and free from faults \/ Has no need of any bow or Moorish javelin.\u201d One of the Goth Queen Tamora\u2019s sons, Chiron, says \u201cOh, \u2018tis a verse in Horace. I know it well: \/ I read it in the grammar long ago\u201d (Norton 178, 4.2.22-23).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is interesting\u2014that the old Roman general Titus would know Horace\u2019s verses shouldn\u2019t surprise us. But that two Goths and the Moor in this play are also familiar with them is interesting. Roman culture is common to them all, and the implication appears to be that there is no single, coherent history of Rome, no simple pitting of Barbarians against the civilized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Metaphor:<\/strong> Metaphor clarifies or deepens the meaning of a first thing by ascribing to it or transferring over to it the qualities of a second, unrelated thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Example: \u201cNow is the winter of our discontent \/ Made glorious summer by this son of York,\u201d as Richard Duke of Gloucester says to open Richard III <\/em>(Norton Histories<\/em> 385, 1.1.1-2). Here, discontentment, an emotional state or condition, borrows the qualities of a pensive season, winter, a season that threatens to deaden the soul. \u201cWinter\u201d is the figurative term, the vehicle, <\/em>that Shakespeare uses to convey something important about the tenor, <\/em>the thing to be understood, which here is \u201cdiscontent,\u201d an emotional state. It will soon become clear that Richard doesn\u2019t align himself with the \u201cwe\u201d he posits: everyone else <\/em>has felt the profound transformation of spirit with Edward IV\u2019s victory, but not Richard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Metaphor grabs listeners\u2019 attention, feelings, and even intellect in a way that less creative usages seldom do. If we were to write, \u201cNow is our wintry discontent turned into summery satisfaction,\u201d hearers would pelt us with rotten tomatoes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simile:<\/strong> \u201cThis old car balks like a horse trader\u2019s mule.\u201d Or, \u201cFrank is as fearsome as a lion.\u201d This device compares one thing to another. It isn\u2019t as radically transformative or creative as metaphor in that it involves a mere comparison, not an equation or mingling of two things. A Shakespearean example: When Cardinal Wolsey in Henry VIII <\/em>realizes that his downfall is certain, he says, \u201cI have ventured, \/ Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders, \/ This many summers in a sea of glory, But far beyond my depth\u201d  (Norton Histories<\/em> 930, 3.2.358-61). The great cleric compares himself to carefree little children playing in the water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Metonymy:<\/strong> \u201cFriends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears\u201d (Norton  Tragedies 320, 3.2.71), as Mark Antony says to the plebeians in Julius Caesar.<\/em> This figure entails replacing a word with another word closely related to the  thing it stands for, but not simply a part of it. Here, \u201cears\u201d replaces \u201cattention.\u201d Or how about, \u201cLet\u2019s run it by the suits in corporate headquarters.\u201d The word \u201csuits\u201d is not a part<\/em> of a corporate attorney the way an arm or a leg would be, but it is something we associate with attorneys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Synecdoche:<\/strong> Synecdoche substitutes the part for the whole. \u201cAll hands<\/strong> on deck!\u201d The Monty Python players would represent that sentence by showing us a row of hands moving across a ship\u2019s deck. Here, \u201chands\u201d stands in for \u201csailors.\u201d Another well-worn synecdoche would be \u201ctwenty sail\u201d for \u201ctwenty ships.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Elliptical expressions:<\/strong> \u201cAnd he to England shall along with you,\u201d says Claudius to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in Hamlet <\/em>(Norton Tragedies<\/em> 408, 3.3.4) The verb \u201cgo\u201d is omitted: \u201cshall go along\u201d would be the standard way to say it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

C. Grammatical Irregularities:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anthimeria.<\/strong> One part of speech is often substituted for another. This happens especially with nouns and verbs. For example, in the first act of The Tempest, <\/em>Prospero asks Miranda, \u201cWhat seest thou else \/ In the dark backward<\/strong> and abysm of time?\u201d (Norton Romances<\/em> 400, 1.2.49-50.) The word \u201cbackward\u201d is an adverb, but it is used as a noun here, producing an apt, elegant verse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Archaic pronoun and verb forms:<\/strong> The familiar or intimate second-person singular forms are thou\/thee, as in, \u201cI tell thee (direct object) that thou (subject) art mistaken.\u201d The possessive form is often \u201cthy\/thine\u201d (and \u201cmy\/mine\u201d for first person): \u201cthy book is before thine eyes.\u201d As for verbs, the second-person familiar suffix is often (e)-st, as in \u201cThou speakest or speak\u2019st, while the third person singular is often -eth, as in \u201cHe\/she speaketh.\u201d Key verbs like \u201cto be,\u201d \u201cto have,\u201d \u201cto do,\u201d and \u201cto say\u201d can have odd forms: \u201cthou art, he\/she is\u201d; \u201cthou dost, he\/she doth; thou sayest, he\/she saith; \u201cthou hast, he\/she hath.\u201d Example: \u201cO Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain!\u201d (Norton Tragedies <\/em>414, Hamlet <\/em>3.4.157.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Antithesis:<\/strong> This quality of Shakespearean verse is critical to its overall impact. Shakespeare consistently uses it to lend emphasis and shape to his characters\u2019 speech. For example, Brutus says in Julius Caesar <\/em>that he killed the dictator not from personal spite or envy, but from patriotism: \u201cnot that I loved Caesar less, \/ but that I loved Rome more\u201d (Norton Tragedies <\/em>319, 3.2.20-21).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The effect of antithesis (implied or direct) is to render an utterance emphatic. Consider again the following part of Richard, Duke of Gloucester\u2019s opening soliloquy in Richard III,<\/em> which offers multiple antithetical pairings to strengthen its appeal: \u201cNow is the winter<\/u> <\/strong>of our discontent \/ Made glorious summer<\/u> <\/strong>by this son<\/u><\/strong> of York, \/ And all the clouds<\/u><\/strong> that loured upon our house \/ In the deep bosom of the ocean<\/u> <\/strong>buried\u201d (Norton Histories <\/em>385, 1.1.1-4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This quality is partly what makes Shakespeare\u2019s verse memorable: the words are knit together by antithetical imagery and concepts. This is strong verse, the sort of stuff one can speak boldly without losing sensitivity and psychological subtlety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rhyme:<\/strong> Rhyme is another way of lending shape to verse and making it memorable. The end of a scene is a good place to serve up a rhyme, as in Hamlet\u2019s summative lines, \u201cThe play\u2019s the thing, \/ Wherein I\u2019ll catch the conscience of the king\u201d (Norton Tragedies<\/em> 394, Hamlet <\/em>F1\/Q2 3.1.523-24), or his wicked uncle Claudius\u2019s anguished conclusion to a prayer for absolution, \u201cMy words fly up, my thoughts remain below; \/ Words without thoughts never to heaven go\u201d (Norton Tragedies <\/em>410, 3.4.97-98). Such rhymes often have the effect of medieval moral sayings known as sententiae<\/em>, <\/em>summations of a moral principle or lesson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Further Observations on the Distinctive Qualities of Shakespeare\u2019s Language:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shakespeare\u2019s language is growing increasingly remote from us. It isn\u2019t as distant as Chaucer\u2019s middle English, or the Old English of Beowulf, <\/em>but it\u2019s sufficiently far from today\u2019s standard \u201cnewspaper English\u201d to turn our heads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every reader of Shakespeare has probably had the sensation of being perfectly able to scan all the words of a passage for their modern sense and yet not being able to understand<\/em> the passage as a coherent sentence or expression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This difficulty may be partly due to the quality that critics often say best distinguishes poetry from prose: compression. <\/em>Good poetry is remarkably efficient language. People who don\u2019t like poetry sometimes accusing it of being \u201cflowery,\u201d but the truth is that poetry is often sparing, even stark, in its approach. Compared to prose, verse packs a great deal of meaning into very few words.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We don\u2019t expect prose-like transparency from poetry\u2014we expect it to challenge our understanding, startle us out of stale truisms, and so forth. Prose usually does more of the work for us, while poetry expects more work from <\/em>us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under extreme pressure, a character\u2019s speech may break down and become evasive or fragmented, as does Lear\u2019s towards the end of King Lear. <\/em>Indeed, Shakespeare\u2019s ability to capture the fleeting processes of the mind under pressure in its relation to speech is praised highly by Harold Bloom. There is even a deliberately hollow, brittle eloquence to note, particularly that of Macbeth as his life winds down and his only remaining strategy is to deaden his soul to the evil he has done: \u201cMy way of life \/ Is fall\u2019n into the sere, the yellow leaf, \/ And that which should accompany old age, \/ As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends, \/ I must not look to have\u201d (Norton Tragedies <\/em>963, Macbeth <\/em>5.3.22-26).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shakespeare often seems to revel in the beauty of language in a way that seems almost foreign to modern sensibilities, but he does not exempt himself from chronicling the many ways this crowning glory of the species, language, often fails <\/em>to keep us fully human, or even \u201cindifferent honest.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Edition for Quotations.<\/strong> Greenblatt, Stephen et al., editors. The Norton Shakespeare: Set of Four + Digital Edition.<\/em> 3rd ed. W. W. Norton, 2016. ISBN-13: 978-0-393-26546-0.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Copyright \u00a9 2024, revised 2025 Alfred J. Drake<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Document Timestamp: 10\/2\/2025 8:50 AM<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shakespeare’s Language and Art, Part 1 of 2 Themes and Scope of the Plays We might expect an active playwright 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