Romeo and Juliet’s Infinite (Variety) Playlist Part 1

September 5, 2015 | astronut1

Hello Loyal Subscribers and First Time Readers!

A few weeks ago I created a fake playlist of songs that I though the protagonists, Benedick and Beatrice, might want to hear during moments of the play. So I decided to do another one for R&J!

For those of you who didn’t read the older post, this is a game!

The way it works is I provide you with a list of the events that happen to Romeo, and then a fake ipod Playlist screen. This screen has a group of songs that I chose because I feel Romeo might want them as part of his ‘internal soundtrack.’ So if Romeo is feeling sad at a particular moment, you look at the playlist and try to pick a song that would match his mood. Today is Romeo’s playlist and tomorrow I’ll do Juliet’s.
Anyway, enough gabbing. LET’S PLAY!

Part I: Events that Happen To Romeo (In Chronological Order)

Romeo is distraught because Rosalind will not give in to his romantic advances
Romeo is disappointed when he finds out that the Montegues and the Capulets have been fighting again.
Benvolio convinces Romeo to get over himself and go crash the party at the Capulet’s.
Romeo dances at the Capulet Ball and is immediately stuck with true love.
Romeo realizes with horror that his true love is a Capulet; his family’s enemy.
Determined to seize the moment, Romeo climbs the orchard wall under Juliet’s balcony and risks death to talk to her.
Having already plotted with the Friar and Nurse, Romeo secretly marries Juliet
Romeo attempts to break up a fight between his friend Mercutio, and his new cousin, Tybalt.
Full of rage after Tybalt kills Mercutio, Romeo challenges Tybalt to a duel and wins.
Romeo is once again distraught and full of self-hatred for killing Tybalt. He hides in Friar Lawrence’s cell, and thinks about what he has done.
Romeo sneaks once again into Juliet’s room and spends one last tender night with her before he has to leave for Mantua.
Hearing that Juliet has died, Romeo is once again full of rage for the whole of humanity. He resolves to go back to Verona and die by Juliet.
Feeling strangely at peace, Romeo bids farewell to his beloved Juliet, drinks a poison, and dies.
Epilogue: Through Romeo’s death, his father reconciles with Capulet.

Part II- The playlist- Try to match these songs with the events above.

So now you know the rules, enjoy the game. Send your answers to us by leaving a comment below or by emailing me here:

Have fun!

Romeo and Juliet Extended Play Of the Month

September 2, 2015September 2, 2015 | astronut1

Hi everyone,

Just wanted to let you know that I’ll be extending Romeo and Juliet for the next two weeks because it’s the start of the school year, and I still have plenty more to say about this play. So for the moment, here’s the list of posts I’ve done so far:

By the way, here’s a hilarious summary of the play from “Zounds, Alack, and By My Troth,”

The Genesis of Romeo and Juliet

August 29, 2015December 13, 2022 | astronut1

Hello loyal subscribers and first-time readers!

If you’ve read any of my last four posts, hopefully I gave you some insight as to the literary sources of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, and a little bit of what Shakespeare accomplished in writing the play, so now I’d like to focus on what was going on when Shakespeare wrote it; what was going on in his own life and his career. Unfortunately, nobody knows when Shakespeare’s company first performed Romeo and Juliet, but since it was published in 1597, it must have been written sometime between 1593, and 1596.

Above- Video Bio of Shakespeare by me!

In 1593, Shakespeare was in a bit of a creative slump; all the London theaters were closed down, thanks to an outbreak of Bubonic Plague Shakespeare knew intimately the pain, fear, and heartbreak that plague could bring- At age 7, he saw his sister Anne die in April 4, 1579. Anne Shakespeare was 8 years old.
In addition, Shakespeare had gained success from his four English history plays,, but great tragedy had never been his forte. In fact, although he was a commercial success, Shakespeare wasn’t respected much in his own artistic community. In 1592, Robert Greene, a well-known smarty-pants dramatist in 1593, saw that his plays were getting passed over by theatre goers in favor of Shakespeare, who was an uneducated ACTOR!!! This set Greene’s teeth on edge, and he published an insulting pamphlet which slyly satirizes Shakespeare as:
- “An upstart Crow, beautified with our feathers, that with his Tygers hart wrapt in a Players hyde, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blanke verse as the best of you: and being an absolute Iohannes fac totum, is in his owne conceit the onely Shake-scene in a countrey
-Robert Greene, Greenes, Groats-worth of Witte, Bought With a Nillion Of Repentance (with original spelling) [1592].

More criticism ensued from Shakespeare’s distant relative, a poet and Jesuit missionary named Robert Southwell. Because of his Catholic beliefs, Southwell was an outlaw and a traitor to the Queen, yet he continued to try and convert England back to Catholicism with everything he did and wrote. Somewhere between his secret arrival in England in 1586, and his capture, torture, and execution in 1595, Southwell wrote a dedicatory essay addressed “To my poet cousin, Master W.S,”

the text of the title page is reprinted below:

Worthy Cousin, Poets by abusing their talents and making the follies and fainings of love the subject of their base endeavors, have so discredited this faculty (ability) that a poet, a lover, and a liar are but three words of one signification.

Southwell’s speech strongly echoes the speech Shakespeare gives to Theseus in his play A Midsummer Night’s Dream, especially the comment where Theseus claims “The lunatic, the lover, and the poet are of imagination all compact.” We don’t know how much influence Southwell had on Shakespeare, but in any case, it’s clear that around 1593, Shakespeare was trying to establish himself as a true Renaissance writer, which meant writing great poetry and not just crowd-pleasing histories full of blood and gore.

So Shakespeare had to face two great challenges- to defend his art from his detractors, and to make a living without the theatre in a time of plague. To pay his rent, he took a job writing poetry for the Earl of Southampton, Henry Wriothesley (pronounced “Rizely,” left). By all accounts, the Earl was a spoiled, vain pretty- boy who loved patronizing poets. To please Wriothesley, Shakespeare composed two long epic poems, “Venus and Adonis,” and “The Rape Of Lucrece,” classical stories inspired by Shakespeare’s favorite Roman poet, Ovid.

According to The Poetry Foundation, a lot of the themes and language devices Shakespeare employed in these two poems contributed greatly to Romeo and Juliet. Most notably, Shakespeare’s use of the concept of forbidden love, his creation of strong, tragic heroines who conquer their predicaments in their deaths, Shakespeare’s use of paradox to describe impossible situations, and perhaps, in the case of Adonis, a model for the character of Romeo:

it features an innocent hero, Adonis, who encounters a world in which the precepts he has acquired from his education are tested in the surprising school of experience. His knowledge of love, inevitably, is not firsthand (“I have heard it is a life in death, / That laughs and weeps, and all but with a breath.”

(reprinted 8/30/12 from http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/william-shakespeare).

In these two poems Shakespeare was refining his craft, and examining questions about the nature of love. In Venus and Adonis, the title characters explore love as a giddy romp through the forest, but their relationship ends with a tragic accident when a wild boar kills Adonis. In The Rape Of Lucreece, Shakespeare shows the destructive quality of male desire, and the nobility of self-possessed women. I think that Romeo and Juliet would not have existed without Shakespeare making a meditation on his craft, on the nature of love, and the fragility of human life.

Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet

As you saw from my post last week, Romeo and Juliet wasn’t a new story- it had appeared as a poem in 1587 and in several versions before that. When Shakespeare adapted the story, he used his new-found powers of poetic language to make the story more alive, more beautiful, and to make the characters more complete.

What Did Shakespeare Do Differently With His Version Of the Story?

Plot- Generally, Shakespeare keeps the same plot as the poem version of the play, but compresses characters, times, and speeds the action along faster.
- Shakespeare compresses the story to 5 days, making the love affair even more passionate and volatile.
- He changes the Capulet’s feast from a Christmas celebration to a summer’s feast, making the time of year hot and dangerous.
- He makes Juliet 13 instead of 16 as she was in the poem.
- He makes Peter Capulet’s servant, instead of Romeo’s.

Themes- Shakespeare, more than most poets who have interpreted this story, refuses to put the blame squarely on Romeo and Juliet, which is why he invents thematic devices to put the blame on chance, fate, or possibly an angry God.

Plague Themes– In the 16th century, plagues were viewed as a consequence of angering God. The fact that Mercutio curses the two warring families with “A plague on both your houses,” suggests that the lover’s deaths was a just punishment from God, or at least a horrible instance of random chance.

Importance of Fate- Romeo and Juliet are first described as “Star-crossed lovers,” which means their destinies are intertwined, and determined by an unlucky star, (like being crossed by a black cat). In addition, Medieval and renaissance poets often invoked the goddess Fortuna, who guides people’s destinies and controls whether they have good fortune or bad fortune. Some said this destiny was written in the stars, as Romeo angrily denounces after he hears of Juliet’s death:

“Is it even so? Then I DEFY you stars!”

Shakespeare uses these thematic devices to make the fates of Romeo and Juliet less clear and more open to interpretation. Without a clear-cut moral, Shakespeare’s audiences could make up their own minds.

The Language Of Romeo and Juliet

Steven Greenblatt, editor of the Norton Anthology of Shakespeare’s plays, points out the amazing variety of wordplay and language devices in Romeo and Juliet, which Shakespeare employs to allow characters to insult each other (like verbal artillery), to curse, to mock, to impress, and in the case of Romeo and Juliet themselves, “To create a new Heaven and a new Earth” (Norton, 889). Romeo and Juliet are unable to be together due to their feuding families, so through poetic imagery they turn their situation into paradise and turn each other into gods. Romeo turns Juliet into the Sun, the force that sustains all life on Earth, and Juliet asks God to:

Take him and cut him out in little stars,

And he will make the face of heaven so fine

That all the world will be in love with night

And pay no worship to the garish sun (R&J III.i).

Antithesis-To characterize the powerful and contradictory forces at work in the hearts of the characters, Shakespeare frequently has them speak using antithesis- putting two opposite terms next to each other, such as in the phrase,“Why then, O brawling love, O loving hate, O anything of nothing first create” (R&J, I. i).

One big way Shakespeare uses antithesis is the repeated imagery of night and day. Night stands for beauty, danger, love, and hidden love, as in the example from Act III above, and from the phrase: “I have night’s cloak to hide them from my eyes,” from the Balcony Scene. Day on the other hand, is associated with fighting, unpleasantness, and rudeness, like in the example above, where Juliet describes the Sun as “garish” or rude. In fact, the first time the word “day” is used in the play, Shakespeare follows it with the rhyme, “fray,” which immediately sets up how the day means hotblooded violence.
- One final example occurs in Act IV, Scene v, where Romeo has slipped into Juliet’s bedroom during the night, where Romeo laments how, as it comes closer to day time, the time for him to leave draws near:
- JULIET: O, now be gone; more light and light it grows.
  ROMEO More light and light; more dark and dark our woes!
- I could go on talking about Shakespeare’s literary devices, but the important thing is that, to establish himself as a great Rennaisance poet, Shakespeare put his love of language in this play more than he had ever done before, and it shows in every line.

What was the first performance like?

Above is the trailer for a production of Romeo and Juliet at the re-built Globe Theatre in 1999, which illustrates how this production relied thoroughly on the imagination of the audience.
Just like us at Open Air Shakespeare NRV, the first production of Romeo and Juliet was outdoors during the afternoon, (we know from the records of the time that plays took place about 2PM most of the time).
There were minimal props and scenery, no lighting and few sound effects, and the actors were able to talk directly to the audience.

Another important thing about Elizabethan performance is the multiple levels of the audience. As you can see, audience members can stand on a semi-circle around the stage. These audience members were called “groundlings,” and they paid a penny to stand through the show. For another penny, audience members sat on wooden planks like the people in the foregrounds. The upper galleries were a little less expensive, since they were further away from the stage, and the most expensive seats of all were The Lord’s Rooms (far right just below the roof of the stage). The Lord’s Rooms allowed wealthy patrons to be seen by everyone in the house, showing off their aristocratic status. The Lord’s Rooms also doubled as a musicians gallery, and also as Juliet’s balcony, as you can see in this video

The backstage facade area that the actors went through for costume changes was called the Tiring House, where at the end of the play, they would push out Juliet on a stone slab, to represent her tomb.
Since the Globe Theatre wasn’t built until 1599, Romeo and Juliet was not originally performed there. You can see a contemporary sketch of The Swan, Shakespeare’s first theatre, by clicking here: http://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Library/SLT/stage/public%20theater/sources.html

Success for Shakespeare

Without question, Romeo and Juliet was popular in Shakespeare’s lifetime;
It was printed in 1597, two more times during Shakespeare’s lifetime, then it was printed four more times between 1622, and 1637. It would probably have continued printing continuously till this day, if not for the Puritans abolishing theater in 1642.
The same year Shakespeare first performed the play, we know he became a shareholder in the Chamberlain’s Men, which meant he not only got a salary for writing and performing, he also got a share in the profits.
Critics praised Shakespeare’s poetry, calling him “The poet of the heart-robbing line.”

So, to sum up, Shakespeare composed this masterpiece during a very turbulent time- he was unable to act, the theaters were closed. He was no doubt afraid of being killed by the plague, and all the while he was being plagued by critics. When he wrote the play, he expanded his art and craft to a new and unheard of degree, ensuring his place in history as the finest dramatist in the English-speaking world. It was truly a labor of love.
– Shakespearean Student

Where Did This Play Come From?

August 25, 2015August 25, 2015 | astronut1

R&J Poster (horiz) — Poster for a production of “Romeo and Juliet,” that I worked on in 2012.

When I say that the story of Romeo and Juliet is timeless, I mean that the story’s roots go back almost to the beginnings of time. According to Sigmund Freud in Beyond the Pleasure Principle, the desire for love is inexplicably tied to the desires for creation, and destruction. These contradictory forces live deep in the human psyche, which explains why stories of doomed love have been re-interpreted throughout history. What follows is a short history of the stories that inspired Shakespeare, so you can see how this archetypal story has evolved into the one we still read today.

Ancient Sources

When Shakespeare was going to school in the late 1560s, Elizabethan boys were expected to read ancient Greek and Roman writers, who wrote many of the classical love stories listed below. We know that Shakespeare remembered of all these stories because he gives a brief homage to them in Ac II, Scene iv of Romeo and Juliet:

MERCUTIO

Now is he [Romeo] for the numbers
that Petrarch flowed in: Laura to his lady was but a
kitchen-wench; marry, she had a better love to
be-rhyme her; Dido a dowdy; Cleopatra a gipsy;
Helen and Hero hildings and harlots; Thisbe a grey
eye or so, but not to the purpose.

Mercutio’s opinion of these old love stories is that they are based on a false concept of true love, when in fact, love for Mercutio is merely lust and obsession.

Hero and Leander

Author– Unknown (traditional Greek Myth)
Date Of Composition 1400- 300 BC (approx)

Plot– Hero, a prophetess of Aphrodite loves Leander, a young man from the other side of her temple across a river called the Hellespond. As a priestess, Hero is supposed to remain a virgin, but Leander convinces her to make love to him, and visits her several times by swimming across the Hellespond. Their affair comes to a tragic end when on one stormy night, Leander is overcome by the waves and drowns on his journey to be with his beloved Hero. Consumed with grief, Hero throws herself off the temple tower to be with him.
Moral– love (or at least lust), destroys and kills.

The Iliad

Author– Homer
Date Of Composition 800 BC (approx)

Plot– Paris, the prince of Troy abducts and ravishes Helen, the queen of Sparta in Greece, leading to a 10 year war between the Greeks and the Trojans. This war divides everyone in both countries, even the gods, leading to the question of whether love is more important to loyalty to one’s country or family.
Moral– Ambiguous- The Greeks fight the Trojans bravely, but only to destroy Troy. Whereas the Trojans are often more sympathetic than the Greeks, but their decision to protect Paris and Helen’s adulterous affair is very unwise. The characters in this story strive to answer the question of what is the most important thing in life- desire for power, fame, to protect one’s home, or love?

Tristan and Isolde

Authors– Various, including the French bards Thomas and Beroul
Date of Composition– somewhere around the 12th century AD.
Plot– Similar to the Trojan War story, but in a medieval context: a young English knight named Tristan meets the heroine, a princess from Ireland, who is engaged to his country’s king. Their passion is instant and fiery, (sometimes it is the result of a love potion they accidentally drank), but it also forces them to make a terrible choice- If Tristan carries off Isolde, he will be disobeying his king, destroying a peaceful alliance, and forcing England and Ireland to go to war. However, it is clear from the beginning that Isolde does not love the one-eyed English king, and if she marries him, Isolde will be miserable her whole life. Tristan fights gallantly to protect both Isolde and her honor and it puts Tristan, the king, and Isolde into a torturous love triangle, which usually ends with Tristan and the king fighting to the death.
Morals–

Arranged marriages ruin everything,
love is like a drug,
“Bros before, [you know-what].”

Note– This story was also the root of the story of Lancelot in the Arthur myths. In the version created by Thomas Mallory in the 15th century, Lancelot falls in love with Queen Guineveere, and betrays King Arthur, whom he loves like a father. Lancelot’s adultery eventually destroys the fellowship of the Round Table, and allows Arthur’s wicked bastard son Mordred to kill Arthur and ruin Camelot.

Renaissance Sources

Here is a brief timeline of the narrative sources dating from 1530-1580 that Shakespeare used to create his own masterpiece. As you can see, they differ considerably from the ancient sources in plot, and overall morals.

Timeline Of the Narrative Sources of Romeo and Juliet:

Romeo and Giulietta

Author– Luigi Da Porto in his novel Historia novellamente ritrovata di due nobili amanti (“Newly found story of two noble lovers”
Date of Composition- 1530
Background– Da Porto was a soldier and a brilliant story writer. Some claim that he based his tale on an earlier story, while some claim he based it on his falling in love with a girl at a masked ball. In any case, Da Porto was the first to set the story in Verona, created the characters of Mercutio and Benvolio, and also the first author to change the context of the story into two warring households, rather than great empires or kingdoms. This small change helps the audience sympathize with the lovers more, since they are not guilty of treason or adultery.
Plot– Two noble houses, the Montecchi and the Cappelletti are at war. The hero Romeo meets Giulietta at a Carnival ball, which makes him forget about an unrequited love he has for an unnamed girl (the name Rosalind is Shakespeare’s invention). The two lovers have several liasons over a much longer period than in Shakespeare’s play at Guilietta’s chamber window. Also, although they are married in secret and Romeo is banished just as in Shakespeare’s version, the character he kills is not related to Guilietta. However, the plot device of the sleeping potion and Romeo’s suicide is also consistent with Shakespeare’s version of the story.

Romeus and Juliet

Author– Matteo Bandello’s in his story Novelle,
(translated into English) by Arthur Brooke in 1587.
Date of Composition– 1554, (translated in 1562, re-printed 1587)
Background– Bandello adapted Da Porto’s version of the story and developed the supporting characters, adding The Nurse, the Friar and the Apothecary, and developing Benvolio (without giving him a name).
Plot– This plot is almost exactly the same as Shakespeare’s play,but it does reveal some narrative details that Shakespeare omits. Bandello’s poem reveals the origin of the Capulet/ Monegue feud, as well as the ultimate fates of the surviving characters.
Moral– Like many other interpretations, the author (or at least the translator) seem to be struggling with the Christian taboo of premarital sex, which to some extent condemns the protagonists. In the English translation by Arthur Brooke, the Preface makes it very clear that Brooke is not condoning Romeus’ premarital sex or his blatant disregard for his parents’ authority. Brooke claims that the story is intended to show the actions of bad people being punished for their actions:

The good man’s example biddeth men to be good, and the evil man’s mischief warneth men not to be evil. To this good end serve all ill ends of ill beginnings. And to this end, good Reader, is this tragical matter written, to describe unto thee a couple of unfortunate lovers, thralling themselves to unhonest desire; neglecting the authority and advice of parents and friends; conferring their principal counsels with drunken gossips and superstitious friars (the naturally fit instruments of unchastity); attempting all adventures of peril for th’ attaining of their wished lust – (Brooke, Romeus and Juliet )

On the other hand, at the end of the poem, Bandello describes Romeus and Juliet’s love (or at least Brooke’s translation), as: “so perfect, sound, and so approvéd love,” which suggests that the author at least approve of the lover’s actions. One can almost imagine Italian passion fighting with English morality in the dueling pens of Brooke and Bandello. It was up to Shakespeare to try and resolve this conflict in his own version.

Romeo and Juliet

Author– William Shakespeare

Date of Composition 1593 (approximately)

Plot– One of the most interesting things about Shakespeare’s play is that he develops the characters of Mercutio, the Nurse, and Friar Lawrence, but deliberately omits certain plot elements such as why the feud began between the Capulets and Montegues, and what happened to The Apothecary, Nurse, and Friar Lawrence after the Prince found out about the lovers’ suicides. This effectively makes the Capulet/Montegue feud seem pointless, which allows the audience to focus more on the lovers. On the other hand, Shakespeare also compresses the time Romeo and Juliet know each other from 9 months as in Brooke’s version to 5 days, making the love affair seem even more rash. These changes in plot make the story much less a morality tale about morally wrong love, and more about the war between creative and destructive love that play in the human psyche.

Moral– As we’ve seen, most interpretations of the story condemn the lovers as rash, foolish, and adulterous. Shakespeare refuses to condemn or condone. That is Shakespeare’s great gift for storytelling- he doesn’t give us clear answers because he knows life is more complicated than that. He merely provides two sides of an issue and lets the reader sort it out for themselves.

How did Shakespeare get away with ripping off material this old? You’d think that, since every English schoolboy knew this story for over 1000 years, nobody would see this play since there would be no surprises. The answer is that Shakespeare writes primarily for characters, not plot. He infuses old characters like Romeo and Juliet with a new language that makes them more complete, more modern, and more timeless. That’s why stories like R&J, which was already known to Shakespeare’s audiences, are still entertaining and compelling, even after you read it 100 times, and see hundreds of different productions.

I hope this short history of the sources of Romeo and Juliet allows you to ponder the complex theories behind love and lust that authors have struggled to explain in the history of this story. Each age debates the values of love and whether it’s worth fighting or dying or killing for. Perhaps the best thing about Shakespeare’s version is that it tries to provide the most complete summary of the question, without giving us an answer, allowing us to marvel at how complex it is.

Thanks For Reading!

Shakespearean Student

Fun Posts about Friar Lawrence from our Friends at “Zounds, Alack, and By My Troth.”

August 25, 2015August 25, 2015 | astronut1

I love it every time I come across some Shakespearean humor. One of the ideas I keep coming back to in “Romeo and Juliet,” is how close the play comes to being a comedy- it has two lovers, a funny nurse, a wisecracking friend, if people didn’t die it could be a sitcom. Even more ridiculous is the clichéd comic device of having people fake their own deaths, which Shakespeare does again in his comedy Much Ado About Nothing. So here is a humorous take on the old friar, and his go-to advice:

Web comic strip from “Zounds, Alack and By My Troth,” Used with permission.

https://zoundsalackandbymytroth.wordpress.com/comic/friar/

O Fortuna!

June 25, 2015June 28, 2015 | astronut1

Today, June 24rth, is the ancient Roman festival of Fortuna, the goddess of luck and worldly fortunes. I’ve chosen to use this opportunity to explain a little bit about the concept of Fortune, which Shakespeare uses frequently in his tragedies. But first, a short musical interlude:

Does this song sound familiar? You’ve probably heard it underscored in hundreds of commercials, TV shows, maybe even in concerts, it’s a song composed by composer Carl Orff called “O Fortuna.”

The Roman goddess Fortuna with her wheel and orb.

In Roman mythology, Fortuna was the goddess of luck, wealth, and fertility. If you listen to the lyrics of the song above, you can see that for centuries, people chose to represent Fortune as a fickle, changeable, and irresponsible goddess. Unfortunately, one of the reasons she’s personified as a woman is the long-held prejudice that women are weak, have frequent changes of mind and mood, and can’t commit to one person, (a view of women that I and Shakespeare believe to not be true). However, based on his writing he does seem to think Fortune fits these characteristics:

“I am Fortune’s fool” –Romeo and Juliet

O fortune, fortune! all men call thee fickle: If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him. That is renown’d for faith? Be fickle, fortune; For then, I hope, thou wilt not keep him long, But send him back. –Romeo and Juliet

“When Fortune means to men most good, She looks upon them with a threatening eye.” –King John

Out, out, thou strumpet, Fortune! All you gods,

In general synod ‘take away her power;

Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel,

And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven,

As low as to the fiends! -Hamlet

In Dante’s Inferno, Fortuna lives in the Underworld with Plutus the god of gold, helping to distribute the god’s wealth to people above ground. In the Middle ages she was an explanation for why some people have good luck, some have bad, and why luck frequently changes.

The Wheel of Fortune.

Fortuna’s most recognizable symbol is her wheel; the symbol of how luck can change; just when you think your life is perfect, the wheel turns and you find yourself on the bottom. Frequently in tragedy when things go wrong, the characters blame Fortune, such as when the Lord of Kent finds himself put in the stocks like a common thief and gripes: “Fortune good night, smile once more, turn thy wheel,” King Lear, Act II, Scene ii. And yes, the real game show was partially inspired by the goddess’ most famous symbol.

Fortuna In Tragedies

Shakespeare mentions fortune over 500 times in his plays and frequently in his tragedies. Characters in Shakespearean tragedy frequently single out Fortuna as the cause of their unhappiness and curse her as a liar and a strumpet. In a Christian society, it was a lot more appealing to blame a pagan goddess than a loving, Christian god, (which would probably be considered blasphemous). Now you see why she has become a popular scapegoat for misfortune in tragedy. At the same time, all tragedy raises questions about the nature of free will; how much of bad fortune is the result of fate, and how much is a direct result of the character’s bad choices? Edmund in King Lear laughs at the notion of any kind of fate, and accuses all of humanity of shirking responsibility in this speech:

EDMUND

This is the excellent foppery of the world, that,
when we are sick in fortune,–often the surfeit
of our own behavior,–we make guilty of our
disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as
if we were villains by necessity; fools by
heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and
treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards,
liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of
planetary influence; and all that we are evil in,
by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion
of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish
disposition to the charge of a star! (King Lear, Act I, Scene ii).

At the same time, the audience also knows that Edmund was cursed by Fortune from the beginning, since he is the illegitimate child of the Duke of Gloucester, which might prove exactly the opposite point of his speech. He may act like he is absolute in his free will, but his behavior and his violent end suggests otherwise. So when characters curse Fortune or Fortuna in Shakespeare’s plays, take a look at the language they use to characterize this abstract concept. The way we think about luck or fate helps shape our perspective of our own lives, and therefore how playwrights depict this mysterious goddess helps us see the possibilities of human choice, and maybe help us make better choices than the tragic men who slander her in these plays!

For more insight into this topic: Click here to listen to my podcast about this week’s post:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/45002/284936-the-shakespearean-student-episode-6-o-fortuna

For Further Reading:

Brittanica.com: Fortuna: http://www.britannica.com/topic/Fortuna-Roman-goddess
Internet Shakespeare Editions: Fortuna in Medieval Drama: http://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Library/SLT/drama/early%20tragedies/medievaltragedy.html#boethius
Encyclopedia Mythica: Fortune: http://pantheon.org/areas/mythology/europe/roman/articles.html
The Obscure Goddess Online Dictionary: http://www.thaliatook.com/OGOD/fortuna.html

Announcing The Best Fathers In the Shakespearean Cannon

June 19, 2015June 16, 2024 | astronut1

Announcing The Best and Worst Fathers In the Shakespearean Cannon

Podcast Link: https://www.buzzsprout.com/45002/282555-the-shakespearean-student-episode-5-the-best-dads-in-the-shakespearean-cannon

Shakespeare himself was a father, and he frequently wrote about the dynamic between fathers and their children. There are many different types of fathers in Shakespeare’s 40 plus plays, and this week I’m ranking them in terms of three categories: Good Dads, Bad Dads, and “Dad Dads.” You’ve probably already read the “Worst Dad” post, so now we’re looking at the good, and the not so good. I used the following criteria when choosing the top 5 dads in each categories:

The Good Dads

Are supportive for their kids
Try to keep their children happy
Offer help and advice, especially on their children’s future.
Are willing to sacrifice themselves
They let their children become their own people.

The Bad Dads

Treat their children as property
Have little to no interest in their children
Put their children in danger
Subject their children to abuse
In some cases, they murder them!

The “Dad” Dads

Are basically good hearted, but they have some kind of flaw that prevents them from becoming really good parents.
In my view, are the most human, modern dads on the list.
I’ve chosen to award these dads a necktie, something every ok dad needs.

Now, onto the Dad Dads:

5. Aegean from The Comedy Of Errors. Aegean wonders around for 20 years looking for his lost children, which I call devoted parenting, but a little aimless and undisciplined. I therefore award Aegean two ties with little anchors on them, to remind him to stay in one place and wait for his sons to find him!

Alexandre Bida, “The death of Lord and John Talbott,” 1895

4. Lord Talbott from Henry the Sixth Part I. Talbott is the hero of the English fight against the French at the close of the Hundred Years War. He goes toe to toe with Joan of Arc on numerous occasions. He also raises a fine and valliant son, John Talbott who is also a warrior. The two die bravely in a siege against the French, rather than surrendering, or leaving the other to die. Talbott is clearly also devoted to his child, but his career choice doesn’t allow his son to grow up in a safe environment! I therefore award Talbott two ties with little English and French flags on them.

The Ghost of Hamlet's Father by William Blake, 1806. — The Ghost of Hamlet’s Father by William Blake, 1806.

3. The Ghost Of Hamlet’s Father from Hamlet/ Portia’s Dad from Merchant Of Venice. Both these parents die before their plays begin, yet they still try to improve their children’s lives from beyond the grave! The Ghost helps Hamlet become king of Denmark, and Portia’s dad tries to help her find a good husband, (one who will love her for something besides her beauty or riches). Although these parents achieve their goals, waiting this long to help their kids seems a bit like absentee parenting! I therefore award these posthumous parents ties with little skulls on them.

https://youtu.be/mx6mEMnNK4A

. King Henry IV, from King Henry IV King Henry is the classic career dad, one who wants his son Hal (the future King Henry V), to follow in his footsteps. The two have a terrible fight when Henry thinks Hal is trying to steal his crown on his deathbed! Eventually though, father and son reconcile, and dad even gives the future king some last minute advice; if you fight a war with France it’ll help secure your crown, which Hal does and succeeds! I therefore award King Henry a tie with little crowns on it, hoping that nobody with a dagger ties tries to steal it when he’s sleeping!

1. Prince Pericles from Pericles Pericles is another busy dad- King Antiocus tries to murder him, and he has to leave his own kingdom. Then he gets shipwrecked 3 times! In fact, his only daughter is born onboard a ship in the middle of a storm! Pericles raises the girl for a number of years, but then has to leave again, and guess what, he gets shipwrecked AGAIN! He eventually finds his daughter and they live happily ever after, but you kind of get the idea that Pericles is a little accident-prone, which keeps him from being on the Best Dads list. Sorry Pericles, but at least you get a tie with, what else, Boats on it! Maybe next Fathers Day, someone will get you a life preserver.

And now at Long LAST, the BEST Dads in Shakespeare!

5. Aaron the Moor from Titus Andronicus. Ironically, one of the worst villains in Shakespeare is also one of the best fathers. Aaron is fiercely protective of his child, even threatening people at sword point if they dare come near his baby. He also plans out the child’s future and is willing to give his own life for a promise that Lucius will protect and nourish his son. He may be a monster to everyone else, but to his baby, Aaron is simply, a good dad!

4. The Old Shepherd from The Winter’s Tale. This character is a very mirror of generosity and kindness; not only does he take care of his son The Clown, he adopts a poor discarded child, the princess Perdita, with no obligation to do so. He raises her for 16 years and constantly brags about her to the entire town. She becomes a beautiful, wise, and modest girl who fills her adopted father with pride because of his good parenting. Even when Perdita meets her real father, she speaks of The Old Shepherd with real filial affection “Oh my poor father.”

Lord Capulet, from Romeo and Juliet. I know this was a controversial choice, and I discuss my choice in detail on my podcast, but I’ll sum up my major arguments here:

Even though a lot of actors choose to have him smack Juliet around, there’s no mention of it in Shakespeare’s text. The most he ever does is threaten to strike her, but the stage directions never indicate he does it. Capulet is clearly more bark than bite.
From the very beginning of the play, Capulet has shown that he cares about Juliet, and wants her to marry for love, not money.
Lord Capulet hovers and frets constantly when Juliet tells him she will marry Paris, staying up late to plan the wedding! I ask you, does that sound like a tyrannical father? I wonder sometimes if Lord Capulet would’ve forgiven Juliet for marrying Romeo if she had just told him. In any case, based on my criteria above, Capulet is a good dad, bad tempered, yes, but fundamentally concerned for the welfare of his children.

BOL143705 Prospero and Miranda, fragment from 'The Tempest', c.1790 (oil on canvas) by Romney, George (1734-1802); ¬© Bolton Museum and Art Gallery, Lancashire, UK; English, out of copyright — Prospero and Miranda, fragment from ‘The Tempest’, c.1790 (oil on canvas) by Romney, George (1734-1802); ¬© Bolton Museum and Art Gallery, Lancashire, UK; English, out of copyright

3. Prospero from The Tempest I chose this high spot for Prospero mainly because he seems to have the most success of any other dad in the cannon. Like Pericles, he too is shipwrecked with his daughter, but Prospero stays with Miranda, raises her alone, teaches her everything she knows, and calls her an angel that helped preserve his life. Prospero cares so much for his daughter that he refuses to give into despair, even though he’s lost his wife, his dukedom, and his home.

Prospero also hatches a plan to get him and Miranda off the island, to get his dukedom back, and to get her married to a handsome prince name Ferdinand, and he succeeds with every one of these endeavors, even though it takes 12 years. Prospero gets extra points for his patience and his wisdom, but I have to admit he’s a bit of a control freak; he demands that Miranda listen to him and obey him no matter what, and he warns Ferdinand that there will be dire consequences if he dare try to do anything illicit with his daughter before the wedding. In addition, there’s no denying that Prospero is also acting out of self interest- he wants to become duke again, and he wants revenge against his enemies and that’s partially why he raises a tempest, (or a huge storm), instead of just sending a message back to Milan.

Simonides grants permission for Pericles to wed his daughter. Production shot from Mary Zimmerman's 2006 production of — Simonides grants permission for Pericles to wed his daughter. Production shot from Mary Zimmerman’s 2006 production of “Pericles.”

King Simonedes from Pericles, Prince Of Tyre You might forget this character because he only has a short time onstage, but I defy anyone to come up with a better father. He’s kind, supportive, stable, funny, and has a wonderful relationship with his daughter Thaisa. Above all, Simonedes actually listens to his child and does everything in his power to help her when she decides she wants to marry Pericles. Also, like Prospero, Simonedes pretends to object to the marriage, but you kind of get the sense that, rather than testing the affection of the couple, he’s actually just playing a joke on them. You can hear a “gotcha” and a fatherly wink in the final line of the speech in Act II, where he pretends to object to their marriage:

Congratulations to all our fabulous fictional fathers! Thank you for reading, and see you soon!

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The Shakespearean Student

For Shakespeare lovers of any age

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