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La tragedia manzoniana si distanzia da quella classica, il soggetto non è più il mito ma il tema storico e le trame sono verosimili, giacché non avvengono eventi soprannaturali come nella tragedia classica (causati dagli dei), inoltre la tragedia manzoniana è dilatata del tempo e nello spazio in rispetto a quella classica (la cui storia si concludeva generalmente entro pochi giorni).

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The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, often shortened to Hamlet (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts Prince Hamlet and his attempts to exact revenge against his uncle, Claudius, who has murdered Hamlet's father in order to seize his throne and marry Hamlet's mother.

Hamlet is considered among the "most powerful and influential tragedies in the English language", with a story capable of "seemingly endless retelling and adaptation by others".

There are many works that have been pointed to as possible sources for Shakespeare's play-from ancient Greek tragedies to Elizabethan plays. The editors of the Arden Shakespeare question the idea of "source hunting", pointing out that it presupposes that authors always require ideas from other works for their own, and suggests that no author can have an original idea or be an originator. When Shakespeare wrote, there were many stories about sons avenging the murder of their fathers, and many about clever avenging sons pretending to be foolish in order to outsmart their foes. This would include the story of the ancient Roman, Lucius Junius Brutus, which Shakespeare apparently knew, as well as the story of Amleth, which was preserved in Latin by 13th-century chronicler Saxo Grammaticus in his Gesta Danorum, and printed in Paris in 1514. The Amleth story was subsequently adapted and then published in French in 1570 by the 16th-century scholar François de Belleforest. It has a number of plot elements and major characters in common with Shakespeare's Hamlet, and lacks others that are found in Shakespeare. Belleforest's story was first published in English in 1608, after Hamlet had been written, though it's possible that Shakespeare had encountered it in the French-language version.

Three different early versions of the play are extant: the First Quarto (Q1, 1603); the Second Quarto (Q2, 1604); and the First Folio (F1, 1623). Each version includes lines and passages missing from the others.

Characters

Prince Hamlet of Denmark is the son of the recently deceased King Hamlet, and nephew of King Claudius, his father's brother and successor. Claudius hastily married King Hamlet's widow, Gertrude, Hamlet's mother, and took the throne for himself. Denmark has a long-standing feud with neighbouring Norway, in which King Hamlet slew King Fortinbras of Norway in a battle some years ago. Although Denmark defeated Norway and the Norwegian throne fell to King Fortinbras's infirm brother, Denmark fears that an invasion led by the dead Norwegian king's son, Prince Fortinbras, is imminent.

On a cold night on the ramparts of Elsinore, the Danish royal castle, the sentries Bernardo and Marcellus discuss a ghost resembling the late King Hamlet which they have recently seen, and bring Prince Hamlet's friend Horatio as a witness. After the ghost appears again, the three vow to tell Prince Hamlet what they have witnessed.

The court gathers the next day, and King Claudius and Queen Gertrude discuss affairs of state with their elderly adviser Polonius. Claudius grants permission for Polonius's son Laertes to return to school in France, and he sends envoys to inform the King of Norway about Fortinbras. Claudius also questions Hamlet regarding his continuing to grieve for his father, and forbids him to return to his university in Wittenberg. After the court exits, Hamlet despairs of his father's death and his mother's hasty remarriage. Learning of the ghost from Horatio, Hamlet resolves to see it himself.

Horatio, Hamlet, and the ghost (Artist: Henry Fuseli, 1789)[4]

As Polonius's son Laertes prepares to depart for France, Polonius offers him advice that culminates in the maxim "to thine own self be true." Polonius's daughter, Ophelia, admits her interest in Hamlet, but Laertes warns her against seeking the prince's attention, and Polonius orders her to reject his advances. That night on the rampart, the ghost appears to Hamlet, tells the prince that he was murdered by Claudius, and demands that Hamlet avenge the murder. Hamlet agrees, and the ghost vanishes. The prince confides to Horatio and the sentries that from now on he plans to "put an antic disposition on", or act as though he has gone mad. Hamlet forces them to swear to keep his plans for revenge secret; however, he remains uncertain of the ghost's reliability.

Ophelia rushes to her father, telling him that Hamlet arrived at her door the prior night half-undressed and behaving erratically. Polonius blames love for Hamlet's madness and resolves to inform Claudius and Gertrude. As he enters to do so, the king and queen are welcoming Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two student acquaintances of Hamlet, to Elsinore. The royal couple has requested that the two students investigate the cause of Hamlet's mood and behaviour. Additional news requires that Polonius wait to be heard: messengers from Norway inform Claudius that the king of Norway has rebuked Prince Fortinbras for attempting to re-fight his father's battles. The forces that Fortinbras had conscripted to march against Denmark will instead be sent against Poland, though they will pass through Danish territory to get there.

Polonius tells Claudius and Gertrude his theory regarding Hamlet's behaviour, and then speaks to Hamlet in a hall of the castle to try to learn more. Hamlet feigns madness and subtly insults Polonius all the while. When Rosencrantz and Guildenstern arrive, Hamlet greets his "friends" warmly but quickly discerns that they are there to spy on him for Claudius. Hamlet admits that he is upset at his situation but refuses to give the true reason, instead remarking " What a piece of work is a man". Rosencrantz and Guildenstern tell Hamlet that they have brought along a troupe of actors that they met while travelling to Elsinore. Hamlet, after welcoming the actors and dismissing his friends-turned-spies, asks them to deliver a soliloquy about the death of King Priam and Queen Hecuba at the climax of the Trojan War. Hamlet then asks the actors to stage The Murder of Gonzago, a play featuring a death in the style of his father's murder. Hamlet intends to study Claudius's reaction to the play, and thereby determine the truth of the ghost's story of Claudius's guilt.

Polonius forces Ophelia to return Hamlet's love letters to the prince while he and Claudius secretly watch in order to evaluate Hamlet's reaction. Hamlet is walking alone in the hall as the King and Polonius await Ophelia's entrance. Hamlet muses on thoughts of life versus death. When Ophelia enters and tries to return Hamlet's things, Hamlet accuses her of immodesty and cries "get thee to a nunnery", though it is unclear whether this, too, is a show of madness or genuine distress. His reaction convinces Claudius that Hamlet is not mad for love. Shortly thereafter, the court assembles to watch the play Hamlet has commissioned. After seeing the Player King murdered by his rival pouring poison in his ear, Claudius abruptly rises and runs from the room; for Hamlet, this is proof of his uncle's guilt.

Hamlet mistakenly stabs Polonius (Artist: Coke Smyth, 19th century).

Gertrude summons Hamlet to her chamber to demand an explanation. Meanwhile, Claudius talks to himself about the impossibility of repenting, since he still has possession of his ill-gotten goods: his brother's crown and wife. He sinks to his knees. Hamlet, on his way to visit his mother, sneaks up behind him but does not kill him, reasoning that killing Claudius while he is praying will send him straight to heaven while his father's ghost is stuck in purgatory. In the queen's bedchamber, Hamlet and Gertrude fight bitterly. Polonius, spying on the conversation from behind a tapestry, calls for help as Gertrude, believing Hamlet wants to kill her, calls out for help herself.

Hamlet, believing it is Claudius, stabs wildly, killing Polonius, but he pulls aside the curtain and sees his mistake. In a rage, Hamlet brutally insults his mother for her apparent ignorance of Claudius's villainy, but the ghost enters and reprimands Hamlet for his inaction and harsh words. Unable to see or hear the ghost herself, Gertrude takes Hamlet's conversation with it as further evidence of madness. After begging the queen to stop sleeping with Claudius, Hamlet leaves, dragging Polonius's corpse away.

Hamlet jokes with Claudius about where he has hidden Polonius's body, and the king, fearing for his life, sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to accompany Hamlet to England with a sealed letter to the English king requesting that Hamlet be executed immediately.

Unhinged by grief at Polonius's death, Ophelia wanders Elsinore. Laertes arrives back from France, enraged by his father's death and his sister's madness. Claudius convinces Laertes that Hamlet is solely responsible, but a letter soon arrives indicating that Hamlet has returned to Denmark, foiling Claudius's plan. Claudius switches tactics, proposing a fencing match between Laertes and Hamlet to settle their differences. Laertes will be given a poison-tipped foil, and, if that fails, Claudius will offer Hamlet poisoned wine as a congratulation. Gertrude interrupts to report that Ophelia has drowned, though it is unclear whether it was suicide or an accident caused by her madness.

The gravedigger scene.[6] (Artist: Eugène Delacroix, 1839)

Horatio has received a letter from Hamlet, explaining that the prince escaped by negotiating with pirates who attempted to attack his England-bound ship, and the friends reunite offstage. Two gravediggers discuss Ophelia's apparent suicide while digging her grave. Hamlet arrives with Horatio and banters with one of the gravediggers, who unearths the skull of a jester from Hamlet's childhood, Yorick. Hamlet picks up the skull, saying "Alas, poor Yorick" as he contemplates mortality. Ophelia's funeral procession approaches, led by Laertes. Hamlet and Horatio initially hide, but when Hamlet realizes that Ophelia is the one being buried, he reveals himself, proclaiming his love for her. Laertes and Hamlet fight by Ophelia's graveside, but the brawl is broken up.

Back at Elsinore, Hamlet explains to Horatio that he had discovered Claudius's letter with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern's belongings and replaced it with a forged copy indicating that his former friends should be killed instead. A foppish courtier, Osric, interrupts the conversation to deliver the fencing challenge to Hamlet. Hamlet, despite Horatio's pleas, accepts it. Hamlet does well at first, leading the match by two hits to none, and Gertrude raises a toast to him using the poisoned glass of wine Claudius had set aside for Hamlet. Claudius tries to stop her but is too late: she drinks, and Laertes realizes the plot will be revealed. Laertes slashes Hamlet with his poisoned blade. In the ensuing scuffle, they switch weapons, and Hamlet wounds Laertes with his own poisoned sword. Gertrude collapses and, claiming she has been poisoned, dies. In his dying moments, Laertes reconciles with Hamlet and reveals Claudius's plan. Hamlet rushes at Claudius and kills him. As the poison takes effect, Hamlet, hearing that Fortinbras is marching through the area, names the Norwegian prince as his successor. Horatio, distraught at the thought of being the last survivor and living whilst Hamlet does not, says he will commit suicide by drinking the dregs of Gertrude's poisoned wine, but Hamlet begs him to live on and tell his story. Hamlet dies in Horatio's arms, proclaiming "the rest is silence". Fortinbras, who was ostensibly marching towards Poland with his army, arrives at the palace, along with an English ambassador bringing news of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern's deaths. Horatio promises to recount the full story of what happened, and Fortinbras, seeing the entire Danish royal family dead, takes the crown for himself and orders a military funeral to honour Hamlet.

A facsimile of Gesta Danorum by Saxo Grammaticus, which contains the legend of Amleth

Hamlet-like legends are so widely found (for example in Italy, Spain, Scandinavia, Byzantium, and Arabia) that the core "hero-as-fool" theme is possibly Indo-European in origin. Several ancient written precursors to Hamlet can be identified. The first is the anonymous Scandinavian Saga of Hrolf Kraki. In this, the murdered king has two sons- Hroar and Helgi-who spend most of the story in disguise, under false names, rather than feigning madness, in a sequence of events that differs from Shakespeare's. The second is the Roman legend of Brutus, recorded in two separate Latin works. Its hero, Lucius ("shining, light"), changes his name and persona to Brutus ("dull, stupid"), playing the role of a fool to avoid the fate of his father and brothers, and eventually slaying his family's killer, King Tarquinius. A 17th-century Nordic scholar, Torfaeus, compared the Icelandic hero Amlóði (Amlodi) and the hero Prince Ambales (from the Ambales Saga) to Shakespeare's Hamlet. Similarities include the prince's feigned madness, his accidental killing of the king's counsellor in his mother's bedroom, and the eventual slaying of his uncle.

Many of the earlier legendary elements are interwoven in the 13th-century "Life of Amleth" (Latin: Vita Amlethi) by Saxo Grammaticus, part of Gesta Danorum. Written in Latin, it reflects classical Roman concepts of virtue and heroism, and was widely available in Shakespeare's day. Significant parallels include the prince feigning madness, his mother's hasty marriage to the usurper, the prince killing a hidden spy, and the prince substituting the execution of two retainers for his own. A reasonably faithful version of Saxo's story was translated into French in 1570 by François de Belleforest, in his Histoires tragiques. Belleforest embellished Saxo's text substantially, almost doubling its length, and introduced the hero's melancholy.

Title page of The Spanish Tragedy by Thomas Kyd

According to one theory, Shakespeare's main source may be an earlier play-now lost-known today as the . Possibly written by Thomas Kyd or by Shakespeare, the Ur-Hamlet would have existed by 1589, and would have incorporated a ghost. Shakespeare's company, the Chamberlain's Men, may have purchased that play and performed a version for some time, which Shakespeare reworked. However, no copy of the Ur-Hamlet has survived, and it is impossible to compare its language and style with the known works of any of its putative authors. In 1936 Andrew Cairncross suggested that, until more becomes known, it may be assumed that Shakespeare wrote the Ur-Hamlet. Eric Sams lists reasons for supporting Shakespeare's authorship. Harold Jenkins considers that there are no grounds for thinking that the Ur-Hamlet is an early work by Shakespeare, which he then rewrote.

It is not known whether the Ur-Hamlet, Belleforest, Saxo, or Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy were sources for Shakespeare's Hamlet. However, elements of Belleforest's version which are not in Saxo's story do appear in Shakespeare's play.

Most scholars reject the idea that Hamlet is in any way connected with Shakespeare's only son, Hamnet Shakespeare, who died in 1596 at age eleven. Conventional wisdom holds that Hamlet is too obviously connected to legend, and the name Hamnet was quite popular at the time. However, Stephen Greenblatt has argued that the coincidence of the names and Shakespeare's grief for the loss of his son may lie at the heart of the tragedy. He notes that the name of Hamnet Sadler, the Stratford neighbour after whom Hamnet was named, was often written as Hamlet Sadler and that, in the loose orthography of the time, the names were virtually interchangeable.

Scholars have often speculated that Hamlet's Polonius might have been inspired by William Cecil (Lord Burghley)-Lord High Treasurer and chief counsellor to Queen Elizabeth I. E. K. Chambers suggested Polonius's advice to Laertes may have echoed Burghley's to his son Robert Cecil. John Dover Wilson thought it almost certain that the figure of Polonius caricatured Burghley. A. L. Rowse speculated that Polonius's tedious verbosity might have resembled Burghley's. Lilian Winstanley thought the name Corambis (in the First Quarto) did suggest Cecil and Burghley. Harold Jenkins considers the idea of Polonius as a caricature of Burghley to be conjecture, perhaps based on the similar role they each played at court, and perhaps also based on the similarity between Burghley addressing his Ten Precepts to his son, and Polonius offering "precepts" to his son, Laertes. Jenkins suggests that any personal satire may be found in the name "Polonius", which might point to a Polish or Polonian connection. G. R. Hibbard hypothesised that differences in names (Corambis/Polonius:Montano/Raynoldo) between the First Quarto and other editions might reflect a desire not to offend scholars at Oxford University. ( Robert Pullen, was the founder of Oxford University, and John Rainolds, was the President of Corpus Christi College.)

John Barrymore as Hamlet (1922)

"Any dating of Hamlet must be tentative", states the New Cambridge editor, Phillip Edwards. MacCary suggests 1599 or 1600; James Shapiro offers late 1600 or early 1601; Wells and Taylor suggest that the play was written in 1600 and revised later; the New Cambridge editor settles on mid-1601; the New Swan Shakespeare Advanced Series editor agrees with 1601; Thompson and Taylor, tentatively ("according to whether one is the more persuaded by Jenkins or by Honigmann") suggest a terminus ad quem of either Spring 1601 or sometime in 1600.

The earliest date estimate relies on Hamlet's frequent allusions to Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, itself dated to mid-1599. The latest date estimate is based on an entry, of 26 July 1602, in the Register of the Stationers' Company, indicating that Hamlet was "latelie Acted by the Lo: Chamberleyne his servantes".

In 1598, Francis Meres published his Palladis Tamia, a survey of English literature from Chaucer to its present day, within which twelve of Shakespeare's plays are named. Hamlet is not among them, suggesting that it had not yet been written. As Hamlet was very popular, Bernard Lott, the series editor of New Swan, believes it "unlikely that he [Meres] would have overlooked ... so significant a piece".

The phrase "little eyases" in the First Folio (F1) may allude to the Children of the Chapel, whose popularity in London forced the Globe company into provincial touring. This became known as the War of the Theatres, and supports a 1601 dating. Katherine Duncan-Jones accepts a 1600-01 attribution for the date Hamlet was written, but notes that the Lord Chamberlain's Men, playing Hamlet in the 3000-capacity Globe, were unlikely to be put to any disadvantage by an audience of "barely one hundred" for the Children of the Chapel's equivalent play, Antonio's Revenge; she believes that Shakespeare, confident in the superiority of his own work, was making a playful and charitable allusion to his friend John Marston's very similar piece.

A contemporary of Shakespeare's, Gabriel Harvey, wrote a marginal note in his copy of the 1598 edition of Chaucer's works, which some scholars use as dating evidence. Harvey's note says that "the wiser sort" enjoy Hamlet, and implies that the Earl of Essex-executed in February 1601 for rebellion-was still alive. Other scholars consider this inconclusive. Edwards, for example, concludes that the "sense of time is so confused in Harvey's note that it is really of little use in trying to date Hamlet". This is because the same note also refers to Spenser and Watson as if they were still alive ("our flourishing metricians"), but also mentions " Owen's new epigrams", published in 1607.

Three early editions of the text, each different, have survived, making attempts to establish a single "authentic" text problematic.

First Quarto (Q1): In 1603 the booksellers Nicholas Ling and John Trundell published, and Valentine Simmes printed, the so-called "bad" first quarto, under the name The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet Prince of Denmarke. Q1 contains just over half of the text of the later second quarto.

Second Quarto (Q2): In 1604 Nicholas Ling published, and James Roberts printed, the second quarto, under the same name as the first. Some copies are dated 1605, which may indicate a second impression; consequently, Q2 is often dated "1604/5". Q2 is the longest early edition, although it omits about 77 lines found in F1 (most likely to avoid offending James I's queen, Anne of Denmark).

First Folio (F1): In 1623 Edward Blount and William and Isaac Jaggard published The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke in the First Folio, the first edition of Shakespeare's Complete Works.

This list does not include three additional early texts, John Smethwick's Q3, Q4, and Q5 (1611-37), which are regarded as reprints of Q2 with some alterations.

Title page of the 1605 printing (Q2) of Hamlet

The first page of the First Folio printing of Hamlet, 1623

Early editors of Shakespeare's works, beginning with Nicholas Rowe (1709) and Lewis Theobald (1733), combined material from the two earliest sources of Hamlet available at the time, Q2 and F1. Each text contains material that the other lacks, with many minor differences in wording: scarcely 200 lines are identical in the two. Editors have combined them in an effort to create one "inclusive" text that reflects an imagined "ideal" of Shakespeare's original. Theobald's version became standard for a long time, and his "full text" approach continues to influence editorial practice to the present day. Some contemporary scholarship, however, discounts this approach, instead considering "an authentic Hamlet an unrealisable ideal. ... there are texts of this play but no text". The 2006 publication by Arden Shakespeare of different Hamlet texts in different volumes is perhaps evidence of this shifting focus and emphasis. Other editors have continued to argue the need for well-edited editions taking material from all versions of the play. Colin Burrow has argued that "most of us should read a text that is made up by conflating all three versions ... it's about as likely that Shakespeare wrote: "To be or not to be, ay, there's the point" [in Q1], as that he wrote the works of Francis Bacon. I suspect most people just won't want to read a three-text play ... [multi-text editions are] a version of the play that is out of touch with the needs of a wider public."

Traditionally, editors of Shakespeare's plays have divided them into five acts. None of the early texts of Hamlet, however, were arranged this way, and the play's division into acts and scenes derives from a 1676 quarto. Modern editors generally follow this traditional division but consider it unsatisfactory; for example, after Hamlet drags Polonius's body out of Gertrude's bedchamber, there is an act-break after which the action appears to continue uninterrupted.

Comparison of the 'To be, or not to be' soliloquy in the first three editions of Hamlet, showing the varying quality of the text in the Bad Quarto, the Good Quarto and the First Folio

Q1 was discovered in 1823. Only two copies are extant. According to Jenkins, "The unauthorized nature of this quarto is matched by the corruption of its text." Yet Q1 has value: it contains stage directions (such as Ophelia entering with a lute and her hair down) that reveal actual stage practices in a way that Q2 and F1 do not; it contains an entire scene (usually labelled 4.6) that does not appear in either Q2 or F1; and it is useful for comparison with the later editions. The major deficiency of Q1 is in the language: particularly noticeable in the opening lines of the famous " To be, or not to be" soliloquy: "To be, or not to be, aye there's the point. / To die, to sleep, is that all? Aye all: / No, to sleep, to dream, aye marry there it goes." However, the scene order is more coherent, without the problems of Q2 and F1 of Hamlet seeming to resolve something in one scene and enter the next drowning in indecision. New Cambridge editor Kathleen Irace has noted that "Q1's more linear plot design is certainly easier [...] to follow [...] but the simplicity of the Q1 plot arrangement eliminates the alternating plot elements that correspond to Hamlet's shifts in mood."

Q1 is considerably shorter than Q2 or F1 and may be a memorial reconstruction of the play as Shakespeare's company performed it, by an actor who played a minor role (most likely Marcellus). Scholars disagree whether the reconstruction was pirated or authorised. It is suggested by Irace that Q1 is an abridged version intended especially for travelling productions, thus the question of length may be considered as separate from issues of poor textual quality. Editing Q1 thus poses problems in whether or not to "correct" differences from Q2 and F. Irace, in her introduction to Q1, wrote that "I have avoided as many other alterations as possible, because the differences...are especially intriguing...I have recorded a selection of Q2/F readings in the collation." The idea that Q1 is not riddled with error but is instead eminently fit for the stage has led to at least 28 different Q1 productions since 1881. Other productions have used the probably superior Q2 and Folio texts, but used Q1's running order, in particular moving the to be or not to be soliloquy earlier. Developing this, some editors such as Jonathan Bate have argued that Q2 may represent "a 'reading' text as opposed to a 'performance' one" of Hamlet, analogous to how modern films released on disc may include deleted scenes: an edition containing all of Shakespeare's material for the play for the pleasure of readers, so not representing the play as it would have been staged.

Analysis and criticism

Critical history

From the early 17th century, the play was famous for its ghost and vivid dramatisation of melancholy and insanity, leading to a procession of mad courtiers and ladies in Jacobean and Caroline drama. Though it remained popular with mass audiences, late 17th-century Restoration critics saw Hamlet as primitive and disapproved of its lack of unity and decorum. This view changed drastically in the 18th century, when critics regarded Hamlet as a hero-a pure, brilliant young man thrust into unfortunate circumstances. By the mid-18th century, however, the advent of Gothic literature brought psychological and mystical readings, returning madness and the ghost to the forefront. Not until the late 18th century did critics and performers begin to view Hamlet as confusing and inconsistent. Before then, he was either mad, or not; either a hero, or not; with no in-betweens. These developments represented a fundamental change in literary criticism, which came to focus more on character and less on plot. By the 19th century, Romantic critics valued Hamlet for its internal, individual conflict reflecting the strong contemporary emphasis on internal struggles and inner character in general. Then too, critics started to focus on Hamlet's delay as a character trait, rather than a plot device. This focus on character and internal struggle continued into the 20th century, when criticism branched in several directions, discussed in context and interpretation below.

Dramatic structure

Modern editors have divided the play into five acts, and each act into scenes. The First Folio marks the first two acts only. The quartos do not have such divisions. The division into five acts follows Seneca, who in his plays, regularized the way ancient Greek tragedies contain five episodes, which are separated by four choral odes. In Hamlet the development of the plot or the action are determined by the unfolding of Hamlet's character. The soliloquies do not interrupt the plot, instead they are highlights of each block of action. The plot is the developing revelation of Hamlet's view of what is "rotten in the state of Denmark." The action of the play is driven forward in dialogue; but in the soliloquies time and action stop, the meaning of action is questioned, fog of illusion is broached, and truths are exposed.

The contrast between appearance and reality is a significant theme. Hamlet is presented with an image, and then interprets its deeper or darker meaning. Examples begin with Hamlet questioning the reality of the ghost. It continues with Hamlet's taking on an "antic disposition" in order to appear mad, though he is not. The contrast (appearance and reality) is also expressed in several "spying scenes": Act two begins with Polonius sending Reynaldo to spy on his son, Laertes. Claudius and Polonius spy on Ophelia as she meets with Hamlet. In act two, Claudius asks Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to spy on Hamlet. Similarly, the play-within-a-play is used by Hamlet to reveal his step-father's hidden nature.

There is no subplot, but the play presents the affairs of the courtier Polonius, his daughter, Ophelia, and his son, Laertes-who variously deal with madness, love and the death of a father in ways that contrast with Hamlet's. The graveyard scene eases tension prior to the catastrophe, and, as Hamlet holds the skull, it is shown that Hamlet no longer fears damnation in the afterlife, and accepts that there is a "divinity that shapes our ends".

Hamlet's enquiring mind has been open to all kinds of ideas, but in act five he has decided on a plan, and in a dialogue with Horatio he seems to answer his two earlier soliloquies on suicide: "We defy augury. There is special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come. The readiness is all. Since no man, of aught he leaves, knows aught, what is't to leave betimes."

The First Quarto (1603) text of Hamlet contains 15,983 words, the Second Quarto (1604) contains 28,628 words, and the First Folio (1623) contains 27,602 words. Counting the number of lines varies between editions, partly because prose sections in the play may be formatted with varied lengths. Editions of Hamlet that are created by conflating the texts of the Second Quarto and the Folio are said to have approximately 3,900 lines; the number of lines varies between those editions based on formatting the prose sections, counting methods, and how the editors have joined the texts together. Hamlet is by far the longest play that Shakespeare wrote, and one of the longest plays in the Western canon. It might require more than four hours to stage; a typical Elizabethan play would need two to three hours. It is speculated that the because of the considerable length of Q2 and F1, there was an expectation that those texts would be abridged for performance, or that Q2 and F1 may have been aimed at a reading audience.

That Q1 is so much shorter than Q2 has spurred speculation that Q1 is an early draft, or perhaps an adaptation, a bootleg copy, or a stage adaptation. On the title page of Q2, its text is described as "newly imprinted and enlarged to almost as much again as it was." That is probably a comparison to Q1.

Hamlet's statement that his dark clothes are the outer sign of his inner grief demonstrates strong rhetorical skill (artist: Eugène Delacroix 1834).

Much of Hamlet's language is courtly: elaborate, witty discourse, as recommended by Baldassare Castiglione's 1528 etiquette guide, The Courtier. This work specifically advises royal retainers to amuse their masters with inventive language. Osric and Polonius, especially, seem to respect this injunction. Claudius's speech is rich with rhetorical figures-as is Hamlet's and, at times, Ophelia's-while the language of Horatio, the guards, and the gravediggers is simpler. Claudius's high status is reinforced by using the royal first person plural ("we" or "us"), and anaphora mixed with metaphor to resonate with Greek political speeches.

Of all the characters, Hamlet has the greatest rhetorical skill. He uses highly developed metaphors, stichomythia, and in nine memorable words deploys both anaphora and asyndeton: "to die: to sleep- / To sleep, perchance to dream". In contrast, when occasion demands, he is precise and straightforward, as when he explains his inward emotion to his mother: "But I have that within which passes show, / These but the trappings and the suits of woe". At times, he relies heavily on puns to express his true thoughts while simultaneously concealing them. Pauline Kiernan argues that Shakespeare changed English drama forever in Hamlet because he "showed how a character's language can often be saying several things at once, and contradictory meanings at that, to reflect fragmented thoughts and disturbed feelings". She gives the example of Hamlet's advice to Ophelia, "get thee to a nunnery", which, she claims, is simultaneously a reference to a place of chastity and a slang term for a brothel, reflecting Hamlet's confused feelings about female sexuality. However Harold Jenkins does not agree, having studied the few examples that are used to support that idea, and finds that there is no support for the assumption that "nunnery" was used that way in slang, or that Hamlet intended such a meaning. The context of the scene suggests that a nunnery would not be a brothel, but instead a place of renunciation and a "sanctuary from marriage and from the world's contamination". Thompson and Taylor consider the brothel idea incorrect considering that "Hamlet is trying to deter Ophelia from breeding".

Hamlet's first words in the play are a pun; when Claudius addresses him as "my cousin Hamlet, and my son", Hamlet says as an aside: "A little more than kin, and less than kind."

An unusual rhetorical device, hendiadys, appears in several places in the play. Examples are found in Ophelia's speech at the end of the nunnery scene: "Th' expectancy and rose of the fair state" and "And I, of ladies most deject and wretched". Many scholars have found it odd that Shakespeare would, seemingly arbitrarily, use this rhetorical form throughout the play. One explanation may be that Hamlet was written later in Shakespeare's life, when he was adept at matching rhetorical devices to characters and the plot. Linguist George T. Wright suggests that hendiadys had been used deliberately to heighten the play's sense of duality and dislocation.

Hamlet's soliloquies have also captured the attention of scholars. Hamlet interrupts himself, vocalising either disgust or agreement with himself and embellishing his own words. He has difficulty expressing himself directly and instead blunts the thrust of his thought with wordplay. It is not until late in the play, after his experience with the pirates, that Hamlet is able to articulate his feelings freely.

Context and interpretation

John Everett Millais' Ophelia (1852) depicts Lady Ophelia's mysterious death by drowning. In the play, the gravediggers discuss whether Ophelia's death was a suicide and whether she merits a Christian burial.

Written at a time of religious upheaval and in the wake of the English Reformation, the play is alternately Catholic (or piously medieval) and Protestant (or consciously modern). The ghost describes himself as being in purgatory and as dying without last rites. This and Ophelia's burial ceremony, which is characteristically Catholic, make up most of the play's Catholic connections. Some scholars have observed that revenge tragedies come from Catholic countries such as Italy and Spain, where the revenge tragedies present contradictions of motives, since according to Catholic doctrine the duty to God and family precedes civil justice. Hamlet's conundrum then is whether to avenge his father and kill Claudius or to leave the vengeance to God, as his religion requires.

Much of the play's Protestant tones derive from its setting in Denmark-both then and now a predominantly Protestant country, though it is unclear whether the fictional Denmark of the play is intended to portray this implicit fact. Dialogue refers explicitly to the German city of Wittenberg where Hamlet, Horatio, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern attend university, implying where the Protestant reformer Martin Luther nailed the Ninety-five Theses to the church door in 1517.

Philosophical

Philosophical ideas in Hamlet are similar to those of the French writer Michel de Montaigne, a contemporary of Shakespeare's (artist: Thomas de Leu, fl. 1560-1612).

Hamlet is often perceived as a philosophical character, expounding ideas that are now described as relativist, existentialist, and sceptical. For example, he expresses a subjectivistic idea when he says to Rosencrantz: "there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so". The idea that nothing is real except in the mind of the individual finds its roots in the Greek Sophists, who argued that since nothing can be perceived except through the senses-and since all individuals sense, and therefore perceive things differently-there is no absolute truth, but rather only relative truth. The clearest alleged instance of existentialism is in the " to be, or not to be" speech, where Hamlet is thought by some to use "being" to allude to life and action, and "not being" to death and inaction.

Hamlet reflects the contemporary scepticism promoted by the French Renaissance humanist Michel de Montaigne. Prior to Montaigne's time, humanists such as Pico della Mirandola had argued that man was God's greatest creation, made in God's image and able to choose his own nature, but this view was subsequently challenged in Montaigne's of 1580. Hamlet's " What a piece of work is a man" seems to echo many of Montaigne's ideas, and many scholars have discussed whether Shakespeare drew directly from Montaigne or whether both men were simply reacting similarly to the spirit of the times.

Psychoanalytic

Freud suggested that an unconscious Oedipal conflict caused Hamlet's hesitations (artist: Eugène Delacroix 1844).

Sigmund Freud

Sigmund Freud's thoughts regarding Hamlet were first published in his book The Interpretation of Dreams (1899), as a footnote to a discussion of Sophocles' tragedy, Oedipus Rex, all of which is part of his consideration of the causes of neurosis. Freud does not offer over-all interpretations of the plays, but uses the two tragedies to illustrate and corroborate his psychological theories, which are based on his treatments of his patients and on his studies. Productions of Hamlet have used Freud's ideas to support their own interpretations. In The Interpretation of Dreams, Freud says that according to his experience "parents play a leading part in the infantile psychology of all persons who subsequently become psychoneurotics," and that "falling in love with one parent and hating the other" is a common impulse in early childhood, and is important source material of "subsequent neurosis". He says that "in their amorous or hostile attitude toward their parents" neurotics reveal something that occurs with less intensity "in the minds of the majority of children". Freud considered that Sophocles' tragedy, Oedipus Rex, with its story that involves crimes of parricide and incest, "has furnished us with legendary matter which corroborates" these ideas, and that the "profound and universal validity of the old legends" is understandable only by recognizing the validity of these theories of "infantile psychology".

Freud explores the reason " Oedipus Rex is capable of moving a modern reader or playgoer no less powerfully than it moved the contemporary Greeks". He suggests that "It may be that we were all destined to direct our first sexual impulses toward our mothers, and our first impulses of hatred and violence toward our fathers." Freud suggests that we "recoil from the person for whom this primitive wish of our childhood has been fulfilled with all the force of the repression which these wishes have undergone in our minds since childhood."

These ideas, which became a cornerstone of Freud's psychological theories, he named the " Oedipus complex", and, at one point, he considered calling it the "Hamlet complex". Freud considered that Hamlet "is rooted in the same soil as Oedipus Rex." But the difference in the "psychic life" of the two civilizations that produced each play, and the progress made over time of "repression in the emotional life of humanity" can be seen in the way the same material is handled by the two playwrights: In Oedipus Rex incest and murder are brought into the light as might occur in a dream, but in Hamlet these impulses "remain repressed" and we learn of their existence through Hamlet's inhibitions to act out the revenge, while he is shown to be capable of acting decisively and boldly in other contexts. Freud asserts, "The play is based on Hamlet's hesitation in accomplishing the task of revenge assigned to him; the text does not give the cause or the motive of this." The conflict is "deeply hidden".

Hamlet is able to perform any kind of action except taking revenge on the man who murdered his father and has taken his father's place with his mother-Claudius has led Hamlet to realize the repressed desires of his own childhood. The loathing which was supposed to drive him to revenge is replaced by "self-reproach, by conscientious scruples" which tell him "he himself is no better than the murderer whom he is required to punish". Freud suggests that Hamlet's sexual aversion expressed in his "nunnery" conversation with Ophelia supports the idea that Hamlet is "an hysterical subject".

Freud suggests that the character Hamlet goes through an experience that has three characteristics, which he numbered: 1) "the hero is not psychopathic, but becomes so" during the course of the play. 2) "the repressed desire is one of those that are similarly repressed in all of us." It is a repression that "belongs to an early stage of our individual development". The audience identifies with the character of Hamlet, because "we are victims of the same conflict." 3) It is the nature of theatre that "the struggle of the repressed impulse to become conscious" occurs in both the hero onstage and the spectator, when they are in the grip of their emotions, "in the manner seen in psychoanalytic treatment".

Freud points out that Hamlet is an exception in that psychopathic characters are usually ineffective in stage plays; they "become as useless for the stage as they are for life itself", because they do not inspire insight or empathy, unless the audience is familiar with the character's inner conflict. Freud says, "It is thus the task of the dramatist to transport us into the same illness."

John Barrymore's long-running 1922 performance in New York, directed by Thomas Hopkins, "broke new ground in its Freudian approach to character", in keeping with the post-World War I rebellion against everything Victorian. He had a "blunter intention" than presenting the genteel, sweet prince of 19th-century tradition, imbuing his character with virility and lust.

Beginning in 1910, with the publication of "The Œdipus-Complex as an Explanation of Hamlet's Mystery: A Study in Motive" Ernest Jones-a psychoanalyst and Freud's biographer-developed Freud's ideas into a series of essays that culminated in his book Hamlet and Oedipus (1949). Influenced by Jones's psychoanalytic approach, several productions have portrayed the "closet scene", where Hamlet confronts his mother in her private quarters, in a sexual light. In this reading, Hamlet is disgusted by his mother's "incestuous" relationship with Claudius while simultaneously fearful of killing him, as this would clear Hamlet's path to his mother's bed. Ophelia's madness after her father's death may also be read through the Freudian lens: as a reaction to the death of her hoped-for lover, her father. Ophelia is overwhelmed by having her unfulfilled love for him so abruptly terminated and drifts into the oblivion of insanity. In 1937, Tyrone Guthrie directed Laurence Olivier in a Jones-inspired Hamlet at The Old Vic. Olivier later used some of these same ideas in his 1948 film version of the play.

In the Bloom's Shakespeare Through the Ages volume on Hamlet, editors Bloom and Foster express a conviction that the intentions of Shakespeare in portraying the character of Hamlet in the play exceeded the capacity of the Freudian Oedipus complex to completely encompass the extent of characteristics depicted in Hamlet throughout the tragedy: "For once, Freud regressed in attempting to fasten the Oedipus Complex upon Hamlet: it will not stick, and merely showed that Freud did better than T.S. Eliot, who preferred Coriolanus to Hamlet, or so he said. Who can believe Eliot, when he exposes his own Hamlet Complex by declaring the play to be an aesthetic failure?" The book also notes James Joyce's interpretation, stating that he "did far better in the Library Scene of Ulysses, where Stephen marvellously credits Shakespeare, in this play, with universal fatherhood while accurately implying that Hamlet is fatherless, thus opening a pragmatic gap between Shakespeare and Hamlet."

Joshua Rothman has written in The New Yorker that "we tell the story wrong when we say that Freud used the idea of the Oedipus complex to understand Hamlet". Rothman suggests that "it was the other way around: Hamlet helped Freud understand, and perhaps even invent, psychoanalysis". He concludes, "The Oedipus complex is a misnomer. It should be called the 'Hamlet complex'."

Jacques Lacan

In the 1950s, the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan analyzed Hamlet to illustrate some of his concepts. His structuralist theories about Hamlet were first presented in a series of seminars given in Paris and later published in "Desire and the Interpretation of Desire in Hamlet". Lacan postulated that the human psyche is determined by structures of language and that the linguistic structures of Hamlet shed light on human desire. His point of departure is Freud's Oedipal theories, and the central theme of mourning that runs through Hamlet. In Lacan's analysis, Hamlet unconsciously assumes the role of phallus-the cause of his inaction-and is increasingly distanced from reality "by mourning, fantasy, narcissism and psychosis", which create holes (or lack) in the real, imaginary, and symbolic aspects of his psyche. Lacan's theories influenced some subsequent literary criticism of Hamlet because of his alternative vision of the play and his use of semantics to explore the play's psychological landscape.

Ophelia is distracted by grief.[125] Feminist critics have explored her descent into madness (artist: Henrietta Rae 1890).

In the 20th century, feminist critics opened up new approaches to Gertrude and Ophelia. New historicist and cultural materialist critics examined the play in its historical context, attempting to piece together its original cultural environment. They focused on the gender system of early modern England, pointing to the common trinity of maid, wife, or widow, with whores outside of that stereotype. In this analysis, the essence of Hamlet is the central character's changed perception of his mother as a whore because of her failure to remain faithful to Old Hamlet. In consequence, Hamlet loses his faith in all women, treating Ophelia as if she too were a whore and dishonest with Hamlet. Ophelia, by some critics, can be seen as honest and fair; however, it is virtually impossible to link these two traits, since 'fairness' is an outward trait, while 'honesty' is an inward trait.

Hamlet tries to show his mother Gertrude his father's ghost (artist: Nicolai A. Abildgaard, c. 1778).

Carolyn Heilbrun's 1957 essay "The Character of Hamlet's Mother" defends Gertrude, arguing that the text never hints that Gertrude knew of Claudius poisoning King Hamlet. This analysis has been praised by many feminist critics, combating what is, by Heilbrun's argument, centuries' worth of misinterpretation. By this account, Gertrude's worst crime is of pragmatically marrying her brother-in-law in order to avoid a power vacuum. This is borne out by the fact that King Hamlet's ghost tells Hamlet to leave Gertrude out of Hamlet's revenge, to leave her to heaven, an arbitrary mercy to grant to a conspirator to murder.

Ophelia has also been defended by feminist critics, most notably Elaine Showalter. Ophelia is surrounded by powerful men: her father, brother, and Hamlet. All three disappear: Laertes leaves, Hamlet abandons her, and Polonius dies. Conventional theories had argued that without these three powerful men making decisions for her, Ophelia is driven into madness. Feminist theorists argue that she goes mad with guilt because, when Hamlet kills her father, he has fulfilled her sexual desire to have Hamlet kill her father so they can be together. Showalter points out that Ophelia has become the symbol of the distraught and hysterical woman in modern culture.

Hamlet is one of the most quoted works in the English language, and is often included on lists of the world's greatest literature. As such, it reverberates through the writing of later centuries. Academic Laurie Osborne identifies the direct influence of Hamlet in numerous modern narratives, and divides them into four main categories: fictional accounts of the play's composition, simplifications of the story for young readers, stories expanding the role of one or more characters, and narratives featuring performances of the play.

Actors before Hamlet by Władysław Czachórski (1875), National Museum in Warsaw

English poet John Milton was an early admirer of Shakespeare and took evident inspiration from his work. As John Kerrigan discusses, Milton originally considered writing his epic poem Paradise Lost (1667) as a tragedy. While Milton did not ultimately go that route, the poem still shows distinct echoes of Shakespearean revenge tragedy, and of Hamlet in particular. As scholar Christopher N. Warren argues, Paradise Lost's Satan "undergoes a transformation in the poem from a Hamlet-like avenger into a Claudius-like usurper," a plot device that supports Milton's larger Republican internationalist project. The poem also reworks theatrical language from Hamlet, especially around the idea of "putting on" certain dispositions, as when Hamlet puts on "an antic disposition," similarly to the Son in Paradise Lost who "can put on / [God's] terrors."

Henry Fielding's , published about 1749, describes a visit to Hamlet by Tom Jones and Mr Partridge, with similarities to the "play within a play". In contrast, Goethe's Bildungsroman Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, written between 1776 and 1796, not only has a production of Hamlet at its core but also creates parallels between the ghost and Wilhelm Meister's dead father. In the early 1850s, in , Herman Melville focuses on a Hamlet-like character's long development as a writer. Ten years later, Dickens's Great Expectations contains many Hamlet-like plot elements: it is driven by revenge-motivated actions, contains ghost-like characters (Abel Magwitch and Miss Havisham), and focuses on the hero's guilt. Academic Alexander Welsh notes that Great Expectations is an "autobiographical novel" and "anticipates psychoanalytic readings of Hamlet itself". About the same time, George Eliot's The Mill on the Floss was published, introducing Maggie Tulliver "who is explicitly compared with Hamlet" though "with a reputation for sanity".

L. Frank Baum's first published short story was "They Played a New Hamlet" (1895). When Baum had been touring New York State in the title role, the actor playing the ghost fell through the floorboards, and the rural audience thought it was part of the show and demanded that the actor repeat the fall, because they thought it was funny. Baum would later recount the actual story in an article, but the short story is told from the point of view of the actor playing the ghost.

In the 1920s, James Joyce managed "a more upbeat version" of Hamlet-stripped of obsession and revenge-in , though its main parallels are with Homer's . In the 1990s, two novelists were explicitly influenced by Hamlet. In Angela Carter's Wise Children, To be or not to be is reworked as a song and dance routine, and Iris Murdoch's The Black Prince has Oedipal themes and murder intertwined with a love affair between a Hamlet-obsessed writer, Bradley Pearson, and the daughter of his rival. In the late 20th century, David Foster Wallace's novel Infinite Jest draws heavily from Hamlet and takes its title from the play's text; Wallace incorporates references to the gravedigger scene, the marriage of the main character's mother to his uncle, and the re-appearance of the main character's father as a ghost.

There is the story of the woman who read Hamlet for the first time and said, "I don't see why people admire that play so. It is nothing but a bunch of quotations strung together."

-  Isaac Asimov, Asimov's Guide to Shakespeare, p. vii, Avenal Books, 1970

Performance history

The day we see Hamlet die in the theatre, something of him dies for us. He is dethroned by the spectre of an actor, and we shall never be able to keep the usurper out of our dreams.

Maurice Maeterlinck in La Jeune Belgique (1890).

Shakespeare's day to the Interregnum

Shakespeare almost certainly wrote the role of Hamlet for Richard Burbage. He was the chief tragedian of the Lord Chamberlain's Men, with a capacious memory for lines and a wide emotional range. Judging by the number of reprints, Hamlet appears to have been Shakespeare's fourth most popular play during his lifetime-only Henry IV Part 1, Richard III and eclipsed it. Shakespeare provides no clear indication of when his play is set; however, as Elizabethan actors performed at the Globe in contemporary dress on minimal sets, this would not have affected the staging.

Firm evidence for specific early performances of the play is scant. It is sometimes argued that the crew of the ship , anchored off Sierra Leone, performed Hamlet in September 1607; however, this claim is based on a 19th century insert of a 'lost' passage into a period document, and is today widely regarded as a hoax, likely to have been perpetrated by John Payne Collier (not to mention the intrinsic unlikelihood of sailors memorising and performing the play).[citation needed ] More credible is that the play toured in Germany within five years of Shakespeare's death, and that it was performed before James I in 1619 and Charles I in 1637. Oxford editor George Hibbard argues that, since the contemporary literature contains many allusions and references to Hamlet (only Falstaff is mentioned more, from Shakespeare), the play was surely performed with a frequency that the historical record misses.

All theatres were closed down by the Puritan government during the Interregnum. Even during this time, however, playlets known as were often performed illegally, including one called The Grave-Makers based on act 5, scene 1 of Hamlet.

Restoration and 18th century

Title page and frontispiece for Hamlet, Prince of Denmark: A Tragedy. As it is now acted at the Theatres-Royal in Drury-Lane and Covent-Garden. London, 1776

The play was revived early in the Restoration. When the existing stock of pre- civil war plays was divided between the two newly created patent theatre companies, Hamlet was the only Shakespearean favourite that Sir William Davenant's Duke's Company secured. It became the first of Shakespeare's plays to be presented with movable flats painted with generic scenery behind the proscenium arch of Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre. This new stage convention highlighted the frequency with which Shakespeare shifts dramatic location, encouraging the recurrent criticism of his failure to maintain unity of place. In the title role, Davenant cast Thomas Betterton, who continued to play the Dane until he was 74. David Garrick at Drury Lane produced a version that adapted Shakespeare heavily; he declared: "I had sworn I would not leave the stage till I had rescued that noble play from all the rubbish of the fifth act. I have brought it forth without the grave-digger's trick, Osrick, & the fencing match". The first actor known to have played Hamlet in North America is Lewis Hallam Jr., in the American Company's production in Philadelphia in 1759.

David Garrick expresses Hamlet's shock at his first sighting of the ghost (artist: unknown).

John Philip Kemble made his Drury Lane debut as Hamlet in 1783. His performance was said to be 20 minutes longer than anyone else's, and his lengthy pauses provoked the suggestion by Richard Brinsley Sheridan that "music should be played between the words". Sarah Siddons was the first actress known to play Hamlet; many women have since played him as a breeches role, to great acclaim. In 1748, Alexander Sumarokov wrote a Russian adaptation that focused on Prince Hamlet as the embodiment of an opposition to Claudius's tyranny-a treatment that would recur in Eastern European versions into the 20th century. In the years following America's independence, Thomas Abthorpe Cooper, the young nation's leading tragedian, performed Hamlet among other plays at the Chestnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia, and at the Park Theatre in New York. Although chided for "acknowledging acquaintances in the audience" and "inadequate memorisation of his lines", he became a national celebrity.

19th century

A poster, c. 1884, for an American production of Hamlet (starring Thomas W. Keene), showing several of the key scenes

From around 1810 to 1840, the best-known Shakespearean performances in the United States were tours by leading London actors-including George Frederick Cooke, Junius Brutus Booth, Edmund Kean, William Charles Macready, and Charles Kemble. Of these, Booth remained to make his career in the States, fathering the nation's most notorious actor, John Wilkes Booth (who later assassinated Abraham Lincoln), and its most famous Hamlet, Edwin Booth. Edwin Booth's Hamlet at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in 1875 was described as "... the dark, sad, dreamy, mysterious hero of a poem. [... acted] in an ideal manner, as far removed as possible from the plane of actual life". Booth played Hamlet for 100 nights in the 1864/5 season at the Winter Garden Theatre, inaugurating the era of long-run Shakespeare in America.

In the United Kingdom, the actor-managers of the Victorian era (including Kean, Samuel Phelps, Macready, and Henry Irving) staged Shakespeare in a grand manner, with elaborate scenery and costumes. The tendency of actor-managers to emphasise the importance of their own central character did not always meet with the critics' approval. George Bernard Shaw's praise for Johnston Forbes-Robertson's performance contains a sideswipe at Irving: "The story of the play was perfectly intelligible, and quite took the attention of the audience off the principal actor at moments. What is the Lyceum coming to?"

In London, Edmund Kean was the first Hamlet to abandon the regal finery usually associated with the role in favour of a plain costume, and he is said to have surprised his audience by playing Hamlet as serious and introspective. In stark contrast to earlier opulence, William Poel's 1881 production of the Q1 text was an early attempt at reconstructing the Elizabethan theatre's austerity; his only backdrop was a set of red curtains. Sarah Bernhardt played the prince in her popular 1899 London production. In contrast to the "effeminate" view of the central character that usually accompanied a female casting, she described her character as "manly and resolute, but nonetheless thoughtful ... [he] thinks before he acts, a trait indicative of great strength and great spiritual power".

In France, Charles Kemble initiated an enthusiasm for Shakespeare; and leading members of the Romantic movement such as Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas saw his 1827 Paris performance of Hamlet, particularly admiring the madness of Harriet Smithson's Ophelia. In Germany, Hamlet had become so assimilated by the mid-19th century that Ferdinand Freiligrath declared that "Germany is Hamlet". From the 1850s, the Parsi theatre tradition in India transformed Hamlet into folk performances, with dozens of songs added.

20th century

Apart from some western troupes' 19th-century visits, the first professional performance of Hamlet in Japan was Otojirō Kawakami's 1903 ("new school theatre") adaptation. Tsubouchi Shōyō translated Hamlet and produced a performance in 1911 that blended Shingeki ("new drama") and styles. This hybrid-genre reached its peak in Tsuneari Fukuda's 1955 Hamlet. In 1998, Yukio Ninagawa produced an acclaimed version of Hamlet in the style of Nō theatre, which he took to London.

Konstantin Stanislavski and Edward Gordon Craig-two of the 20th century's most influential theatre practitioners-collaborated on the Moscow Art Theatre's seminal production of 1911-12. While Craig favoured stylised abstraction, Stanislavski, armed with his 'system,' explored psychological motivation. Craig conceived of the play as a symbolist monodrama, offering a dream-like vision as seen through Hamlet's eyes alone. This was most evident in the staging of the first court scene. The most famous aspect of the production is Craig's use of large, abstract screens that altered the size and shape of the acting area for each scene, representing the character's state of mind spatially or visualising a dramaturgical progression. The production attracted enthusiastic and unprecedented worldwide attention for the theatre and placed it "on the cultural map for Western Europe".

The first modern dress stagings of Hamlet happened in 1925 in London and then New York. Barry Jackson's Birmingham Repertory Theatre opened their production, directed by H.K. Ayliff at the Kingsway Theatre on August 25, 1925. Ivor Brown reported, "Many of the first night audience came to scoff and remained to hold its breath, to marvel and enjoy. . . .Shakespeare's victory over time and tailoring was swift and sweeping." Horace Brisbin Liveright's modern dress production opened at the Booth Theater in New York on November 9, 1925, the same night that the London production moved to Birmingham. It was known "more dryly, and perhaps with a touch of something more sinister, as 'the plain-clothes Hamlet'" and did not reach the same level of success.

Hamlet is often played with contemporary political overtones. Leopold Jessner's 1926 production at the Berlin Staatstheater portrayed Claudius's court as a parody of the corrupt and fawning court of Kaiser Wilhelm. In Poland, the number of productions of Hamlet has tended to increase at times of political unrest, since its political themes (suspected crimes, coups, surveillance) can be used to comment on a contemporary situation. Similarly, Czech directors have used the play at times of occupation: a 1941 Vinohrady Theatre production "emphasised, with due caution, the helpless situation of an intellectual attempting to endure in a ruthless environment". In China, performances of Hamlet often have political significance: Gu Wuwei's 1916 The Usurper of State Power, an amalgam of Hamlet and Macbeth, was an attack on Yuan Shikai's attempt to overthrow the republic. In 1942, Jiao Juyin directed the play in a Confucian temple in Sichuan Province, to which the government had retreated from the advancing Japanese. In the immediate aftermath of the collapse of the protests at Tiananmen Square, Lin Zhaohua staged a 1990 Hamlet in which the prince was an ordinary individual tortured by a loss of meaning. In this production, the actors playing Hamlet, Claudius and Polonius exchanged roles at crucial moments in the performance, including the moment of Claudius's death, at which point the actor mainly associated with Hamlet fell to the ground.

Mignon Nevada as Ophelia, 1910

Notable stagings in London and New York include Barrymore's 1925 production at the Haymarket; it influenced subsequent performances by John Gielgud and Laurence Olivier. Gielgud played the central role many times: his 1936 New York production ran for 132 performances, leading to the accolade that he was "the finest interpreter of the role since Barrymore". Although "posterity has treated Maurice Evans less kindly", throughout the 1930s and 1940s he was regarded by many as the leading interpreter of Shakespeare in the United States and in the 1938/39 season he presented Broadway's first uncut Hamlet, running four and a half hours. Evans later performed a highly truncated version of the play that he played for South Pacific war zones during World War II which made the prince a more decisive character. The staging, known as the "G.I. Hamlet", was produced on Broadway for 131 performances in 1945/46. Olivier's 1937 performance at The Old Vic was popular with audiences but not with critics, with James Agate writing in a famous review in The Sunday Times, "Mr. Olivier does not speak poetry badly. He does not speak it at all." In 1937 Tyrone Guthrie directed the play at Elsinore, Denmark, with Laurence Olivier as Hamlet and Vivien Leigh as Ophelia.

In 1963, Olivier directed Peter O'Toole as Hamlet in the inaugural performance of the newly formed National Theatre; critics found resonance between O'Toole's Hamlet and John Osborne's hero, Jimmy Porter, from Look Back in Anger.

Richard Burton received his third Tony Award nomination when he played his second Hamlet, his first under John Gielgud's direction, in 1964 in a production that holds the record for the longest run of the play in Broadway history (137 performances). The performance was set on a bare stage, conceived to appear like a dress rehearsal, with Burton in a black v-neck sweater, and Gielgud himself tape-recorded the voice for the ghost (which appeared as a looming shadow). It was immortalised both on record and on a film that played in US theatres for a week in 1964 as well as being the subject of books written by cast members William Redfield and Richard L. Sterne.

Other New York portrayals of Hamlet of note include that of Ralph Fiennes's in 1995 (for which he won the Tony Award for Best Actor)-which ran, from first preview to closing night, a total of one hundred performances. About the Fiennes Hamlet Vincent Canby wrote in The New York Times that it was "... not one for literary sleuths and Shakespeare scholars. It respects the play, but it doesn't provide any new material for arcane debates on what it all means. Instead it's an intelligent, beautifully read ..." Stacy Keach played the role with an all-star cast at Joseph Papp's Delacorte Theater in the early 1970s, with Colleen Dewhurst's Gertrude, James Earl Jones's King, Barnard Hughes's Polonius, Sam Waterston's Laertes and Raul Julia's Osric. Sam Waterston later played the role himself at the Delacorte for the New York Shakespeare Festival, and the show transferred to the Vivian Beaumont Theater in 1975 ( Stephen Lang played Bernardo and other roles). Stephen Lang's Hamlet for the Roundabout Theatre Company in 1992 received mixed reviews and ran for sixty-one performances. David Warner played the role with the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in 1965. William Hurt (at Circle Repertory Company off-Broadway, memorably performing " To be, or not to be" while lying on the floor), Jon Voight at Rutgers[clarification needed ], and Christopher Walken (fiercely) at Stratford, Connecticut, have all played the role, as has Diane Venora at The Public Theatre. The Internet Broadway Database lists sixty-six productions of Hamlet.

Ian Charleson performed Hamlet from 9 October to 13 November 1989, in Richard Eyre's production at the Olivier Theatre, replacing Daniel Day-Lewis, who had abandoned the production. Seriously ill from AIDS at the time, Charleson died eight weeks after his last performance. Fellow actor and friend, Sir Ian McKellen, said that Charleson played Hamlet so well it was as if he had rehearsed the role all his life; McKellen called it "the perfect Hamlet". The performance garnered other major accolades as well, some critics echoing McKellen in calling it the definitive Hamlet performance.

Keanu Reeves performed Hamlet from 12 January to 4 February 1995 at the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre ( Winnipeg, Manitoba). The production garnered positive reviews from worldwide media outlets. Directed by Lewis Baumander the lavish production featured a cast of some of Canada's most distinguished classical actors of that period.

21st century

Hamlet continues to be staged regularly. Actors performing the lead role have included: Simon Russell Beale, Ben Whishaw, David Tennant, Tom Hiddleston, Angela Winkler, Samuel West, Christopher Eccleston, Maxine Peake, Rory Kinnear, Oscar Isaac, Michael Sheen, Christian Camargo, Paapa Essiedu and Michael Urie.

In May 2009, Hamlet opened with Jude Law in the title role at the Donmar Warehouse West End season at Wyndham's Theatre. The production officially opened on 3 June and ran through 22 August 2009. A further production with Jude Law ran at Elsinore Castle in Denmark from 25-30 August 2009, and then moved to Broadway, and ran for 12 weeks at the Broadhurst Theatre in New York.

In October 2011, a production starring Michael Sheen opened at the Young Vic, in which the play was set inside a psychiatric hospital.

In 2013, American actor Paul Giamatti played the title role of Hamlet in modern dress, at the Yale Repertory Theatre, at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.

The Globe Theatre of London initiated a project in 2014 to perform Hamlet in every country in the world in the space of two years. Titled Globe to Globe Hamlet, it began its tour on 23 April 2014, the 450th anniversary of Shakespeare's birth, and performed in 197 countries.

Benedict Cumberbatch played the role for a 12-week run in a production at the Barbican Theatre, opening on 25 August 2015. The play was produced by Sonia Friedman, and directed by Lyndsey Turner, with set design by Es Devlin. It was called the "most in-demand theatre production of all time" and sold out in seven hours after tickets went on sale 11 August 2014, more than a year before the play opened.

A 2017 Almeida Theatre production, directed by Robert Icke and starring Andrew Scott, was transferred that same year to the West End's Harold Pinter Theatre.

Tom Hiddleston played the role for a three-week run at Vanbrugh Theatre that opened on 1 September 2017 and was directed by Kenneth Branagh.

In 2018, The Globe Theatre's newly instated artistic director Michelle Terry played the role in a production notable for its gender-blind casting.

A production by Bristol Old Vic starring Billy Howle in title role, Niamh Cusack as Gertrude, Mirren Mack as Ophelia opened on 13 October 2022.

Film and TV performances

An early film version of Hamlet is Sarah Bernhardt's five-minute film of the fencing scene, which was produced in 1900. The film was an early attempt at combining sound and film; music and words were recorded on phonograph records, to be played along with the film. Silent versions were released in 1907, 1908, 1910, 1913, 1917, and 1920. In the 1921 film , Danish actress Asta Nielsen played the role of Hamlet as a woman who spends her life disguised as a man.

Laurence Olivier's 1948 moody black-and-white won Best Picture and Best Actor Academy Awards, and is, as of 2020, the only Shakespeare film to have done so. His interpretation stressed the Oedipal overtones of the play, and cast 28-year-old Eileen Herlie as Hamlet's mother, opposite himself, at 41, as Hamlet.

In 1953, actor Jack Manning performed the play in 15-minute segments over two weeks in the short-lived late night DuMont series Monodrama Theater. New York Times TV critic Jack Gould praised Manning's performance as Hamlet.

The 1964 Soviet film (Russian: Гамлет) is based on a translation by Boris Pasternak and directed by Grigori Kozintsev, with a score by Dmitri Shostakovich. Innokenty Smoktunovsky was cast in the role of Hamlet.

John Gielgud directed Richard Burton in a Broadway production at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre in 1964-65, the longest-running Hamlet in the U.S. to date. A live film of the production was produced using "Electronovision", a method of recording a live performance with multiple video cameras and converting the image to film. Eileen Herlie repeated her role from Olivier's film version as the Queen, and the voice of Gielgud was heard as the ghost. The Gielgud/Burton production was also recorded complete and released on LP by Columbia Masterworks.

Sarah Bernhardt as Hamlet, with Yorick's skull (photographer: James Lafayette, c. 1885-1900)

The first Hamlet in color was a 1969 film directed by Tony Richardson with Nicol Williamson as Hamlet and Marianne Faithfull as Ophelia.

In 1990 Franco Zeffirelli, whose Shakespeare films have been described as "sensual rather than cerebral", cast Mel Gibson-then famous for the and Lethal Weapon movies-in the title role of his 1990 version; Glenn Close-then famous as the psychotic "other woman" in Fatal Attraction-played Gertrude, and Paul Scofield played Hamlet's father.

Kenneth Branagh adapted, directed, and starred in a 1996 film version of Hamlet that contained material from the First Folio and the Second Quarto. Branagh's Hamlet runs for just over four hours. Branagh set the film with late 19th-century costuming and furnishings, a production in many ways reminiscent of a Russian novel of the time; and Blenheim Palace, built in the early 18th century, became Elsinore Castle in the external scenes. The film is structured as an epic and makes frequent use of flashbacks to highlight elements not made explicit in the play: Hamlet's sexual relationship with Kate Winslet's Ophelia, for example, or his childhood affection for Yorick (played by Ken Dodd).

In 2000, Michael Almereyda's set the story in contemporary Manhattan, with Ethan Hawke playing Hamlet as a film student. Claudius (played by Kyle MacLachlan) became the CEO of "Denmark Corporation", having taken over the company by killing his brother.

The 2014 Bollywood film is an adaptation set in modern Kashmir.

The Northman, released on 22 April 2022 and directed by the American director Robert Eggers who also co-wrote the script with Icelandic author Sjón, is based in the original Scandinavian legend that inspired Shakespeare to write Hamlet.

Derivative works

Scenes from a 1904 benefit performance of W. S. Gilbert's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, with Gilbert as Claudius

This section is limited to derivative works written for the stage.

Tom Stoppard's 1966 play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead retells many of the events of the story from the point of view of the characters Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and gives them a backstory of their own. Several times since 1995, the American Shakespeare Center has mounted repertories that included both Hamlet and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, with the same actors performing the same roles in each; in their 2001 and 2009 seasons the two plays were "directed, designed, and rehearsed together to make the most out of the shared scenes and situations".

W. S. Gilbert wrote a short comic play titled Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, in which Hamlet's play is presented as a tragedy written by Claudius in his youth of which he is greatly embarrassed. Through the chaos triggered by Hamlet's staging of it, Guildenstern helps Rosencrantz vie with Hamlet to make Ophelia his bride.

Lee Blessing's Fortinbras is a comical sequel to Hamlet in which all the deceased characters come back as ghosts. The New York Times reviewed the play, saying it is "scarcely more than an extended comedy sketch, lacking the portent and linguistic complexity of Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Fortinbras operates on a far less ambitious plane, but it is a ripping yarn and offers Keith Reddin a role in which he can commit comic mayhem".

Caridad Svich's 12 Ophelias (a play with broken songs) includes elements of the story of Hamlet but focuses on Ophelia. In Svich's play, Ophelia is resurrected and rises from a pool of water, after her death in Hamlet. The play is a series of scenes and songs, and was first staged at a public swimming pool in Brooklyn.

David Davalos's Wittenberg is a "tragical-comical-historical" prequel to Hamlet that depicts the Danish prince as a student at Wittenberg University (now known as the University of Halle-Wittenberg), where he is torn between the conflicting teachings of his mentors John Faustus and Martin Luther. The New York Times reviewed the play, saying, "Mr. Davalos has molded a daft campus comedy out of this unlikely convergence", and Nytheatre.com's review said the playwright "has imagined a fascinating alternate reality, and quite possibly, given the fictional Hamlet a back story that will inform the role for the future."

Mad Boy Chronicle by Canadian playwright Michael O'Brien is a dark comedy loosely based on Hamlet, set in Viking Denmark in 999 AD.

Notes and references

References

All references to Hamlet, unless otherwise specified, are taken from the Arden Shakespeare Q2. Under their referencing system, 3.1.55 means act 3, scene 1, line 55. References to the First Quarto and First Folio are marked Hamlet Q1 and Hamlet F1, respectively, and are taken from the Arden Shakespeare Hamlet: the texts of 1603 and 1623. Their referencing system for Q1 has no act breaks, so 7.115 means scene 7, line 115.

Secondary sources

Further reading

External links

Related works

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The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark , often shortened to Hamlet (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts Prince Hamlet and his attempts to exact revenge against his uncle, Claudius, who has murdered Hamlet's father in order to seize his throne and marry Hamlet's mother.

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Romeo Montecchi
Giulietta Capuleti

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Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetime and, along with , is one of his most frequently performed. Today, the title characters are regarded as archetypal young lovers.

Romeo and Juliet belongs to a tradition of tragic romances stretching back to antiquity. The plot is based on an Italian tale written by Matteo Bandello and translated into verse as The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet by Arthur Brooke in 1562 and retold in prose in Palace of Pleasure by William Painter in 1567. Shakespeare borrowed heavily from both but expanded the plot by developing a number of supporting characters, particularly Mercutio and Paris. Believed to have been written between 1591 and 1595, the play was first published in a quarto version in 1597. The text of the first quarto version was of poor quality, however, and later editions corrected the text to conform more closely with Shakespeare's original.

Shakespeare's use of poetic dramatic structure (including effects such as switching between comedy and tragedy to heighten tension, the expansion of minor characters, and numerous sub-plots to embellish the story) has been praised as an early sign of his dramatic skill. The play ascribes different poetic forms to different characters, sometimes changing the form as the character develops. Romeo, for example, grows more adept at the sonnet over the course of the play.

Romeo and Juliet has been adapted numerous times for stage, film, musical, and opera venues. During the English Restoration, it was revived and heavily revised by William Davenant. David Garrick's 18th-century version also modified several scenes, removing material then considered indecent, and Georg Benda's Romeo und Julie omitted much of the action and used a happy ending. Performances in the 19th century, including Charlotte Cushman's, restored the original text and focused on greater realism. John Gielgud's 1935 version kept very close to Shakespeare's text and used Elizabethan costumes and staging to enhance the drama. In the 20th and into the 21st century, the play has been adapted in versions as diverse as George Cukor's 1936 film Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli's 1968 film Romeo and Juliet, Baz Luhrmann's 1996 film Romeo + Juliet, and most recently, Carlo Carlei's 2013 film Romeo and Juliet.

Characters

Ruling house of Verona

House of Capulet

Capulet is the patriarch of the house of Capulet.

Lady Capulet is the matriarch of the house of Capulet.

Juliet Capulet, the 13-year-old daughter of Capulet, is the play's female protagonist.

Tybalt is a cousin of Juliet, the nephew of Lady Capulet.

The Nurse is Juliet's personal attendant and confidante.

Rosaline is Lord Capulet's niece, Romeo's love in the beginning of the story.

Peter, Sampson, and Gregory are servants of the Capulet household.

House of Montague

Montague is the patriarch of the house of Montague.

Lady Montague is the matriarch of the house of Montague.

Romeo Montague, the son of Montague, is the play's male protagonist.

Benvolio is Romeo's cousin and best friend.

Abram and Balthasar are servants of the Montague household.

Friar Laurence is a Franciscan friar and Romeo's confidant.

Friar John is sent to deliver Friar Laurence's letter to Romeo.

An Apothecary who reluctantly sells Romeo poison.

A Chorus reads a prologue to each of the first two acts.

The play, set in Verona, Italy, begins with a street brawl between Montague and Capulet servants who, like the masters they serve, are sworn enemies. Prince Escalus of Verona intervenes and declares that further breach of the peace will be punishable by death. Later, Count Paris talks to Capulet about marrying his daughter Juliet, but Capulet asks Paris to wait another two years and invites him to attend a planned Capulet ball. Lady Capulet and Juliet's Nurse try to persuade Juliet to accept Paris's courtship.

Meanwhile, Benvolio talks with his cousin Romeo, Montague's son, about Romeo's recent depression. Benvolio discovers that it stems from unrequited infatuation for a girl named Rosaline, one of Capulet's nieces. Persuaded by Benvolio and Mercutio, Romeo attends the ball at the Capulet house in hopes of meeting Rosaline. However, Romeo instead meets and falls in love with Juliet. Juliet's cousin, Tybalt, is enraged at Romeo for sneaking into the ball but is stopped from killing Romeo by Juliet's father, who does not wish to shed blood in his house. After the ball, in what is now famously known as the "balcony scene", Romeo sneaks into the Capulet orchard and overhears Juliet at her window vowing her love to him in spite of her family's hatred of the Montagues. Romeo makes himself known to her, and they agree to be married. With the help of Friar Laurence, who hopes to reconcile the two families through their children's union, they are secretly married the next day.

Tybalt, meanwhile, still incensed that Romeo had sneaked into the Capulet ball, challenges him to a duel. Romeo, now considering Tybalt his kinsman, refuses to fight. Mercutio is offended by Tybalt's insolence, as well as Romeo's "vile submission", and accepts the duel on Romeo's behalf. Mercutio is fatally wounded when Romeo attempts to break up the fight, and declares a curse upon both households before he dies. ("A plague o' both your houses!") Grief-stricken and racked with guilt, Romeo confronts and slays Tybalt.

Montague argues that Romeo has justly executed Tybalt for the murder of Mercutio. The Prince, now having lost a kinsman in the warring families' feud, exiles Romeo from Verona, under penalty of death if he ever returns. Romeo secretly spends the night in Juliet's chamber, where they consummate their marriage. Capulet, misinterpreting Juliet's grief, agrees to marry her to Count Paris and threatens to disown her when she refuses to become Paris's "joyful bride". When she then pleads for the marriage to be delayed, her mother rejects her.

Juliet visits Friar Laurence for help, and he offers her a potion that will put her into a deathlike coma or catalepsy for "two and forty hours". The Friar promises to send a messenger to inform Romeo of the plan so that he can rejoin her when she awakens. On the night before the wedding, she takes the drug and, when discovered apparently dead, she is laid in the family crypt.

The messenger, however, does not reach Romeo and, instead, Romeo learns of Juliet's apparent death from his servant, Balthasar. Heartbroken, Romeo buys poison from an apothecary and goes to the Capulet crypt. He encounters Paris who has come to mourn Juliet privately. Believing Romeo to be a vandal, Paris confronts him and, in the ensuing battle, Romeo kills Paris. Still believing Juliet to be dead, he drinks the poison. Juliet then awakens and, discovering that Romeo is dead, stabs herself with his dagger and joins him in death. The feuding families and the Prince meet at the tomb to find all three dead. Friar Laurence recounts the story of the two "star-cross'd lovers", fulfilling the curse that Mercutio swore. The families are reconciled by their children's deaths and agree to end their violent feud. The play ends with the Prince's elegy for the lovers: "For never was a story of more woe / Than this of Juliet and her Romeo."

Romeo and Juliet borrows from a tradition of tragic love stories dating back to antiquity. One of these is Pyramus and Thisbe, from Ovid's Metamorphoses, which contains parallels to Shakespeare's story: the lovers' parents despise each other, and Pyramus falsely believes his lover Thisbe is dead. The of Xenophon of Ephesus, written in the 3rd century, also contains several similarities to the play, including the separation of the lovers, and a potion that induces a deathlike sleep.

One of the earliest references to the names Montague and Capulet is from Dante's Divine Comedy, who mentions the Montecchi ( Montagues) and the Cappelletti ( Capulets) in canto six of Purgatorio:

Come and see, you who are negligent,
Montagues and Capulets, Monaldi and Filippeschi
One lot already grieving, the other in fear.

Masuccio Salernitano, author of Mariotto & Ganozza (1476), the earliest known version of Romeo & Juliet tale

However, the reference is part of a polemic against the moral decay of Florence, Lombardy, and the Italian Peninsula as a whole; Dante, through his characters, chastises German King Albert I for neglecting his responsibilities towards Italy ("you who are negligent"), and successive popes for their encroachment from purely spiritual affairs, thus leading to a climate of incessant bickering and warfare between rival political parties in Lombardy. History records the name of the family Montague as being lent to such a political party in Verona, but that of the Capulets as from a Cremonese family, both of whom play out their conflict in Lombardy as a whole rather than within the confines of Verona. Allied to rival political factions, the parties are grieving ("One lot already grieving") because their endless warfare has led to the destruction of both parties, rather than a grief from the loss of their ill-fated offspring as the play sets forth, which appears to be a solely poetic creation within this context.

The earliest known version of the Romeo and Juliet tale akin to Shakespeare's play is the story of Mariotto and Ganozza by Masuccio Salernitano, in the 33rd novel of his Il Novellino published in 1476. Salernitano sets the story in Siena and insists its events took place in his own lifetime. His version of the story includes the secret marriage, the colluding friar, the fray where a prominent citizen is killed, Mariotto's exile, Ganozza's forced marriage, the potion plot, and the crucial message that goes astray. In this version, Mariotto is caught and beheaded and Ganozza dies of grief.

Luigi da Porto (1485-1529) adapted the story as Giulietta e Romeo and included it in his Historia novellamente ritrovata di due nobili amanti (A Newly-Discovered History of two Noble Lovers), written in 1524 and published posthumously in 1531 in Venice. Da Porto drew on Pyramus and Thisbe, Boccaccio's , and Salernitano's Mariotto e Ganozza, but it is likely that his story is also autobiographical: He was a soldier present at a ball on 26 February 1511, at a residence of the pro- Venice Savorgnan clan in Udine, following a peace ceremony attended by the opposing pro- Imperial Strumieri clan. There, Da Porto fell in love with Lucina, a Savorgnan daughter, but the family feud frustrated their courtship. The next morning, the Savorgnans led an attack on the city, and many members of the Strumieri were murdered. Years later, still half-paralyzed from a battle-wound, Luigi wrote Giulietta e Romeo in Montorso Vicentino (from which he could see the "castles" of Verona), dedicating the novella to the bellisima e leggiadra (the beautiful and graceful) Lucina Savorgnan. Da Porto presented his tale as historically factual and claimed it took place at least a century earlier than Salernitano had it, in the days Verona was ruled by Bartolomeo della Scala (anglicized as Prince Escalus).

Title page of Arthur Brooke's poem, Romeus and Juliet

Da Porto presented the narrative in close to its modern form, including the names of the lovers, the rival families of Montecchi and Capuleti (Cappelletti) and the location in Verona. He named the friar Laurence ( frate Lorenzo) and introduced the characters Mercutio ( Marcuccio Guertio), Tybalt ( Tebaldo Cappelletti), Count Paris ( conte (Paride) di Lodrone), the faithful servant, and Giulietta's nurse. Da Porto originated the remaining basic elements of the story: the feuding families, Romeo-left by his mistress-meeting Giulietta at a dance at her house, the love scenes (including the balcony scene), the periods of despair, Romeo killing Giulietta's cousin (Tebaldo), and the families' reconciliation after the lovers' suicides. In da Porto's version, Romeo takes poison and Giulietta keeps her breath until she dies.

In 1554, Matteo Bandello published the second volume of his Novelle, which included his version of Giuletta e Romeo, probably written between 1531 and 1545. Bandello lengthened and weighed down the plot while leaving the storyline basically unchanged (though he did introduce Benvolio). Bandello's story was translated into French by Pierre Boaistuau in 1559 in the first volume of his Histories Tragiques. Boaistuau adds much moralising and sentiment, and the characters indulge in rhetorical outbursts.

In his 1562 narrative poem The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet, Arthur Brooke translated Boaistuau faithfully but adjusted it to reflect parts of Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde. There was a trend among writers and playwrights to publish works based on Italian novelle-Italian tales were very popular among theatre-goers-and Shakespeare may well have been familiar with William Painter's 1567 collection of Italian tales titled Palace of Pleasure. This collection included a version in prose of the Romeo and Juliet story named "The goodly History of the true and constant love of Romeo and Juliett". Shakespeare took advantage of this popularity: The Merchant of Venice, Much Ado About Nothing, All's Well That Ends Well, Measure for Measure, and Romeo and Juliet are all from Italian novelle. Romeo and Juliet is a dramatization of Brooke's translation, and Shakespeare follows the poem closely but adds detail to several major and minor characters (the Nurse and Mercutio in particular).

Christopher Marlowe's Hero and Leander and Dido, Queen of Carthage, both similar stories written in Shakespeare's day, are thought to be less of a direct influence, although they may have helped create an atmosphere in which tragic love stories could thrive.

Date and text

Title page of the first edition

It is unknown when exactly Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet. Juliet's Nurse refers to an earthquake she says occurred 11 years ago. This may refer to the Dover Straits earthquake of 1580, which would date that particular line to 1591. Other earthquakes-both in England and in Verona-have been proposed in support of the different dates. But the play's stylistic similarities with A Midsummer Night's Dream and other plays conventionally dated around 1594-95, place its composition sometime between 1591 and 1595. One conjecture is that Shakespeare may have begun a draft in 1591, which he completed in 1595.

Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet was published in two quarto editions prior to the publication of the First Folio of 1623. These are referred to as Q1 and Q2. The first printed edition, Q1, appeared in early 1597, printed by John Danter. Because its text contains numerous differences from the later editions, it is labelled a so-called ' bad quarto'; the 20th-century editor T. J. B. Spencer described it as "a detestable text, probably a reconstruction of the play from the imperfect memories of one or two of the actors", suggesting that it had been pirated for publication. An alternative explanation for Q1's shortcomings is that the play (like many others of the time) may have been heavily edited before performance by the playing company. However, "the theory, formulated by [Alfred] Pollard," that the 'bad quarto' was "reconstructed from memory by some of the actors is now under attack. Alternative theories are that some or all of 'the bad quartos' are early versions by Shakespeare or abbreviations made either for Shakespeare's company or for other companies." In any event, its appearance in early 1597 makes 1596 the latest possible date for the play's composition.

The title page from the First Folio, printed in 1623

The superior Q2 called the play The Most Excellent and Lamentable Tragedie of Romeo and Juliet. It was printed in 1599 by Thomas Creede and published by Cuthbert Burby. Q2 is about 800 lines longer than Q1. Its title page describes it as "Newly corrected, augmented and amended". Scholars believe that Q2 was based on Shakespeare's pre-performance draft (called his foul papers) since there are textual oddities such as variable tags for characters and "false starts" for speeches that were presumably struck through by the author but erroneously preserved by the typesetter. It is a much more complete and reliable text and was reprinted in 1609 (Q3), 1622 (Q4) and 1637 (Q5). In effect, all later Quartos and Folios of Romeo and Juliet are based on Q2, as are all modern editions since editors believe that any deviations from Q2 in the later editions (whether good or bad) are likely to have arisen from editors or compositors, not from Shakespeare.

The First Folio text of 1623 was based primarily on Q3, with clarifications and corrections possibly coming from a theatrical prompt book or Q1. Other Folio editions of the play were printed in 1632 (F2), 1664 (F3), and 1685 (F4). Modern versions-that take into account several of the Folios and Quartos-first appeared with Nicholas Rowe's 1709 edition, followed by Alexander Pope's 1723 version. Pope began a tradition of editing the play to add information such as stage directions missing in Q2 by locating them in Q1. This tradition continued late into the Romantic period. Fully annotated editions first appeared in the Victorian period and continue to be produced today, printing the text of the play with footnotes describing the sources and culture behind the play.

Themes and motifs

Scholars have found it extremely difficult to assign one specific, overarching theme to the play. Proposals for a main theme include a discovery by the characters that human beings are neither wholly good nor wholly evil, but instead are more or less alike, awaking out of a dream and into reality, the danger of hasty action, or the power of tragic fate. None of these have widespread support. However, even if an overall theme cannot be found it is clear that the play is full of several small thematic elements that intertwine in complex ways. Several of those most often debated by scholars are discussed below.

" Romeo
If I profane with my unworthiest hand
This holy shrine, the gentle sin is this:
My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.
Juliet
Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
Which mannerly devotion shows in this;
For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss."

Romeo and Juliet is sometimes considered to have no unifying theme, save that of young love. Romeo and Juliet have become emblematic of young lovers and doomed love. Since it is such an obvious subject of the play, several scholars have explored the language and historical context behind the romance of the play.

On their first meeting, Romeo and Juliet use a form of communication recommended by many etiquette authors in Shakespeare's day: metaphor. By using metaphors of saints and sins, Romeo was able to test Juliet's feelings for him in a non-threatening way. This method was recommended by Baldassare Castiglione (whose works had been translated into English by this time). He pointed out that if a man used a metaphor as an invitation, the woman could pretend she did not understand him, and he could retreat without losing honour. Juliet, however, participates in the metaphor and expands on it. The religious metaphors of "shrine", "pilgrim", and "saint" were fashionable in the poetry of the time and more likely to be understood as romantic rather than blasphemous, as the concept of sainthood was associated with the Catholicism of an earlier age. Later in the play, Shakespeare removes the more daring allusions to Christ's resurrection in the tomb he found in his source work: Brooke's Romeus and Juliet.

Watercolor by John Masey Wright of Act II, Scene ii (the balcony scene).

In the later balcony scene, Shakespeare has Romeo overhear Juliet's soliloquy, but in Brooke's version of the story, her declaration is done alone. By bringing Romeo into the scene to eavesdrop, Shakespeare breaks from the normal sequence of courtship. Usually, a woman was required to be modest and shy to make sure that her suitor was sincere, but breaking this rule serves to speed along the plot. The lovers are able to skip courting and move on to plain talk about their relationship-agreeing to be married after knowing each other for only one night. In the final suicide scene, there is a contradiction in the message-in the Catholic religion, suicides were often thought to be condemned to Hell, whereas people who die to be with their loves under the " Religion of Love" are joined with their loves in Paradise. Romeo and Juliet's love seems to be expressing the "Religion of Love" view rather than the Catholic view. Another point is that, although their love is passionate, it is only consummated in marriage, which keeps them from losing the audience's sympathy.

The play arguably equates love and sex with death. Throughout the story, both Romeo and Juliet, along with the other characters, fantasise about it as a dark being, often equating it with a lover. Capulet, for example, when he first discovers Juliet's (faked) death, describes it as having deflowered his daughter. Juliet later erotically compares Romeo and death. Right before her suicide, she grabs Romeo's dagger, saying "O happy dagger! This is thy sheath. There rust, and let me die."

Fate and chance

"O, I am fortune's fool!"

Scholars are divided on the role of fate in the play. No consensus exists on whether the characters are truly fated to die together or whether the events take place by a series of unlucky chances. Arguments in favour of fate often refer to the description of the lovers as " star-cross'd". This phrase seems to hint that the stars have predetermined the lovers' future. John W. Draper points out the parallels between the Elizabethan belief in the four humours and the main characters of the play (for example, Tybalt as a choleric). Interpreting the text in the light of humours reduces the amount of plot attributed to chance by modern audiences. Still, other scholars see the play as a series of unlucky chances-many to such a degree that they do not see it as a tragedy at all, but an emotional melodrama. Ruth Nevo believes the high degree to which chance is stressed in the narrative makes Romeo and Juliet a "lesser tragedy" of happenstance, not of character. For example, Romeo's challenging Tybalt is not impulsive; it is, after Mercutio's death, the expected action to take. In this scene, Nevo reads Romeo as being aware of the dangers of flouting social norms, identity, and commitments. He makes the choice to kill, not because of a tragic flaw, but because of circumstance.

Duality (light and dark)

"O brawling love, O loving hate,
O any thing of nothing first create!
O heavy lightness, serious vanity,
Misshapen chaos of well-seeming forms,
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health,
Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!"

Scholars have long noted Shakespeare's widespread use of light and dark imagery throughout the play. Caroline Spurgeon considers the theme of light as "symbolic of the natural beauty of young love" and later critics have expanded on this interpretation. For example, both Romeo and Juliet see the other as light in a surrounding darkness. Romeo describes Juliet as being like the sun, brighter than a torch, a jewel sparkling in the night, and a bright angel among dark clouds. Even when she lies apparently dead in the tomb, he says her "beauty makes / This vault a feasting presence full of light." Juliet describes Romeo as "day in night" and "Whiter than snow upon a raven's back." This contrast of light and dark can be expanded as symbols-contrasting love and hate, youth and age in a metaphoric way. Sometimes these intertwining metaphors create dramatic irony. For example, Romeo and Juliet's love is a light in the midst of the darkness of the hate around them, but all of their activity together is done in night and darkness while all of the feuding is done in broad daylight. This paradox of imagery adds atmosphere to the moral dilemma facing the two lovers: loyalty to family or loyalty to love. At the end of the story, when the morning is gloomy and the sun hiding its face for sorrow, light and dark have returned to their proper places, the outward darkness reflecting the true, inner darkness of the family feud out of sorrow for the lovers. All characters now recognise their folly in light of recent events, and things return to the natural order, thanks to the love and death of Romeo and Juliet. The "light" theme in the play is also heavily connected to the theme of time since light was a convenient way for Shakespeare to express the passage of time through descriptions of the sun, moon, and stars.

"These times of woe afford no time to woo."

Time plays an important role in the language and plot of the play. Both Romeo and Juliet struggle to maintain an imaginary world void of time in the face of the harsh realities that surround them. For instance, when Romeo swears his love to Juliet by the moon, she protests "O swear not by the moon, th'inconstant moon, / That monthly changes in her circled orb, / Lest that thy love prove likewise variable." From the very beginning, the lovers are designated as "star-cross'd" referring to an astrologic belief associated with time. Stars were thought to control the fates of humanity, and as time passed, stars would move along their course in the sky, also charting the course of human lives below. Romeo speaks of a foreboding he feels in the stars' movements early in the play, and when he learns of Juliet's death, he defies the stars' course for him.

Another central theme is haste: Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet spans a period of four to six days, in contrast to Brooke's poems spanning nine months. Scholars such as G. Thomas Tanselle believe that time was "especially important to Shakespeare" in this play, as he used references to "short-time" for the young lovers as opposed to references to "long-time" for the "older generation" to highlight "a headlong rush towards doom". Romeo and Juliet fight time to make their love last forever. In the end, the only way they seem to defeat time is through a death that makes them immortal through art.

Time is also connected to the theme of light and dark. In Shakespeare's day, plays were most often performed at noon or in the afternoon in broad daylight. This forced the playwright to use words to create the illusion of day and night in his plays. Shakespeare uses references to the night and day, the stars, the moon, and the sun to create this illusion. He also has characters frequently refer to days of the week and specific hours to help the audience understand that time has passed in the story. All in all, no fewer than 103 references to time are found in the play, adding to the illusion of its passage.

Criticism and interpretation

Critical history

Portrait of the earliest recorded critic of the play, Samuel Pepys, by John Hayls. Oil on canvas, 1666.

The earliest known critic of the play was diarist Samuel Pepys, who wrote in 1662: "it is a play of itself the worst that I ever heard in my life." Poet John Dryden wrote 10 years later in praise of the play and its comic character Mercutio: "Shakespear show'd the best of his skill in his Mercutio, and he said himself, that he was forc'd to kill him in the third Act, to prevent being killed by him." Criticism of the play in the 18th century was less sparse but no less divided. Publisher Nicholas Rowe was the first critic to ponder the theme of the play, which he saw as the just punishment of the two feuding families. In mid-century, writer Charles Gildon and philosopher Lord Kames argued that the play was a failure in that it did not follow the classical rules of drama: the tragedy must occur because of some character flaw, not an accident of fate. Writer and critic Samuel Johnson, however, considered it one of Shakespeare's "most pleasing" plays.

In the later part of the 18th and through the 19th century, criticism centred on debates over the moral message of the play. Actor and playwright David Garrick's 1748 adaptation excluded Rosaline: Romeo abandoning her for Juliet was seen as fickle and reckless. Critics such as Charles Dibdin argued that Rosaline had been included in the play in order to show how reckless the hero was and that this was the reason for his tragic end. Others argued that Friar Laurence might be Shakespeare's spokesman in his warnings against undue haste. At the beginning of the 20th century, these moral arguments were disputed by critics such as Richard Green Moulton: he argued that accident, and not some character flaw, led to the lovers' deaths.

Dramatic structure

In Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare employs several dramatic techniques that have garnered praise from critics, most notably the abrupt shifts from comedy to tragedy (an example is the punning exchange between Benvolio and Mercutio just before Tybalt arrives). Before Mercutio's death in Act III, the play is largely a comedy. After his accidental demise, the play suddenly becomes serious and takes on a tragic tone. When Romeo is banished, rather than executed, and Friar Laurence offers Juliet a plan to reunite her with Romeo, the audience can still hope that all will end well. They are in a "breathless state of suspense" by the opening of the last scene in the tomb: If Romeo is delayed long enough for the Friar to arrive, he and Juliet may yet be saved. These shifts from hope to despair, reprieve, and new hope serve to emphasise the tragedy when the final hope fails and both the lovers die at the end.

Shakespeare also uses sub-plots to offer a clearer view of the actions of the main characters. For example, when the play begins, Romeo is in love with Rosaline, who has refused all of his advances. Romeo's infatuation with her stands in obvious contrast to his later love for Juliet. This provides a comparison through which the audience can see the seriousness of Romeo and Juliet's love and marriage. Paris' love for Juliet also sets up a contrast between Juliet's feelings for him and her feelings for Romeo. The formal language she uses around Paris, as well as the way she talks about him to her Nurse, show that her feelings clearly lie with Romeo. Beyond this, the sub-plot of the Montague-Capulet feud overarches the whole play, providing an atmosphere of hate that is the main contributor to the play's tragic end.

Shakespeare uses a variety of poetic forms throughout the play. He begins with a 14-line prologue in the form of a Shakespearean sonnet, spoken by a Chorus. Most of Romeo and Juliet is, however, written in blank verse, and much of it in strict iambic pentameter, with less rhythmic variation than in most of Shakespeare's later plays. In choosing forms, Shakespeare matches the poetry to the character who uses it. Friar Laurence, for example, uses sermon and sententiae forms and the Nurse uses a unique blank verse form that closely matches colloquial speech. Each of these forms is also moulded and matched to the emotion of the scene the character occupies. For example, when Romeo talks about Rosaline earlier in the play, he attempts to use the Petrarchan sonnet form. Petrarchan sonnets were often used by men to exaggerate the beauty of women who were impossible for them to attain, as in Romeo's situation with Rosaline. This sonnet form is used by Lady Capulet to describe Count Paris to Juliet as a handsome man. When Romeo and Juliet meet, the poetic form changes from the Petrarchan (which was becoming archaic in Shakespeare's day) to a then more contemporary sonnet form, using "pilgrims" and "saints" as metaphors. Finally, when the two meet on the balcony, Romeo attempts to use the sonnet form to pledge his love, but Juliet breaks it by saying "Dost thou love me?" By doing this, she searches for true expression, rather than a poetic exaggeration of their love. Juliet uses monosyllabic words with Romeo but uses formal language with Paris. Other forms in the play include an epithalamium by Juliet, a rhapsody in Mercutio's Queen Mab speech, and an elegy by Paris. Shakespeare saves his prose style most often for the common people in the play, though at times he uses it for other characters, such as Mercutio. Humour, also, is important: scholar Molly Mahood identifies at least 175 puns and wordplays in the text. Many of these jokes are sexual in nature, especially those involving Mercutio and the Nurse.

Psychoanalytic criticism

Early psychoanalytic critics saw the problem of Romeo and Juliet in terms of Romeo's impulsiveness, deriving from "ill-controlled, partially disguised aggression", which leads both to Mercutio's death and to the double suicide. Romeo and Juliet is not considered to be exceedingly psychologically complex, and sympathetic psychoanalytic readings of the play make the tragic male experience equivalent with sicknesses. Norman Holland, writing in 1966, considers Romeo's dream as a realistic "wish fulfilling fantasy both in terms of Romeo's adult world and his hypothetical childhood at stages oral, phallic and oedipal" - while acknowledging that a dramatic character is not a human being with mental processes separate from those of the author. Critics such as Julia Kristeva focus on the hatred between the families, arguing that this hatred is the cause of Romeo and Juliet's passion for each other. That hatred manifests itself directly in the lovers' language: Juliet, for example, speaks of "my only love sprung from my only hate" and often expresses her passion through an anticipation of Romeo's death. This leads on to speculation as to the playwright's psychology, in particular to a consideration of Shakespeare's grief for the death of his son, Hamnet.

Feminist criticism

Feminist literary critics argue that the blame for the family feud lies in Verona's patriarchal society. For Coppélia Kahn, for example, the strict, masculine code of violence imposed on Romeo is the main force driving the tragedy to its end. When Tybalt kills Mercutio, Romeo shifts into a violent mode, regretting that Juliet has made him so "effeminate". In this view, the younger males "become men" by engaging in violence on behalf of their fathers, or in the case of the servants, their masters. The feud is also linked to male virility, as the numerous jokes about maidenheads aptly demonstrate. Juliet also submits to a female code of docility by allowing others, such as the Friar, to solve her problems for her. Other critics, such as Dympna Callaghan, look at the play's feminism from a historicist angle, stressing that when the play was written the feudal order was being challenged by increasingly centralised government and the advent of capitalism. At the same time, emerging Puritan ideas about marriage were less concerned with the "evils of female sexuality" than those of earlier eras and more sympathetic towards love-matches: when Juliet dodges her father's attempt to force her to marry a man she has no feeling for, she is challenging the patriarchal order in a way that would not have been possible at an earlier time.

Queer theory

The playbill from a 1753 production at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane starring David Garrick

A number of critics have found the character of Mercutio to have unacknowledged homoerotic desire for Romeo. Jonathan Goldberg examined the sexuality of Mercutio and Romeo utilising queer theory in Queering the Renaissance (1994), comparing their friendship with sexual love. Mercutio, in friendly conversation, mentions Romeo's phallus, suggesting traces of homoeroticism. An example is his joking wish "To raise a spirit in his mistress' circle ... letting it there stand / Till she had laid it and conjured it down." Romeo's homoeroticism can also be found in his attitude to Rosaline, a woman who is distant and unavailable and brings no hope of offspring. As Benvolio argues, she is best replaced by someone who will reciprocate. Shakespeare's procreation sonnets describe another young man who, like Romeo, is having trouble creating offspring and who may be seen as being a homosexual. Goldberg believes that Shakespeare may have used Rosaline as a way to express homosexual problems of procreation in an acceptable way. In this view, when Juliet says "...that which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet", she may be raising the question of whether there is any difference between the beauty of a man and the beauty of a woman.

The balcony scene

The balcony scene was introduced by Da Porto in 1524. He had Romeo walk frequently by her house, "sometimes climbing to her chamber window", and wrote, "It happened one night, as love ordained, when the moon shone unusually bright, that whilst Romeo was climbing the balcony, the young lady ... opened the window, and looking out saw him". After this they have a conversation in which they declare eternal love to each other. A few decades later, Bandello greatly expanded this scene, diverging from the familiar one: Julia has her nurse deliver a letter asking Romeo to come to her window with a rope ladder, and he climbs the balcony with the help of his servant, Julia and the nurse (the servants discreetly withdraw after this).

Nevertheless, in October 2014, Lois Leveen pointed out in The Atlantic that the original Shakespeare play did not contain a balcony; it just says that Juliet appears at a window. The word balcone is not known to have existed in the English language until two years after Shakespeare's death. The balcony was certainly used in Thomas Otway's 1679 play, The History and Fall of Caius Marius, which had borrowed much of its story from Romeo and Juliet and placed the two lovers in a balcony reciting a speech similar to that between Romeo and Juliet. Leveen suggested that during the 18th century, David Garrick chose to use a balcony in his adaptation and revival of Romeo and Juliet and modern adaptations have continued this tradition.

Shakespeare's day

Richard Burbage, probably the first actor to portray Romeo

Romeo and Juliet ranks with as one of Shakespeare's most performed plays. Its many adaptations have made it one of his most enduring and famous stories. Even in Shakespeare's lifetime, it was extremely popular. Scholar Gary Taylor measures it as the sixth most popular of Shakespeare's plays, in the period after the death of Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Kyd but before the ascendancy of Ben Jonson during which Shakespeare was London's dominant playwright. The date of the first performance is unknown. The First Quarto, printed in 1597, reads "it hath been often (and with great applause) plaid publiquely", setting the first performance before that date. The Lord Chamberlain's Men were certainly the first to perform it. Besides their strong connections with Shakespeare, the Second Quarto actually names one of its actors, Will Kemp, instead of Peter, in a line in Act V. Richard Burbage was probably the first Romeo, being the company's chief tragedian; and Master Robert Goffe (a boy), the first Juliet. The premiere is likely to have been at The Theatre, with other early productions at the Curtain. Romeo and Juliet is one of the first Shakespeare plays to have been performed outside England: a shortened and simplified version was performed in Nördlingen in 1604.

Restoration and 18th-century theatre

All theatres were closed down by the puritan government on 6 September 1642. Upon the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, two patent companies (the King's Company and the Duke's Company) were established, and the existing theatrical repertoire was divided between them.

Mary Saunderson, probably the first woman to play Juliet professionally

Sir William Davenant of the Duke's Company staged a 1662 adaptation in which Henry Harris played Romeo, Thomas Betterton Mercutio, and Betterton's wife Mary Saunderson Juliet: she was probably the first woman to play the role professionally. Another version closely followed Davenant's adaptation and was also regularly performed by the Duke's Company. This was a tragicomedy by James Howard, in which the two lovers survive.

Thomas Otway's The History and Fall of Caius Marius, one of the more extreme of the Restoration adaptations of Shakespeare, debuted in 1680. The scene is shifted from Renaissance Verona to ancient Rome; Romeo is Marius, Juliet is Lavinia, the feud is between patricians and plebeians; Juliet/Lavinia wakes from her potion before Romeo/Marius dies. Otway's version was a hit, and was acted for the next seventy years. His innovation in the closing scene was even more enduring, and was used in adaptations throughout the next 200 years: Theophilus Cibber's adaptation of 1744, and David Garrick's of 1748 both used variations on it. These versions also eliminated elements deemed inappropriate at the time. For example, Garrick's version transferred all language describing Rosaline to Juliet, to heighten the idea of faithfulness and downplay the love-at-first-sight theme. In 1750, a "Battle of the Romeos" began, with Spranger Barry and Susannah Maria Arne (Mrs. Theophilus Cibber) at Covent Garden versus David Garrick and George Anne Bellamy at Drury Lane.

The earliest known production in North America was an amateur one: on 23 March 1730, a physician named Joachimus Bertrand placed an advertisement in the Gazette newspaper in New York, promoting a production in which he would play the apothecary. The first professional performances of the play in North America were those of the Hallam Company.

19th-century theatre

The American Cushman sisters, Charlotte and Susan, as Romeo and Juliet in 1846

Garrick's altered version of the play was very popular, and ran for nearly a century. Not until 1845 did Shakespeare's original return to the stage in the United States with the sisters Susan and Charlotte Cushman as Juliet and Romeo, respectively, and then in 1847 in Britain with Samuel Phelps at Sadler's Wells Theatre. Cushman adhered to Shakespeare's version, beginning a string of eighty-four performances. Her portrayal of Romeo was considered genius by many. wrote: "For a long time Romeo has been a convention. Miss Cushman's Romeo is a creative, a living, breathing, animated, ardent human being." Queen Victoria wrote in her journal that "no-one would ever have imagined she was a woman". Cushman's success broke the Garrick tradition and paved the way for later performances to return to the original storyline.

Professional performances of Shakespeare in the mid-19th century had two particular features: firstly, they were generally star vehicles, with supporting roles cut or marginalised to give greater prominence to the central characters. Secondly, they were "pictorial", placing the action on spectacular and elaborate sets (requiring lengthy pauses for scene changes) and with the frequent use of tableaux. Henry Irving's 1882 production at the Lyceum Theatre (with himself as Romeo and Ellen Terry as Juliet) is considered an archetype of the pictorial style. In 1895, Sir Johnston Forbes-Robertson took over from Irving and laid the groundwork for a more natural portrayal of Shakespeare that remains popular today. Forbes-Robertson avoided the showiness of Irving and instead portrayed a down-to-earth Romeo, expressing the poetic dialogue as realistic prose and avoiding melodramatic flourish.

American actors began to rival their British counterparts. Edwin Booth (brother to John Wilkes Booth) and Mary McVicker (soon to be Edwin's wife) opened as Romeo and Juliet at the sumptuous Booth's Theatre (with its European-style stage machinery, and an air conditioning system unique in New York) on 3 February 1869. Some reports said it was one of the most elaborate productions of Romeo and Juliet ever seen in America; it was certainly the most popular, running for over six weeks and earning over $60,000 (equivalent to $1,000,000 in 2022). The programme noted that: "The tragedy will be produced in strict accordance with historical propriety, in every respect, following closely the text of Shakespeare."

The first professional performance of the play in Japan may have been George Crichton Miln's company's production, which toured to Yokohama in 1890. Throughout the 19th century, Romeo and Juliet had been Shakespeare's most popular play, measured by the number of professional performances. In the 20th century it would become the second most popular, behind .

20th-century theatre

In 1933, the play was revived by actress Katharine Cornell and her director husband Guthrie McClintic and was taken on a seven-month nationwide tour throughout the United States. It starred Orson Welles, Brian Aherne and Basil Rathbone. The production was a modest success, and so upon the return to New York, Cornell and McClintic revised it, and for the first time the play was presented with almost all the scenes intact, including the Prologue. The new production opened on Broadway in December 1934. Critics wrote that Cornell was "the greatest Juliet of her time", "endlessly haunting", and "the most lovely and enchanting Juliet our present-day theatre has seen".

John Gielgud, who was among the more famous 20th-century actors to play Romeo, Friar Laurence and Mercutio on stage

John Gielgud's New Theatre production in 1935 featured Gielgud and Laurence Olivier as Romeo and Mercutio, exchanging roles six weeks into the run, with Peggy Ashcroft as Juliet. Gielgud used a scholarly combination of Q1 and Q2 texts and organised the set and costumes to match as closely as possible the Elizabethan period. His efforts were a huge success at the box office, and set the stage for increased historical realism in later productions. Olivier later compared his performance and Gielgud's: "John, all spiritual, all spirituality, all beauty, all abstract things; and myself as all earth, blood, humanity ... I've always felt that John missed the lower half and that made me go for the other ... But whatever it was, when I was playing Romeo I was carrying a torch, I was trying to sell realism in Shakespeare."

Peter Brook's 1947 version was the beginning of a different style of Romeo and Juliet performances. Brook was less concerned with realism, and more concerned with translating the play into a form that could communicate with the modern world. He argued, "A production is only correct at the moment of its correctness, and only good at the moment of its success." Brook excluded the final reconciliation of the families from his performance text.

Throughout the century, audiences, influenced by the cinema, became less willing to accept actors distinctly older than the teenage characters they were playing. A significant example of more youthful casting was in Franco Zeffirelli's Old Vic production in 1960, with John Stride and Judi Dench, which would serve as the basis for his 1968 film. Zeffirelli borrowed from Brook's ideas, altogether removing around a third of the play's text to make it more accessible. In an interview with , he stated that the play's "twin themes of love and the total breakdown of understanding between two generations" had contemporary relevance.

Recent performances often set the play in the contemporary world. For example, in 1986, the Royal Shakespeare Company set the play in modern Verona. Switchblades replaced swords, feasts and balls became drug-laden rock parties, and Romeo committed suicide by hypodermic needle. Neil Bartlett's production of Romeo and Juliet themed the play very contemporary with a cinematic look which started its life at the Lyric Hammersmith, London then went to West Yorkshire Playhouse for an exclusive run in 1995. The cast included Emily Woof as Juliet, Stuart Bunce as Romeo, Sebastian Harcombe as Mercutio, Ashley Artus as Tybalt, Souad Faress as Lady Capulet and Silas Carson as Paris. In 1997, the Folger Shakespeare Theatre produced a version set in a typical suburban world. Romeo sneaks into the Capulet barbecue to meet Juliet, and Juliet discovers Tybalt's death while in class at school.

The play is sometimes given a historical setting, enabling audiences to reflect on the underlying conflicts. For example, adaptations have been set in the midst of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, in the apartheid era in South Africa, and in the aftermath of the Pueblo Revolt. Similarly, Peter Ustinov's 1956 comic adaptation, Romanoff and Juliet, is set in a fictional mid-European country in the depths of the Cold War. A mock-Victorian revisionist version of Romeo and Juliet's final scene (with a happy ending, Romeo, Juliet, Mercutio, and Paris restored to life, and Benvolio revealing that he is Paris's love, Benvolia, in disguise) forms part of the 1980 stage-play The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby. Shakespeare's R&J, by Joe Calarco, spins the classic in a modern tale of gay teenage awakening. A recent comedic musical adaptation was The Second City's Romeo and Juliet Musical: The People vs. Friar Laurence, the Man Who Killed Romeo and Juliet, set in modern times.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, Romeo and Juliet has often been the choice of Shakespeare plays to open a classical theatre company, beginning with Edwin Booth's inaugural production of that play in his theatre in 1869, the newly re-formed company of the Old Vic in 1929 with John Gielgud, Martita Hunt, and Margaret Webster, as well as the Riverside Shakespeare Company in its founding production in New York City in 1977, which used the 1968 film of Franco Zeffirelli's production as its inspiration.

21st-century theatre

In 2013, Romeo and Juliet ran on Broadway at Richard Rodgers Theatre from 19 September to 8 December for 93 regular performances after 27 previews starting on 24 August with Orlando Bloom and Condola Rashad in the starring roles.

The best-known ballet version is Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet. Originally commissioned by the Kirov Ballet, it was rejected by them when Prokofiev attempted a happy ending and was rejected again for the experimental nature of its music. It has subsequently attained an "immense" reputation, and has been choreographed by John Cranko (1962) and Kenneth MacMillan (1965) among others.

In 1977, Michael Smuin's production of one of the play's most dramatic and impassioned dance interpretations was debuted in its entirety by San Francisco Ballet. This production was the first full-length ballet to be broadcast by the PBS series " Great Performances: Dance in America"; it aired in 1978.

Dada Masilo, a South African dancer and choreographer, reinterpreted Romeo and Juliet in a new modern light. She introduced changes to the story, notably that of presenting the two families as multiracial.

"Romeo loved Juliet
Juliet, she felt the same
When he put his arms around her
He said Julie, baby, you're my flame
Thou givest fever ..."

At least 24 operas have been based on Romeo and Juliet. The earliest, Romeo und Julie in 1776, a Singspiel by Georg Benda, omits much of the action of the play and most of its characters and has a happy ending. It is occasionally revived. The best-known is Gounod's 1867 Roméo et Juliette (libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré), a critical triumph when first performed and frequently revived today. Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi is also revived from time to time, but has sometimes been judged unfavourably because of its perceived liberties with Shakespeare; however, Bellini and his librettist, Felice Romani, worked from Italian sources-principally Romani's libretto for Giulietta e Romeo by Nicola Vaccai-rather than directly adapting Shakespeare's play. Among later operas, there is Heinrich Sutermeister's 1940 work Romeo und Julia.

Roméo et Juliette by Berlioz is a "symphonie dramatique", a large-scale work in three parts for mixed voices, chorus, and orchestra, which premiered in 1839. Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet Fantasy-Overture (1869, revised 1870 and 1880) is a 20-minute symphonic poem, containing the famous melody known as the "love theme". Tchaikovsky's device of repeating the same musical theme at the ball, in the balcony scene, in Juliet's bedroom and in the tomb has been used by subsequent directors: for example, Nino Rota's love theme is used in a similar way in the 1968 film of the play, as is Des'ree's " Kissing You" in the 1996 film. Other classical composers influenced by the play include Henry Hugh Pearson ( Romeo and Juliet, overture for orchestra, Op. 86), Svendsen ( Romeo og Julie, 1876), Delius (A Village Romeo and Juliet, 1899-1901), Stenhammar ( Romeo och Julia, 1922), and Kabalevsky ( Incidental Music to Romeo and Juliet, Op. 56, 1956).

The play influenced several jazz works, including Peggy Lee's " Fever". Duke Ellington's Such Sweet Thunder contains a piece entitled "The Star-Crossed Lovers" in which the pair are represented by tenor and alto saxophones: critics noted that Juliet's sax dominates the piece, rather than offering an image of equality. The play has frequently influenced popular music, including works by The Supremes, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Waits, Lou Reed, and Taylor Swift. The most famous such track is Dire Straits' " Romeo and Juliet".

The most famous musical theatre adaptation is West Side Story with music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. It débuted on Broadway in 1957 and in the West End in 1958 and was twice adapted as popular films in 1961 and in 2021. This version updated the setting to mid-20th-century New York City and the warring families to ethnic gangs. Other musical adaptations include Terrence Mann's 1999 rock musical William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, co-written with Jerome Korman; Gérard Presgurvic's 2001 Roméo et Juliette, de la Haine à l'Amour; Riccardo Cocciante's 2007 Giulietta & Romeo and Johan Christher Schütz; and Johan Petterssons's 2013 adaptation Carnival Tale (Tivolisaga), which takes place at a travelling carnival.

Literature and art

Romeo and Juliet had a profound influence on subsequent literature. Before then, romance had not even been viewed as a worthy topic for tragedy. In Harold Bloom's words, Shakespeare "invented the formula that the sexual becomes the erotic when crossed by the shadow of death". Of Shakespeare's works, Romeo and Juliet has generated the most-and the most varied-adaptations, including prose and verse narratives, drama, opera, orchestral and choral music, ballet, film, television, and painting. The word "Romeo" has even become synonymous with "male lover" in English.

Romeo and Juliet was parodied in Shakespeare's own lifetime: Henry Porter's Two Angry Women of Abingdon (1598) and Thomas Dekker's Blurt, Master Constable (1607) both contain balcony scenes in which a virginal heroine engages in bawdy wordplay. The play directly influenced later literary works. For example, the preparations for a performance form a major plot in Charles Dickens' Nicholas Nickleby.

Romeo and Juliet is one of Shakespeare's most-illustrated works. The first known illustration was a woodcut of the tomb scene,[182] thought to be created by Elisha Kirkall, which appeared in Nicholas Rowe's 1709 edition of Shakespeare's plays. Five paintings of the play were commissioned for the Boydell Shakespeare Gallery in the late 18th century, one representing each of the five acts of the play. Early in the 19th century, Henry Thomson painted Juliet after the Masquerade, an engraving. of which was published in The Literary Souvenir, 1828, with an accompanying poem by Letitia Elizabeth Landon. The 19th-century fashion for "pictorial" performances led to directors' drawing on paintings for their inspiration, which, in turn, influenced painters to depict actors and scenes from the theatre. In the 20th century, the play's most iconic visual images have derived from its popular film versions.

David Blixt's 2007 novel The Master Of Verona imagines the origins of the famous Capulet-Montague feud, combining the characters from Shakespeare's Italian plays with the historical figures of Dante's time. Blixt's subsequent novels Voice Of The Falconer (2010), Fortune's Fool (2012), and The Prince's Doom (2014) continue to explore the world, following the life of Mercutio as he comes of age. More tales from Blixt's Star-Cross'd series appear in Varnished Faces: Star-Cross'd Short Stories (2015) and the plague anthology, We All Fall Down (2020). Blixt also authored Shakespeare's Secrets: Romeo & Juliet (2018), a collection of essays on the history of Shakespeare's play in performance, in which Blixt asserts the play is structurally not a Tragedy, but a Comedy-Gone-Wrong. In 2014 Blixt and his wife, stage director Janice L Blixt, were guests of the city of Verona, Italy for the launch of the Italian language edition of The Master Of Verona, staying with Dante's descendants and filmmaker Anna Lerario, with whom Blixt collaborated on a film about the life of Veronese prince Cangrande della Scala.

Lois Leveen's 2014 novel Juliet's Nurse imagined the fourteen years leading up to the events in the play from the point of view of the nurse. The nurse has the third largest number of lines in the original play; only the eponymous characters have more lines.

The play was the subject of a 2017 General Certificate of Secondary Education ( GCSE) question by the Oxford, Cambridge and RSA Examinations board that was administered to c.  14000 students. The board attracted widespread media criticism and derision after the question appeared to confuse the Capulets and the Montagues, with exams regulator Ofqual describing the error as unacceptable.

Romeo and Juliet was adapted into manga format by publisher UDON Entertainment's Manga Classics imprint and was released in May 2018.

Romeo and Juliet may be the most-filmed play of all time. The most notable theatrical releases were George Cukor's multi- Oscar-nominated 1936 production, Franco Zeffirelli's 1968 version, and Baz Luhrmann's 1996 MTV-inspired Romeo + Juliet. The latter two were both, in their time, the highest-grossing Shakespeare film ever. Romeo and Juliet was first filmed in the silent era, by Georges Méliès, although his film is now lost. The play was first heard on film in The Hollywood Revue of 1929, in which John Gilbert recited the balcony scene opposite Norma Shearer.

Leslie Howard as Romeo and Norma Shearer as Juliet, in the 1936 MGM film directed by George Cukor

Shearer and Leslie Howard, with a combined age over 75, played the teenage lovers in George Cukor's MGM 1936 film version. Neither critics nor the public responded enthusiastically. Cinema-goers considered the film too "arty", staying away as they had from Warner's A Midsummer Night's Dream a year before: leading to Hollywood abandoning the Bard for over a decade. Renato Castellani won the at the Venice Film Festival for his 1954 film of Romeo and Juliet. His Romeo, Laurence Harvey, was already an experienced screen actor. By contrast, Susan Shentall, as Juliet, was a secretarial student who was discovered by the director in a London pub and was cast for her "pale sweet skin and honey-blonde hair".

Stephen Orgel describes Franco Zeffirelli's 1968 Romeo and Juliet as being "full of beautiful young people, and the camera and the lush technicolour make the most of their sexual energy and good looks". Zeffirelli's teenage leads, Leonard Whiting and Olivia Hussey, had virtually no previous acting experience but performed capably and with great maturity. Zeffirelli has been particularly praised, for his presentation of the duel scene as bravado getting out-of-control. The film courted controversy by including a nude wedding-night scene while Olivia Hussey was only fifteen.

Baz Luhrmann's 1996 Romeo + Juliet and its accompanying soundtrack successfully targeted the " MTV Generation": a young audience of similar age to the story's characters. Far darker than Zeffirelli's version, the film is set in the "crass, violent and superficial society" of Verona Beach and Sycamore Grove. Leonardo DiCaprio was Romeo and Claire Danes was Juliet.

The play has been widely adapted for TV and film. In 1960, Peter Ustinov's cold-war stage parody, Romanoff and Juliet was filmed. The 1961 film West Side Story-set among New York gangs-featured the Jets as white youths, equivalent to Shakespeare's Montagues, while the Sharks, equivalent to the Capulets, are Puerto Rican. In 2006, Disney's High School Musical made use of Romeo and Juliet's plot, placing the two young lovers in different high-school cliques instead of feuding families. Film-makers have frequently featured characters performing scenes from Romeo and Juliet. The conceit of dramatising Shakespeare writing Romeo and Juliet has been used several times, including John Madden's 1998 Shakespeare in Love, in which Shakespeare writes the play against the backdrop of his own doomed love affair. An anime series produced by Gonzo and SKY Perfect Well Think, called Romeo x Juliet, was made in 2007 and the 2013 version is the latest English-language film based on the play. In 2013, Sanjay Leela Bhansali directed the Bollywood film Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela, a contemporary version of the play which starred Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone in leading roles. The film was a commercial and critical success. In February 2014, BroadwayHD released a filmed version of the 2013 Broadway Revival of Romeo and Juliet. The production starred Orlando Bloom and Condola Rashad.

Modern social media and virtual world productions

In April and May 2010, the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Mudlark Production Company presented a version of the play, entitled Such Tweet Sorrow, as an improvised, real-time series of tweets on Twitter. The production used RSC actors who engaged with the audience as well each other, performing not from a traditional script but a "Grid" developed by the Mudlark production team and writers Tim Wright and Bethan Marlow. The performers also make use of other media sites such as YouTube for pictures and video.

Two of Uranus's moons, Juliet and Mab, are named for the play.

Scene by scene

Notes and references

1. ^ Levenson defines "star-cross'd" as "thwarted by a malign star".

2. When performed in the central yard of an inn and in public theaters such as the ^ Globe Theatre the only source of lighting was daylight. When performed at Court, inside the stately home of a member of the nobility and in indoor theaters such as the Blackfriars theatre candle lighting was used and plays could be performed even at night.

3. The five more popular plays, in descending order, are ^ Henry VI, Part 1, Richard III, Pericles, Hamlet and Richard II.

4. 1634-1699: ^ McCusker, J. J. (1997). How Much Is That in Real Money? A Historical Price Index for Use as a Deflator of Money Values in the Economy of the United States: Addenda et Corrigenda (PDF). American Antiquarian Society. 1700-1799: McCusker, J. J. (1992). How Much Is That in Real Money? A Historical Price Index for Use as a Deflator of Money Values in the Economy of the United States (PDF). American Antiquarian Society. 1800-present: Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. "Consumer Price Index (estimate) 1800-".

5. Booth's ^ Romeo and Juliet was rivalled in popularity only by his own "hundred night Hamlet" at The Winter Garden of four years before.

6. Levenson provides the quote from the 1960 interview with Zeffirelli in ^ The Times.

7. Brode cites Anthony West of ^ Vogue and Mollie Panter-Downes of The New Yorker as examples.

References

All references to Romeo and Juliet, unless otherwise specified, are taken from the Arden Shakespeare second edition (Gibbons, 1980) based on the Q2 text of 1599, with elements from Q1 of 1597. Under its referencing system, which uses Roman numerals, II.ii.33 means act 2, scene 2, line 33, and a 0 in place of a scene number refers to the prologue to the act.

Editions of Romeo and Juliet

Secondary sources

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Arafay, Mireia (2005). Books in Motion: Adaptation, Adaptability, Authorship. Rodopi. ISBN 978-90-420-1957-7.

Bonnard, Georges A. (1951). "Romeo and Juliet: A Possible Significance?". Review of English Studies. II (5): 319-27. doi:10.1093/res/II.5.319.

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Honegger, Thomas (2006). "'Wouldst thou withdraw love's faithful vow?': The negotiation of love in the orchard scene (Romeo and Juliet Act II)". Journal of Historical Pragmatics. 7 (1): 73-88. doi:10.1075/jhp.7.1.04hon.

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(Subscription or . Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. participating institution membership required.)

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Pedicord, Harry William (1954). The Theatrical Public in the Time of David Garrick. New York: King's Crown Press.

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da Porto, Luigi (1868). "The Original Story of Romeo and Juliet". In Pace-Sanfelice, G. (ed.). The original story of Romeo and Juliet by Luigi da Porto. From which Shakespeare evidently drew the subject of his drama. Being the Italian text of 1530, and an English translation, together with a critical preface, historical and bibliographical notes and illustrations. Translated by Pace-Sanfelice, G. Cambridge: Deighton, Bell, and co. hdl:2027/mdp.39015082232961.

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Scarci, Manuela (1993-1994). "From Mariotto and Ganozza to Romeo and Giulietta: Metamorphoses of a Renaissance Tale". Scripta Mediterranea. Canadian Institute for Mediterranean Studies. 14-15.

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External links

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetime and, along with , is one of his most frequently performed. Today, the title characters are regarded as archetypal young lovers.

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William Shakespeare nel ritratto eseguito da Martin Droeshout

Firma autografa di William Shakespeare

È considerato il poeta più rappresentativo del popolo inglese e soprannominato il " Bardo dell' Avon" (o semplicemente "Il Bardo") oppure il "Cigno dell'Avon"; delle sue opere sono stati ritrovati, incluse alcune collaborazioni, 38 testi teatrali, 154 sonetti e una serie di altri poemi. Le sue opere teatrali sono state tradotte in tutte le maggiori lingue del mondo e sono state inscenate più spesso di qualsiasi altra opera; inoltre è lo scrittore maggiormente citato nella storia della letteratura inglese e molte delle sue espressioni linguistiche sono entrate nell'inglese quotidiano.

Nonostante la cronologia esatta delle sue opere sia ancora al centro di numerosi dibattiti, così come la paternità di alcune di esse, è possibile collocare con sufficiente certezza l' epoca di composizione della maggior parte dei suoi lavori nei circa venticinque anni compresi tra il 1588 e il 1613. Capace di eccellere sia nella tragedia sia nella commedia, fu in grado di coniugare il gusto popolare della sua epoca con una complessa caratterizzazione dei personaggi, una poetica raffinata e una notevole profondità filosofica.

Benché fosse già popolare in vita, divenne immensamente famoso dopo la sua morte e i suoi lavori furono esaltati e celebrati da numerosi e importanti personaggi nei secoli seguenti. La scarsità di documenti pervenutici riguardanti la sua vita privata ha fatto sorgere numerose congetture riguardo al suo aspetto fisico, alla sua sessualità, al suo credo religioso e persino all' attribuzione delle sue opere. Gli è stato dedicato un asteroide: 2985 Shakespeare.

La presunta casa natale di Shakespeare a Stratford

Shakespeare visse a cavallo fra il XVI e il XVII secolo, un periodo in cui si stava realizzando il passaggio dalla società medievale al mondo moderno. Nel 1558 sul trono del regno era salita Elisabetta I d'Inghilterra, inaugurando in questo modo un periodo di fioritura artistica e culturale che da lei prese il nome. Il padre di William, John, si trasferì, alla metà del Cinquecento, da Snitterfield a Stratford-upon-Avon, dove divenne guantaio e conciatore.

John compare per la prima volta nelle documentazioni storiche nel 1552. Un documento ci informa che John Shakespeare aveva in affitto un'ala di quella che sarebbe poi diventata famosa come la casa natale del poeta, situata a Henley Street. Nel 1556 John accrebbe le sue proprietà, acquistando una proprietà fondiaria e l'altra ala della casa natale, che a quel tempo era una struttura separata.

John prese in moglie Mary Arden, figlia del ricco agricoltore Robert Arden. Mary era la figlia minore, tuttavia era probabilmente la prediletta del padre visto che quando questi morì, verso la fine del 1556, le lasciò la sua tenuta e il raccolto della sua terra. Il matrimonio avvenne tra il novembre del 1556, mese in cui fu redatto il testamento di Robert Arden, e il settembre del 1558, mese in cui nacque la prima figlia.

A partire dall'autunno del 1558, iniziò la carriera politica di John Shakespeare: prestò giuramento come uno dei quattro connestabili. Dal 1565 fu aldermanno, cioè un componente della giunta municipale di Stratford; nel 1568 ricoprì per un anno la carica più importante della città, quella di balivo. Raggiunto il massimo riconoscimento cittadino, decise di rivolgersi al Collegio degli araldisti per ricevere uno stemma, ma non riuscì a ottenerlo. Tra il 1570 e il 1590, John Shakespeare, oppresso dai debiti, ebbe problemi di natura finanziaria, che portarono alla fine della sua carriera pubblica e alla vendita di alcuni possedimenti.

La famiglia di Shakespeare in un'illustrazione del 1890: William recita l'Amleto, Anne è seduta sulla destra, Hamnet è in piedi, mentre da sinistra Judith e Susannah lo ascoltano

La data di battesimo di William Shakespeare a Stratford-upon-Avon risulta essere il 26 aprile 1564; la trascrizione nel registro parrocchiale riporta: Gulielmus, filius Johannes Shakespeare. Non è documentata la data di nascita, che tradizionalmente si suppone sia avvenuta tre giorni prima, il 23 aprile, giorno in cui si festeggia San Giorgio, patrono dell' Inghilterra. William fu il terzo di otto figli. Nell'estate del 1564 la peste colpì Stratford, ma risparmiò gli Shakespeare.

Sebbene nei registri scolastici di quel periodo non compaia il suo nome, per alcuni biografi Shakespeare frequentò la King's New School, istituto gratuito per i maschi della cittadina, dedicato a Edoardo VI e fondato dalla Gilda della Santa Croce, distante circa 400 metri dalla sua casa; lì avrebbe avuto modo di apprendere il latino e i classici della letteratura, e di essere forse sottoposto a frequenti punizioni corporali. Le lezioni erano impartite sei giorni alla settimana, cominciavano alle sei o alle sette di mattina e continuavano fino alle undici; dopo la sosta per il pranzo riprendevano all'una per poi concludersi alle sei di sera. Non risulta nessuna sua eventuale formazione universitaria.

È probabile che William abbia lavorato come apprendista nel negozio del padre; è stato messo in rilievo come Shakespeare abbia fatto riferimento a svariati tipi di pelle e ad altre conoscenze tipiche dei conciatori. Il 27 novembre 1582, a diciotto anni, William sposò a Stratford Anne Hathaway, di otto anni più grande. Considerata la data di nascita della prima figlia, il matrimonio, testimoniato da Fulk Sandalls e John Richardson, fu forse affrettato dalla gravidanza della sposa.

Il 26 maggio 1583 la prima figlia di Shakespeare, Susannah, fu battezzata a Stratford. Due anni dopo, il 2 febbraio 1585, furono battezzati due gemelli: un maschio, Hamnet, e una femmina, Judith. Gli Shakespeare chiamarono i figli come i loro vicini e inseparabili amici, Hamnet e Judith Sadler. Quando nel 1598 Judith e Hamnet Sadler ebbero un figlio, lo chiamarono William. Hamnet era una variante morfologica, consueta a quel tempo, di Hamlet, ed è stato supposto che per il nome del bambino si sia ispirato a quello del protagonista dell' opera omonima, benché il nome Hamnet o Hamlet fosse a quei tempi piuttosto comune. La figlia di Susannah e di John Hall, Elizabeth, sarà l'ultima discendente della famiglia.

Shakespeare Before Thomas Lucy, un'illustrazione di un aneddoto sul poeta

Tra il battesimo dei due gemelli e la sua comparsa sulla scena letteraria inglese, non vi sono documenti relativi alla vita di Shakespeare; per questo motivo, il periodo che va dal 1585 al 1592 è definito dagli studiosi come " lost years" (anni perduti). Il tentativo di spiegare questo periodo ha dato vita a numerose supposizioni e fantasie; spesso nessuna prova suffraga queste storie se non le dicerie raccolte dopo la morte del drammaturgo. Nicholas Rowe, il primo biografo di Shakespeare, riporta una leggenda di Stratford secondo la quale Shakespeare abbandonò la città, rifugiandosi a Londra, per sfuggire a un processo causato dalla caccia di frodo di un cervo di Thomas Lucy, un signorotto locale. Un altro racconto del XVIII secolo riporta che Shakespeare cominciò la sua carriera teatrale badando ai cavalli dei clienti dei teatri di Londra.

John Aubrey riportò che Shakespeare divenne un insegnante di campagna pur non presentando nessuna prova a sostegno di questa ipotesi. Alcuni studiosi hanno suggerito la possibilità che Shakespeare sia stato assunto come tutore da Alexander Hoghton di Lancashire, un proprietario terriero cattolico che cita un certo "William Shakeshafte" nel suo testamento del 1581. Tuttavia non si hanno prove che qualche membro della famiglia del poeta usò mai la variante "Shakeshafte". È stato ipotizzato che Shakespeare abbia cominciato la sua carriera teatrale unendosi a una delle tante compagnie che visitavano Stratford annualmente. Nella stagione 1583- 84 tre compagnie visitarono Stratford, nella stagione 1586- 87 ben cinque, tra cui quella della regina, quella di Essex e quella di Leicester.

La statua di Shakespeare a Leicester Square, Londra, opera di Giovanni Fontana del 1874[61]

Diversi documenti del 1592 ci informano del successo di Shakespeare in ambito teatrale: sappiamo che sue opere sono già state rappresentate dalle compagnie dei conti di Derby, di Pembroke e del Sussex; si ha notizia, inoltre, della rappresentazione del 3 marzo 1592 della prima parte dell'Enrico VI. La fama delle opere di Shakespeare era probabilmente in ascesa, tanto da attirarsi le gelosie dei colleghi più anziani: proprio in quest'anno Robert Greene dedicò la celebre invettiva che sembrerebbe rivolta a Shakespeare:

Greene era uno scrittore dalla personalità focosa che entrò in contrasto col letterato John Florio e che nel Groatsworth criticò anche Marlowe e Nashe. Henry Chettle, il tipografo che aveva preparato per le stampe il manoscritto del Groatsworth, sentì il bisogno, mesi dopo, di prendere le distanze da Greene nella prefazione alla sua opera Kind-Heart's Dream ( Sogno di cuor gentile); nel passo in questione, sul quale gli studiosi hanno spesso speculato dal momento che tramanda il carattere di Shakespeare, Chettle si dispiace di non averlo risparmiato, apprezzando la "rettitudine della sua condotta, che attesta della sua onestà, e della sua grazia arguta nello scrivere, che depone bene sulla sua arte".

Lo stemma della famiglia Shakespeare

Negli anni 1593- 94, a causa di un'epidemia di peste, i teatri inglesi rimasero chiusi; Shakespeare, in questo periodo, pubblicò due poemetti, Venere e Adone e Il ratto di Lucrezia. Il primo, stampato nel 1593, è dedicato a Henry Wriothesley, III conte di Southampton, all'epoca diciannovenne. Sono state fatte molte speculazioni intorno alla relazione tra Shakespeare e Southampton - alcuni critici lo identificano come il misterioso "W.H." destinatario dei sonetti. Il volume ebbe molto successo ed ebbe numerose ristampe. Il successo dell'opera è testimoniato anche da un'opera teatrale, stampata nel 1606 ma di qualche anno precedente, The Return from Parnassus, rappresentata all'inizio del XVII secolo dagli studenti del St John's College di Cambridge. The Return from Parnassus è la seconda di un ciclo di tre opere teatrali; al suo interno, un personaggio dice:

Tuttavia questa citazione manifesta solo la popolarità che il Venere e Adone aveva raggiunto in quegli anni; infatti, sebbene alcuni critici abbiano interpretato questa frase come un apprezzamento dell'ambiente universitario nei confronti di Shakespeare, altri hanno sottolineato che il personaggio che fa questo elogio è uno stupido. A supporto dell'ipotesi che Shakespeare non fosse visto di buon occhio dall'ambiente universitario, è possibile citare la terza e ultima parte del ciclo "Parnassus" degli studenti del St John's College, The Second Part of the Return from Parnassus; in questa, un personaggio che impersona William Kempe, parlando con un personaggio che impersona un altro membro della compagnia in cui si trovava Shakespeare, critica in maniera grossolana i drammaturghi con educazione universitaria e afferma che "il nostro compagno Shakespeare li ha tutti umiliati".

Nel 1594, Shakespeare dà alle stampe il suo secondo poemetto Il ratto di Lucrezia, anch'esso dedicato al conte di Southampton. Leggendo la dedica, la maggioranza degli studiosi sono d'accordo sull'accresciuta familiarità tra il poeta e il conte; tuttavia, la relazione tra i due resta di difficile interpretazione, dato che, escluse queste due dediche, Southampton non compare in nessun altro documento riguardante Shakespeare.

Nell'autunno 1594 la peste terminò a Londra, e ciò permise la riapertura dei teatri; Shakespeare si unì alla compagnia teatrale chiamata The Lord Chamberlain's Men ("servi del Lord Ciambellano"), della quale facevano parte anche Richard Burbage e William Kempe. La prima notizia dell'esistenza della compagnia si ebbe nel giugno 1594, attraverso un documento del libro dei conti del tesoriere privato della regina, che riportava la notizia di una rappresentazione della compagnia presso il palazzo reale di Greenwich, il giorno di S. Stefano (26 dicembre) e il giorno degli Innocenti (28 dicembre), di fronte a Elisabetta I.

New Place, casa di Shakespeare, in un disegno di George Vertue

Nel 1596 morì l'unico figlio maschio, Hamnet, che fu sepolto a Stratford l'11 agosto. Nello stesso anno, John Shakespeare, grazie al successo avuto dal figlio, riuscì a ottenere il diritto di fregiarsi di uno stemma e del titolo di per sé e per i suoi discendenti, nonostante il suo prestigio e la sua fortuna fossero notevolmente ridotti rispetto ad alcuni anni prima; il motto scelto è Non sanz droict, "Non senza diritto".

Nel 1597 Shakespeare comprò da William Underhill per sessanta sterline una residenza a Stratford, , composta da "due granai, due giardini, due frutteti, con annessi". La casa, la più grande di Stratford a quei tempi, era stata infatti costruita da un eminente cittadino della generazione precedente, Sir Hugh Clopton. L'acquisto testimonia i notevoli guadagni ottenuti da Shakespeare con l'attività teatrale.

Nell 1598 Shakespeare si trasferì nella diocesi di St. Helen's Bishopsgate. Nello stesso anno, Francis Meres pubblicò il Palladis Tamia, nel quale parlava di "un Ovidio risorto nel mellifluo Shakespeare", e aggiungeva che tra i drammaturghi inglesi era il migliore sia nella tragedia sia nella commedia, citando molti suoi titoli. Sempre nel 1598 il Bardo partecipò come attore alla rappresentazione di Every Man in his Humour di Ben Jonson, nella parte di Kno'well, un vecchio gentiluomo; nell' in-folio delle opere di Jonson del 1616, Shakespeare compariva infatti in cima alla lista degli attori.

Shakespeare divenne poi azionista dei The Lord Chamberlain's Men, acquisendo circa il 10% della compagnia la quale, soprattutto grazie a lui, era talmente popolare da far sì che, dopo la morte di Elisabetta I e l'incoronazione di Giacomo I ( 1603), il nuovo monarca la adottasse, e si fregiò così del titolo di ("Gli uomini del re"); in questa compagnia Shakespeare ricoprì anche il ruolo di amministratore, oltre a quelli di drammaturgo e attore. Vari documenti che registrano affari legali e transazioni economiche mostrano come la ricchezza di Shakespeare si fosse accresciuta molto nei suoi anni londinesi. Il 5 giugno 1607 sua figlia Susannah sposò il medico John Hall nella chiesa della Holy Trinity di Stratford.

Il monumento funerario di Shakespeare

Intorno al 1611 si ritirò nella sua città natale, Stratford. L'11 settembre "Mr. Shakespeare" figura sulla lista dei contribuenti che devono pagare l'imposta per la manutenzione delle strade reali. In quello stesso anno firmò una petizione dei cittadini di Stratford che chiedeva alla Camera dei comuni di riparare le strade maestre. Il 3 febbraio 1612 fu sepolto Gilbert, un fratello di Shakespeare. A maggio Shakespeare fu convocato a Londra per testimoniare nella causa "Mountjoy-Bellott", che opponeva due fabbricanti di parrucche londinesi, Christopher Mountjoy e il genero Stephen Bellott. Gli atti del processo sono giunti fino a noi: al termine di quelli che contengono la deposizione di Shakespeare è presente la sua firma.

Agli inizi del 1613 morì l'ultimo fratello di Shakespeare, Richard: degli otto figli di John Shakespeare rimanevano solo William e la sorella Joan. Nel mese di marzo Shakespeare acquistò una casa a Londra per 140 sterline (di cui 80 in contanti); era l'ex portineria dell'abbazia dei Frati Neri ( Blackfriars), non lontano dall' omonimo teatro. A partire dal 1613 Shakespeare non produsse più alcunché. Nel novembre 1614 trascorse diverse settimane a Londra insieme al genero John Hall.

Il 10 febbraio 1616 sua figlia Judith sposò Thomas Quiney: quest'ultimo poco prima di sposarsi aveva messo incinta una ragazza di Stratford. Il 25 marzo seguente Shakespeare fece testamento: la maggior parte dei suoi beni andò alla figlia Susanna e al marito; all'altra figlia, Judith, lasciò alcune somme in denaro con clausole cautelative, mentre alla moglie lasciò "l'usufrutto della seconda camera da letto" nella casa a New Place; lasciò poi vari oggetti e piccole somme per l'acquisto di anelli ad alcuni conoscenti di Stratford e agli attori Richard Burbage, John Heminges e Henry Condell.

La tomba di William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare morì il giorno del suo 52º compleanno, il 23 aprile 1616 secondo il calendario giuliano; era rimasto sposato ad Anne fino alla fine. John Ward, un vicario di Stratford, mezzo secolo dopo raccontò che Shakespeare, dopo aver passato una serata in campagna con Michael Drayton e Ben Jonson, in cui bevve molto alcol, morì di una febbre contratta in quell'occasione. È possibile che questa sia una delle numerose leggende relative alla vita del Bardo.

Fu sepolto nel coro della Holy Trinity Church, la chiesa parrocchiale di Stratford; questo privilegio non fu dovuto alla sua fama come scrittore ma al pagamento di una quota della decima della chiesa, 440 sterline. Su un muro nei pressi della sua tomba si trova un monumento, commissionato probabilmente dalla sua famiglia; è un busto che mostra Shakespeare nell'atto di scrivere. L' epitaffio sulla sua tomba recita:

L'opera poetica e drammaturgica di Shakespeare costituisce una parte fondamentale della letteratura occidentale ed è continuamente studiata e rappresentata in ogni parte del globo. La cronologia delle sue opere è incerta e rappresenta un argomento ancora dibattuto dagli studiosi. Nel First Folio del 1623, redatto da John Heminges e Henry Condell, sono comprese le 36 opere teatrali di Shakespeare, elencate in base alla loro classificazione come tragedie, commedie e drammi storici.

Nessun'opera poetica di Shakespeare è stata inclusa nel First Folio. Alla fine del XIX secolo, Edward Dowden ha definito quattro delle ultime commedie shakespeariane, Pericle, principe di Tiro, La tempesta, I due nobili congiunti e Il racconto d'inverno, come e, anche se molti studiosi preferiscono chiamarle " tragicommedie ", questo termine è spesso usato.

Nel 1896 Frederick S. Boas coniò il termine problem play, "drammi dialettici", per descrivere quattro scritti di Shakespeare, Tutto è bene quel che finisce bene, Misura per misura, Troilo e Cressida e ; il termine, nonostante sia dibattuto, rimane in uso, anche se Amleto viene definitivamente classificato come una tragedia. Altre opere, attribuite talvolta al drammaturgo di Stratford, sono elencate come apocrife. Due sono le opere andate perdute, e Pene d'amore vinte.

Inizialmente, come era tradizione in età elisabettiana, Shakespeare collaborò con altri drammaturghi alla stesura delle sue prime opere; tra queste vi sono Tito Andronico, della quale un drammaturgo di fine Seicento disse "egli si è limitato soltanto a perfezionare con il suo magistrale tocco uno o due dei personaggi principali". I due nobili congiunti, scritta in collaborazione con John Fletcher, e , andata perduta, hanno una documentazione sull'attribuzione a Shakespeare precisa.

Le prime opere di Shakespeare furono incentrate su Enrico VI; Enrico VI, parte I, composto tra il 1588 e il 1592, potrebbe essere la prima opera di Shakespeare, sicuramente messa in scena, se non commissionata, da Philip Henslowe. Al successo della prima parte fanno seguito Enrico VI, parte II, Enrico VI, parte III e Riccardo III, costituendo a posteriori una tetralogia sulla guerra delle due rose e sui fatti immediatamente successivi; queste furono in diversa misura composte a più mani attingendo copiosamente dalle Cronache di Raphael Holinshed, ma sempre più segnate dallo stile caratteristico del drammaturgo, descrivendo i contrasti tra le dinastie York e Lancaster, conclusisi con l'avvento della dinastia Tudor da cui discendeva l'allora regnante Elisabetta I. Nel suo insieme, prima ancora che celebrazione della monarchia e dei meriti del suo casato, la tetralogia appare come un appello alla concordia civile.

Molte opere risalenti al primo periodo della carriera di Shakespeare furono influenzate dalle opere di altri drammaturghi elisabettiani, in particolare Thomas Kyd e Christopher Marlowe, dalle tradizioni del dramma medievale e dalle opere di Seneca. Di datazione controversa, ma collocabili prima delle opere della maturità, sono un piccolo gruppo di commedie, in cui è forte l'influenza dell' eufuismo, dei testi dei letterati rinascimentali e delle ambientazioni italiane. Di questo periodo fanno parte I due gentiluomini di Verona, La commedia degli errori, in cui vi sono elementi riconducibili ai modelli classici e La bisbetica domata, che secondo alcuni deriverebbe da un racconto popolare, ma che troviamo nelle novelle di Giambattista Cinzio che ispirò anche Otello e Misura per misura.

Dal 1594 la peste e l'inasprirsi della censura provocarono la scomparsa di molte compagnie, mentre nacquero nuove realtà teatrali, come The Lord Chamberlain's Men, di cui fece parte come autore e attore. L'abilità del drammaturgo di identificare i temi più richiesti e il suo talento nella riscrittura dei copioni perché non incappassero nei tagli del Master of the Revels, gli assicurarono in questo periodo una rapida ascesa al successo. Le prime commedie shakespeariane, influenzate dallo stile classico e italiano, con strette trame matrimoniali e precise sequenze comiche, dal 1594 cedono il passo all'atmosfera romantica, con toni a volte più scuri e propri di una tragicommedia.

In tutte le opere di questa fase è presente il wit, gioco letterario basato sulle sottigliezze lessicali. Shakespeare riesce a rendere strumenti espressivi i giochi di parole, gli ossimori, le figure retoriche, che non sono mai fini a sé stessi, ma inseriti a creare voluti contrasti tra l'eleganza della convenzione letteraria e i sentimenti autentici dei personaggi. Questo periodo caratterizzato quindi da commedie romantiche ha inizio tuttavia con una tragedia, Romeo e Giulietta, una delle opere più note di Shakespeare, proseguendo poi con Sogno di una notte di mezza estate, che contiene diversi elementi inediti nelle opere del bardo come la magia e le fate, e Il mercante di Venezia. Completano le opere di questa fase degli scritti shakespeariani l'ingegno e i giochi di parole di Molto rumore per nulla, la suggestiva cornice rurale di Come vi piace, la vivace allegria de La dodicesima notte e Le allegre comari di Windsor.

Negli stessi anni nacque la seconda serie di drammi storici inglesi; dopo la lirica Riccardo II, scritta quasi interamente in versi, Shakespeare presentò, alla fine del XVI secolo, alcune commedie in prosa, come Enrico IV, parte I e ed . L'ultimo scritto di questo periodo fu Giulio Cesare, basato sulla traduzione di Thomas North delle Vite parallele di Plutarco. La produzione di opere storiche riguardanti le origini della dinastia regnante andò di pari passo con il successo suscitato da tale genere. Edoardo III, attribuibile a Shakespeare solo in parte, offre un esempio positivo di monarchia, contrapposto a quello del Riccardo III. Re Giovanni, abile riscrittura shakespeariana di un copione pubblicato nel 1591, narra di un monarca instabile e tormentato e dei discutibili personaggi che lo circondano. In queste opere i suoi personaggi divennero più complessi e teneri, mentre si passa abilmente tra scene comiche e serie, tra prosa e poesia, raggiungendo una notevole varietà narrativa. Fu determinante per il successo dei drammi l'introduzione di personaggi fittizi a cui il pubblico si affezionò, come Falstaff.

Nei primi anni del XVII secolo, Shakespeare scrisse quelle che verranno definite da Frederick S. Boas problem play, i "drammi dialettici" che segnano un nuovo modo di intendere la rappresentazione, in cui i personaggi esprimono compiutamente le contraddizioni umane, dando voce alle problematiche di un'epoca che si è ormai distaccata completamente dagli schemi medioevali; di queste fanno parte Tutto è bene quel che finisce bene, Misura per misura, Troilo e Cressida e alcune tra le sue tragedie più note, come ; l'eroe di quest'ultima è probabilmente il personaggio shakespeariano più conosciuto, discusso e studiato, soprattutto per il suo famoso monologo "To be, or not to be". Shakespeare inoltre ha probabilmente scritto parte della scena VI di Sir Tommaso Moro, frutto della mano di almeno cinque diversi autori, mai rappresentato e stampato soltanto nel 1814.

Il 1603 segna una svolta storica per il teatro inglese; salito al trono, Giacomo I promuove un nuovo impulso delle arti sceniche, avocando a sé la migliore compagnia dell'epoca, i Chamberlain's Men, che da quel momento si chiameranno . A Giacomo I, Shakespeare dedicò alcune delle sue opere maggiori, scritte per l'ascesa al trono del sovrano scozzese, come , e , la più breve e più complessa delle tragedie di Shakespeare. A differenza dell'introverso Amleto, il cui errore fatale è l'esitazione, gli eroi di queste tragedie come Otello e Re Lear furono sconfitti da affrettati errori di giudizio; le trame di queste opere fanno spesso perno su questi errori fatali, che sovvertono l'ordine e distruggono l'eroe e i suoi cari. Le tre ultime tragedie, che risentono della lezione di Amleto, sono drammi che restano aperti, senza ristabilire un ordine ma generando piuttosto ulteriori interrogativi. Ciò che conta non è l'esito finale, ma l'esperienza. Ciò a cui si dà maggiore importanza è l'esperienza catartica dell'azione scenica, piuttosto che la sua conclusione.

Incisione de La tempesta, atto I, scena I, basata su un dipinto di George Romney

Le sue ultime grandi tragedie contengono alcune delle più note poesie di Shakespeare e sono state considerate le migliori da Thomas Stearns Eliot. I drammi di argomento classico sono l'occasione per affrontare il tema politico, calato nella dimensione della storia antica ricca di corrispondenze con la realtà britannica. In Antonio e Cleopatra l'utilizzo di una scrittura poetica sottolinea la grandiosità del tema, le vicissitudini storiche e politiche dell' impero romano. è invece occasione per affrontare il tema del crollo dei potenti, l'indagine sui vizi e sulle virtù, dando voce a un'intera comunità come in una sorta di coro. Timone d'Atene, probabilmente scritto in collaborazione con Thomas Middleton, contiene allo stesso tempo la coscienza dei rischi di un individualismo moderno e la denuncia della corruzione e del potere dell'oro.

Negli ultimi anni della produzione shakespeariana, il mondo del teatro londinese subisce un cambiamento sensibile; il pubblico aristocratico e della nuova borghesia agiata non frequenta più i grandi anfiteatri, ma teatri più raccolti come il Blackfriars Theatre. Le richieste di tale pubblico andavano più nella direzione dell'intrattenimento che non del coinvolgimento nella rappresentazione; alcuni commentatori hanno visto questo cambiamento di umore come prova di una più serena visione della vita da parte di Shakespeare. Il Bardo, sempre attento ai cambiamenti del gusto e della sensibilità dei suoi spettatori, produce dei nuovi drammi, i cosiddetti , "drammi romanzeschi", tornando in parte agli scritti romantici e alle tragicommedie; nascono dunque Pericle, principe di Tiro, , Il racconto d'inverno, La tempesta e I due nobili cugini.

A differenza delle tragedie degli anni precedenti, queste spesso terminano con la riconciliazione e il perdono di errori potenzialmente tragici. In Enrico VIII, l'ultimo grande rifacimento di un dramma storico già in cartellone per le compagnie rivali, Shakespeare, aiutato probabilmente da Fletcher, arricchiva e perfezionava la vicenda, riprendendo i temi della produzione precedente, dalla cronaca storica e nazionale al dramma morale, riprendendo lo stile dell' età elisabettiana nel momento in cui quell'epoca era giunta al termine. Shakespeare abolisce le tre unità aristoteliche dalle proprie opere teatrali.

Elenco delle opere teatrali di Shakespeare

Rappresentazioni teatrali

Gli interni del Globe Theatre nella ricostruzione del 1997

Non è chiaro per quali compagnie teatrali Shakespeare scrisse le sue prime opere; il frontespizio dell'edizione del 1594 del Tito Andronico rileva che la tragedia è stata messa in scena da tre gruppi di attori diversi. Dopo la peste del 1592-1593, le opere di Shakespeare vennero affidate alla propria compagnia, The Lord Chamberlain's Men, che si esibiva presso il The Theatre e il The Curtain di Shoreditch. Quando la compagnia si trovò in conflitto con il proprietario del The Theatre, con conseguente riduzione del pubblico del teatro, Richard Burbage, capo dei The Lord Chamberlain's Men, per salvare l'investimento fatto, decise di abbattere la struttura e utilizzare il legno rimanente per costruire il Globe Theatre. Il "Globe" venne aperto nell'autunno del 1599; uno dei primi copioni rappresentati nel nuovo teatro fu Giulio Cesare, mentre negli anni successivi vennero messe in scena alcune delle maggiori opere shakespeariane, tra cui , e .

Nel 1603, i The Lord Chamberlain's Men entrarono nei favori di Re Giacomo I e cambiarono nome in ; anche se le loro rappresentazioni non furono regolari e continue nel tempo, riuscirono a esibirsi sette volte a corte tra il 10 novembre 1604 e il 31 ottobre 1605. Dal 1608 si spostarono al Blackfriars Theatre in inverno (era infatti un teatro coperto) e al Globe, che venne distrutto da un incendio accidentale il 29 giugno 1613 mentre era in corso la rappresentazione dell'Enrico VIII, in estate. Le scenografie interne, combinate con le elaborate maschere della moda giacobina, permisero a Shakespeare di introdurre dispositivi scenici più complessi.

Tra gli attori della compagnia di Shakespeare vi erano Richard Burbage, William Kempe, Henry Condell e John Heminges. Burbage svolgeva il ruolo di primo attore nelle prime rappresentazioni delle opere di Shakespeare, tra cui Riccardo III, , e . Il popolare attore comico William Kempe ricoprì il ruolo del servo Pietro in Romeo e Giulietta e di Dogberry in Molto rumore per nulla, oltre ad altri personaggi. Alla fine del XVI secolo venne sostituito da Robert Armin, che fu Pietraccia in Come vi piace e il Fool in .

Negli anni dal 1592 al 1594 a Londra infuriò la peste, provocando la chiusura dei teatri. Shakespeare, nell'attesa di riprendere la sua attività sul palcoscenico, scrisse due poemi di diverso stile, ma entrambi dedicati a Henry Wriothesley, III conte di Southampton; Venere e Adone, pubblicato nel 1593, fu ristampato numerose volte ed ebbe un notevole seguito; Il ratto di Lucrezia, registrato l'anno seguente, ebbe un successo molto inferiore. Influenzate da Le metamorfosi di Ovidio, le due opere, caratterizzate da forti tematiche erotiche, mostrano il senso di colpa e la confusione morale che derivano dalla lussuria incontrollata.

Negli anni seguenti Shakespeare continuò occasionalmente a scrivere poemi e sonetti, perlopiù diffusi nella cerchia delle sue amicizie. Nel 1609 l'editore Thomas Thorpe stampò senza il consenso dell'autore , una raccolta di 154 sonetti del Bardo. Scritti prevalentemente tra il 1593 e il 1595, i sonetti rappresentano l'unica opera autobiografica di Shakespeare, da considerarsi anche come libro filosofico colmo di implicazioni meditative. La critica ha suddiviso sommariamente la raccolta in due parti: la prima è dedicata a un non meglio specificato fair friend ("bell'amico", sonetti 1-126), la seconda a una ("donna misteriosa", sonetti 127-154); tra questi possiamo poi individuare la sequenza del "poeta rivale" (sonetti 76-86).

Un terzo poema narrativo, A Lover's Complaint, attribuito a Shakespeare dalla maggior parte degli studiosi, venne stampato e inserito nella prima edizione dei nel 1609. Nel 1599, due prime stesure dei sonetti 138 e 144 vennero incluse ne Il pellegrino appassionato, pubblicato sotto il nome di Shakespeare ma senza il suo permesso. La fenice e la tortora, pubblicato in appendice a Love's Martyr, un poema di Robert Chester, è conosciuto come uno dei suoi lavori più oscuri e ha portato a molti conflitti interpretativi.

Pagina del Sir Tommaso Moro scritta dalla "Mano D", considerata l'unico esempio pervenutoci della scrittura di Shakespeare

Nel corso degli anni, un gruppo di opere teatrali e poetiche è stato talvolta attribuito a Shakespeare, anche se il dibattito sulla paternità di questi lavori è ancora aperto. Questa incertezza è dovuta alla mancanza di alcune opere all'interno del First Folio e del Palladis Tamia di Francis Meres. Tra queste vi sono Arden of Feversham, dramma del 1592 attribuito in parte a Shakespeare, che lo mise in scena almeno una volta insieme ai The Lord Chamberlain's Men, Edoardo III, opera edita anonimamente nel 1596, scritta almeno in parte, secondo gli studiosi, da Shakespeare, , pubblicata nel 1595 con la scritta "Appena redatta, supervisionata e corretta da WS", Sir John Oldcastle, edita nel 1600, per la quale Shakespeare fu indicato subito come l'autore (il diario di Philip Henslowe riporta invece che il lavoro fu opera di altri quattro scrittori), Thomas Lord Cromwell, che venne data alle stampe nel 1602 e della quale, secondo moderni studi, il Bardo non contribuì alla stesura e To the Queen, poesia ritenuta l'epilogo di Come vi piace.

The London Prodigal venne stampata nel 1605 sotto il nome di Shakespeare, anche se, secondo alcuni studiosi, manca di alcuni elementi tipici delle opere shakespeariane, mentre The Puritan, A Yorkshire Tragedy e The Second Maiden's Tragedy, pubblicate rispettivamente nel 1607, nel 1608 e nel 1611 e attribuite a "W.S.", vennero in seguito ritenute tutte di Thomas Middleton. Tra gli scritti apocrifi del Bardo vi sono anche The Birth of Merlin, pubblicata nel 1662 come opera del Bardo e di William Rowley, ma scritta probabilmente nel 1622, sei anni dopo la morte di Shakespeare, e Sir Tommaso Moro, dramma incappato subito nella censura che ne impose numerosi tagli; tre delle pagine di quest'opera possono essere state scritte da Shakespeare e rappresentare quindi, l'unico documento autografo del Bardo (fatta eccezione per le firme poste su alcuni documenti) arrivato in età contemporanea.

Diverse sono le opere attribuite a Shakespeare andate perdute; ( The History of Cardenio) è una commedia messa in scena dai King's Men nel 1613. Il libraio Humphrey Moseley inserì l'opera nel 1653 nello Stationers' Register, attribuendola a Shakespeare e a John Fletcher. Il contenuto della commedia, la cui esistenza è attestata da diversi documenti, non è conosciuto, ma era probabilmente basato sulle disavventure che coinvolgevano il personaggio Cardenio del Don Chisciotte. Nel Palladis Tamia, Meres inserì nella lista di opere di Shakespeare Pene d'amore vinte ( Love's Labour's Won); alcuni lo ritengono un lavoro a noi non giunto, altri considerano la citazione di Meres un titolo alternativo di una commedia del Bardo a noi giunta. Alcuni studiosi ipotizzano inoltre la pubblicazione di , una prima versione di .

A differenza del suo contemporaneo Ben Jonson, Shakespeare non ha partecipato alla redazione e pubblicazione delle sue opere. Infatti, fatta eccezione per due poemetti giovanili (Venere e Adone e Lo stupro di Lucrezia), il Bardo non si è mai curato di dare alle stampe le proprie opere; d'altra parte a quel tempo non vi era interesse a farlo, poiché le opere teatrali erano di proprietà della compagnia e pubblicarle avrebbe significato mettere nelle mani di compagnie rivali i propri copioni. I testi esistenti sono solitamente trascrizioni effettuate dopo le prime rappresentazioni oppure provengono direttamente dal manoscritto autografato dello scrittore o dagli stessi copioni.

Le prime stampe furono destinate a un pubblico popolare e le copie erano fatte senza particolari accorgimenti estetici. Il formato utilizzato è chiamato in quarto, le cui pagine sono ottenute piegando i fogli stampati in quattro parti; talvolta le pagine non erano ordinate correttamente. La seconda edizione fu destinata a un pubblico più agiato, comportando quindi una maggiore attenzione per la presentazione; per questa stampa fu utilizzato il formato .

Nel 1598 Francis Meres pubblicò Palladis Tamia, primo resoconto critico delle opere di Shakespeare di natura enciclopedica, importante per la ricostruzione della cronologia dei drammi shakespeariani. Mr. William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories & Tragedies, conosciuta comunemente come First Folio, fu la prima raccolta delle opere di Shakespeare, pubblicata nel 1623 a cura di John Heminges e Henry Condell; contiene 36 testi, di cui 18 stampati per la prima volta, elencati come tragedie, commedie e drammi storici. Il First Folio, che non comprende né poesie né poemi, rappresenta la sola fonte attendibile per circa venti opere e comunque una fonte molto importante anche per molte di quelle già pubblicate in precedenza. Due opere non sono incluse nel First Folio: I due nobili congiunti e Pericle, principe di Tiro, tuttavia accettate come parte del canone shakespeariano, dal momento che numerosi studiosi hanno concordato sul notevole contributo di Shakespeare nella loro composizione.

La ricerca dei testi originali di Shakespeare è diventata una delle principali preoccupazioni degli editori moderni. Refusi, errori di battitura, interpretazioni sbagliate del copista, dimenticanze di interi versi sono presenti nell' in quarto e nel First Folio. Inoltre il drammaturgo spesso scriveva utilizzando ortografie diverse anche per la stessa parola, aggiungendo del suo alla confusione della trascrizione; gli studiosi devono dunque ricostruire i testi originali eliminandone gli errori. Critici moderni credono che lo stesso Shakespeare abbia rivisto le sue composizioni nel corso degli anni, facendo così coesistere versioni differenti di una determinata opera. Per arrivare a un testo accettabile, gli editori devono scegliere tra la prima e la versione rivista, che è generalmente più "teatrale"; in passato, gli editori risolvevano la questione con la fusione dei testi, ma per i critici questo processo è contrario alle intenzioni di Shakespeare.

Le prime opere di Shakespeare vennero scritte seguendo lo stile convenzionale dell'epoca, utilizzando un linguaggio stilizzato che non sempre è funzionale ai personaggi e alle opere. La poesia si basa su estese ed elaborate metafore e il linguaggio è spesso retorico, scritto appositamente per declamare piuttosto che per parlare. Ben presto, però, Shakespeare cominciò ad adeguare lo stile tradizionale ai propri fini, riuscendo a coniugare le convenzioni e la scrittura del passato alle esigenze del pubblico; nel periodo della pubblicazione di Romeo e Giulietta, probabilmente il migliore esempio di mescolanza dei due stili, di Riccardo II e di Sogno di una notte di mezza estate, Shakespeare aveva iniziato a scrivere una poesia più naturale e scorrevole, in cui comico e tragico coesistono nello stesso testo, relazionando le metafore e le figure retoriche alle esigenze dell'opera. L'originalità di Shakespeare non era negli intrecci, ma nell'ampiezza di respiro con cui faceva propri gli apporti più diversi.

La forma poetica standard utilizzata da Shakespeare è il blank verse, mutuato nella letteratura inglese dalla tradizione classica tra XIII e XIV secolo e adottato anche da Christopher Marlowe; questo è composto da un sistema giambico a cinque accenti ( pentametro giambico). Questo significava che i suoi versi, costituiti solitamente da dieci sillabe, lasciando l'accento su ogni seconda sillaba, non erano in rima; tuttavia le frasi tendono a coincidere con le righe, aumentando il rischio di una lettura monotona. Il blank verse delle sue prime opere è piuttosto diverso da quello dei suoi lavori più maturi, riuscendo a modificare il ritmo delle sue opere, dando così maggiore forza, flessibilità e importanza ai propri versi.

Dopo Amleto, Shakespeare modificò ulteriormente il suo stile poetico, in particolare nei passaggi più emotivi delle tragedie, sottolineando inoltre l'illusione del teatro. Il critico letterario A.C. Bradley ha descritto questo stile come "più concentrato, veloce, vario e meno regolare nella costruzione, non di rado contorta o ellittica". Nell'ultima fase della sua carriera, Shakespeare adottò molte tecniche letterarie per raggiungere questi effetti; tra queste vi sono gli enjambement, pause irregolari e notevoli variazioni nella struttura della frase e nella lunghezza dei versi, riuscendo a coinvolgere maggiormente il pubblico. Le opere della maturità, con le variazioni della sequenza cronologica degli eventi e i colpi di scena nella trama, sono invece caratterizzate da frasi lunghe e brevi in sequenza, dall'inversione tra oggetto e soggetto e dall'omissione di parole, creando così maggiore spontaneità. Shakespeare fu in grado di combinare il suo genio poetico con un senso pratico del teatro, strutturando le trame delle sue opere per creare vari centri di interesse e per mostrare diversi possibili punti di vista, senza schemi preordinati.

Geoffrey Chaucer, padre della letteratura inglese, a cui Shakespeare attinse per Troilo e Cressida e Due nobili cugini

La grande maggioranza dei lavori di Shakespeare sono rielaborazioni di opere precedenti; inoltre, non raro è il caso in cui Shakespeare attinga a gruppi separati di narrazioni per intrecciarle tra loro. Il primo punto di riferimento sono evidentemente le opere dei contemporanei, in particolare le opere del teatro elisabettiano. Alcuni esempi di opere utilizzate come fonte d'ispirazione sono i romances Rosalynde di Thomas Lodge per Come vi piace, Pandosto o il trionfo del tempo di Robert Greene per Il racconto d'inverno, Arcadia di Philip Sidney per , I due gentiluomini di Verona e Come vi piace, oltre alle opere di autori stranieri riproposte da autori inglesi, come The tragical History of Romeus and Juliet di Arthur Brooke, riproposizione di una novella di Matteo Bandello rifacentesi a quella omonima di Luigi da Porto, per Romeo e Giulietta o il romanzo pastorale Diana Enamorada di Jorge de Montemayor, tradotto in inglese da Bartolomew Yong, per I due gentiluomini di Verona e per Sogno di una notte di mezza estate. Anche Geoffrey Chaucer venne utilizzato da Shakespeare per Troilo e Cressida e Due nobili cugini.

Per i drammi storici la fonte principale sono le imponenti compilazioni cronologiche degli storici Tudor. La prima opera utilizzata da Shakespeare per i suoi drammi storici fu The Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Families of Lancastre and Yorke di Edward Hall, tuttavia "ben presto Shakespeare avrebbe abbandonato l'opera di Hall a favore delle più ricche e pittoresche Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland di Raphael Holinshed". Oltre che ai drammi storici, queste cronache fornirono spunti importanti anche per , e . Sia Hall sia Holinshead hanno spesso attinto dalla Anglicae Historiae Libri XXVI dei Polidoro Virgili. Altre opere storiche certamente utilizzate da Shakespeare furono la Historia Regum Britanniae redatta in latino da Goffredo di Monmouth nel 1130 e poi ripresa da altri autori compreso Holinshed, utilizzata per e , e le Gesta Danorum di Saxo Grammaticus, fonte principale dell'.

Numerose sono le riproposizioni di storie e tematiche presenti nella novellistica italiana; tuttavia è probabile che Shakespeare sia arrivato a conoscenza di tali storie solo attraverso la mediazione di traduzioni e adattamenti francesi e inglesi. Le novelle di Matteo Bandello furono utilizzate per Romeo e Giulietta, Molto rumore per nulla e La dodicesima notte, mentre alcuni spunti del di Giovanni Boccaccio sono rintracciabili in Tutto è bene quel che finisce bene e nel . La traduzione inglese delle 100 novelle degli Hecatommithi di Giambattista Giraldi Cinzio servì a Shakespeare per alcuni elementi di Misura per misura e una novella in particolare fu la fonte principale dell' Il Pecorone di Giovanni Fiorentino servì per Le allegre comari di Windsor e per Il mercante di Venezia. La novella Le piacevoli notti di Gianfrancesco Straparola servì anch'essa per Le allegre comari di Windsor. La traduzione inglese di George Gascoigne de I suppositi di Ludovico Ariosto servì per La bisbetica domata. Gl'ingannati, una commedia italiana allestita a Siena dall' Accademia degli Intronati nel 1531 e stampata a Venezia nel 1537, fornì la guida principale per la vicenda amorosa de La dodicesima notte. La traduzione inglese di Thomas Hoby de Il Cortegiano di Baldassare Castiglione fu certamente letta da Shakespeare, attingendoci per Molto rumore per nulla.

Bronzo di Shakespeare a Verona

Shakespeare probabilmente non conosceva il greco, tuttavia aveva studiato il latino e letto i classici come Seneca alla King's New School di Stratford, non c'è da stupirsi pertanto che molti spunti delle sue opere provengono da autori antichi. Le Vite parallele di Plutarco fornirono la fonte principale del Giulio Cesare, Antonio e Cleopatra, e del Timone d'Atene; non conoscendo il greco è probabile che Shakespeare abbia utilizzato la traduzione di Thomas North Plutarch's Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans stampata nel 1579 e nel 1595. I di Plauto servirono invece come spunto per La commedia degli errori e La dodicesima notte; la Mostellaria servì invece per La bisbetica domata. Le tragedie di Seneca fornirono alcuni elementi del Tito Andronico. Ovidio era il modello dichiarato dei due poemetti giovanili di Shakespeare, Venere e Adone e Lo stupro di Lucrezia. Le metamorfosi riecheggiano anche in Tito Andronico, La commedia degli errori, Le allegre comari di Windsor, Sogno di una notte di mezza estate (con la vicenda di Piramo e Tisbe), Troilo e Cressida e La tempesta.

Sono temi ricorrenti nel teatro di Shakespeare: l'amore (passione disperata in , passione sensuale in Romeo e Giulietta), la lotta per il potere, il problema della giustizia, la morte, il carattere illusorio e la fugacità della vita, la precarietà dell'esistenza con i frequenti motivi dell'oscura presenza della morte e del dubbio che sembrano dominare il cammino terreno dell'uomo (si pensi al celeberrimo monologo di Amleto "Essere o non essere, questo è il problema", scritto nella prima scena del terzo atto). Il tema della lotta per il potere è frequente (, , ) anche per il fatto che l'autore vive in un'epoca in cui predomina la monarchia assoluta che, se da una parte può assicurare l'ordine e la prosperità, dall'altra crea grande brama di potere e di potenza, nonché rivalità, invidie, gelosie.

Altri temi fondamentali sono la presentazione dei sentimenti e degli stati d'animo umani nella loro varietà e complessità, senza escludere i problemi morali e psicologici nonché gli stati anomali della mente quali le contraddizioni nel comportamento, l'inquietudine, la follia (quest'ultima presente, ad esempio, in ). Dalla tradizione popolare e medievale Shakespeare accoglie poi la dimensione fantastica e irrazionale (gli spettri in e , le streghe in , i folletti in La tempesta, fate ed elfi nel Sogno di una notte di mezza estate, ecc.). Tali figure soprannaturali rappresentano le angosce e le colpe insite nell'animo umano. L'"eroe" si presenta come una figura complessa che resta tale e spesso esce moralmente nobilitata anche dopo drammatici conflitti di coscienza e una sconfitta subita per opera degli eventi.

Il fato nella tragedia classica era una forza soprannaturale, superiore anche agli dei, capace di determinare la sorte degli uomini. Nel teatro di Shakespeare esso non è più presente in quanto cede il posto al carattere, alle libere scelte e ai conflitti interiori dell'individuo. Quanto alle figure femminili, esse assumono una notevole importanza: sono dotate di autonomia e di forte individualità. I loro caratteri e i loro comportamenti sono diversi: ad esempio la tenera Giulietta (Romeo e Giulietta), l'innocente Desdemona (), l'intelligente Porzia (Il mercante di Venezia). Altre invece sono coinvolte nella lotta per il potere come la sinistra Lady Macbeth () o le due perfide figlie di .

Il drammaturgo inglese da una parte è figlio del Rinascimento in quanto nelle sue opere interpreta l'uomo che afferma se stesso, la propria creatività e razionalità ( antropocentrismo) contro i limiti posti dalla realtà e dal destino; d'altra parte egli è anche esponente della nuova sensibilità del barocco in quanto evidenzia le lacerazioni di coscienza dell'individuo, l'incertezza degli ideali, la mutevolezza della sorte, il mistero insondabile della vita accompagnato da un senso di smarrimento esistenziale. I drammi di Shakespeare si interrogano quindi sull'identità dell'uomo, sull'assurdità della vita, sui misteri profondi e inconfessabili dell'animo umano, senza però giungere a una verità unica capace di eliminare ansie e insicurezze. In Shakespeare troviamo poi un dubbio radicale, cioè se la vita, oltre a essere breve, fragile e minacciata dalla continua presenza della morte, sia anche un sogno, un'illusione: ne sono testimonianza due celebri affermazioni, una nel (V, 5) ed una ne La tempesta (IV, 1).

Macbeth sostiene che "la vita è solo un'ombra che cammina, un povero commediante che si pavoneggia e si dimena per un'ora sulla scena e poi cade nell' oblio: la storia raccontata da un idiota, piena di rumore e di foga, che non significa nulla". Nella seconda opera citata, il principe Prospero dice: "noi siamo fatti della stessa sostanza dei sogni e la nostra breve vita è cinta di sonno". I personaggi del drammaturgo inglese tuttavia lasciano aperta la questione in quanto non forniscono una risposta definitiva a questa domanda contenente un'idea ricorrente nell' età barocca: si pensi al Don Chisciotte di Cervantes (realtà-illusione) e al capolavoro La vita è sogno del grande drammaturgo spagnolo Pedro Calderón de la Barca.

Statua di Shakespeare, opera di John Massey Rhind, situata presso il Carnegie Museum of Art di Pittsburgh

Durante la sua vita, benché non fosse venerato e apprezzato come dopo la morte, Shakespeare ricevette comunque numerose lodi per i suoi lavori. Nel 1598 Francis Meres lo ha inserito in un gruppo di scrittori inglesi, definiti come "i più eccellenti". Gli autori del Parnassus del St John's College di Cambridge lo paragonarono a Geoffrey Chaucer, a John Gower e a Edmund Spenser. Anche Ben Jonson, nel First Folio, dimostrò apprezzamento per le sue opere.

Tra la restaurazione inglese e la fine del XVII secolo l'apprezzamento per le idee e i modelli classici fece sì che i critici del tempo apprezzavano John Fletcher e Ben Jonson piuttosto che Shakespeare. Thomas Rymer, ad esempio, criticò il drammaturgo per la sua combinazione di comico e tragico; tuttavia, il poeta e critico John Dryden aveva grande considerazione di Shakespeare, dicendo di Jonson, "Lo ammiro, ma amo Shakespeare". Per alcuni decenni, il giudizio di Rymer non fu largamente diffuso, ma nel corso del XVIII secolo, i critici cominciarono a considerare l'importanza e il genio del Bardo. Una serie di critiche letterarie sulle sue opere, in particolare quella di Samuel Johnson del 1765 e di Edmond Malone del 1790, ha contribuito alla sua crescente reputazione. Nel 1800, Shakespeare divenne poeta nazionale. Tra il XVIII e il XIX secolo, la sua fama si diffuse anche all'estero; tra coloro che hanno apprezzato le sue opere vi sono Voltaire, Goethe, Stendhal e Victor Hugo.

Durante l' età romantica venne ulteriormente riconosciuta l'importanza dei lavori di Shakespeare; venne elogiato dal poeta e filosofo Samuel Taylor Coleridge, mentre il critico Wilhelm August von Schlegel tradusse le sue opere nello spirito del romanticismo tedesco. Nel XIX secolo, l'ammirazione critica per il genio di Shakespeare spesso scivolava in eccessi e nell'adulazione; i vittoriani misero in scena le sue opere in modo sontuoso e su larga scala. George Bernard Shaw definì il culto di Shakespeare come bardolatry ("bardolatria"), ritenendo che il nuovo naturalismo di Ibsen avesse fatto diventare le opere shakespeariane obsolete.

La rivoluzione modernista nelle arti del XX secolo utilizzò con entusiasmo i suoi testi al servizio dell' Avanguardia. Gli espressionisti in Germania e i futuristi a Mosca organizzarono alcune rappresentazioni delle sue commedie; anche Bertolt Brecht mise in scena il suo teatro epico, influenzato dalle opere di Shakespeare. Il poeta e critico T. S. Eliot, insieme a G. Wilson Knight e al New Criticism, sostenne la necessità di una lettura più attenta di opere di Shakespeare. Negli anni cinquanta, nuovi approcci critici hanno aperto la strada a studi post-moderni sul bardo. Negli anni ottanta, le sue opere cominciarono a essere utilizzate per nuovi movimenti come lo strutturalismo, il femminismo, il New Historicism, gli studi afro-americani e queer.

I lavori di William Shakespeare hanno avuto una profonda influenza sul teatro e sulla letteratura successiva. In particolare, Shakespeare ampliò il potenziale drammatico della caratterizzazione dei personaggi, dell'intreccio e del linguaggio. Ad esempio, i monologhi erano generalmente utilizzati per fornire informazioni sui personaggi o gli eventi; Shakespeare, invece, li utilizzò per esplorare la mente dei personaggi.

Le sue opere influenzarono profondamente anche la letteratura poetica successiva. La poesia romantica tentò di far rivivere i versi drammatici shakespeariani, tuttavia con scarso successo. Il critico George Steiner descrisse tutti i versi drammatici inglesi da Coleridge a Tennyson come "flebili variazioni di temi shakespeariani". Shakespeare influenzò i romanzieri come Thomas Hardy, William Faulkner, e Charles Dickens. I monologhi del romanziere statunitense Herman Melville devono molto a Shakespeare: il suo Capitano Achab di è un classico eroe tragico, ispirato al King Lear. Alcune opere liriche sono direttamente collegate con i lavori di Shakespeare, tra cui tre lavori di Giuseppe Verdi, il , l' e il . Shakespeare ha inoltre ispirato molti pittori, inclusi i romantici, tra cui Henry Fuseli, e i preraffaelliti.

Ai giorni di Shakespeare, la grammatica, l'ortografia e la pronuncia inglese erano meno standardizzati rispetto a oggi, e il suo utilizzo del linguaggio aiutò la formazione dell'inglese moderno. Samuel Johnson citò Shakespeare più spesso di qualsiasi altro autore nel suo dizionario di lingua inglese, il primo lavoro autorevole di questo tipo. Espressioni come "with bated breath" ("con il fiato sospeso", da Il mercante di Venezia) e "a foregone conclusion" ("una conclusione inevitabile", dall' Otello) sono ormai presenti nell'inglese di tutti i giorni.

Screenshot di Cleopatra, film tratto da Antonio e Cleopatra

Diversi elementi degli scritti di Shakespeare sono stati spesso utilizzati nella cultura popolare come modelli stilistici, sia per le sceneggiature, sia per le ambientazioni, sia per i personaggi. Numerose sono le opere letterarie il cui titolo si basa su frasi del Bardo; Beds in the East di Anthony Burgess si riferisce ad Antonio e Cleopatra; Under the Greenwood Tree di Thomas Hardy a Come vi piace; Time Must Have a Stop di Aldous Huxley a Enrico IV; Band of Brothers di Stephen Ambrose a Enrico V; The Dogs of War di Frederick Forsyth e There is a Tide di Agatha Christie a Giulio Cesare; Twice-Told Tales di Nathaniel Hawthorne a Re Giovanni; Pomp and Circumstance di Noël Coward a Otello; The Winter of Our Discontent di John Steinbeck e Tomorrow in the Battle Think on Me di Javier Marías a Riccardo III; What's in a Name? di Isaac Asimov a Romeo e Giulietta; Absent in the Spring di Agatha Christie e Nothing Like the Sun di Anthony Burgess ai Sonetti; Brave New World di Aldous Huxley a La tempesta; Pale Fire di Vladimir Nabokov a Timone d'Atene e Cakes and Ale di William Somerset Maugham e Sad Cypress di Agatha Christie a La dodicesima notte; Brief Candles di Aldous Huxley, By the Pricking of My Thumbs di Agatha Christie, The Moon is Down di John Steinbeck, Something Wicked this Way Comes di Ray Bradbury, The Sound and the Fury di William Faulkner, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow di Kurt Vonnegut, Wyrd Sisters di Terry Pratchett a Macbeth; The Glimpses of the Moon di Edith Wharton; There are More Things di Jorge Luis Borges, Time Out of Joint di Philip K. Dick, Mortal Coils di Aldous Huxley, Infinite Jest di David Foster Wallace ad Amleto.

Altre opere shakespeariane sono state di grande influenza per diversi poeti, soprattutto in lingua inglese, come Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came di Robert Browning, Macbeth per di Robert Frost, Amleto per Very Like A Whale di Ogden Nash e La tempesta per Full Fathom Five di Sylvia Plath. Anche diverse rappresentazioni teatrali hanno attinto in qualche modo alle opere del Bardo, in particolare Amleto; la tragedia venne infatti utilizzata, tra gli altri, come base le sceneggiature da Ivor Novello per il musical Perchance to Dream, da Agatha Christie per The Mouse Trap, da Tom Stoppard per Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead e da Elmer Rice per Cue for Passion. Inoltre Journey's End di R.C. Sherriff si basa su Otello, The Isle Is Full of Noises di Derek Walcott su La tempesta e Present Laughter di Noël Coward e Improbable Fiction di Alan Ayckbourn su La dodicesima notte. Si ipotizza inoltre che oltre 20 000 brani musicali sono collegati con i lavori di Shakespeare.

Il cinema è uno dei campi che ha maggiormente risentito dell'opera di Shakespeare, sia in forma integrale sia come adattamenti. Romeo e Giulietta è l'opera che è stata riprodotta sul grande schermo il maggior numero di volte; tra gli adattamenti più famosi vi sono Giulietta e Romeo (1936), Giulietta e Romeo (1954), West Side Story, Romeo e Giulietta (1968), Romeo + Giulietta di William Shakespeare, Shakespeare in Love e Romeo and Juliet (2013). Tra le altre pellicole che hanno tratto dai lavori del Bardo vi sono da Le allegre comari di Windsor; Amleto (1948), Amleto (1964), Amleto (1990) e Amleto (1996) da Amleto; da Antonio e Cleopatra; La bisbetica domata e 10 cose che odio di te da La bisbetica domata; Belli e dannati da Enrico IV; Enrico V (1944) e Enrico V (1989) da Enrico V; Macbeth (1948), Il trono di sangue, Macbeth (1971), Macbeth (2015) da Macbeth; Otello (1951), Otello (1965), Otello (1995) e O come Otello da Otello; da Re Lear; Riccardo III (1955), Riccardo III (1995) e Riccardo III - Un uomo, un re da Riccardo III; Sogno di una notte di mezza estate (1935), Sogno di una notte di mezza estate (1999) e Una commedia sexy in una notte di mezza estate da Sogno di una notte di mezza estate; da Tito Andronico. Come vi piace, La dodicesima notte, Giulio Cesare, Il mercante di Venezia, Molto rumore per nulla, Pene d'amore perdute e La tempesta sono invece adattamenti delle rispettive opere.

I principali quattro candidati alternativi all'attribuzione delle opere di William Shakespeare (al centro). In senso orario, da sinistra in alto: Edward de Vere, Francis Bacon, William Stanley e Christopher Marlowe.

Attribuzione e identità

La maggior parte degli studiosi shakespeariani ritiene senza alcun dubbio che lo Shakespeare nato a Stratford on Avon sia l'autore materiale delle opere che gli furono attribuite. Tuttavia, a causa della scarsità di notizie sulla sua vita, la sua istruzione, assenza di documenti o lettere a lui intestate, sono stati avanzati diversi dubbi sull'identità del drammaturgo. A partire dal XVIII secolo questi temi sono stati ampiamente e intensamente dibattuti da studiosi e non. In campo accademico, tali ipotesi non hanno avuto riconoscimenti dagli studiosi shakespeariani.

In particolare, come autore delle opere shakespeariane sono state avanzate le candidature di Francis Bacon, celebre filosofo e scrittore, che avrebbe scritto le opere teatrali sotto uno pseudonimo, di Christopher Marlowe, autore teatrale, morto nel 1593, ma che secondo alcuni avrebbe svolto attività di spionaggio per la corona e avrebbe continuato la propria attività letteraria con un falso nome, di Edward de Vere, 17º conte di Oxford, colto nobiluomo della corte elisabettiana che avrebbe continuato la propria giovanile attività poetica sotto uno pseudonimo per motivi di decoro oppure di William Stanley, sesto Conte di Derby, genero di Edward de Vere.

Altre ipotesi hanno messo in discussione l'identità inglese stessa di William Shakespeare, per cui il bardo sarebbe da identificarsi con il linguista e scrittore di origini italiane Giovanni Florio, conosciuto come John. Diversi studi hanno approfondito l' influenza di Giovanni Florio sulle opere shakespeariane. John Florio ha coniato per la lingua inglese 1.149 parole e diversi proverbi e frasi scritti da John Florio compariranno in seguito nelle opere di William Shakespeare e diversi neologismi creati da Florio compariranno per la prima volta nel First Folio di Shakespeare. Inoltre, tre frasi di Florio diventarono titoli di tre commedie shakespeariane. John Florio è stato proposto come redattore del First Folio da alcuni studiosi di Shakespeare, tra cui Saul Frampton e Stuart Kells.

Un altro candidato proposto è il teologo e predicatore toscano Michelangelo Florio, padre di John Florio. Sono stati fatti, tra gli altri candidati, anche i nomi di Ben Jonson, Thomas Middleton, sir Walter Raleigh, Mary Sidney contessa di Pembroke, e persino la regina Elisabetta I.

Alcuni studiosi affermano che i membri della famiglia Shakespeare fossero cattolici; sua madre, Mary Arden, proveniva infatti da una famiglia cattolica. Nel 1757, nella casa del padre di Shakespeare, fu trovato un testamento cattolico firmato da John Shakespeare; sebbene ne sia stato tramandato il contenuto, il testamento è stato perduto, pertanto gli studiosi discutono ancora della sua autenticità. Nel 1591 le autorità più volte riportarono che John Shakespeare non andava alla funzione domenicale "per paura di essere processato per debiti", una comune scusa utilizzata dai cattolici per evitare di seguire le cerimonie protestanti; tuttavia, molti documenti sembrano indicare che effettivamente all'epoca John Shakespeare avesse problemi economici. Nel 1606 il nome della figlia di Shakespeare, Susanna, apparve in una lista di persone che non presero la comunione durante la Pasqua di quell'anno.

Gli studiosi hanno trovato prove sia a favore sia a sfavore del cattolicesimo di Shakespeare nelle sue opere, ma la verità sembra impossibile da trovare nell'uno e nell'altro caso. Rowan Williams, arcivescovo di Canterbury e primate della Comunione Anglicana, che è anche uno studioso di letteratura, ha comunicato durante l'Hay Festival in Galles del 2011: "Non penso che questo ci debba interessare molto, se posizionarlo tra i cattolici o i protestanti. Ma per quel che vale, penso che egli avesse probabilmente un retroterra cattolico e molti amici cattolici".

Numerosi sono i dipinti o le sculture che raffigurano William Shakespeare, tuttavia nella maggior parte dei casi si tratta di opere posteriori alla sua morte, realizzate da artisti che mai videro il vero volto di Shakespeare. Un tempo l'unica raffigurazione di cui era accettato il valore documentario è la statua del monumento funebre a Stratford, ma la forma attuale risulta solamente dopo il 1720, in quanto precedentemente aveva dettagli diversi dalle caratteristiche attuali (nel monumento originale Shakespeare non teneva in mano una penna e un libro ma si appoggiava a un sacco di grano). La celebre incisione presente sul First Folio del 1623 è di fatto posteriore di alcuni anni alla morte di Shakespeare. Tra i ritratti la cui attendibilità è discussa possiamo ricordare il Ritratto Chandos, il ritratto dell' Ely Palace, il ritratto Flowers, la maschera mortuaria Kesselstadt, il ritratto di Cornelius Janssen, la miniatura di Nicholas Hilliard e il recente Ritratto Cobbe.

1. In ^ italiano si trovano la rara e antica forma adattata Guglielmo Scespir (Museo di letteratura e filosofia, per cura di S. Gatti. Nuova ser., vol. 1-15; 3a ser., vol. 1-nuova [4th], Volume 7, Museo di scienze e letteratura, 1845, p. 256; Scrivendo & parlando: usi e abusi della lingua italiana, Luciano Satta, 1988, p. 137; Opere edite e inedite in prosa ed in versi, Volume 22, Saverio Bettinelli, 1801, p. 113) e le varianti ancor più rare e .

2. ^ La data di battesimo è il 26 aprile 1564, mentre l'esatto giorno di nascita è un argomento ancora dibattuto tra gli esperti. Si dice che sia nato il 23 aprile per convenzione, in quanto in quel giorno si celebra la festa di san Giorgio, patrono della nazione.

3. La data di morte riportata segue il ^ calendario giuliano allora in uso in Inghilterra. Secondo il calendario gregoriano, introdotto nei paesi cattolici dal 1582, Shakespeare morì il 3 maggio. Nella stessa data del 23 aprile 1616, ma del calendario gregoriano, fu sepolto Miguel de Cervantes, morto il giorno addietro, e morì il meticcio inca Garcilaso de la Vega. Per questo motivo l'UNESCO ha scelto il 23 aprile per la Giornata mondiale del libro e del diritto d'autore.

4. ^ () Michael Dobson, The Making of the National Poet: Shakespeare, Adaptation and Authorship, 1660-1769 , su us.oup.com, Oxford University Press. URL consultato il 26 febbraio 2006 (archiviato dall'url originale il 10 marzo 2007).

5. ^ () David Bevington, Shakespeare, William - Shakespeare the man>Life>Sexuality , su search.eb.com, Encyclopædia Britannica's Guide to Shakespeare. URL consultato il 23 giugno 2015.

6. Carlo Maria Pensa prefazione a ^ William Shakespeare, Amleto - Sogno di una notte di mezza estate 1999.

7. ^ Alessandro Serpieri, Il mistero del primo Amleto, in Giuseppina Restivo, Renzo Crivelli (a cura di), Tradurre/Interpretare "Amleto", Bologna, Clueb, 2002, ISBN 88-491-1853-8.

8. La frase in corsivo è una parodia della frase di Shakespeare "Oh, cuore di tigre nascosto da un corpo di donna!" (^ Enrico VI, parte III).

9. ^ Evidente l'assonanza Shake-scene / Shake-speare.

10. ^ Giorgio Melchiori, Prospetto alle opere di Shakespeare, in Shakespeare, Re Lear, Mondadori, 1989, ISBN 88-04-32575-5.

11. ^ Anna Luisa Zazo (a cura di), Cronologia della vita e delle opere di Shakespeare, in Otello, Mondadori, 1992, p. LI, ISBN 978-88-04-50938-7.

12. ^ All'epoca le strade erano costruite e riparate per lo più da filantropi.

13. Edward Ravenscroft (1654?-1707) in ^ Jonathan Bate, Arden Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus, 1996, p. 79, ISBN non esistente.

14. ^ () F. E. Halliday, A Shakespeare Companion 1564-1964 , Baltimore, Penguin, 1964, pp. 74-75, ISBN non esistente.

15. ^ () R. A. Foakes, "Playhouses and Players", in Braunmuller, Michael Hattaway, The Cambridge Companion to English Renaissance Drama, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990, ISBN 0-521-38662-4.

16. ^ () William Jr. Ringler, Shakespeare and His Actors: Some Remarks on King Lear , in James Ogden, Scouten, In Lear from Study to Stage: Essays in Criticism, New Jersey, Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1997, p. 127, ISBN 0-8386-3690-X.

17. ^ George T. Wright, The Play of Phrase and Line, in Russ McDonald, Shakespeare: An Anthology of Criticism and Theory, 1945-2000, Oxford, Blackwell, 2004, ISBN 0-631-23488-8.

18. Questa particolarità è tipica delle commedie shakespeariane; tuttavia non mancano gli esempi notevoli anche nelle tragedie, si veda ad esempio il ^ Re Lear, con le due leggende fonte d'ispirazione: quella di Lear e quella del Conte di Gloucester.

19. Mario Pazzaglia, ^ Letteratura italiana, vol.2, ed. Zanichelli, Bologna.

20. Marta Sambugar, Gabriella Salà; Gaot. ^ Generi autori opere temi, La Nuova Italia, Firenze, vol. 2.

21. ^ Margaret Drabble, Jenny Stringer, V. De Simone, Dizionario Oxford della letteratura inglese, Gremese Editore, 1998, p. 110, ISBN 88-7742-218-1.

22. ^ Emanuela Martini (a cura di), Ombre che camminano: Shakespeare nel cinema , Torino, Lindau, 1998, ISBN 88-7180-215-2.

23. ^ Isabella Imperiali (a cura di), Shakespeare al cinema, Roma, Bulzoni, 2000, ISBN 88-8319-528-0.

24. ^ Empire of Words: The Reign of the OED, by John Willinsky, Princeton University Press, 1994

25. ^ Florio: It is Labour lost to speak of love (Second Fruits, Folio 71, 1591),Shakespeare lo rende un titolo di una commedia: 'Love's Labour's Lost' (Pene d'amor perdute, 1598)Florio: Gran romore, e poca lana (much a doe about nothing) (Giardino di Ricreatione, 1591/Queen's Anna New World of Words, 1611)Shakespeare lo rende titolo di una commedia: 'Much Ado About Nothing' (1600)Florio: Tutto è bene, che riesce bene (Giardino di Ricreatione, 1591)Shakespeare lo rende titolo di una commedia 'All's Well That Ends Well' ('Tutto è bene quel che finisce bene', 1623)

26. ^ Stuart Kells, Shakespeare's Library, Counterpoint, 2019

27. ^ Primate Anglicano Rowan Williams, Shakespeare era cattolico , in Buonanotizia.org, 4 giugno 2011. URL consultato il 27 dicembre 2011 (archiviato dall'url originale il 6 novembre 2011).

Gabriele Baldini, Le tragedie di Shakespeare, Torino, ERI, 1957, ISBN non esistente.

() John Bryant, Moby Dick as Revolution, a cura di Robert Steven Levine, in The Cambridge Companion to Herman Melville, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1998, ISBN 0-521-55571-X.

() Fausto Cercignani, Shakespeare's Works and Elizabethan Pronunciation , Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1981, ISBN 0-19-811937-2.

Michele Ciarammella, A Short Account of English Literature, "The Age of Shakespeare", Roma, Edizioni Cremonese, 1957, ISBN non esistente.

Benedetto Croce, Shakespeare, Bari, Laterza, 1948, ISBN non esistente.

() Edward Dowden, Shakspere, New York, Appleton & Co, 1881, ISBN non esistente.

() Hugh Grady, Shakespeare Criticism 1600-1900, in Margreta deGrazia, Stanley Wells, The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001, ISBN 0-521-65094-1.

Giuseppe Leone, Il palcoscenico esemplare. La questione della giustizia nelle tragedie shakespeariane, Napoli, Liguori, 2016, ISBN 9788820765880.

() Harry Levin, Critical Approaches to Shakespeare from 1660 to 1904, in Stanley Wells, The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare Studies, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1986, ISBN 0-521-31841-6.

John Middleton Murry, Shakespeare, Torino, Einaudi, 1977, ISBN non esistente.

() Kenneth Muir, A New Companion to Shakespeare Studies , a cura di Samuel Schoenbaum, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1971, ISBN non esistente.

() Júlia Paraisz, Peter Holland, The Nature of a Romantic Edition , in Shakespeare Survey, 59, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2006, ISBN 0-521-86838-6.

() Richard Schoch, Pictorial Shakespeare , in Stanley Wells, Sarah Stanton, The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Stage, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2002, ISBN 0-521-79711-X.

() Samuel Schoenbaum, William Shakespeare: a compact documentary life , Oxford Paperbacks, 1987, ISBN 0-19-505161-0.

() Samuel Schoenbaum, Shakespeare. Sulle tracce di una leggenda. , Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1991, ISBN 0-19-818618-5.

Michele Stanco (a cura di), La letteratura inglese dall'Umanesimo al Rinascimento. 1485-1625, Roma, Carocci, 2016, ISBN 978-88-430-8060-1

() George Steevens, Alexander Pope, Samuel Johnson, The Plays and Poems of William Shakspeare, Londra, Bathurst, 1785, ISBN non esistente.

() George Wilson Knight, The Wheel of Fire - Interpretations of Shakespearian Tragedy , Londra, Methuen & Co. Ltd, 1977, ISBN non esistente.

(FR) William Shakespeare , su CÉSAR - Calendrier Électronique des Spectacles sous l'Ancien régime et sous la Révolution, Huma-Num.

Opere di William Shakespeare / William Shakespeare (altra versione) / William Shakespeare (altra versione) / William Shakespeare (altra versione) / William Shakespeare (altra versione) , su openMLOL, Horizons Unlimited srl.

(EN) Opere di William Shakespeare , su Open Library, Internet Archive.

(EN) Opere riguardanti William Shakespeare , su Open Library, Internet Archive.

(EN) William Shakespeare , su AllMovie, All Media Network.

(EN) William Shakespeare , su TV.com, Red Ventures (archiviato dall'url originale il 1º gennaio 2012).

(EN) William Shakespeare , su BFI Film & TV Database, British Film Institute (archiviato dall'url originale il 1º gennaio 2018).

(DE, EN) William Shakespeare , su filmportal.de.

(EN) Open Source Shakespeare , su opensourceshakespeare.org.

(EN) Testi delle opere teatrali di William Shakespeare nel sito del MIT.

(EN) Shakespeare Literature, versioni indicizzate per capitolo e ricercabili delle opere di Shakespeare.

Shakespeare Italia, in versione integrale le opere teatrali e i sonetti. Con sezione tematiche varie.

Wikimedaglia

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
È considerato il poeta più rappresentativo del popolo inglese e soprannominato il " Bardo dell' Avon" (o semplicemente "Il Bardo") oppure il "Cigno dell'Avon"; delle sue opere sono stati ritrovati, incluse alcune collaborazioni, 38 testi teatrali, 154 sonetti e una serie di altri poemi.