The Cambridge Introduction to Shakespeare's TragediesMacbeth clutches an imaginary dagger; Hamlet holds up Yorick's skull; Lear enters with Cordelia in his arms. Do these memorable and iconic moments have anything to tell us about the definition of Shakespearean tragedy? Is it in fact helpful to talk about 'Shakespearean tragedy' as a concept, or are there only Shakespearean tragedies? What kind of figure is the tragic hero? Is there always such a figure? What makes some plays more tragic than others? Beginning with a discussion of tragedy before Shakespeare and considering Shakespeare's tragedies chronologically one by one, this 2007 book seeks to investigate such questions in a way that highlights both the distinctiveness and shared concerns of each play within the broad trajectory of Shakespeare's developing exploration of tragic form. |
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Janette Dillon. Janette Dillon The Cambridge Introduction to Shakespeare's Tragedies Chapter 1 Tragedy before Shakespeare The First Folio collected edition. Front Cover.
Janette Dillon. Janette Dillon The Cambridge Introduction to Shakespeare's Tragedies Chapter 1 Tragedy before Shakespeare The First Folio collected edition. Front Cover.
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Janette Dillon. Chapter 1 Tragedy before Shakespeare The First Folio collected edition of Shakespeare's Works , published in 1623 , seven years after his death , grouped his plays under three headings : comedies , histories and tragedies ...
Janette Dillon. Chapter 1 Tragedy before Shakespeare The First Folio collected edition of Shakespeare's Works , published in 1623 , seven years after his death , grouped his plays under three headings : comedies , histories and tragedies ...
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... tragedy (The Comedy of Errors (1594) and Titus Andronicus (1592)), show him openly imitating these two great predecessors. The tragedies of Seneca , the first - century Roman 8 The Cambridge Introduction to Shakespearean Tragedies.
... tragedy (The Comedy of Errors (1594) and Titus Andronicus (1592)), show him openly imitating these two great predecessors. The tragedies of Seneca , the first - century Roman 8 The Cambridge Introduction to Shakespearean Tragedies.
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... tragedy more substantially than any body of theoretical writing , including Aristotle's . His plays may not have been written for fully staged performance ... Shakespeare almost certainly never read Aristotle, so Tragedy before Shakespeare 9.
... tragedy more substantially than any body of theoretical writing , including Aristotle's . His plays may not have been written for fully staged performance ... Shakespeare almost certainly never read Aristotle, so Tragedy before Shakespeare 9.
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... -century commentator on Terence whose work was part of the standard grammar-school curriculum in England. Tragedies and comedies , saith Donatus , had their beginning 10 The Cambridge Introduction to Shakespearean Tragedies.
... -century commentator on Terence whose work was part of the standard grammar-school curriculum in England. Tragedies and comedies , saith Donatus , had their beginning 10 The Cambridge Introduction to Shakespearean Tragedies.
Contents
Section 1 | 25 |
Section 2 | 26 |
Section 3 | 27 |
Section 4 | 33 |
Section 5 | 38 |
Section 6 | 40 |
Section 7 | 43 |
Section 8 | 46 |
Section 14 | 77 |
Section 15 | 84 |
Section 16 | 91 |
Section 17 | 103 |
Section 18 | 114 |
Section 19 | 115 |
Section 20 | 126 |
Section 21 | 127 |
Section 9 | 52 |
Section 10 | 55 |
Section 11 | 65 |
Section 12 | 66 |
Section 13 | 72 |
Section 22 | 134 |
Section 23 | 136 |
Section 24 | 140 |
Section 25 | 147 |
Section 26 | 150 |
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Common terms and phrases
action actor Antony and Cleopatra Antony's Apemantus Aristotle audience Aufidius become blood bond Brutus Capulet Cassius chorus classical close clown comedy comic contemporary contrast Cordelia Core scene Coriolanus death Desdemona drama earlier Elizabethan emblematic Emilia excess Faustus fear feel figure Folio friends Ghost Gloucester Gorboduc Hamlet handkerchief honour human Iago Iago's Julius Caesar kill kind King kneeling Lady Macbeth Lavinia Lear Lear's lovers Macduff manhood Marcus mark antony Martius masculinity moral murder opening scene Ophelia Othello parallel performance perspective play play's Plutarch political Portia protagonist question recalls recognise represented response revenge tragedy rhetoric ritual Roman Rome Romeo and Juliet Saturninus scripts seems Seneca sequence Shakespeare Shakespearean tragedy shows soliloquy Spanish Tragedy speak speech stage direction story suggest Tamora theatre thee thing thou Timon of Athens Titus Andronicus tragic hero villain violence virtue wife women words
Popular passages
Page 112 - I'll kneel down, And ask of thee forgiveness. So we'll live, And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues Talk of court news ; and we'll talk with them too, Who loses,- and who wins ; who's in, who's out ; And take upon's the mystery of things, As if we were God's spies...
Page 42 - A glooming peace this morning with it brings : The sun, for sorrow, will not show his head...
Page 71 - Imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to clay, Might stop a hole to keep the wind away : O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe, Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw ! But soft ! but soft ! aside : here comes the king.
Page 63 - Cowards die many times before their deaths ; The valiant never taste of death but once. Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, It seems to me most strange that men should fear ; Seeing that death, a necessary end, Will come, when it will come.
Page 125 - I have lived long enough : my way of life Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf ; And that which should accompany old age, As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, I must not look to have...
Page 138 - tis most certain, Iras. Saucy lictors Will catch at us, like strumpets ; and scald rhymers Ballad us out o' tune : the quick comedians Extemporally will stage us, and present Our Alexandrian revels : Antony Shall be brought drunken forth, and I shall see Some squeaking Cleopatra boy my greatness I
Page 139 - Take up her bed; And bear her women from the monument. She shall be buried by her Antony: No grave upon the earth shall clip in it A pair so famous. High events as these Strike those that make them; and their story is No less in pity than his glory which Brought them to be lamented.
Page 57 - Between the acting of a dreadful thing And the first motion, all the interim is Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream: The genius, and the mortal instruments, Are then in council; and the state of man, Like to a little kingdom, suffers then The nature of an insurrection.
Page 73 - What's Hecuba to him or he to Hecuba That he should weep for her? What would he do Had he the motive and the cue for passion That I have?