Moreover, the different mediums enable the audience to explore the performative nature of identity and the individualistic nature of ambition and how the different contexts respond to and portray this. Ambition and identity in Richard the Third are overwhelmingly portrayed in a negative light, ultimately resulting in dire consequences; in an Elizabethan context individualism and ambition reflected a person striving to grasp what was not due to them - ultimately, opposing God’s will. Richard, in the play, is represented as both villain and protagonist. We are made aware of Richards duplicitous nature and his evil aspirations as early as Act 1 Scene 1 where he states “I am determinèd to prove a villain” a self referential (and metadramatic in nature) pun which brings about questions of determinism and free will, themes that are explored throughout the play; there is ambiguity around whether or not Richard actually has autonomy over his nefarious deeds, which he goes about plotting. In keeping with his Elizabethan context, Shakespeare can not be seen to oppose the chain of being, the hierarchical chain of the period where a king was at the top,
All these inexcusable, yet necessary, deeds that I have committed art for what? For Maduff to betray us, and for Malcom to overthrow us? (Laughs hysterically) Oh, how excited I was to learn my dearest Macbeth wouldst be King, keen to “pour my spirits in thine ear”, and I wouldst be his Queen! To think that an ambition so strong wouldn’t succeed, how cruel this world is! Macbeth/Weird Sisters It was those wretched Weird Sisters who wedged themselves into our thoughts, manipulating and distorting Macbeth and I both.
Alliteration, Shakespeare presents patriarchal power in the technique ‘alliteration’ to exaggerate Lord Capulet’s anger over Juliet and to show negativity. “Fettle your fine joints.” Shakespeare uses this technique to repeat the ‘f’ sound to show and harsh language and negativity. Also to show the audience how terrible it is for Juliet to challenge her fathers
He undermines Brutus, conveyed through his lamenting tone “thou art the ruins of the noblest man” to further challanege the perspective that caesars thirst for power was a threat to the roman republic. Shakespeare furthers these conflicting perspectives in Act 3 scene 2 to demonstrate the power of political rhetoric. In the funerary speeches, Brutus’ patriotic tone in “not that I loved Caesar less but that I loved rome more” representes him as a protector of the roman republican values that Caesar threatened. This is sharply
Macbeth, by William Shakespeare is a play with a series of tragic events. Throughout the play we see those who are led by astray of their own weaknesses. Macbeth in this play shows the darkest side of human nature, and showing how greed, temptation and power can make one betray their own king for royalty. The events in Macbeth are tragic and dreadful. Shakespeare’s play Macbeth is a play revolving around greed and ambition.
The ways concepts are represented shape how the audience will perceive them. The central conflict of Julius Caesar, leading to Caesar’s assassination, is the clash of views about how Rome should be governed. Even though it is clear that Shakespeare disapproves of the conspirators and their murder, he also disapproves of Caesar’s manipulation to become sole ruler and is sympathetic to Brutus’ fears about the loss of the republic. On several occasions in the play Caesar is represented as deceptive and insincere, merely acting a part to get what he wants. The rejection of the crown, in particular, shows us Caesar at his most manipulative and self interested.
Shakespeare had to make recourse to a wholly artificial device in order to show Hamlet in action, or inaction – the soliloquy. Another strain that goes through Hamlet, and a disturbing one, is the abuse by Hamlet of his former beloved and his mother, Ophelia and Gertrude. In his scenes with Ophelia, Hamlet is relentlessly cruel, charging her with a lustful nature, a dishonest heart, a dissembling appearance, and so on. He builds up, in scene three, to an utterly misogynistic rant, beginning, “I have heard of your paintings well enough.” Men in the English Renaissance were obsessed with women’s make-up, which they took to be a symbol of feminine wiles, excuses, manipulations, artifices, and hypocrisies. Shakespeare, especially, has a long rhetorical history with this line of vitriol; it shows up in many of his plays and features strongly in his Sonnets.
In Act 3 Scene 1 Banquo accuses Macbeth of having got the royal title in an unfair way when he says, “Thou hast it now: king, Cawdor, Glamis, all, As the weird women promised, and I fear Thou played’st most foully for’t.” Now Banquo had accused Macbeth he felt he had to stop him from talking. As soon as Banquo leaves, Macbeth calls in hired murderers and convinces them to kill his friend by blaming Banquo for the bad things that have happened to the murderers in the past, “That it was he, in the times past, which held you.” He asks them if they are man enough to help Macbeth
Richard is presented as a character both deformed in appearance and in spirit. He has the aim of becoming King at all costs and Shakespeare depicts him as thoroughly unprincipled and vicious. Primarily he is motivated by boundless ambition to gain and keep the crown. Utterly heartless, he does not hesitate to betray his own brothers, devising the murder of Clarence, deceiving and damaging the reputation of Edward IV, and orchestrating the death his own nephews. Shakespeare manipulates our response to Richard by implying in the text that he poisoned his wife Anne in order to gain a political marriage to his niece, Elizabeth of York.
Then why is the existence of our species threatened by it’s violence? (Bond, Author’s Preface 03) This question posed by Edward Bond in Author’s Preface raises a series of thought-provoking arguments. Majority of the critics agree that unchecked an uncontrolled violence in human race leads to terrible results. Political and social worlds of King Lear and Bond’s Lear evince it. The aggressive struggle for power amongst the leading characters of both plays creates a world of unrest, disharmony and continuous threat.