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William Shakespeare ((1564-1616) - Coggle Diagram
William Shakespeare ((1564-1616)
Life facts
Born in Stratford-Upon-Avon from a glover and whittawer (John Shakespeare)
During Will's childhoos, his father increased his wealth and civic importance in SuA, but then had some troubles with the law and fell in debt
some scholars claim that the Shakespeare family was secretly Catholic, but the (probably forged) docs that could have proved it are lost
After school, he didn't go to university; he went back to SuA and married Anne Hathaway, 8 years older than him
They had 3 children: Susanna, Hamnet (died at 11) and Judith
He gained fame as an actor and playwright, eventually managing to get a coat of arms for his family - application submitted by his father 25 years before (motto:
Non sans droit
)
He made major investments in SuA even while he lived in London
He probably "semi-retired" somewhere at the beginning of James I's reign (kept writing but less, and stayed in SuA?)
Died in 1616, but his fame remained and a complete collection of his works, known as the First Folio, was published in 1623 (overseen by his friends Heminges and Condell)
As a poet
not only his plays were mainly written in verse...
he also penned 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems and a few other minor poems!
his first poem was probably a sonnet for his wife
‘“I hate” from hate away she threw, And saved my life, saying “not you.”’
As an actor and playwright
Imitatio
: Will freely borrowed charas and ideas from other writers, used several sources and inspired himself after lots of authors and works
NOT PLAGIARISM!
the Renaissance theory of imitatio (creative imitation of others): a poet showed genius not by inventing new stories but by adapting old ones (transformation rather than invention)
he probably had been exposed to theatre from a very young age (travelling companies)
between 1585 and 1592 ("lost years") he clearly was an actor (probably he joined the Queen's Men in 1587 or so), had become a playwright, and had a certain notoriety
initially he probably wrote for Lord Strange's Men, but when the Lord Chamberlain started his own company (based in the Theatre) he began writing exclusively for them
unlike many of his contemporaries, he never wrote masques, plays for boy companies, or shows for the trade guilds
his plays were performed at the Theatre, the Curtain and the Globe, but also at court in palaces like Hampton Court and Richmond
Authorship controversy: the Anti-Stratfordians
claimed that Shakespeare was a "beard" for other authors such as Francis Bacon, Christopher Marlowe and... Queen Elizabeth! (the reasoning being that the plays denoted a culture that could not belong to a man of humble origins)
of course it's false, there are record of Will's existence and authorship
A-Ss employ a form of fallacious logic: argumentum ex silentio (based on the absence of documents, rather than their presence)
Education
During Will's time, students were trained via repetition and composition, which fostered a great sensitivity to language (especially to its sound)
Latin-centered curriculum; students not only had to study grammar and authors, but also to write like them (imitation: not "how did the author write this" but "how would the author write this"
all the techniques they learned were supposed to make them into lawyers and clerics... but also taught them how to become playwrights!
they learned composition and oratory techniques, and how to argue an issue from both sides, which taught them how to organize elements and proofs in order to be convincing both for and against a situation, but it also helped them develop a sort of empathy
Students were also indoctrinated with the tenets of the C of E (conformist and monarchist)
regular attendance to Mass was mandatory and exposed them to the Bible (in English) which was also read and studied in group sessions (also a social practice!)