Biography of William Shakespeare | English playwright, considered the best playwright of all time.

Biography of William Shakespeare

The enigmatic life and literary career of the English playwright, considered the best playwright of all time.

Around 1860, at the time that culminated his work Les Misérables, Victor Hugo wrote from exile: 'Shakespeare is the monument that England should you'. At this point in the 19th century, the work of which is today considered the greatest of all time playwright was ignored by most and despised by the exquisite. The words of the French Patriarch fell like a mallet on English patriotic conscience; dozens of monuments to Shakespeare were immediately erected.

Currently, the volume of his complete works is as indispensable as the Bible in Anglo-Saxon households; Hamlet, Othello and Macbeth have become symbols and its author is a classic on which run rivers of ink. In spite of this, William Shakespeare as a man, is still unknown.

William Shakespeare

Large gaps, a bunch of apocryphal stories and some scattered data make up his biography. It is not even known exactly the date of his birth. This would give foot in the last century to a strange work of apparent erudition, starring the "antiestratfordianos", which aims to spread evil suspicion that the works of Shakespeare had not been written by the historical character of the same name, but by others who served as a screen. Francis Bacon, Edward de Vere, Walter Raleigh, the Queen Isabel I and even the same wife of bardo, Anne Hathaway, were the candidates proposed by the fictitious Shakespeare scholars speculators. According to another theory, his friend the playwright Christopher Marlowe was the true author: would not have died at the age of twenty-nine in a tavern fight as it was believed, but managed to flee abroad and from there sent her writings to Shakespeare.

Certain Cryptography fans believed they had encountered, in his works, key revealing the real authors name. In keeping with the theatrical covers, Shakespeare was divided in the pseudo-Shakespeare and Shakespeare the Bribon. Under this work of entertainment encouraged a curious snobbery: one man's humble birthplace and few studies could not have written works of such greatness.

Fortunately, with the passing of the years, no less dedicated, serious critic to slander that to discern, most worried about glitter outside by himself, he has signed these witty anecdotes. But of the many rebuttals that have been invalidated, none as conclusive, apart from scarce but incontrovertible historical data, such as the testimony of the work itself; because through his style and his distinctive talent we can find the man.

The origins

In the sixth year of the reign of Isabel I of England, on April 26, 1564, was christened William Shakespeare in Stratford-upon-Avon, a village in Warwick County which not exceeded two thousand inhabitants, proud of its church, its school and its bridge over the river. One of these was John Shakespeare, dealer in wool, butcher and tenant who became Councillor, Treasurer and Mayor. From his marriage with Mary Arden, Lady of distinguished family, were born five children, the third of which received the name of William. There is no evidence from the day of his birth, but traditionally his birthday is celebrated on 23 April, perhaps to find some design or fatality on the date, since death came, fifty-two years later, on the same day.

Therefore, it wasn't his crib as humble as it ensures the adverse criticism, nor his studies so scarce as he is assumed. While Ben Johnson, playwright and friend of the playwright, exaggeratedly said that "I knew little latin and less Greek", the truth is that Shakespeare learned the language of Virgil in the Stratford school, albeit as an unenthusiastic student, extreme both confirming his works. The mother came from an old and wealthy Catholic family, and is very likely that the poet, along with his two brothers and a sister, was educated in the faith of his mother.

Shakespeare's birthplace

However, it must not remain a long time in the classrooms, as it when he was thirteen his father Fortune vanished and the young man had to be placed as a dependent of carnage. At the age of fifteen, says, it was already a dexterous butcher who beheaded calves with pomp, that is, saying funeral and flowery speeches. He paints is also wandering indolent the banks of the Avon, blurring lines, delivered to the study of botanical trivia or rivaling the hardest drinkers and then napping at the foot of the woods of Arden.

At eighteen he had married Anne Hathaway, one villager nine years older than him whose pregnancy was very advanced. Five months after the wedding she had a daughter, Susan, and then the twins Judith and Hamnet. But Shakespeare would not be an ideal husband or she was so ample garments to hold it on its side for a long time. The interests of the poet driving it in other directions rather than road home. He continued to write verses, hypnotized attended representations offered by companies of comedians of the League in the Guild Hall of Stratford and not lose the masquerades, Fireworks, horseback riding and theatrical functions that held the visits of the Queen to the castle of Kenilworth, abode of one of their favorite.

According to the legend, in 1586 was caught red-handed hunting furtively. Nicholas Rowe, his first biographer, writes: "Unfortunately too common in young, Shakespeare was given to bad companies, and some who stole deer induced him more than once to steal them in a park belonging to sir Thomas Lucy, of Charlecote, near Stratford. As a result, this gentleman prosecuted Shakespeare, who, for revenge, he wrote a satire against him. This case first rehearsal of his muse was so aggressive that the gentleman redoubled his pursuit, in such terms that it forced Shakespeare to leave his business and his family and to take refuge in London". But it is more plausible to the virus of the theatre to push him to join some celebrity comic travellers passing through Stratford, leaving children and wife and bartering them for both grim and splendid capital of the Kingdom.

Shakespeare in the city of theatre

From that moment there is a gap in the life of Shakespeare, a period the biographers call "the dark years". It does not reappear before our eyes until 1593, when it is already a famous playwright and one of the most popular characters in London. Meanwhile attributed the following jobs: trainee lawyer, school teacher, soldier of fortune, guardian of noble family and even guardian of horses to the gate of the theatres. It would take several months until he could enter them and meddling behind the scenes, first as traspunte or servant of the pointer, then as a comparsa, later as an actor recognized and, finally, as an author of great and well-deserved prestige.

Prohibited by a Puritan town Council that considered them seedlings of vices, theatres had installed on the other side of the River Thames, outside the jurisdiction of the city and the annoyance of their deputies. Curtain, El Globo, El Cisne or Blackfriars were not very different Hispanic pen where represented Lope de Vega. The scenery was extremely simple: two swords crossed at the bottom of the proscenium meant a battle; a stationary player powdered plaster was a wall, and, if it separated the fingers, the wall had cracks; a man loaded with firewood, carrying a flashlight and followed by a dog, was the moon.

The costumes are improvised in a corner of the scene partially hidden by curtains made rags, through which the audience saw actors painting their cheeks with brick powder or tiznando the mustache with carbonized Cork. While players gesturing and CITES, the Noblemen and officers, accommodated to its peer on the platform, they baffled them with their laughter, their cries and their card games, ready to show off his wit improvising replicas and to spoil the representation if the work was not pleased them. Around the courtyard, galleries hosting the ladies of rank and the Knights. And at the bottom of "casserole", wrapped in shadows, sitting on the floor between pitchers of beer and smoke pipes, it looked to "the foul", the smelly people.

In any case, it was an audience with more imagination than the current or, at least, connoisseur of theatrical conventions imposed by poverty or by law. Inspired by the severe primitivism of Deuteronomy, Puritan lawmakers prohibited the presence of women in the scene. The Julietas, Desdemonas, and Shakespeare Ofelias were embodied by boys but similar voice atiplada, amounted to Hamlets, Macbeths and Otelos as blunted them beard and changing them voice. Such was the theatre in which Shakespeare began his dramatic career.

Fertility

To 1589, Shakespeare began to write. He did it on loose sheets, like most of the poets of the time. The actors learned and rehearsed their roles hastily and reading in the original, which not is drew copies for lack of time; Hence, already there are no manuscripts. As each evening offered a different work, the Repertoire had to be varied. If the play failed and it did not return to stage. If you liked was replaced at intervals of two or three days. A work of much success, as all of Shakespeare, could represent a ten or twelve times in a month. Some players were able to improvise from a shallow argument the dialogues of the work as the action was developing. Shakespeare never needed them.

Portrait and signature of Shakespeare

Beset by this dizzying pace spurred by his genius, Shakespeare began to produce two works per year. In its first stage, Shakespeare followed the line of these Elizabethan dramas of swashbuckling. These years (between 1589 and 1592) are the works which inaugurated its national Chronicle, its historical dramas: the first three parts of Henry VI and the history of who killed it, Richard III. The comedy of errors, based on a theme of Plautus, marks his burlesque side, and Titus Andronicus, barbaric tragedy inspired by Seneca, his first work of Roman theme.

During the plague of London in 1592 (which the Puritans took advantage to keep closed the theatres until 1594), Shakespeare retired to Stratford and developed his poetic talent. Venus and Adonis published in 1593 and 1594 the rape of Lucretia, two long poems, dedicated to his guard young, Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, who are usually associated with one of the protagonists of the famous sonnets. As contained in documents, in 1594 was already a prominent member of the best company of the time, the Lord Chamberlain completo Company of Players (lord Chamberlain actors company), name taken from his guard, and had written the taming of the Shrew, the two gentlemen of Verona, Italian-inspired two comedies and a third, lost love works, set in an imaginary Navarra.

Shakespeare began acting in the company and although he continued to do so until 1603, was never to play major roles. However, the experience should be helpful. As Molière, Brecht or Bulgakov, Shakespeare was a true man of Theatre: he knew him from within, participated in the trials, witnessed the shows and conceived his characters with specific actors in mind. In addition to its theatrical success, improved its economy. It became one of the shareholders of its theatre, could financially help his father and even in 1596 bought him a title of nobility, whose coat appears in monument the poet built shortly after his death in the Church in Stratford. Between 1594 and 1597 he wrote Romeo and Juliet and a Midsummer night's dream, two works of love and youth, and historical dramas Richard II, King John , and the merchant of Venice.

In 1598 Chamberlain company was installed at the new theater, The Globe (the balloon), whose name would join the Shakespeare forever. This seems like the happiest stage of the writer, the time of comedy much ADO and ADO, as you please, the merry wives of Windsor (which according to legend was written in fifteen days on urgent request of the Queen), Twelfth night and is well that ends well, written all between 1598 and 1603. These years are also (as anticipating your next stage) Julius Caesar, Troilus and Cressida and his most famous and enduring, work Hamlet.

To the death of Elizabeth in 1603 l, Jacobo I, son of María Estuardo and King of Scotland from 1567, also became King of England and Chamberlain company passed under its protection with the name of King completo Men (men of the King). Despite the change of name and protector, the theatre maintained its public character: made representations to everyone, even to the Court.

Given this success, the company opened a small room covered in 1608, the Blackfriars, with a higher entrance and for a more select audience. Financially, the company functioned as a limited liability company of which Shakespeare was one of its major shareholders. Due to good management, its economic position was stated even more: he bought several properties in London and Stratford, made various investments, including some agricultural, and in 1605 he bought a share of the tithes of the parish of Stratford, thanks to which (and not to your literary glory) would be buried in the chancel of the Church.

The last act

Shakespeare had always works on stage, but never bored. Between 1600 and 1610 he left not being in the limelight with his Princes impelled to tackle the impossible, its monarchs of bombastic speech, his courtiers vengeful and grim, sane types posing is as crazy madmen and their types seeking to reach black of his madness, his fairies and lively geniecillos, their buffoons, their monsters, their loan sharks and their perfect stupid. This plethora of creatures capable of cramming heaven and hell will be filled the bag.

At the end of the century he was already wealthy enough and bought or made to build a house in Stratford, called New Place. His son, leaving a line in the mortuary record of the parish of his people as a unique and concise signal from passing through the Earth died in 1597. Susan and Judith were married, the first with a doctor and the second with a merchant. Susan had talent; Judith did not read or write and signed with a cross. In 1611, when Shakespeare was at the peak of his fame, he said goodbye to the scene with The Tempest and tired and perhaps ill, withdrew to his house of New-Place willing to give himself body and soul to your garden and resigned to see next to him every morning the stern face of his wife. In the garden he planted the first Mulberry grown in Stratford. He died on 23 April 1616 at the age of fifty-two, on a date which was marked in black on the history of the world literature by the mournful coinciding with the death of Cervantes.

The mysteries of Shakespeare

It is true that the youth of the poet offers the most unknown passages for the biographer. However, the true mysteries of his life belong to those years that his career can be reconstructed quite faithfully. The best-known of these puzzles is related to his sonnets, published in 1609, but written, mostly, about ten or fifteen years earlier. One of the protagonists of the 154 sonnets is a handsome young man whom the poet admires very much, and the other is the famous dark lady, "Dark Lady", that was unfaithful with the former.

Many tried to find in these key poems from the inner life of Shakespeare, evidence of his alleged homosexuality, stating that young Heartthrob sonnets or, perhaps, the "Dark Lady" was none other than the Earl of Southampton, patron of the debutant author who had devoted its first two poetic works. It is not known with certainty who was the object of the secret worship of the poet. Their unique personal references comprehensible and clear are giblets: that was suffering from insomnia, he liked music, which disapproved the use of wigs and painted cheeks.

Count Henry Wriothesley's
Southampton, protector of Shakespeare

Another of the unknowns is that their years of more social, economic and professional success between 1603 and 1612, coincide with the time of their great tragedies, their works more bitter and disillusioned, as Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus and Timon of Athens. Even the last comedy of these years, measure for measure, is gloomier than many of his dramas. In addition, his last four works, Pericles, Cymbeline, the winter's tale and The Tempest, his wonderful farewell of the theatre and the world, are a curious incursion of fictional and pastoral elements in its theater, no doubt under the influence of the new generation of dramatists such as Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher. There are two other works, Henry VIII and the two noble relatives, both of 1612-1613, whose partial authorship tend to be attributed, since by all indications they were written in collaboration with the young Fletcher, with the number of their theatrical pieces would add 38. But the storm is universally regarded as his last work.

Either way, the truth is that around 1613, i.e. to the forty-eight years of age, in the power of his mental faculties and at the zenith of his career, Shakespeare broke sharply with the theatre and retreated to his hometown as it could a bourgeois small that after a lifetime of work I would like to enjoy their goods in the country quiet. His last years passed as of a respected rural hidalgo: participating in the social life of Stratford, administrated their properties and shared their days with their families and neighbors.

His works followed in billboard until after his death, and he should keep some contact, although only friendly, with the theatre. Even said, according to a legend recorded nearly half a century later, that he died as a result of a banquet held in the company of his colleague Ben Jonson. This history contradicts the fact that a month before his death handed down his will rubricando it with a shaky signature that allows to imagine he was already sick.

The Testament, extensive and thorough, is related to the last mystery of the life of Shakespeare, even if it is only minor and anecdotal order: after naming as the main heir to the husband of his eldest daughter, Susan, and bequeath valuable objects of gold and silver to his other daughter, Judith, left his wife his "second best bed". No one has been able to decipher the true meaning of this strange legacy, which, in turn, says a lot about the character of the marriage of the poet.

Posterity has occupied Shakespeare more than any other author, and not only in the positive sense. Many wanted to deny the authorship of his work, attributing it to higher spirits, preferably of illustrious origin. Voltaire and Tolstoy, for example, irritated them not the person of the poet (or plebeian origin), but his work, which is the opposite to all classical order, artistic rule or formal realism. It is the same freedom: verbal, dramatic, emotional. Expressed with fast images, in the same work jump seas, countries and years, randomly change the weft threads and alternating with the tragic comic tone. His work is the perennial concern and their perspective, infinity. It ignores the canons of the composition because it obeys laws more important and atavistic as the unit of time or place. No one was able to capture as many characters as the playwright who practically did not invent a single own story.

In one of those surprisingly plastic metaphors that abound in his works, Shakespeare defined the glory as "a circle in the water / that never ceases to be enlarged / to be so wide / dissipates into nothingness...». But hers was not. Not tended to fade, not even to languish: after the relative disinterest for his work in the times of moral Puritan and neo-classical taste, from the pre-romanticism turned you to discover universal mode. Since then all eras and styles have their own Shakespeare, confirming the prediction of his friend and rival, Ben Jonson: "Was not of an age but for all time".

Chronology of William Shakespeare

1564	Born in Stratford-upon-Avon. He is the third son of John Shakespeare and Mary Arden.
1582	Marries Anne Hathaway. The following year was born his daughter Susan and, two years later, the twins Judith and Hamnet.
1588-89	He settled in London, leaving wife and children, and wrote his first works.
1592	The plague forced to close theatres and Shakespeare retired to Stratford. Possible to stay in the North of Italy.
1593-94	He published the poems Venus and Adonis and the rape of Lucretia, dedicated to count Henry Wriothesley de Southampton, his protector.
1594	Reopening of the theatres. Shakespeare is now member of the best company of the time, the actors company of Lord Chamberlain.
1597	Death of his son, Hamnet. Its good economic situation as an entrepreneur of the company allows you to acquire New-Place, a house in Stratford.
1598	Your company is installed in the new The Globe Theater, Shakespeare is co-owner.
1600-01	He writes and debuts Hamlet.
1603	The new King of England, Jacobo I, becomes the protector of Shakespeare's company, which happens to be called King completo Men (the King's men).
1605-06	Write Macbeth and King Lear.
1609	Your company opens a new room, the Blackfriars Theatre, where Shakespeare is also co-owner. His sonnets are published without your permission.
1611	Write The Tempest, his last work. Leave the theatre and retires to New Place, his house in Stratford.
1616	He died in his hometown.

Works of William Shakespeare

The golden age of European theatre

In the 17TH century an important development of European dramaturgy, took place mostly in England, Spain, France and Italy. Theatre companies were still mostly itinerant, but already at the end of the 16th century began to settle. Representations of fans ceased to be its old importance, appeared the figure of the professional actor, although the economic and social situation of the people of the theatre remained very precarious. If in Italy the actor enjoyed some consideration, in England the Puritan tradition was always hostile to those who participated in an art so dissolute, while in Catholic France Church refused the sacraments to the comedians. The involvement of women in the scenarios varied: in Italy and Spain, the actresses were admired, but in England and in Germany the female roles were represented by boys.

Since the beginning of the 17TH century, the theatre was developed under the protection of Kings and nobles. In France, Enrique IV and his wife Médicis María invited on numerous occasions to Italian companies, and then highlighted the protective role of Cardinal Richelieu. In England, the interest of Carlos I and his wife, Enriqueta Maria French, gave a powerful impetus to gender. In Italy the courts were the center of the theatrical activity, while real representations took place, from 1632, at the Palace of the Buen Retiro in Madrid.

William Shakespeare

It should be noted that throughout the period, was awarded a growing importance to the prescriptive literary, applied with less intensity to plays. "Rules of art" put into force consisted of, mainly, the idea of verisimilitude, insofar as classical decorum (each character should behave according to their social rank), in the appropriateness of the style to the subject (among the three possible levels: lyric, epic or tragic and comic or satirical) and, finally, in the "three units" of action, time and place. This regulation was based on the poetics of Aristotle, which became an inescapable canonical text for literary aesthetics. However, while in France the rules had an increasingly imperative character, both in Spain and Italy were only respected but little met, and in England were ignored almost in full.

The English scene at the time of Shakespeare

At the end of the 16th century, during the reign of Isabel I of England, the first stable and public theatres were built in London. Elizabethan theatres were constructions either octagonal or circular, made of wood, with a central courtyard open pit and surrounding galleries. They had approximately 25 meters outside diameter and about ten high.

In the courtyard, the spectators remained standing. On the platform of the stage, on an upper floor supported by columns, were the dependencies for the machinery of special effects and other accessories of the props. Although the dramatic action took place mainly on stage, a gallery located at the bottom of the Valley was employed when the scene included a balcony (as in Romeo and Juliet) or the top of a wall (as in Macbeth). In some theatres, a second smaller Tribune was destined to the musicians.

To the back of the stage, two doors allowed the entrance and exit of the players. In the more sophisticated theatres a second space, of small dimensions, called inner stage was between them. Separated from the main platform by a curtain, this area was used to recreate specific, like dormitories or cave environments. Through the trap doors in the floor of the main stage are represented by different effects, such as graves or appearances.

The theatres that were built include The Theatre (1576), The Rose (1587), The Swan (1595) and The Globe (1599), which in its original either rebuilt form remained open in the first half of the next century. To 1609 Shakespeare's company was established in the private theatre in Blackfriars, although he continued representing the balloon. The latter, destroyed by fire, was built in 1614.

Shakespeare's

Within this context of revival of the European theatre, the undisputed theatrical figure in England was William Shakespeare. In his career, four stages can be distinguished. The first of them (until 1598 approximately) are a series of juvenile parts in which Shakespeare followed fashion force, adapting the themes to the taste of the public. During this period practiced various genres, from comedy of entanglement (the comedy of errors) to the classical tragedy of influence out (Titus Andronicus), passing through the historical drama (King John, Richard III, Henry IV). Other works of this initial moment, as the merchant of Venice, the taming of the Shrew, Romeo and Juliet and a Midsummer night's dream, mark the beginning of a phase of greater creativity.

On the Shakespearean stage, which goes from 1598 to 1604, parts that are often referred to as "middle works", are characterised by a greater scenic virtuosity. The comedies include the merry wives of Windsor and is well that ends well, while dramas Julius Caesar, Hamlet and Othello announce already the next period, known as the of the great tragedies (1604-1608), in which Shakespeare dive the deepest feelings of the human being: the subversion of the affections in King Lear, violent and foolish ambition in Macbeth and passion rampant in Antony and Cleopatra. The final phase (1608-1611) is conspicuous by his latest masterpiece, The Tempest, in which fantasy and reality mingle offering a testimony of wisdom and acceptance of death.

Portrait of Shakespeare in the
first edition of his works

The division into stages no longer actually a teaching Convention by the impossibility of chronologically dated many of his works and the same heterogeneity that warns within these so-called phases in the evolution of its dramaturgy. It is known that already before 1594, he had befriended the young count of Southampton, Henry Wriothesley, who dedicated his two narrative poems Venus and Adonis (1593) and the rape of Lucretia (1594), and most of the sonnets (possibly those of the period 1593-97).

Can be attributed to Shakespeare, as it seems, the second and third parts of Henry VI, the first date that is possible to date his dramatic activity would be the year 1591; in the drafting of this drama, there are comic and emotional traits that would later become characteristic of the author. In the course of this period Shakespeare was tested, as well as historical drama, then very fashionable, comedy (comedy of mistakes) and the dramatic genre of horror, with Titus Andronicus, the first drama published by Shakespeare (anonymous, in 1594). Richard III and this latest work revealed the influence of Marlowe, who, for his part, seems to have inspired his Edward IIin Henry VI . Such initial dramatic set just allows you to discover the traces of a genius.

It is believed that Shakespeare could have happened, part of the period 1592-94 in the North of Italy (perhaps together with the Earl of Southampton), as to the resumption of activity in theaters after the plague which was then disorganized the London theatre world, our author presented a series of dramas of Italian atmosphere in which shows a significant familiarity with certain details of the local topography. It is possible, also, that the playwright received such information from some Italians resident in London; his protector, without a doubt, met Giovanni Florio (author of manuals of Italian conversation and an Italian dictionary, as well as a translator of Montaigne) in the count's House. This was a generous patron for Shakespeare, and, quite possibly, his bounty allowed the poet acquire a stake in the company.

Shakespeare then devoted all his energies to the composition of dramas, and only continued its activities of non-dramatic poet with some sonnets that were appearing at least until 1600 approximately. The period between half of 1599 and 1601, that is between the March of the Earl of Essex to Ireland and its unsuccessful insurrection, coincides with a kind of parenthesis in the inspiration of the playwright, which, conscious of his powers, seems to hesitate before committing them in enterprises of greater significance than the three comedies whose very title could be considered indicative of a negligent lightness : Much ADO for nothing, as you please and Night of Epiphany.

At the end of the reign of Elizabeth, Shakespeare had developed all the possibilities of the drama historical and reached its highest peaks with Richard II and Henry IV, continuation of which, and also of Henry V, is the comedy the merry wives of Windsor, that some tend to put towards 1598; at the same time, in their activity of playwright was exploiting the finest resources of a genre very appreciated by the public.

Just as tragic had said even the fullness of his talent, despite the great transformation of the old formula out of the tragedy of revenge and horror, evident in Titus Andronicus, and not so much in Romeo and Juliet, in which terror is veiled by piety, and Julius Caesar, work in which, along with the persistence of the themes of revenge and spectra the character of Brutus, which already exceeds the spiritual boundaries of such dramatic genre is given.

The formula in question appears in Hamlet, on the other hand, whose original version, possibly Kyd, must have been a typical drama out, drowned by impassioned protest of the protagonist against the inevitable sophistries of thought, inducing to see in the "appearances" things, but not absolute certainty. In this work, whose central note is in the words of the monologue of the Prince (act. III, scene I, 85) "the primitive nuances of resolution faint under the pale touches of thought", Shakespeare may have experienced the influence of the terrible disaster of Essex, which occurred the same year of the composition of the drama (1601) and dragged with it for some time the fate of the protector of Shakespeare.

Lawrence Olivier directed and played Hamlet (1948)

The latter company, in fact, indirectly participated in the plot to lend itself to represent Richard II shortly before the beginning of the insurrection; the party opposed to Elizabeth thought she saw a parallel between the sovereign and Ricardo: supporters of Essex, indeed, sought to guess at the scene of the deposition of the King the Queen. However, the company of the distinguished playwright was not harmed at all by the discovery of the plot. However, Horacio farewell to dying Hamlet ("happy eternal night, beloved Prince; and choirs of angels relax your dream") was played at the end of the 18th century by the great critic Malone as an allusion to the similar words uttered by Essex before the gallows 25 February 1601:"When my life away from my body, sends to your blessed angels, to accept my soul and bring it to the joys of heaven".

Also the comedies written by Shakespeare at the beginning of the reign of Jacobo I, i.e. around 1603, reveal a restless spirit; the irony and the disgust appear in several ways in Troilus and Cressida, is well that ends well and measure for measure. There is, however, ambiguity in the three major tragedies Othello, King Lear and Macbeth, posed by the mystery of a bad goal (King Lear, III, 6, 80: "consider, therefore carefully to scold, and see what grows around his heart.") There are, perhaps, in nature a reason that allows you to create hard hearts") and seem to present life as "a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing" (Macbeth, V, 5, 27). In the three tragedies in question passions are presented in essence and attributed to primitive characters: Lear and Macbeth are barbarian chiefs belonging to very remote times, and Othello is an African.

Macbeth was influenced in Antony and Cleopatra, in which, however, an almost romantic aura surrounding the tragedy of two lovers of temperament and mentality as opposed to only at the cost of the disaster they get get the best out of the other. Coriolanus is studying another primitive, single piece and almost childish character in his generous spirit, which contrasts the Machiavellian opportunism of the mother. Timon of Athens continues bitter satire of human ingratitude which constituted the theme of King Lear.

Shakespeare, however, gave only an outline of such drama, perhaps because of a crisis or illness of which could have come out with the soul possibly renewed religious faith: in fact, the conception of the world of his later dramatic works, and singularly of the storm, can be considered Christian. At the end of the 17TH century the priest Richard Davies said that Shakespeare was dead "popish", that is at the heart of Roman Catholicism; his father may have been Catholic: this name appears on a list of "recusants", i.e. of people, usually Catholic, who did not attend the ceremonies of the Anglican Church. To 1610 it is worth placing the return of a permanently, to Stratford, where Shakespeare quietly spent the last years of his life; in 1613 he wrote, in collaboration with the young playwright John Fletcher, his last drama, two noble relatives.

In 1609, without his consent, was published the whole of his sonnets, authentic universe of extraordinary formal rigor and conceptual depth, raised a series of uninterrupted time for AWE readers and scholars. A body of fifty-four sonnets of undeniable perfection, written over twenty years, who returned and modified the petrarquista tradition, with several plot threads of enigmatic definition: the earliest are dedicated to a young beautiful and fickle whom the poetic voice criticizes the disdain and sometimes advised to get married, while a rear block refers to a brunette Lady in which many have wanted to guess another guise of sex. In any case, progression and exceptional quality of Assembly make this a world of unsurpassed aesthetic density.

The great tragedies of Macbeth, Othello, Hamlet and King Lear are mirrors of the whole map of the modern sensibility, since they build in a world, the Renaissance, in which the divine presence begins to wane. For the first time, doubt facing old age, identity, betrayal, ambition and even the perception of evil are displayed in his human radicalism. But that does not explain its unique quality; It happens that these characters and these conflicts arise from an unlimited capacity to shape the word at all levels. There are no borders in Shakespeare: Jesters and Kings share the same range of problematic design, contradictory and rich social, verbal and moral existence. Why are Falstaff, the fat buffoon and soldier present in several works, along with the old King Lear, two of the end points of the arc of her characters. In general terms, the sublime in the works of Shakespeare is the portrait of a few characters that becomes defined with mathematical precision, so this same ambiguity fills its character of an extraordinary richness of nuances. Through the strength of the language, the Shakespearian types express the depths of his spirit and declared individuals free, able to choose their own destiny. In this sense, his work is so modern and is as open to different interpretations as Don Quixote of Cervantes.

The ups and downs of the printing press

The publication of his dramas made without the participation of the author. A group of editors, unscrupulous, gave light dramatic texts in room (rooms), some of them "good", or conformity to authentic versions have appeared with the more or less vague consent of Shakespeare, and other "bad"; in regards the latter is meant several backgrounds: estenograficos texts, reconstitution of memory or use of no revised copies.

In 1619 Thomas Pavier published ten dramas without authorization, and shortly after two authors colleagues from the famous dramatist, John Heminge and Henry Condell, began a complete Edition, which, after several difficulties, was born in 1623, by work of editor William Jaggard, and is known as the first infolio (First Folio); about eighteen dramas is the only existing and, in terms of the other, except Pericles, offers texts if not always better than the of in room, Yes, at least, of fundamental importance.

First Folio of his work (1623) Edition

The damning criticism has failed to dispose of the conviction according to which most of the dramas in question are entirely due to the pen of Shakespeare, who, as also stated the same opinion, would have not reviewed them once posted. The testimonies of contemporaries do not allow believe patients alterations of such works by the same author. Yet, admittedly, as it is natural, some rebuilt in many texts resulting from the needs of the show (deletions and interpolations).

In addition to devastating critics, who have tried to show in the Shakespearian dramas on the collaboration of other playwrights, several heretics who Shakespeare is considered ignorant actor and mere figurehead and denied, therefore the paternity of their production, which, at its discretion, can only be attributed to characters extremely cults have appeared around the work of the great writer like, for example, the philosopher Francis Bacon, the Earl of Oxford or other candidates even more problematic. The data about the life of Shakespeare are, indeed, aggregate, and does not seem to correspond to a personality as big as the one of our playwright; However, should recognize them also more abundant than those who possess with respect to other Elizabethan authors in general, except, perhaps, Ben Jonson.

Extracted from the website: Biografías y Vidas