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Characteristics of spanish tragedy by thomas kyd
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Revenge in Thomas Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy
Thomas Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy (c. 1587) is generally considered the first of the English Renaissance "revenge-plays." A rich genre that includes, among others, Hamlet. These plays tend to be soaked in blood and steeped in madness. The genre is not original to the period, deriving from a revival of interest in the revenge tragedies of the Roman playwright Seneca. Nor is it exclusive to the past, as anyone who has seen the "Death Wish" or "Lethal Weapon" films can attest. The revenge-play satisfied a deep longing in its audience for simple black-and-white rough justice that seems to be universal. (Watson, 317)
While the brutal quest for vengeance drives Kyd's play, justice is ultimately its main thematic concern: what is it, who has the right to administer it, and is any sacrifice too great for its final attainment? (Hunter, 217) Central to these questions is the pair of hangings that occur in the middle acts of the play. Poisenings and stabbings happen throughout the piece but hanging was revloutionary. Hanging, decapitation, and burning at the stake was forbidden to be shown in a play. The reason for this is simple: the use of the official methods of execution as part of an entertainment would rob those methods of their value as deterrent to crime. (Shapiro, 100) The same argument is made today over the desensitization to violence caused by television. The Spanish Tragedy is unique in its onstage use of hanging as a device of murder.
Why did Kyd risk public censure and official punishment by having two of his characters meet their demises at the end of a rope? It is precisely because the noose is a symbol of temporal justice, and Kyd wishes to
demonstrate just how fickle such j...
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... K. "Ironies of Justice in The Spanish Tragedy."
Dramatic Identities and Cultural Tradition: Studies in
Shakespeare and his Contemporaries. New York: Barnes & Noble
Books, 1978.
Kyd, Thomas. The Spanish Tragedy. Edited by J. R. Mulryne. New
York: W. W. Norton and Company, Inc., 1989.
Shapiro, James. "'Tragedies naturally performed': Kyd's
Representation of Violence." Staging the Renaissance:
Reinterpretations of Elizabethan and Jacobean Drama. Edited
by David Scott Kastan and Peter Stallybrass. New York:
Routledge, 1991.
Smith, Molly. "The Theater and the Scaffold: Death as Spectacle
in The Spanish Tragedy." Studies in English Literature 32:2
(1992), 217-32.
Watson, Robert N. "Tragedy." The Cambridge Companion to English
Renaissance Drama. Edited by A. R. Braunmuller and Michael
Hattaway. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
William Shakespeare, one of the greatest English play writers, has had a profound influence upon different societies globally since the fifteenth century, for his plays inspire many contemporary artists to present new scopes reflecting their societies. Considered as one of Shakespeare’s greatest tragedies, Macbeth has a completely disparate interpretation of the movie Scotland, PA, which translates the original play into a black comedy. A Scottish royal and general, Macbeth the protagonist undergoes a demonic transformation in personality, in which he unethically takes the crown by murdering numerous characters. The director of the movie alters the plot while maintaining the basic semblance of power, ambition, and masculinity from Shakespeare’s work. In the movie, the alteration of the process Macbeth usurps the power of Duncan, including his internal and external incentives, gives the audience a fresh perspective on one of the English classical plays.
The World's Classics version of Kyd's the Spanish Tragedy has more than fifty-three roles*. This number can go much higher depending on the exact number of plural parts the director decided to allot. In other words, the script may read simply "nobles," or "attendants" and the reader can not be completely sure of the number of people referred to. If the performing company was limited in players, there may be only two "knights" but if the director had a large cast he may send in six. This means, after working on the doubling possibilities for three weeks, I can not be one hundred percent sure of which characters were played by whom because I do not know exactly how many parts I am trying to fill. Add that to the fact that there are some parts which only show up once in the whole play and share the stage with only one person. These particular roles can be played by almost anyone in the cast. Therefore, I paired up as many roles as I thought were necessary and left the rest to find an available player to take them.
... would come day after day and vie for the best seats." The description Medieval Tortures provided of an execution by guillotine sounds very similar to how audiences watch horror movies. For both horror films and guillotine executions large crowds are attracted, people fight for the best seats, and individuals are killed. BLANK Though both horror films and guillotine executions are terrifying they offer us a necessary break from our daily lives.
Shakespeare wrote hundreds of pieces, from sonnets to plays. Hamlet is one of his most
The first and most important story of revenge is Hamlet wanting to kill his Uncle Claudius, after Claudius kills Hamlets father. Shakespeare begins the whole idea of revenge very early in the story when the ghost comes and tells Hamlet of what his uncle has done. The ghost first tells Hamlet how his uncle killed the king and then he tells Hamlet to take revenge he says in the play, “Revenge his foul and most unnatural murder.” Hamlet responds with much eager to get revenge saying back to the ghost, “Haste me to know't, that I, with wings as swift As meditation or the thoughts of love, May sweep to my revenge.” It is funny how Hamlet says this because he first of says he wants to get swift revenge then the rest of the play after that Hamlet hesitates to kill Claudius. Shakespeare continues to push the theme of revenge as hamlet conti...
Among the greatest gifts that the renaissance produced was the eloquent and incredible Shakespearean plays. Written mostly in the 1590s these plays have been performed and admired countless times; entertaining mass audiences by providing interesting tales that explore the depth of human insights and the different universal themes. Among the many Shakespearean plays Macbeth, written in 1606, stands out with its short composition but multiple themes. This tragedy narrates the tale of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth’s quest to grasp ultimate power by ignoring their morals and succumbing to their dark desires, which ultimately leads to their downfall. This tragic play portrays the desires, needs, and temptations that accompany ambition in men and women. However the ambition in Macbeth is blind, it does not abide to the morals, but it allows space for dark actions as means necessary for accomplishment. Blind ambition serves as the main driving force that drives Macbeth to subdue to his dark desires, defy his noble behavior, and ultimately his downfall.
Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado” is a frightening and entertaining short story about the severe consequences that result from persistent mockery and an unforgiving heart. Poe’s excellent use of Gothicism within the story sets the perfect tone for a dark and sinister plot of murder to unfold. “The Cask of Amontillado” simply overflows with various themes and other literary elements that result from Poe’s Gothic style of writing. Of these various themes, one that tends to dominant the story as a whole is the theme of revenge, which Poe supports with his sophisticated use of direct and indirect factors, irony, and symbolism.
In Shakespearean drama, a dynamic and explosive fusion of jealousy, pride, anger and ambition is characteristic for heroes’ behaviour. The tragedy was caused by the excessive flaw in character - self-respect and dignity combined with the feelings of hate and revenge. A disaster usually occurred to lead to destruction of the protagonist. Due to divine justice, punishment is inevitable and therefore no happy ending is possible. Therefore, time is the hero’s main enemy, mercilessly working against him. The mystery of tragedy is that once the protagonist has learnt a lesson of how to renew the order in himself, death is the only outcome /no memento mori, however/.
Dramatic irony is used many times throughout the play to intensify the themes of the story. This dramatic device can be found when Macbeth was given the title thane of Cawdor, when Macbeth murdered the king, when Macbeth’s castle’s porter acted as if he was the porter of the gates of hell and also when Macbeth ordered his servants to kill Macduff. These dramatic ironies also support the themes of the play such as the deadly strength of unbridled ambition and differences between tyranny and monarchy. Through these scenes, foresight was given to the audience on events that were going to happen but it did not reveal how they would occur. This element made the story even more interesting and exhilarating by leaving the mind of spectators to imagine the events yet to occur and be surprised to see how they really occur in the play. As the character of Macbeth developed further, the story became much more fascinating and the audience was kept anxious. This is a wonderful work that is performed on stages everywhere and the name of William Shakespeare continues to be heard throughout the world.
Revenge almost always has the makings of an intriguing and tragic story. William Shakespeare’s Hamlet is a perfect example of how revenge unfolds and what it unveils. The play tells the story of Hamlet, the prince of Denmark. Claudius, Hamlet’s uncle, marries his mother soon after his father’s death. Hamlet greatly disapproves of the hasty marriage and suspects foul play. His suspicions are confirmed when the ghost of his father appears and tells him that Claudius murdered him. Hamlet’s father asks him to take revenge upon Claudius, and soon everything takes a drastic change. The courses of revenge throughout Hamlet surround each character with corruption, obsession, and fatality.
Rose, Mark. "Hamlet and the Shape of Revenge." English Literary Renaissance 1.2 (Spring 1971): 132-143. Rpt. in Shakespearean Criticism. Ed. Lynn M. Zott. Vol. 68. Detroit: Gale, 2003. Literature Resource Center. Web. 28 Feb. 2010.
“While seeking revenge, dig two graves - one for yourself” (Douglas Horton). This quote by Horton relates to Hamlet because it speaks of revenge, and Hamlet is a revenge play. The main character, Hamlet, while seeking revenge seals his own fate, and like the quote says while trying to kill someone else ends his own life in the process. Hamlet is a traditional revenge play, it focuses on the plot of revenge but also has subplots that distract the main character from the larger point of the story. Shakespeare was one of the first to expand the revenge tragedy, using what he and everyone knew and intensifying it. He did this by giving his main character many different sides, not just making him two dimensional. These many sides to Hamlet distract
In the play, Hamlet, William Shakespeare explores the theme of revenge. Throughout the work, Hamlet acquires a moral dilemma; he cannot decide how to carry out revenge without condemning himself. Thus, although the play promotes the idea of revenge at the beginning, the cultivation of dialogue, relationships, and complications provide evidence of the detrimental consequences and limitations of the theme.
Through Hamlet, William Shakespeare created a play filled with drama that built strong emotions in its audience, in the genre of revenge theater. Religious and Christian based undertones throughout give the reader a better understanding of the central conflict that exists within the plot, using extended metaphors, imagery, and historical parallels. Without a doubt, religious beliefs influence the characters’ motives and actions. These interwoven religious beliefs, without question, serve the purpose of bringing up ideas of sin and confession, purity, and heaven versus hell, as well as the morality of revenge, a question that is left for the reader to decide in the end.
Throughout 'The Spanish Tragedy', by Thomas Kyd, there is a constant theme of justice and revenge. Justice is the supreme law of the land; without justice, a country would fall into disrepute and those who are readily concerned with the status of society would have no grounds to stand upon. Therefore, those in power venerate justice. Revenge, however, upsets the delicate balance that holds Spanish society together. Hieronimo does his best to maintain a civil attitude towards incrimination and justice, but his plans for revenge lay waste to the very law he professes to adore. A series of carefully plotted steps, coupled with thoughts of revenge, reveals the descent of Hieronimo into madness and thereby fueling his rejection of justice.