Shakespeare's language
William Shakespeare used language to: create a sense of place seize the audience s interest and attention explore the widest range of human experience He was a genius for dramatic language
1. Blank verse unrhymed lines with an arrangement of unstressed and stressed syllables known as iambic pentameter In sooth / I know / not why / I am / so sad / (from The Merchant of Venice)
2. Variations on metre to make his verse less monotonous, Shakespeare: altered the pattern of unstressed and stressed syllables that this too too sullied flesh would melt (from Hamlet) altered the expected number of syllables There s nothing ill can dwell in such a temple (from The Tempest) A shot from Hamlet ).by Franco Zeffirelli (1990 divided a single line between two or more speakers Emilia: Why, would not you? Desdemona: No, by this heavenly light! (from Othello)
3. Use of verse and prose VERSE PROSE generally used by aristocratic characters in serious or dramatic scenes generally used by lower-class characters in comic scenes in informal conversations
4. Imagery a. b. clusters of repeated images build up a sense of the themes of the play, like light and darkness in Romeo and Juliet imagery from nature A shot from Romeo+Juliet by Baz Luhrmann (1996). c. imagery from Elizabethan daily life, like: sports and hunting; shipping and the law; jewels; medicine
4. Imagery d. use of metaphors and similes There s daggers in men s smiles (from Macbeth) The quality of mercy is not strained. It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath (from The Merchant of Venice, IV.i.179 181) e. use of personification Come, civil Night; Thou sober-suited matron all in black. (from Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene II) A shot from The Merchant of Venice by Michael Radford (2004).
5. Antithesis The contrast of direct opposites. Why then, O brawling love, O loving hate, O any thing, of nothing first created: O heavy lightness, serious vanity (from Romeo and Juliet) Frank Dicksee Romeo and Juliet (1884).
6. Repetition Repeated words or phrases add to: the emotional intensity of a scene Oh horrible, oh horrible, most horrible! (The Ghost in Hamlet) its comic effect O night, O night, alack, alack, alack, I fear my Thisbe s promise is forgot! And thou, O wall, O sweet, O lovely wall. (Bottom in A Midsummer Night s Dream)
7. Hyperbole Extravagant and obvious exaggeration Blow me about in winds! Roast me in sulphur! Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire! (from Othello) ( Othello is haunted by the knowledge that he has wrongly killed Desdemona )
8. Irony Verbal irony The audience knows something that a character on stage does not Dramatic irony Saying one thing but meaning another It is structural: one line or scene contrasts sharply with another In Julius Caesar, Mark Antony calls Brutus an honourable man but means the opposite In Macbeth Duncan s line He was a gentleman on whom I built an absolute trust is followed by the stage direction Enter Macbeth
9. Pronouns: you and thee Send clear social signals YOU THEE Implies either closeness or contempt More formal and distant form Friendship towards an equal Suggests respect for a superior Superiority over someone considered a social inferior Courtesy to a social equal Used to address someone of higher social rank Can be aggressive or insulting