Shakespeare and Changing Culture

During the Elizabethan Era, different ways in culture were starting up and one of those ways was how people viewed suicide. Suicide before that time was thought as a bad way to die and by Christians as a “mortal sin”. William Shakespeare helped to change how people viewed suicide by having many characters in his plays commit suicide. They did this for reasons like loss of loved ones, fear, and other reasons. He did this even while many Christians saw suicide as a “mortal sin”.

At this time views on suicide was changing from being a bad thing to becoming a “noble” or “courageous” thing to do. Even with the changing view on suicide, many Christians still saw suicide as a “mortal sin”. They thought that people that committed suicide did not “have God’s mercy”. Because of this, people that had committed suicide could not be buried at cemeteries or other holy grounds so they were most commonly buried at crossroads (Internet Shakespeare Editions). Suicide is not directly stated in the bible as “bad”. St. Augustine was one of the first people to question suicide. In his work The City of God, he stated that God says in the Bible,” Thou shall not kill”. He said that this also included “killing one’s self” (Ralph McLean).

Although many Christians saw suicide as a “mortal sin”, it was beginning to be seen as “noble” within the changing Elizabethan culture. The phrase “death before dishonor” is the basis of what the changing culture was becoming (I S E). Because the culture was changing, the suicides that took place within the plays began to be seen as “heroic” or “self-sacrifices” (McLean). Many of Shakespeare’s more violent plays were some of his more popular plays

amongst the people that watched them. This was so even th...

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...ey simply used what was available to them or felt they had to suffer for some reason.

These characters were courageous for taking their own lives because of love, self-ego, or having the chance of being killed or captured by enemies. When Shakespeare showed these plays with these messages, people understood them and started to feel different about their culture in general or suicide. He was a big part in the changing of culture in the public because the messages in his plays spread to most of the people that watched them and maybe even the Christians that had different feelings about the changing culture.

Works Cited

crossthets.wordpress.com/2012/07/01/shakesperean-sucide/

internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/library/SLT/ideas/religion/suicide1.html

www.britaininprint.net/shakespeare/study_tools/suicide.html

www.shakespeare-online.com/plays/violenceinshakespeare.html