The Greatest Playwight in History

Love in Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare Shakespeare is well known for presenting the full repertoire of human emotions, and love is no exception. Much Ado About Nothing is unquestionably a play about love. Shakespeare provides the audience with a whole gamut of lovers from the banal Claudio and Hero to the rebellious Beatrice and Benedick. It is this range which allows Shakespeare to critique the conventions and perceptions within his renaissance society This variance in love and lovers also serves to inform the audience of the many different faces of love, and to further the plot, for example it is Margaret's brand of free love that causes the turning point in the play. The comparisons drawn between Beatrice and Benedick's love and the superficial love of Hero and Claudio are typical of the constant contrasts that Shakespeare builds into this play, comical or otherwise.

These usually come from the characters and 'Romeo and Juliet' is rich in many different uses of language. The play 'Romeo and Juliet' is full of oppositions that beset the doomed lovers. In the prologue, we hear of an, "ancient grudge break to new mutiny." A clever use of language, oxymorons, highlight these oppositions. An oxymoron is usually a phrase, divided into two parts.

There is also lots of emotion displayed by the characters, like Romeo's depression and love-sickness while pining for Rosaline in the opening scene. Shakespeare creates an intriguing opening act that grabs the audience's attention and keeps it well into the next acts.

A Critical Account of Macbeth Act 1 Scene VII Shakespeare is often considered to be one of the world’s greatest playwrights, using his own style to back this up. He writes with poetic diction using eloquent words and phrases, he also uses lots of irony and drama to create and sustain suspense throughout his plays. Throughout this essay I am going to look very closely at Act 1 in his play Macbeth, paying particular attention to Act 1 Scene VII, I will be looking to see how Shakespeare’s use of language enables the reader to become a part of the play. Macbeth was written in Shakespeare’s usual formal manner, although while this play was meant to be performed and spoken, he wrote the dialogue in a poetic manner. Through reading this act closely I began to see how Shakespeare was using metaphors and imagery throughout the dialogue, this enabled me to see just how highly educated Shakespeare was in the English language.

The Role of the Supernatural in Macbeth and It's Effect on the Audience Shakespeare knew that history provided fantastic material for plays. War, conflict, ambition and the downfall of great rulers just being some. Shakespeare, earlier in his career, had written a lot of his historical based plays around Raphael Holinshed's "Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland". It was through reading these that Shakespeare found the story of Macbeth. Shakespeare was immediately touched by the story and he knew that it was brilliant material for a play.

The aim of my essay is to explain the theme of conflict and violence, which is shown strongly in act 1 scene 1. I will comment on Shakespeare’s use of language and how he demonstrates it in a dramatic effect, the plays appeal to the audience, the historical context and my own personal feedback on the play. Like many Shakespearian plays ‘Romeo and Juliet’ begins with a prologue. The prologue was used to settle rowdy crowds, set the scene and introduce the play to the audience. in addition Shakespeare uses Iambic Pentameter: this is where each line has a series of stressed and unstressed syllables making an alternate pattern: he used this so the phrases were easier to learn for his actors.

The opening scene in a play acts as an expository scene that introduces the audience to the background of the play, its hero, and hints at the main theme. Shakespeare is one of the greatest dramatists who wrote the best expository scenes ever. They are known for their greatness and their capacity to attract the audience or the reader from the very beginning. One of Shakespeare's great opening scenes is the opening scene of Macbeth. Some consider the opening scene of Macbeth a compact exposition because it introduces to the audience the background of the lay, its hero and hints at the main theme.

Shakespeare's Use of the Character Romeo to Maximise Dramatic Effect Romeo and Juliet is the greatest love story ever told mainly because it has various aspects of love and is also one of the greatest tragedies of all time. The play Romeo and Juliet was by all accounts taken from the poem 'The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet'. Shakespeare starts his play Romeo and Juliet with a prologue. In the prologue Shakespeare sets the scene and gives the audience a brief summary of the play so if the audience was to miss any part of the play they would still get the general picture of the play. Romeo and Juliet is such a renowned and memorable play that they very names are still used today to describe a man or women who are madly in love.

Shakespeare's works depend on language. One of the most important dimensions of Shakespeare's language is imagery. Through the use of metaphors, similes, symbols, passages of heightened natural description, Shakespeare's writing, to a finer degree than other writers of his time, draws much of its life and power from imagery Individual speeches become richer with ranges of meaning and establish verbal patterns to connect characters together Studying the imagery of Shakespeare is an important way in which we can understand the meaning and the beauty of his dramatic art. In Elizabethan times, punning was very popular (which is almost second nature to each character in this play). In a good play, it is said, a style naturally reflects the character of the person speaking even though the same man in two different moods may speak in two different ways (Lipson and Lipson 14).

These characters are clever in their own separate ways: Othello in living a double life of both war and love (which seems to keep him tied to the battlefield, a danger zone) and Iago is clever in his ways of manipulating an entire lot of people to get what he wants. Any excerpt from the play Othello shows how clever Shakespeare is in his own ways, writing traits that cannot be ignored. A good example of witty Shakespearean playwriting is in the opening Act of Othello- Act I, Scene i., pg. 78-92. The use of language in this Scene is so classic- for example the way Iago and Roderigo play off of each other in speech.