The Dark Comedy of Measure for Measure
Measure for Measure, the last of Shakespeare's great comedies, is also the darkest of his comedies, and represents his transition to tragic plays. This play differs from Shakespeare's other comedies, and is in many ways more akin to tragedy than to comedy. In setting, plot, and character development Measure for Measure has a tragic tone, however, because none of the main characters actually loses his life, this play is considered a comedy.
Almost all of Shakespeare's comedies have dual localities: the real world of crime, punishment, and responsibility, and an idyllic world, where reality is malleable, and forgiving. For example, As You Like It occurs in both the world of the court, dangerous for almost all of the primary characters, and the forest of Arden, a sanctuary that nurses conflict to resolution. Measure for Measure, on the other hand, offers no safe haven for the characters. They are trapped in the corrupted mire called Venice. Angelo, appointed scourge of the city, lets no person escape his punishing hand. Painting no "Arden" to provide asylum, Shakespeare gives Measure for Measure a grave tone. The play is more like a tragedy: intense focus on the gravity of the situation with littleemotional respite for the reader and characters. Measure for Measure is like a tragedy in plot development, as well. Shakespeare's earlier comedies pose situations of extreme danger, but through plot development, Shakespeare handles the conflict with a lighter tone. Much is at stake, but he reassures the reader that good will prosper, and evil will not escape some sort of punishment. Measure for Measure is dangerously close to being a tragedy throughout the whole play.
...
... middle of paper ...
...r protection of her virginity never wavers; not even when her brother's life is at stake will she relinquish her morals. Isabellaand Angelo are more closely related to Shakespeare's Othello than they are to Rosalind who constantly adapts to the situation. Whereas Rosalind's ability to change enables her to affect the plot of As You Like It, Othello's fierce, short sighted determination sends him reeling through a predetermined fate to a tragic end. Angelo and Isabella, in their stubborn adherence to principles, head for a cruel fate, only avoided through the duke's manipulation.
Though Measure for Measure ends with no major characters dying, it is only marginally a comedy. The characters, plot, and setting more resemble Shakespeare's tragedies than his comedies. Shakespeare forces the "happy" ending, and in so doing, announces the end of his comedic works.
In the novel The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald gives the reader a glimpse into the life of the high class during the 1920’s through the eyes of a man named Nick Carraway. Through the narrator's dealings with high society, Fitzgerald demonstrates how modern values have transformed the American dream's ideas into a scheme for materialistic power and he reveals how the world of high society lacks any sense of morals or consequence. In order to support his message, Fitzgerald presents the original aspects of the American dream along with its modern face to show that the wanted dream is now lost forever to the American people. Jay Gatsby had a dream and did everything he could to achieve it however in the end he failed to. This reveals that the American dream is not always a reality that can be obtained. Fitzgerald demonstrates how a dream can become corrupted by one’s focus on acquiring wealth and power through imagery, symbolism, and characterization.
The novel The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, deals heavily with the concept of the American Dream as it existed during the Roaring Twenties, and details its many flaws through the story of Jay Gatsby, a wealthy and ambitious entrepreneur who comes to a tragic end after trying to win the love of the moneyed Daisy Buchanan, using him to dispel the fantastic myth of the self-made man and the underlying falsities of the American Dream. Despite Gatsby’s close association with the American Dream, however, Fitzgerald presents the young capitalist as a genuinely good person despite the flaws that cause his undoing. This portrayal of Gatsby as a victim of the American Dream is made most clear during his funeral, to which less than a handful
By 2025, about 75% of the American workforce will be made up of Generation Y workers, said Emily Matchar, author of “Why Your Office Needs More Bratty Millennials.” Generation Y, also known as millennials, are those who were born within the years 1982 and 1999. Time management has become a persistent issue for people in the United States because of the lack of flexibility in the workforce. Work is taking over people’s lives. The current generation of workers tend not to demand because of the fear of unemployment; jobs are scarce these days. Generation Y workers have shown that they will not accept today’s hierarchical workplace, on the contrary, they will begin to change the workplace to their likings.
The Great Gatsby, a novel by Scott Fitzgerald, is about the American Dream, and the downfall of those who attempt to reach its impossible goals. The attempt to capture the American Dream is used in many novels. This dream is different for different people; but, in The Great Gatsby, for Jay, the dream is that through wealth and power, one can acquire happiness. To get this happiness Jay must reach into the past and relive an old dream; and, in order to do this, he must have wealth and power.
As depicted by Scott F. Fitzgerald, the 1920s is an era of a great downfall both socially and morally. As the rich get richer, the poor remain to fend for themselves, with no help of any kind coming their way. Throughout Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby, the two “breeds” of wealthier folk consistently butt heads in an ongoing battle of varying lifestyles. The West Eggers, best represented by Jay Gatsby, are the newly rich, with little to no sense of class or taste. Their polar opposites, the East Eggers, are signified by Tom and Daisy Buchanan; these people have inherited their riches from the country’s wealthiest old families and treat their money with dignity and social grace. Money, a mere object in the hands of the newly wealthy, is unconscientiously squandered by Gatsby in an effort to bring his only source of happiness, Daisy, into his life once again. Over the course of his countless wild parties, he dissipates thousands upon thousands of dollars in unsuccessful attempts to attract Daisy’s attention. For Gatsby, the only way he could capture this happiness is to achieve his personal “American Dream” and end up with Daisy in his arms. Gatsby’s obsession with Daisy is somewhat detrimental to himself and the ones around him; his actions destroy relationships and ultimately get two people killed.
The Great Gatsby,a novel by F,Scott Fitzgerald,is about the American Dream,and the downfall of the people who try to reach it.The American Dream means something different to different people,but in The Great Gatsby,for Jay Gatsby,the subject of the book,the dream is that through acquiring wealth and power,one can also gain happiness.To reach his idea of what happiness is,Gatsby must go back in time and relive an old dream.To do this,he believes,he must first have wealth and power.
Schlegel, August Wilhelm. Criticism on Shakespeare s Tragedies . A Course of Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature. London: AMS Press, Inc., 1965.
To conclude; the play Measure For Measure showed that the truth will be spoken eventually. Measure For Measure is also known as a dark comedy because in the comical relief it was about people being hanged or punished because of prostitution or being drunk. The play shows lust, love and justice throughout the play’s
The novel, The Great Gatsby focuses on one of the focal characters, James Gatz, also known as Jay Gatsby. He grew up in North Dakota to a family of poor farm people and as he matured, eventually worked for a wealthy man named Dan Cody. As Gatsby is taken under Cody’s wing, he gains more than even he bargained for. He comes across a large sum of money, however ends up getting tricked out of ‘inheriting’ it. After these obstacles, he finds a new way to earn his money, even though it means bending the law to obtain it. Some people will go to a lot of trouble in order to achieve things at all costs. F. Scott Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby, conveys the numerous traits of Jay Gatsby through the incidents he faces, how he voices himself and the alterations he undergoes through the progression of the novel. Gatsby possesses many traits that help him develop as a key character in the novel: ambitious, kind-hearted and deceitful all of which is proven through various incidents that arise in the novel.
Gatsby’s obsession of his love for Daisy and wealth prove his dream as unattainable. Throughout the novel, he consumes himself into lies to cheat his way into people’s minds convincing them he is this wealthy and prosperous man. Gatsby tries to win Daisy’s love through his illusion of success and relive the past, but fails to comprehend his mind as too hopeful for something impossible. In the end, Nick is the only one to truly understand Gatsby’s hopeful aspirations he set out for himself but ultimately could not obtain. In the novel, F. Scott Fitzgerald is able to parallel many themes of the roaring twenties to current society. The ideas of high expectations and obsession of the material world are noticeable throughout the history and is evident in many lives of people today.
The rate of death due to prescription drug abuse in the U.S. has escalated 313 percent over the past decade. According to the Congressional Quarterly Transcription’s article "Rep. Joe Pitt Holds a Hearing on Prescription Drug Abuse," opioid prescription drugs were involved in 16,650 overdose-caused deaths in 2010, accounting for more deaths than from overdoses of heroin and cocaine. Prescribed drugs or painkillers sometimes "condemn a patient to lifelong addiction," according to Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This problem not only affects the lives of those who overdose but it affects the communities as well due to the convenience of being able to find these items in drug stores and such. Not to mention the fact that the doctors who prescribe these opioids often tend to misuse them as well. Abusing these prescribed drugs can “destroy dreams and abort great destinies," and end the possibility of the abuser to have a positive impact in the community.
What is so interesting about Shakespeare's first play, The Comedy of Errors, are the elements it shares with his last plays. The romances of his final period (Pericles, Cymbeline, The Winter's Tale, The Tempest) all borrowed from the romantic tradition, particularly the Plautine romances. So here, as in the later plays, we have reunions of lost children and parents, husbands and wives; we have adventures and wanderings, and the danger of death (which in this play is not as real to us as it is in the romances). Yet, for all these similarities, the plot of The Comedy of Errors is as simple as the plots of the later plays are complex. It is as though Shakespeare's odyssey through the human psyche in tragedy and comedy brought him back to his beginnings with a sharper sense of yearning, poignancy, and the feeling of loss. But to dismiss this play as merely a simplistic romp through a complicated set of maneuvers is to miss the pure theatrical feast it offers on the stage - the wit and humor of a master wordsmith, the improbability of a plot that sweeps...
Abuse can cause countless medical problems to the body. A person who is addicted will continue to stimulate themselves regardless if they are aware of the negative chain reactions. Once addicted, it becomes difficult to stop due to how the body has become dependent. Health will be harmed the more a stimulant is used. Health effects include: cardiovascular disease, strokes, cancer, HIV/AIDS, hepatitis, lung disease, mental disease, birth defects. Mental health is what keeps a person in the right mind to make better decisions and have better control in life. Drugs have the ability to change mood and behavior. If drugs have affected the brain already, the desire increases which changes mental health. Some may not realize that they have been affected their health negatively. “A person who abuses drugs may not realize they have a problem until pronounced effects of drug abuse are seen, often physically. While drug abuse effects on the body vary depending on the drug used, all drug abuse negatively impacts one 's health (Addictions Community). Since drugs create many health issues, treatment is not a simple task. Treatments are hard to obtain and addictions often go
Titles are a crucial part to any story. Shakespeare especially had an understanding of the importance of titles for certain texts. Some of Shakespeare’s titles that do not simply name the protagonist are “Measure for Measure,” “The Tempest,” “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and the “Twelfth Night.” Something to examine when reading Shakespeare is the title. If the title is not simply something like “Hamlet,” or “Romeo and Juliet,” then there is a method to his madness. Titles bear much importance in the content of a story. First, the title sets the mood of the story. To focus primarily on “Measure for Measure,” the title sets the tone that there is something to be measured to determine
There are many addictions in the world, and drug addiction is the biggest. People may experiment with the drug for many reasons. “If your drug use is causing problems in your life, then you likely have a drug abuse or addiction problem”.(Lawrence Robinson pg.1) Many people start out using drugs by peer pressure or out of their own curiosity. Stress, anxiety, lows self-esteem and depression could be another factor to start using drugs. The drug takes over your body and gives you a good feeling that many people tend to enjoy. The urge to use the drug can keep increasing rapidly after the first use. The urge can become so severe that your mind can find many other ways to deny the factor of addiction. Very few drug addicts can feel and realize when they have crossed the line with drugs. A drug addicts mind can build up a very large tolerance for the drug that they start to abandon the activities they used to do on a daily basis like showering, hobbies, socializing and even being associated with family members. The person with the addiction will continue to use the drug knowing that it is harming there body, but they don’t have any remorse. A drug addict will often try to hide their problem, so they can continue to use without anyone’s input. Family and friends may try to use preaching methods or tell the user that they need to stop using the drug. This method is not ...