Elizabethan Period

- Introduction
Reign of Queen Elizabeth I, 1558 – 1603, Golden Age (highlight of the English
renaissance), Shakespeare’s era
- Country’s rulers:
Elizabeth I, 1533, sixth marriage, only child in second marriage
Period of political stability and cultural flourishing
Tudor dynasty, Henry the seventh, Elizabeth was last  religious and cultural
changes
Politically unstable  Elizabeth worked through this
Maritime expansion, political stability (stability, but still absolute power), economic
growth (English East-Indian company)
Defeat of the Spanish armada  helped her reputation
Never married
1603 = end of Tudor dynasty
- Role of the church
Major role in society, Church of England founded by Henry VIII
Dominant religious institution
1. Religious authority: people were forced to believe and go to church
2. Political influence: ruler and church had a close connection (same person)
3. Social control: church kept society in order by setting up rules
4. Education: big role in education, teaching about subjects and religion
5. Being good: the church told the people to do what was right
6. Special events: weddings, funerals, etc.
7. Art and culture: church liked to support art (religious) and cultural aspects
- The Renaissance
Elizabethan period
Rebirth in interest in art, culture and science
Supported by Elizabeth I
Inventions (printing press)
Famous names (Leonardo Da Vinci, Shakespeare, buildings, Erasmus, etc.)
- The characteristics of art and literature
Portraits were common
Miniature paintings, small paintings, portable, upper class
Art was a way to glorify the Queen, no freedom of expression
Satire  social criticism in an indirect way
English drama  medieval tradition became modern drama (Shakespeare, Marlow)
Poetry, sonnets, lyrics (Philip Sydney, Elizabeth I, Shakespeare) melodies
Sonnets, Shakespeare developed his own style (English sonnet)
- Why is the Elizabethan period important?
Crucial and influential:
1. Literature
2. Politics
3. Culture
4. Global interactions
5. Language
Good foundation for future England
Life of Shakespeare
Theories, Stratford and London
Stratford (brought up), London (work), Actor, Playwright
The eldest of eight
Father was a glove-maker and important figure, successful businessman
John Shakespeare x Mary Arden
Third child, but death, thus eldest child
John became mayor
Henley street till eighteen
Eighteen  married Anna Hathaway (already pregnant)
Three children (Susan, Hamnet (died), Judith)
- Education
Stratford grammar school (Latin literature), not proven, John was councilman and
therefore able to send his kids to this school
Theories that he went to Oxford
- Lost years
After study he went to London, but he became successful after 4 years
Time in between  lost period  lots of speculation
Teacher? Young beginning actor? Sailor?
- Work
1592 left for London to become an actor, lord chamberlains man company
Playwrighting instead of acting
’94 most plays written
Plays and sonnets
Hamlet is the longest play (30000 words), most famous play
Frequently acted in many plays
During his career he was wealthy
Returned to Stratford where he lived as a rich man
- Romeo & Juliet
Montague and Capulet, secret marriage, but the families hate each other
Juliet’s father decides that she should marry the count of Paris
Potion to appear dead
Romeo commits suicide, Juliet too
- Macbeth
Macbeth and Banquo  three weird sisters tell them a prophecy  Macbeth’s
children shall reign
Macbeth kills King Duncan
Descendants of Banquo will also become king  Banquo is killed
His children get Macduff, and he kills Macbeth
- Impact
Greatest writer, GOAT
Inspiring to other artists and writers
Modern lexicon
Portrayal of gender roles and discrimination
New words
- Spakespeare’s existence
Identity? Social status? Authorship?
The differences between medieval and renaissance theater:
- Everyman (medieval): represents all men, learns that good lasts and bad doesn’t,
conflict between good and evil, religious, mystery miracle passion and morality plays,
tableau vivant style: separate scenes, allegorical characters, musical intermezzos to
transition, more religious than realistic,
- Macbeth (renaissance): by Shakespeare, prophecy he will be king, ambition and
power: drives him crazy, destiny and fate: prophecy always comes true,
- Characteristics renaissance: use of symbolism, conflict and resolution, supernatural
elements, classical influence, freedom of thought for ordinary people, humanism,
- Medieval: more religious and moral lessons and more abstract
- Renaissance: realistic, wide range of topics, freedom of thought, symbolism
The Globe
- What was the Globe
Theatre
1594: Shakespeare began at the lord Chamberlains men
1599: The lord Chamberlains men teamed up with Shakespeare in 1598 to build the
theatre, it was finished in 1599
1608: Blackfries theatre allowed to play in  Globe in the summer (open), Blackfries
theater in the winter
1613: During Henry VIII the Globe burned down
1642-1644: The Globe was rebuild  first English War and all the theater shut down
 1644 the Globe shut down completely
- Where was the Globe?:
Located in London (south side of the Thames)  everything to do with the status of
the theater
- Only two groups of actors could play within city limits  The Globe moved right
outside of the city, so they wouldn’t have to abide to the rules
- The civilians blocked the Globe from moving into the city, even though they had
permission to move into London (the theater had no cultural importance)
- Plays at the Globe:
- Only during the daytime
- Actors: men, not respected until Elizabeth I
- Audience: poor and rich
- Seating arrangements: poor standing at the bottom  could not see much, rich sat
above, noble and rich by the podium
- Special effects: smells, canons, fireworks, flames, customs, fake blood
- How is the Globe used today?:
- Reconstructed: Shakespeare’s Globe (misleading)
- 1967
- Second Globe burned down, the third was build
- Belongs to the international Shakespeare’s Globe center (all over the world)
- Shakespeare and his popularity
- Visit the Globe
- Classical theater, workshop, tour
Sonnets
Summary
From all the 154 sonnets Shakespeare wrote, sonnet 18 stands out the most, it is well known
from the first line: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
The next 11 lines Shakespeare compares his love to a summer day.
Shakespeare mainly describes the difference between a summer day and the addressee.
At the end of the sonnet, he realizes summer ends but as long as people will live and read his
sonnet his love will live forever in the minds of the people.
It is not sure whom this sonnet is addressed too. Some people think it is addressed to the
third earl of Southampton and some people think it is addressed to the fair youth who is a
mysterious unidentified young man.

Analysis
Like most of Shakespeare’s sonnets, sonnet 18 has 14 lines, and has a rhyme scheme: AB,
AB, CD, CD, EF, EF, GG.
Shakespeare made a total of 154 sonnets. Some may be more popular than others, like
Romeo and Juliet is way more popular than sonnet number 66, for example. These sonnets
all have a different storyline and topic, some stories are more romantic, and some are more
political.

Besides the storylines there are also 6 kinds of themes, like the passage of time, infidelity,
jealousy, beauty, mortality, and love. The most important one is love because Shakespeare
used that theme in most of his sonnets.

The passage of time is used in sonnet 60. In this story he expresses how he feels about the
future, and the end of time. He wants to believe that his poetry will carry his beauty and
worth into the future in some way it never dies.

In sonnet number 136 Shakespeare is obsessed with a woman and ignores her bad
characteristics so he can spend time with her. She is lying to him, and she cheats on him
behind his back. Infidelity is another word for unfaithful, and she is unfaithful to him. He
trusts her and she takes advantage of that.

In a sonnet called Othello, the theme jealousy is recognizable. Othello is manipulated by

iago, because iago tells him his wife is cheating on him. Othello believes him and allows
jealousy to consume him. He murders his wife, but then he kills himself because he
discovered she was innocent.

In sonnet number 18, Shakespeare describes all the ways of beauty, but Thijs is going to tell
you more about that.

Sonnet number 25 is about the stars and about how life is after death. He describes how
death famous people will last and how he wants to be famous too before he dies. So, the
theme mortality jumps right out of this sonnet.
And of course, the theme love. A beautiful example for a sonnet with a love theme, is sonnet
number 116. The first half of this story is about marriage and about how love is so pretty.
But the second half is about how you can be fooled by love. It can be very confusing and
sometimes even disturbing.
What is a sonnet: a sonnet is a poem of fourteen lines using any of a number of formal
rhyme schemes. A sonnet can be broken into four sections called quatrains. The first three
quatrains contain four lines each and use an alternating rhyme scheme. The final quatrain
consists of just two lines, which both rhyme. An English sonnet typically has ten syllables per
line. They are 3 rules for sonnets:
1. Themes – topics in a sonnet generally express a strong emotion, such as love.
2. Rhyme scheme – The rhyming pattern is abab cdcd efef gg.
3. Structure – as mentioned a sonnet has fourteen lines, with a rhyme scheme and with
an iambic pentameter, a pentameter is a method of arranging the vowels of syllables into a
rhythmic pattern, and is most commonly used in English poetry.
Shakespeare compost a collection of 154 poems in the English sonnet form, and this was first
published in 1609. The first 126 sonnets are addressed to a young man while the last 28 are
addressed to a woman.

Where were sonnets invented? Technically, the sonnet is thought to have been invented in
Italy by a thirteenth-century notary named Giacomo da Lentini, he was also a poet. But the
Italian sonetto, meaning “little song ‘’ was popularized by a fourteenth-century humanist
scholar named Francesco Petrarca. He was also an Italian poet and prose writer and the
founder of humanism. Shakespeare's sonnets are considered a continuation of the sonnet
tradition that swept through the Renaissance from Petrarch in 14th-century Italy
and was finally introduced in 16th-century in England by Thomas Wyatt.
The sonnet was given its rhyming metre and division into quatrains by Henry Howard.
With few exceptions, Shakespeare's sonnets observe the stylistic form of the English sonnet
—the rhyme scheme, the 14 lines, and the metre.
But Shakespeare's sonnets are different because, he introduces a young man instead of a
woman and he also introduces the Dark Lady, whom is not a god.
The authorship debate
- Unknown parts of Shakespeare’s life:
- Speculations about mysterious gaps in his life
- Life and education
- Marriage and family life  lost years (teacher, actor, soldier)
Marriage is well documented, but his family life is unknown
- Professional collaborations sometimes are unknown (impact and dynamic are
unknown)
- Late life and retirement  years leading up to his death, unclarity
- Lost plays and poems (references to plays that are lost or undiscovered)

- Did Shakespeare write his own stories?

- Evidence for: business interest, Stratford
- Evidence against: normal family, no money for education, no letters or other writings,
his name is always spelled differently

- Edward de Vere (earl of Oxford):

- Elizabethan era, influential person, impact on the cultural scene at the time
- Theory: he wrote Shakespeare’s works (more capable), experience, travels
- Challenges to the theory: timing of the events is not correct

- Francis Bacon:
- Philosopher, politician, writer, poet
- Excellent examples of English writing  he wrote Shakespeare’s works? Shakespeare
as a pseudonym
- Not a lot of evidence that he could be Shakespeare, different writing style

- Christopher Marlowe:
- Playwright and poet
- Theory: faked his own death due to legal troubles  continued to write under the
name of Shakespeare
- Challenge: Marlowe’s work is well documented, and there is no evidence shown that
he survived (difference between style)

- Mary Sidney Herbert:

- Poet, literal patron
- Elizabethan court  connections  cultural and intellectual circles
- She wrote Shakespeare. Same education, cultural background
- Challenge: no direct evidence linking Mary to Shakespeare, feminist mix

- Shakespeare probably is the true writer of his works