Shakespeare's works

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Shakespeare's works include 38 dramas, the verse poems and 154 sonnets. Individual modern editors also include two presumably lost dramas and two works on which Shakespeare may have worked in the canon.

Dramas

The dramas are divided into comedies, histories, and tragedies according to the directory in the First Folio . When it comes to comedies, a distinction is made between the cheerful comedies, the so-called problem plays and the romances. Of the histories or royal dramas, eight works are combined into two tetralogies, the Lancaster and York tetralogies, which describe the era of the so-called Wars of the Roses . When it comes to tragedies, a distinction is made between the early tragedies, the Roman dramas and the great tragedies.

Comedies

The so-called "cheerful comedies" are sometimes divided into two groups, the seven early and three late or romantic comedies. Accordingly, one differentiates between the group of early comedies: The Comedy of Errors , Lost Love Labor , The Taming of the Shrew , Two Gentlemen from Verona , A Midsummer Night's Dream , The Merchant of Venice and The Merry Wives of Windsor from the group of romantic or late comedies Much Ado nothing , As you like it and Twelfth Night .

The problem pieces

Although the term has recently been increasingly questioned, in literature since Frederick Boas the three works Troilus and Cressida , Ending well, all is well and Measure for Measure, are often counted among the so-called problem pieces. The works mentioned were already viewed by Coleridge and Dowden as a separate group. Boas chose the term based on the modern dramas of Ibsen , Pinero and Shaw and applied it to Shakespeare's works. The serious tone and, in contrast to the romances, the much more realistic plot is characteristic of the problem pieces. The main focus is on the social regulation of sexuality. Conflict resolution no longer takes place through magic, as in a Midsummer Night's Dream, but through the "bed trick", the exchanged love partner and the ruler's violent intervention in the choice of partner.

The romances

Since the work of the Irish critic Edward Dowden, the plays Pericles, Prince of Tire , A Winter's Tale , Cymbeline , The Tempest and, by some authors, The Two Noble Cousins and Henry VIII have been counted among the romances . Miracles, fairy tale motifs, complex family relationships, and long journeys are considered important characteristics of romances. The triggering of an existence-threatening crisis of a character through a forced separation with an unexpected reunion with the family or the partner, as well as a problematic father-daughter relationship can be found in connection with a tendency to de-psychologize and rather schematic representation of the characters, which in an unbelievable Action sequence can be embedded. The occurrence of a voyage or a shipwreck with correspondingly complex performance conditions is seen in connection with the fact that Shakespeare's theater group had the opportunity to work regularly in the Blackfriars Theater from 1608 , where more complex stage technology was probably available.

Histories

In the histories, the works of King John and Henry VIII are not assigned to a larger group. With the work on the second part of Henry VI , Shakespeare created the cycle of works of the two tetralogies . started, so to speak with the death of Richard III. approaching end of the Wars of the Roses. Only then did he write the Lancaster tetralogy . The Wars of the Roses begin with the dethroning of Richard II by Henry Bolingbroke, who later became King Henry IV . The Lancaster tetralogy ends with the victory of King Henry V in the Battle of Agincourt.

tragedies

The classification of the tragedies provides for the distinction between the early tragedies Titus Andronicus and Romeo and Juliet , the compilation of Julius Caesar , Antony and Cleopatra and Coriolanus into the so-called Roman dramas and the presentation of Hamlet , Othello , King Lear and Macbeth as "great" tragedies . Sometimes Timon of Athens is added to this last group and one speaks less judgmentally of the later tragedies.

Other dramas

The works The History of Cardenio and Love's Labor's Won listed in directories contemporary, but are probably lost. Cardenio, inspired by a figure in Miguel de Cervantes ' work Don Quixote von der Mancha , has survived fragmentarily in the piece Double Falsehood by Lewis Theobald , performed in 1727, according to recent research . The anonymous published drama Edward III. and the handwritten fragment of the collaboratively written drama Sir Thomas More are added by some authors to Shakespeare's works. Together with the 36 pieces from the First Folio and the two dramas Pericles and Two Noble Kinsmen , which have only survived as a quarto , various scholars assume 42 well-known Shakespeare dramas. Of the so-called Shakespeare apocrypha (seven works included in the “Third Folio” from 1664), only Pericles are considered authentic today .

Poetic works

Shakespeare's poetic works include his sonnets and the group of verses, consisting of Venus and Adonis , Lucretia , The Lover's Lament , The Pilgrim in Love and The Phoenix and the Turtle Dove .

literature

  • Michael Dobson, Stanley Wells: The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare . OUP 2001, 2nd rev. Edition 2015, ISBN 978-0-19-870873-5 .
  • Hans-Dieter Gelfert: William Shakespeare in his time . CH Beck Verlag, Munich 2014, ISBN 978-3-406-65919-5 .
  • Charlton Hinman: The Norton Facsimile. The First Folio of Shakespeare. Based on the Folios in the Folger Library Collection. Second edition. New York 1996, ISBN 0-393-03985-4 .
  • John Jowett et al .: The Oxford Shakespeare. The Complete Works. Second edition . OUP 2005, ISBN 978-0-19-926718-7 .
  • Alexander Leggatt: The Cambridge Companion to Shakespearean Comedy. CUP 2002, ISBN 978-0-521-77942-5 .
  • Ina Schabert (Ed.): Shakespeare Handbook. Time, man, work, posterity. 5th, revised and supplemented edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 2009, ISBN 978-3-520-38605-2 .
  • Ulrich Suerbaum: The Shakespeare Guide. Reclam, Stuttgart 2006, 3rd revised and supplemented edition 2015, ISBN 978-3-15-020395-8 .
  • Stanley Wells, Gary Taylor: William Shakespeare: A Textual Companion . Oxford 1987, corrected new edition 1997, ISBN 978-0-393-31667-4 .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Norton facsimile. The First Folio of Shakespeare. Based on the Folios in the Folger Library Collection. Prepared by Charlton Hinman. Second edition. New York 1996, p. 13 according to the facsimile count.
  2. ^ Hans-Dieter Gelfert: William Shakespeare in his time . CH Beck Verlag, Munich 2014, pp. 263 and 303.
  3. ^ A b Michael Dobson, Stanley Wells: The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare . OUP 2001. Article “problem play” by MD (Michael Dobson), p. 357.
  4. ↑ Frederick S. Boas: Shakespeare and his Predecessors. 1896.
  5. ↑ Michael Dobson, Stanley Wells: The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare . OUP 2001. Article "Boas, Frederick Samuel" by TM (Tom Matheson), p. 50.
  6. ^ Ina Schabert: Shakespeare Handbook . Kröner, Stuttgart 2009, p. 434.
  7. ↑ Ulrich Suerbaum: The Shakespeare guide. Reclam, Stuttgart 2006, p. 178f.
  8. ↑ Michael Dobson, Stanley Wells: The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare . OUP 2001. Article "Dowden, Edward" by TM (Tom Matheson), pp. 113f.
  9. ^ Edward Dowden: Shakespeare: A Critical Study of His Mind and Art. 1875. Edward Dowden: Introduction to Shakespeare. Blackie and Son, London 1893, p. 82. (quoted from Michael O'Connell: The experiment of romance. In: Alexander Leggatt: The Cambridge Companion to Shakespearean Comedy. Pp. 215–229; there p. 215.)
  10. ↑ Michael Dobson, Stanley Wells: The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare . OUP 2001, article "romance" by SM (Sonia Massai), p. 395.
  11. ^ Ina Schabert: Shakespeare Handbook . Kröner, Stuttgart 2009, p. 454.
  12. ^ TG Bishop: Shakespeare and the Theater of Wonder. Cambridge 1996. PG Platt: Reason Diminished. London 1997. Quoted from Ina Schabert: Shakespeare Handbook . P. 455.
  13. ^ Ina Schabert: Shakespeare Handbook . P. 456.
  14. ↑ Michael Dobson, Stanley Wells: The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare . OUP 2001. Article "Blackfriars" by GE (Gabriel Egan), p. 48f.
  15. ^ John Jowett, William Montgomery, Gary Taylor, Stanley Wells (Eds.): The Oxford Shakespeare. The Complete Works . Second edition. OUP 2005, pp. 1245 and 337.
  16. ^ Stanley Wells: Shakespeare Survey . Cambridge University Press, 2003, ISBN 978-0-521-54184-8 ( google.de [accessed December 11, 2019]).
  17. ↑ Nick Britten: William Shakespeare's lost 18th Century play Double Falsehood 'not a hoax' . March 16, 2010, ISSN  0307-1235 ( telegraph.co.uk [accessed December 11, 2019]).
  18. ^ John Jowett, William Montgomery, Gary Taylor, Stanley Wells (Eds.): The Oxford Shakespeare. The Complete Works . Second edition. OUP 2005, pp. 257 and 813.
  19. ^ Ina Schabert: Shakespeare Handbook . Kröner, Stuttgart 2009, p. 192.
  20. ↑ Michael Dobson, Stanley Wells: The Oxford Companion to Shakespeare . OUP 2001. Article "apogrypha" by MD (Michael Dobson), pp. 14 and 19.