Shakespeare’s Tragedies

King Lear

Hamlet

Romeo and Juliet

Eileen McGrathContent Area: EnglishSubject: Shakespeare’s TragediesGrade: 9th-10th

What is a Tragedy?

• An event causing great suffering, destruction, and distress, such as a serious accident, crime, or natural catastrophe.

• A play representing the disastrous downfall of a central character, the protagonist, and also has a tragic ending.

• Tend to begin with the singing of a choral lyric.

• Tragic Hero: –Tragic heroes have flaws, try to

achieve a goal but are limited, does not have to die at the end but he / she must undergo a change in fortune.

• Examples: Othello, King Lear, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, death in a family, car accident, break-up , cell phone dies.

Characters in King Lear

King Lear → The Beast

Goneril & Regan → The Evil Step Sisters

Cordelia → Princesses/Heroines

Gloucester → The Sultan

Edmund → Villains

Edgar → Mufasa

Fool → Rafiki

Hamlet

Father/Daughter Relationship• Act II.1.110-120• “That hath made him mad. I am sorry that with

better heed and judgment I had not quoted him. I feared he did but trifle And meant to wreck thee. But beshrew my jealousy! By heaven, it is as proper to our age To cast beyond ourselves in our opinions As it is common for the younger sort To lack discretion. Come, go we to the king. This must be known, which, being kept close, might move More grief to hid than hate to utter love. Come.”

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KA9rNLZX2G8&feature=related

• Act II.II.110-11

•“To the celestial and my soul’s idol, the most beautified Ophelia”……

Madness/Death• Ophelia represented the floral motif; beautiful but yet

fragile• Ophelia death was a suicide not an accident.• "Queen: Fell in the weeping brook. Her clothes spread

wide, and mermaid-like awhile they bore her up, which time she chanted snatches of old tune, as one incapable of her own distress, or like a creature native and indued unto that element." (IV, VII: 190-195)

• Ophelia, driven insane by Hamlet's cruelty and the murder of her beloved father, plunges from a tree branch and then into a river.

• "Gravedigger: Is she getting a Christian burial, even though she willfully took her own life?" (V, I: 1-2)

• "Gravedigger: For here lies the point; if I drown myself wittingly, it argues an act, and an act hath three branches – it is to act, to do, to perform; argal, she drowned herself wittingly." (V, I: 9-11)

• "If she hadn't been a gentlewoman, she wouldn't get a Christian Burial," commented the gravedigger.

• Tomorrow is Saint valentine’s day, – All in the morning bedtime,And I a maid at your window,

To be your ValentineThen up he rose, and donned his clothes,

And dupped the chamber door.Let in the maid that out a maid

Never departed more.By Gis and by Saint Charity,

Alack, and fie, for shame!Young men will do’t, if they come to’ t.

By Cock, they are to blame.Quoth she, “Before you tumbled me,

You promised me to wed.”He answeres,

“So would I ha’ done, by younder sun,An thou hadst not come to my bed.”

- Ophelia. IV.V.47-65

Romeo and Juliet

Media/Entertainment• The story is so well known that there

are elements all around us. –West Side Story – Titanic– The Notebook– Gnomeo and Juliet

Works Cited• Fallon, R. (2005). How to enjoy Shakespeare.• Chicago: Ivan R. Dee.

• McAlindon, T. (1991). Shakespeare’s tragic cosmos.• New York: Cambridge University Press.

• Mehl, D. (1986). Shakespeare’s tragedies an introduction. • New York: Cambridge University Press.