Scientific and philosophical ideas of the Renaissance in the worldview of Shakespeare. Shakespeare and the Renaissance Shakespeare Ideas in the Works

We can safely say that this man changed the world, mentality, perception, attitude towards art as such. William Shakespeare, whose works are studied in the school curriculum, was a real genius. His plays and poems can be called a true encyclopedia of human relationships, a kind of mirror of life, a reflector of the shortcomings and strengths of human beings.

great genius

Shakespeare's works are an impressive contribution to world literature. During his life, the great Briton created seventeen comedies, eleven tragedies, a dozen chronicles, five poems and one hundred and fifty-four sonnets. It is interesting that their subjects, the problems described in them, are relevant to this day. Even many researchers of the playwright's work cannot answer how in the sixteenth century a person could create works that excite all generations. It was even hypothesized that the works were written not by one person, but by a certain group of authors, but under one pseudonym. But the truth has not yet been established.

short biography

Shakespeare, whose works are so loved by many, left many mysteries behind him and very few historical facts. It is believed that he was born near Birmingham, in the city of Stratford-upon-Avon, in 1564. His father was engaged in trade and was a wealthy citizen. But the issues of literature and culture were not discussed with little William: at that time there was no environment in the city that would be conducive to the development of talent.

The boy went to a free school, at the age of eighteen he married (forcedly) a rich girl, she was eight years older than him. Apparently, Shakespeare did not like family life, so he joined a wandering group of artists and left for London. But he was not lucky to become an actor, so he wrote poems in honor of influential people, served the horses of wealthy theater visitors, worked as a prompter, and finished writing plays. Shakespeare's first works appeared when he was 25 years old. Then he wrote more and more. They were delivered and were successful. In 1599, at the expense of the artists of the group, including Shakespeare, the famous Globe Theater was built. In it, the playwright worked tirelessly.

Features of the works

Shakespeare's works even then differed from traditional dramas and comedies. Their hallmark was deep content, the presence of intrigue that changes people. William showed how low even a noble person can fall under the influence of circumstances and, conversely, how notorious villains perform great deeds. The playwright forced his characters to reveal their character gradually, as the plot developed, and the audience to empathize with the characters, to follow the scene. Shakespeare's works are also characterized by high moral pathos.

It is not surprising that the genius of dramaturgy already during his lifetime deprived the income of many authors, since the public demanded precisely his work. And he met the requirements of demand - he wrote new plays, replayed ancient stories, used historical chronicles. Success gave William prosperity, and even the coat of arms of the nobility. He died, as is commonly believed, after a cheerful feast in honor of his birthday in a friendly circle.

Works of Shakespeare (list)

We cannot list all the works of the greatest English playwright in this article. But let's point out the most famous works of Shakespeare. The list is as follows:

• "Romeo and Juliet".
• "Hamlet".
• "Macbeth".
• "A dream in a summer night".
• "Othello".
• "King Lear".
• "The Merchant of Venice".
• "Much ado about nothing".
• "Storm".
• "Two Verona".

These plays can be found in the repertoire of any self-respecting theater. And, of course, to paraphrase the famous saying, we can say that the actor who does not dream of playing Hamlet is bad, the actress who does not want to play Juliet is bad.

To be or not to be?

Shakespeare's work "Hamlet" is one of the brightest, most penetrating. The image of the Danish prince excites to the depths of the soul, and his eternal question makes you think about your life. For those who have not yet read the tragedy in the full version, we will tell a summary. The play begins with the appearance of a ghost in the kings. He meets with Hamlet and tells him that the king did not die a natural death. It turns out that the father's soul demands revenge - the murderer Claudius not only took the wife of the late king, but also the throne. Wanting to verify the veracity of the words of night vision, the prince pretends to be a madman and invites wandering artists to the palace to stage the tragedy. Claudius' reaction gave him away, and Hamlet decides to take revenge. Palace intrigues, betrayal of his beloved and former friends make an avenger prince without a heart. He kills several of them in defense of himself, but is killed by the sword of the deceased Ophelia's brother. In the end, everyone dies: both Claudius, who untruthfully took the throne, and the mother, who drank the wine poisoned by her husband, prepared for Hamlet, and the prince himself, and his opponent Laertes. Shakespeare, whose works move to tears, described the problem not only in Denmark. But the whole world, the hereditary monarchy in particular.

Tragedy of two lovers

Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" is a touching story about two young people who are ready to sacrifice themselves to be with their chosen one. This is a story about warring families who did not allow their children to be together, to be happy. But the children of the warring nobles do not care about the established rules, they decide to be together. Their meetings are filled with tenderness and deep feelings. But the bridegroom was found for the girl, and her parents tell her to prepare for the wedding. Juliet's brother is killed in a street fight between representatives of two warring families, and Romeo is considered the killer. The ruler wants to send the criminal out of the city. The young people are helped by a monk and a nurse, but they have not fully discussed all the details of the escape. As a result, Juliet drinks a potion, from which she falls into Romeo, but considers her beloved dead and drinks poison in her crypt. After awakening, the girl kills herself with the guy's dagger. The Montagues and the Capulets reconcile, mourning their children.

Other jobs

But William Shakespeare wrote works and others. These are funny comedies that are uplifting, light and lively. They tell about people, although famous, but those who are not alien to love, passion, striving for life. Wordplay, misunderstandings, happy accidents lead the characters to a happy ending. If sadness is present in the plays, then it is fleeting, such as to emphasize the cheerful turmoil on the stage.

The sonnets of the great genius are also original, filled with deep thoughts, feelings, experiences. In verse, the author turns to a friend, beloved, mourns in separation and rejoices at a meeting, is disappointed. A special melodic language, symbols and images create an elusive picture. Interestingly, in most of the sonnets, Shakespeare refers to a man, perhaps Henry Risley, Earl of Southampton, the playwright's patron. And only then, in later works, does a swarthy lady, a cruel coquette, appear.

Instead of an afterword

Each person is simply obliged to read at least in translation, but the full content of the most famous works of Shakespeare, to make sure that the greatest genius had the ability of a prophet, because he was able to identify the problems of even modern society. He was a researcher of human souls, noticed their shortcomings and advantages, and pushed for changes. And isn't that the purpose of art and the great master?

William Shakespeare

The work of the great English writer William Shakespeare is of worldwide importance. Shakespeare's genius is dear to all mankind. The world of ideas and images of the humanist poet is truly enormous. The universal significance of Shakespeare lies in the realism and nationality of his work.

William Shakespeare was born on April 23, 1564 in Stratford-on-Avon in the family of a glover. The future playwright studied at a grammar school, where they taught Latin and Greek, as well as literature and history. Life in a provincial town provided an opportunity for close contact with the people, from whom Shakespeare learned English folklore and the richness of the vernacular. For a time, Shakespeare was a junior teacher. In 1582 he married Anna Hathaway; he had three children. In 1587, Shakespeare left for London and soon began to play on the stage, although he did not have much success as an actor. From 1593 he worked at the Burbage Theater as an actor, director and playwright, and from 1599 he became a shareholder of the Globe Theatre. Shakespeare's plays were very popular, although few people knew his name at that time, because the audience paid attention primarily to the actors.

In London, Shakespeare met a group of young aristocrats. One of them, the Earl of Southampton, he dedicated his poems Venus and Adonis (Venus and Adonis, 1593) and Lucrece (Lucrece, 1594). In addition to these poems, he wrote a collection of sonnets and thirty-seven plays.

In 1612 Shakespeare left the theatre, stopped writing plays and returned to Stratford-on-Avon. Shakespeare died on April 23, 1616 and was buried in his native city.

The lack of information about the life of Shakespeare gave rise to the so-called Shakespeare question. Starting from the XVIII century. some researchers began to express the idea that Shakespeare's plays were not written by Shakespeare, but by another person who wanted to hide his authorship and published his works under Shakespeare's name. Herbert Lawrence stated in 1772 that the playwright was the philosopher Francis Bacon; Delia Bacon claimed in 1857 that the plays were written by members of Walter Raleigh's circle, which included Bacon; Carl Bleibtrey in 1907, Dumblon in 1918, F. Shipulinsky in 1924 tried to prove that Lord Rutland was the author of the plays. Some scholars have attributed authorship to the Earl of Oxford, Earl of Pembroke, Earl of Derby. In our country, this theory was supported by V.M. Friche. I.A. Aksenov believed that many plays were not written by Shakespeare, but only edited by him.

Theories that deny the authorship of Shakespeare are untenable. They arose on the basis of distrust of those traditions that served as the source of Shakespeare's biography, and on the basis of the unwillingness to see genius talent in a person of democratic origin who did not graduate from the university. What is known about Shakespeare's life fully confirms his authorship. Philosophical mind, poetic worldview, breadth of knowledge, deep insight into moral and psychological problems - Shakespeare possessed all this thanks to increased reading, communication with the people, active participation in the affairs of his time, attentive attitude to life.

Shakespeare's career is divided into three periods. In the first period (1591-1601), the poems "Venus and Adonis" and "Lucretia", sonnets and almost all historical chronicles were created, with the exception of "Henry VIII" (1613); three tragedies: "Titus Andronicus", "Romeo and Juliet" and "Julius Caesar". The genre most characteristic of this period was a cheerful, bright comedy (“The Taming of the Shrew”, “A Midsummer Night's Dream”, “The Merchant of Venice”, “The Merry Wives of Windsor”, “Much Ado About Nothing”, “As You Like It”, “The Twelfth night").

The second period (1601-1608) was marked by an interest in tragic conflicts and tragic heroes. Shakespeare creates tragedies: Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, Timon of Athens. The comedies written during this period already bear a tragic reflection; in the comedies "Troilus and Cressida" and "Measure for Measure" the satirical element is intensified.

The third period (1608-1612) includes the tragicomedies "Pericles", "Cymbeline", "The Winter's Tale", "The Tempest", in which fantasy and allegorism appear.

Shakespeare's sonnets (1592-1598, published in 1699) were the pinnacle of English Renaissance poetry and a milestone in the history of world poetry. By the end of the XVI century. the sonnet became the leading genre in English poetry. Shakespeare's sonnets, in their philosophical depth, lyrical force, dramatic feeling and musicality, occupy an outstanding place in the development of the art of the sonnet of that time. The 154 sonnets created by Shakespeare are united by the image of a lyrical hero who sings of his devoted friendship with a wonderful young man and his ardent and painful love for a swarthy lady (The Dark Lady of the Sonnets). Shakespeare's sonnets are a lyrical confession; the hero tells about the life of his heart, about his conflicting feelings; this is a passionate monologue, angrily denouncing the hypocrisy and cruelty that reigned in society, and opposing them with enduring spiritual values ​​- friendship, love, art. The sonnets reveal the complex and multifaceted spiritual world of the lyrical hero, who vividly responds to the problems of his time. The poet exalts the spiritual beauty of man and at the same time depicts the tragedy of life in the conditions of that time.

Artistic perfection in expressing deep philosophical ideas is inseparable from the concise, concise form of the sonnet. Shakespeare's sonnet uses the following rhyming scheme: abab cdcd efef gg. In three quatrains, a dramatic development of the theme is given, often with the help of contrasts and antitheses and in the form of a metaphorical image; the final distich is an aphorism formulating the philosophical thought of the topic.

The image of a swarthy lady in the 130th sonnet is distinguished by the skill of a truthful lyrical portrait. Shakespeare refuses mannered, euphemistic comparisons, trying to depict the real face of a woman:

Her eyes don't look like stars, Her lips can't be called corals, Her open skin is not snow-white, And a strand twists like a black wire. With a damask rose, scarlet or white, The shade of these cheeks cannot be compared. And the body smells the way the body smells, Not like a delicate violet petal. (Translated by S. Marshak)

Among the sonnets in which the most important social ideas are expressed, the 66th sonnet stands out. This is an angry denunciation of a society based on baseness, meanness and deceit. In lapidary phrases, all the ulcers of an unjust society are named. The lyrical hero is so worried about the terrible picture of triumphant evil that has opened before him that he begins to call for death. The sonnet, however, ends with a glimpse of light mood. The hero remembers his beloved, for whom he must live:

Everything is vile that I see around, But it's a pity to leave you, dear friend!

His accusatory monologue, which is a direct outburst of indignation, the lyrical hero utters in one breath. This is conveyed by the repetition of the union "and" in ten poetic lines. The use of the words "tir" d with all these "(being exhausted by everything ...) at the beginning and at the end of the sonnet emphasizes the direct connection between the experiences of the lyrical hero and the social problems of the time. The hero absorbs into his spiritual world everything that worries a person in the public world. Drama experiences of the lyrical hero is expressed in the forcing of energetic phrases, each of which is an antithesis that reproduces a real social contradiction.The hero can no longer see Nothingness in luxurious attire, And a false sentence to perfection, And virginity, abused rudely, And inappropriate honor, shame, And power in captivity in weakness toothless ...

The intense feelings of the lyrical hero correspond to the frequent and strict alternation of assonances and alliterations:

And folly - doctor-like - controlling skill... And captive good attending captain ill...

By means of language and style, all the strength of the emotions of the excited hero is perfectly conveyed. Sonnet 146 is dedicated to the greatness of a person who, thanks to his spiritual quest and tireless creative burning, is able to gain immortality.

Rule over death in a fleeting life, And death will die, and you will remain forever.

The diverse connections of the spiritual world of the lyrical hero with various aspects of the social life of that time are emphasized by metaphorical images based on political, economic, legal, and military concepts. Love is revealed as a real feeling, so the relationship of lovers is compared with the socio-political relations of that time. In the 26th sonnet, the concepts of vassal dependence (vassalage) and ambassadorial duties (ambassage) appear; in the 46th sonnet - legal terms: "the defendant rejects the claim" (the defendant doth that plea deny); in the 107th sonnet, an image associated with the economy: “love is like a lease” (the lease of my true love); in the 2nd sonnet - military terms: "When forty winters shall besiege your brow, And dig deep trenches in the beauty" s field .. .).

Shakespeare's sonnets are musical. The whole figurative structure of his poems is close to music.

The poetic image in Shakespeare is also close to the pictorial image. In the verbal art of the sonnet, the poet relies on the law of perspective discovered by Renaissance artists. The 24th sonnet begins with the words: My eye has become an engraver and your image Imprinted in my chest truthfully. Since then I have served as a living frame, And the best thing in art is perspective.

The sense of perspective was a way of expressing the dynamics of being, the multidimensionality of real life, the uniqueness of human individuality*.

* See: Samarin P.M. Shakespeare realism. - M., 1964, Ch. "The Aesthetic Problematic of Shakespeare's Sonnets". The lyrical tragedy of the sonnets is developed in the tragedies of Shakespeare. Sonnet 127 anticipates the tragic theme of Othello:

Black was not considered beautiful, When beauty was valued in the world. But, apparently, the white light has changed, - The beautiful has been denigrated with disgrace.

The 66th sonnet in miniature contains the philosophical content and lyrical tone characteristic of the tragedy "Hamlet".

Shakespeare's sonnets were translated into Russian by I. Mamun, N. Gerbel, P. Kuskov, M. Tchaikovsky, E. Ukhtomsky, N. Kholodkovsky, O. Rumer. The translations by S.Ya. Marshak, published in 1949, were recognized as the best, as he managed to convey the philosophical depth and musicality of Shakespeare's sonnets.

Shakespeare's humanistic worldview is revealed with special force in the artistic analysis of socio-political conflicts and tragic contradictions in the life of a person and society, which is given in his historical chronicles. The essence of the historical chronicle genre consists in the dramatic depiction of real persons and events of national history. Unlike tragedies, where Shakespeare, in the interests of design, departed from an accurate depiction of historical facts, the chronicle is characterized by a faithful reproduction of historical events, which, however, presupposes artistic conjecture and artistic re-creation of the material*.

* See: Shvedov Yu.F. William Shakespeare: Studies. - M., 1977; Komarova V.P. Personality and the State in Shakespeare's Historical Dramas. - L., 1977.

Shakespeare's historical chronicles include ten plays:

"Henry VI. Part one "(The First part of King Henry VI, 1590-1592);

"Henry VI. Part Two "(The Second part of King Henry VI, 1590-1592);

"Henry VI. Part Three "(The Third part of King Henry VI, 1590-1592);

"Richard III" (The Tragedy of King Richard III, 1592-1593);

"Richard II" (The Tragedy of King Richard II, 1595-1597);

"King John" (The Life and Death of King John, 1595-1597);

"Henry IV. Part one "(The First part of King Henry IV, 1597-1598);

"Henry IV. Part two "(The Second part of King Henry IV, 1597-1598);

"Henry V" (The Life of King Henry V, 1598-1599);

"Henry VIII" (The Famous History of the Life of King Henry VIII, 1612-1613).

In historical chronicles, Shakespeare gives his understanding and his interpretation of historical events and actions of historical persons. On the material of the past, he solves the problems that worried contemporaries. History in his chronicles serves to cognize the current state of society. Chronicles, as well as tragedies, are characterized by ethical pathos, a philosophical formulation of the problem of good and evil, a humanistic interest in the individual and his fate. Chronicles are in many ways close not only to Shakespeare's tragedies, but also to Shakespeare's comedies; they give a comedic depiction of the "Falstaffian background".

The emergence of the genre of historical chronicle is due to the contradictions of the English reality itself. V. G. Belinsky justified the development of the historical chronicle in England in this way: “Historical drama is possible only if the heterogeneous elements of state life struggle. It is not for nothing that drama has reached its highest development among the English alone; it is no accident that Shakespeare appeared in England, and not in any other state: nowhere were the elements of state life in such contradiction, in such a struggle among themselves, as in England.

* Belinsky V. G. Poly. coll. cit.: In 13 volumes - M, 1954.-T. 5. - S. 496.

Shakespeare's appeal to the genre of historical chronicle was also due to the increased public interest in national history during the period of struggle to strengthen the national state. The source of the plots of historical chronicles was the already mentioned work of R. Holinshed "Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland".

In the trilogy "Henry VI" a wide canvas is drawn: the war of the Scarlet and White Roses is depicted, when the English barons brutally exterminated each other in the internecine struggle between Lancasters and Yorks. Shakespeare correctly showed the bloody feuds of the feudal lords, condemning both warring sides. The playwright advocates a strong royal power that could put an end to feudal wars. Therefore, he condemns King Henry VI, a weak man, unable to rule the country, unable to pacify the warring barons. Henry VI does not commit any atrocities, but he is guilty of evading the duty of head of state and dreaming of giving up the crown to become a shepherd. Henry VI dies precisely because he failed to wisely use the power given to him.

The historical chronicles of Shakespeare show the strength of the people. The barons are forced to reckon with the mood of the masses. The second part of "Henry VI" depicts the revolt of John Cad in 1450. Shakespeare revealed the pattern of popular protest that arose in connection with the plight of the peasants and urban artisans due to feudal civil strife. However, Shakespeare saw how the feudal lords used the popular revolt for their own selfish purposes.

The trilogy "Henry VI" describes such conditions in the life of society that lead to the emergence of a tyrant. The bloody rivalry of the aristocrats was a prerequisite for the rise to power of Richard of Gloucester, the future Richard III. In the finale of the trilogy, the dark personality of Richard Gloucester becomes more and more influential.

In the play "Richard III" this character becomes central. The play itself is close to tragedy in its structure. Attention to the course of historical events, characteristic of "Henry VI", is replaced in "Richard III" by attention to the character of the hero and his conflict with others. Richard III appears not just as a character who usurps power, but as a psychologically convincing personality. Shakespeare develops the accusatory characterization of him as a tyrant, given to him in Thomas More's book The History of Richard III (1514-1518). Richard III is condemned by Shakespeare as a politician who uses Machiavellian ways to achieve power, resorting to criminal actions in the struggle for the throne. He covers up his cruelty and criminal plans with hypocritical arguments about the good. At the same time, alone with himself, he directly speaks of his cunning, of his conscious intention not to reckon with his conscience.

Richard III is smart and courageous, he has great willpower, conquering those who treat him with distrust and hostility. His behavior is a game that misleads many. He managed to seduce Anna, knowing that he had killed her husband. There is a titanic beginning in the villainous appearance of Richard III. It is no coincidence that V. G. Belinsky wrote: “A tragic face must certainly arouse participation. Richard III himself is a monster of villainy, arouses participation in himself with a gigantic power of the spirit. Richard III, who justified his cruelty with the words: “The fist is our conscience, and the law is our sword,” finally experiences pangs of conscience and, in the face of death, condemns himself for breaking his oath, committing murders and thereby dooming himself to loneliness .

* Belinsky V. G. Poly. coll. cit.: In 13 vols. - M, 1955. - T. 7. - S. 534.

The action in the play is the implementation of the cunning villainous plans of the protagonist, it demonstrates the art of intrigue of Richard III, who himself acts as an actor and director in scenes of violence and murder. He plays confidently and boldly, his actions lead to success: he seeks the throne. But, having become king, the tyrant feels that he cannot strengthen his power through crimes.

Condemning tyranny, Shakespeare puts forward the idea of ​​a monarchy that can establish peace and tranquility in the country. The tyrant Richard III is opposed to the Earl of Richmond, the founder of the Tudor dynasty. This image is only outlined here, but its ideological and compositional significance is great: the idea of ​​the need to fight against despotism, of the laws of victory over tyranny, is connected with it. The theme of the monarch, caring for the good of the country, outlined in the image of Richmond, grows in the next chronicle - "King John" - into the theme of a patriotic monarch. The play was created at a time when England felt threatened by Catholic Spain. Therefore, the theme of patriotism and the theme of the condemnation of Catholicism became central in the chronicle. The theme of patriotism is revealed in the images of John the Landless and Bastard Fockenbridge.

The patriotic position of Shakespeare is the main criterion in assessing the behavior of the characters in the play "Richard II". In its plot, this drama is close to "Edward II" by Christopher Marlowe. In both works, the refusal of the depraved king from the crown and his death are depicted. However, the similarity of the plot situation is explained not so much by the influence of Marlo's drama on Shakespeare's drama, but by the closeness of the fates of historical figures. The shrewd Richard II feels that time has turned against him. In a state of deep spiritual crisis, he refuses the crown.

Duke Henry Bolingbroke, the antagonist of Richard II, is a smart and subtle politician. The courage and courage of Bolingbroke aroused sympathy for him from the people. The duke skillfully uses his popularity among the common people to carry out his ambitious plans. Shakespeare treats Bolingbroke's patriotism with great sympathy, but speaks with obvious hostility of his hypocrisy, prudence, and ambition. The usurpation of power is represented by an immoral act leading to a crime - the murder of Richard P.

Shakespeare's best historical dramas are the two parts "Henry IV" and "Henry V". Bolingbroke, who became King Henry IV, comes into conflict with the feudal lords. His main opponents are barons from the Percy family. Raising a rebellion against the king, the feudal lords act inconsistently, selfish interests prevent them from uniting. As a result of this disunity during the rebellion, the brave Henry Percy, nicknamed Hotspur (“Hot Spur”), tragically dies. And in this chronicle, Shakespeare shows the inevitability of the defeat of the feudal lords in a clash with royal power. Nevertheless, the Knight of Hotspur is portrayed in positive terms. He evokes sympathy for his loyalty to the ideal of military honor, courage and fearlessness. Shakespeare is attracted by the moral qualities of a brave knight. But he does not accept Hotsper as a person who expresses the interests of the feudal lords and is associated with forces that are fading into the past. Hotspur acts as an adversary to Henry IV, Prince Harry and Falstaff, and he is clearly inferior to these heroes, who represent the new, evolving forces of society. The play reflects the objective regularity of time: the tragic death of the feudal lords and the gradual establishment of a new force - absolutism.

King Henry IV, having found himself on the throne thanks to skillful diplomatic actions, eventually loses his activity and, like his predecessors, finds himself in a state of moral crisis. Henry IV is concerned that he failed to rid the country of fratricidal wars. Shortly before the death of the sick Henry IV, moving away from his former suspicion and secrecy, in a conversation with his son, he directly expresses his concern for the fate of England, giving Prince Harry advice on public affairs. Henry IV could not bring the struggle against the feudal lords to the end because he himself always acted like a feudal lord and came to power as a feudal lord, having usurped the throne.

The most important role in the plot of both parts of "Henry IV" is played by the image of Prince Harry, the future King Henry V. In accordance with the legend that existed in the Renaissance, Shakespeare presented Prince Harry as a dissolute fellow, indulging in fun and funny adventures in the company of Falstraff. But despite his debauchery, Prince Harry is a morally pure man. Although in reality Prince Harry was a cruel adventurer, Shakespeare portrayed him as a wonderful young man. The idealization of the prince is caused by Shakespeare's belief in the progressive nature of an absolute monarchy that unites the nation.

The character of Prince Harry is multifaceted. He acts decisive and courageous in battle, lively and direct in dealing with the people, smart and far-sighted in state affairs. Prince Harry spends his life in entertainment, together with Falstaff, Bardolph and Pistol, he has fun in the Boar's Head Tavern. But even in the scenes of carousing, Harry remains a noble man. He attracts with a kind attitude towards ordinary people, the ability to find a common language with them. Leading the life of a dissolute fellow, the prince at the same time thinks very seriously about how he will come to power and govern the country. Democratic communication with the lower classes of society for Prince Harry is a form of wide acquaintance with those who will become his subjects.

The historical chronicles "Henry IV" and "Henry V" depict the motley plebeian strata of society - peasants, servants, soldiers, merchants, the so-called "Falstaff background". The realism of the historical drama was determined by the multifaceted and multifaceted depiction of society. Raising the question of the position of the people, of the relationship of the monarch with the people, acquires great importance. "Falstaff's background" is a realistic picture of the life of the lower classes of society, not only of the time when the action of the chronicles takes place, but also of England contemporary to Shakespeare.

Among the characters of the “Falstaffian background”, the bright comic image of Sir John Falstaff stands out first of all. This fat knight causes laughter with his endless antics and witty speech. There are many vices in Falstaff. He is a libertine, a drunkard, a liar and a robber. Hence the satirical touches in this image. But the main thing in Falstaff is the element of fun, artistic play, endless ingenuity. This image conveys the charm of human nature not constrained by social conventions. Falstaff is good-natured and frank, cheerful and cheerful, enterprising and wise. The roguish and mischievous Falstaff, who appears surrounded by comic characters, embodies the cheerful spirit of the Renaissance, opposing both the religious morality of the Middle Ages and the puritanical hypocrisy of bourgeois circles. Falstaff laughs at religious bigotry. An impoverished nobleman and knight, he lives off highway robberies. Conscious of the power of money, he at the same time does not bow before them. Unlike the bourgeoisie, Falstaff is deprived of the thirst for hoarding or petty hoarding and frugality. He needs money to enjoy life.

Falstaff opposes Hotspur with his rejection of knightly honor. The knightly honor of the feudal lords was reduced to mandatory participation in internecine wars. The knight Falstaff has a negative attitude towards knightly honor precisely because he sees the senseless cruelty of war. Falstaff is a comic image of a warrior of that time. He is very worried about his life, which is dearer to him than anything in the world, therefore he does not serve particularly hard, covering up his lack of service zeal with cunning and lies.

Falstaff is charming with his boundless love of life, unbridled fantasy, playful buffoonery, self-confidence, insightful and witty criticism of feudal morality. Falstaff's cynical judgments are a form in which the unattractive essence of relations in feudal society is revealed and emphasized.

One of the most significant images created by Shakespeare, Falstaff represents the comedic world of Shakespearean drama, while Hamlet marks the world of tragedy. The image of Falstaff is a comic correspondence to the tragic plan of the main content of historical chronicles. Those problems that are revealed in the main storyline in a tragic aspect, in the "Falstaffian background" are given in a comic way. Falstaff's speech is presented in prose, in contrast to the poetic speech of tragic characters. His speech is direct, it very naturally reveals the laughter culture of the national language. Often Falstaff's witticisms are based on playing on the homonymous sound of words, on parody. The comical image of Falstaff is also based on the underlined discrepancy between the appearance of a fat, elderly campaigner and the cheerful, daring deeds and statements of a young man in spirit.

Prince Harry is friends with the witty hedonist Falstaff. When the prince becomes King Henry V, he removes Falstaff from himself. In these character relationships, there are echoes of the real relationship between Henry V and Sir John Oldcastle, who is considered the prototype of Falstaff.

The relationship between Falstaff and Prince Harry is full of deep meaning. Thanks to his friendship with Falstaff, Prince Harry joins the Renaissance spirit of criticism and cheerfulness, gets acquainted with the life and customs of the common people. In relations with Prince Harry, Falstaff is trusting; he considers the prince his true friend. In this friendly affection, spiritual generosity of the Renaissance personality, Falstaff's superiority over the "ideal monarch" is manifested. But Falstaff is inferior to Prince Harry in sober assessment of new circumstances. Prince Harry's break with Falstaff is inevitable. The “ideal monarch” Henry V, having come to power, abandons the former Renaissance freemen. Neither humor nor generosity is needed to strengthen an absolutist regime.

In the first period of creativity, along with historical chronicles, Shakespeare created cheerful, optimistic comedies in which a person acts as the creator of his own happiness, overcoming sometimes difficult dramatic situations. Comedies include the following plays: The Comedy of Errors (1591), The Taming of the Shrew (1594), The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1594-1595), The fruitless efforts of love "(Love "s Labor" s Lost, 1594-1595), "A Midsummer Night's Dream" (A Midsummer-Night "s Dream, 1594-1595), "The Merchant of Venice" (The Merchant of Venice, 1595) , "The Merry Wives of Windsor" (The Merry Wives of Windsor, 1597), "Much Ado about Nothing" (Much Ado about Nothing, 1598-1599), "As You Like It" (As You Like It, 1599-1600), " Twelfth Night, or Anything” (Twelfth Night; or What You Will, 1600).

In the merry farcical play The Taming of the Shrew, the bright characters of Catarina and Petruchio appear, standing out among the calculating townspeople of Padua. Katarina is reputed to be a stubborn girl, while her sister Bianca is known for her meekness. Katarina's obstinacy and rudeness is just a way of defending her dignity, a way of resisting petty calculations, the despotism of her father and the suitors besieging the house. Katharina is annoyed by the facelessness of Bianchi, the lowland of suitors. With her usual rudeness, she also meets Petruchio. A long duel begins between them, as a result of which they both feel that they are not inferior to each other in energy, fortitude, love of life and wit, that they are worthy of each other in mind and will.

The idea of ​​the triumph of life and love is also revealed in the comedy A Midsummer Night's Dream. The poetic world of this comedy is in a bizarre mixture of the earthly, the real, with the fabulous, the fantastic. In this comedy Shakespeare the humanist contrasts the conventional nature of traditional morality with the natural naturalness of human feelings and passions. The theme of love is covered here in a lyrical and humorous way. The love of young heroes is a pure, bright feeling. It wins, despite all the whims and quirks of human characters and human behavior.

There are deeply dramatic conflicts and even tragic motifs in Shakespearean comedy. In this regard, the comedy "The Merchant of Venice" is typical. Against the background of the cheerful carnival atmosphere of Venice, there is an acute clash between the world of joy, trust and nobility and the world of self-interest, greed and cruelty. In this comedy, Shakespeare developed the motifs of the short story by Giovanni Fiorentino, giving them dramatic depth. The play sharply contrasts those who value selfless friendship the most - Portia, Antonio, Bassanio, and those who subordinate all human relations to proprietary interests. Antonio borrows money from the pawnbroker Shylock to help his friend Bassanio, who is in love with Portia. Antonio, who did not return the borrowed money on time, appears before the court. Cruel Shylock, according to the bill, demands from Antonio a pound of his meat for non-payment of the debt. Portia, disguised as a lawyer, speaks in Antonio's defense. Good triumphs over evil. Young people defeat the usurer.

The image of Shylock is presented in the comedy not only as the embodiment of evil. Shylock's character is complex. Shylock's versatility was noted by Pushkin: "Shylock is stingy, quick-witted, vindictive, child-loving, witty"*. There is a tragic beginning in this image. Shylock is shown as a cruel and vengeful usurer, but at the same time as a man suffering from his humiliated position in society. With a great sense of human dignity, Shylock says that people are equal by nature, despite the difference in nationalities. Shylock loves his daughter Jessica and is shocked that she ran away from his home. Some of his features Shylock can cause sympathy, but in general he is condemned as a predator, as a person who does not know mercy, as "one who has no music in his soul." The evil world of Shylock is opposed in the comedy by the bright and joyful world of generosity and nobility. Heinrich Heine, in Shakespeare's Girls and Women (1838), wrote: "Portia is a harmoniously clear embodiment of bright joy, as opposed to the gloomy misfortune that Shylock embodies" **.

* Pushkin-critic. - M, 1950. - S. 412.

** Heine G. Sobr. cit.: In 10 volumes - M; L., 1958. - T. 7. - S. 391.

In the cheerful household comedy The Merry Wives of Windsor, a whole gallery of comic images is given: the stupidity of Judge Shallow, his nephew Slender, is ridiculed, pastor Hugh Evans is joking. A whole group of comic characters from the historical chronicle "Henry IV" passed into this comedy - Falstaff, Bardolph, Shallow, Pistol, Mrs. Quickly.

The image of Falstaff undergoes significant changes in The Merry Wives of Windsor. He lost his free-thinking, humor, ingenuity. Now Falstaff plays the role of an unfortunate red tape, who was taught a lesson by the wives of Windsor. Once in a middle-class environment, he becomes a miserable and dull inhabitant, becomes prudent and thrifty.

The comedy "The Merry Wives of Windsor" is imbued with a fun carnival atmosphere. But, unlike other comedies, the action in it takes place in a bourgeois environment, which gives Shakespeare the opportunity to convey the real life and customs of that time to a greater extent, especially in scenes depicting the everyday existence of the Pages and Fords, the life of an inn, the duel of Caius with Evans, Page's exam.

The whimsical intrigue and setting of the action in the comedy Much Ado About Nothing are taken from the works of Bandello and Ariosto. Shakespeare introduced into the well-known plot, which was also used by Spencer, an original combination of the tragic and the comic.

The comedy As You Like It, based on Thomas Lodge's pastoral novel Rosalind, or the Golden Legacy of Euphues, is essentially a parody of the pastoral style. Life in the bosom of nature, in the Ardennes forest, is a kind of utopia, an expression of the dream of a simple and natural life. The overall color of the comedy is determined not by the pastoral element, but by the folklore traditions of ballads about Robin Hood. Not only the shepherds Sylvius and Phoebe live in the Ardennes forest, but also exiles: the dethroned duke, Rosalind, pursued by her cruel uncle, robbed by her brother Orlando. The human world of the inhabitants of the Ardennes forest is opposed to the cruel and greedy modern society. Satirical criticism of the vices of aristocratic society is given in the statements of the witty jester Touchstone with his folk humor and the melancholy Jacques. Jester Touchstone very simply and correctly judges the life of the peasant woman Audrey.

The humorous element of the play is combined with the lyrical theme of the tender feelings of Orlando and Rosalind. A peculiar result of Shakespeare's comedy of the first period of creativity was the comedy Twelfth Night, or Anything. Written on the plot of one of Bandello's short stories, it got its name because it was performed on the twelfth night after Christmas, when the fun of the Christmas holidays ended. Twelfth Night was the last of Shakespeare's merry, cheerful, carnival comedies.

In Twelfth Night, Shakespeare penetrates into the depths of the human heart, speaks of surprises in human behavior, of unforeseen spiritual movements, of the selectivity of feelings. The basis of the comedic intrigue is an accidental coincidence that abruptly changed the fate of a person. The comedy affirms the idea that, despite all the vagaries of fate, a person must fight for his own happiness.

The scene of the play is the exotic country of Illyria. Its ruler Duke Orsino lives in the enchanting world of love and music. The highest value for him is love. Orsino is in love with Olivia, who does not reciprocate his feelings. She lives as a recluse, spending time in mournful thoughts about her dead brother. Viola, who survived the shipwreck, finds herself in the duke's domain. Disguised as a man, she, under the name of Cesario, enters the service of the duke. Viola Cesario falls in love with Orsino, but she selflessly fulfills the Duke's request to go to Olivia and tell her about his love.

The perseverance of Cesario, who sought admission to Olivia's house, his eloquence addressed to her, captivate the recluse. Olivia falls in love with Cesario, confesses her passion for him and speaks of love:

Love is always beautiful and desirable, Especially when it is unexpected. (Translated by E. Lipetskaya)

By the will of fate, Viola's brother Sebastian, who disappeared during a shipwreck, turns out to be in Illyria, very similar to his sister. Olivia, who met Sebastian, mistakes him for Cesario. When the secret is revealed, happy weddings occur.

In the system of images of comedy, an important place belongs to the jester Festa. The peculiarity of Feste is that his humor is sad. He speaks of the transience of life and happiness, of the inevitability of death. Jester Feste, along with a company of merry fellow and joker Toby Belch, taunts Olivia's butler, the arrogant puritan Malvolio. Malvolio lacks a sense of humor. Feste's witticisms irritate him. Gloomy Malvolio is the enemy of fun and joy. Everything he says is a continuous edification and censure. In response to the puritanical severity of Malvolio, Toby Belch says to him the words that have become winged in England: “Do you think that if you are such a saint, then there will be no more pies or drunken beer in the world?”

In the first period of creativity, Shakespeare created three tragedies: "Titus Andronicus" (Titus Andronicus, 1594), "Romeo and Juliet" (Romeo and Juliet, 1595), "Julius Caesar" (Julius Caesar, 1599).

"Titus Andronicus" was written in the genre of "bloody tragedy", in the tradition of the tragedies of Seneca. The plot episodes of this play are murders following one after another. Twenty sons of Titus Andronicus die, his daughter and himself, many other characters die. The commander Titus Andronicus is faithful to his patriotic duty to Rome. However, the high morality of a patriot no longer saves Rome from decay. The insidious and cruel Saturninus, Tamora and the Moor Aron enter the struggle with Titus Andronicus. Dramatically sharp collision is revealed, however, as a chain of bloody atrocities, without touching deeply on the essence of the tragic conflict.

The tragic art of Shakespeare, in all its perfection, first appeared in the tragedy Romeo and Juliet. As a source, Shakespeare used Arthur Brooke's poem "Romeo and Juliet" (1562), which in its plot goes back to the works of Italian authors. Starting from Brooke's poem, Shakespeare created a work that is original in idea and artistic skill. He sings in it the sincerity and purity of youthful feeling, sings of love, free from the shackles of medieval feudal morality. V. G. Belinsky says this about the idea of ​​this play: “The pathos of Shakespeare’s drama Romeo and Juliet is the idea of ​​love, and therefore enthusiastic pathetic speeches pour from the lips of lovers in fiery waves, sparkling with the bright light of stars ... This is the pathos of love, because in the lyrical monologues of Romeo and Juliet one can see not only admiring each other, but also a solemn, proud, ecstatic recognition of love as a divine feeling.

* Belinsky V. G. Poly. coll. cit.: In 13 volumes - T. 7. - S. 313.

In "Romeo and Juliet" there is a tangible connection with Shakespeare's comedies. Proximity to comedy is reflected in the leading role of the theme of love, in the comic character of the nurse, in the wit of Mercutio, in the farce with the servants, in the carnival atmosphere of the ball in the Capulet house, in the bright, optimistic coloring of the whole play. However, in the development of the main theme - the love of young heroes - Shakespeare turns to the tragic. The tragic beginning appears in the play in the form of a conflict of social forces, and not as a drama of an internal, spiritual struggle.

The cause of the tragic death of Romeo and Juliet is the family feud of the Montague and Capulet families and feudal morality. The strife between families takes the lives of other young people - Tybalt and Mercutio. The latter, before his death, condemns this strife: "A plague on both your houses." Neither the duke nor the townspeople could stop the enmity. And only after the death of Romeo and Juliet comes the reconciliation of the warring Montagues and Capulets.

The high and bright feeling of lovers marks the awakening of new forces in society at the dawn of a new era. But the clash of old and new morality inevitably leads the heroes to a tragic end. The tragedy ends with a moral affirmation of the vitality of beautiful human feelings. The tragedy of "Romeo and Juliet" is lyrical, it is permeated with the poetry of youth, the exaltation of the nobility of the soul and the all-conquering power of love. The final words of the play are fanned with lyrical tragedy:

But there is no sadder story in the world than the story of Romeo and Juliet. (Translated by T. Shchepkina-Kupernik)

In the characters of the tragedy, the spiritual beauty of a man of the Renaissance is revealed. Young Romeo is a free person. He has already moved away from his patriarchal family and is not bound by feudal morality. Romeo finds joy in communicating with friends: his best friend is the noble and courageous Mercutio. Love for Juliet illuminated the life of Romeo, made him a courageous and strong person. In the rapid rise of feelings, in the natural outburst of young passion, the flowering of the human personality begins. In his love, full of victorious joy and foreboding of trouble, Romeo acts as an active and energetic nature. With what courage does he endure the grief caused by the news of Juliet's death! How much determination and valor in the realization that life without Juliet is impossible for him!

For Juliet, love has become a feat. She heroically fights against her father's Domostroy morality and defies the laws of blood feud. Juliet's courage and wisdom manifested itself in the fact that she rose above the age-old strife between two families. Having fallen in love with Romeo, Juliet rejects the cruel conventions of social traditions. Respect and love for a person is more important for her than all the rules consecrated by tradition. Juliet says:

After all, only your name is my enemy, And you - it's you, not the Montagues.

In love, the beautiful soul of the heroine is revealed. Juliet is captivating with sincerity and tenderness, ardor and devotion. In love with Romeo her whole life. After the death of her beloved, there can be no life for her, and she courageously chooses death.

The monk Lorenzo occupies an important place in the system of images of the tragedy. Brother Lorenzo is far from religious fanaticism. This is a humanist scientist, he sympathizes with new trends and freedom-loving aspirations emerging in society. So, he helps, than he can, Romeo and Juliet, who are forced to hide their marriage. Wise Lorenzo understands the depth of feelings of young heroes, but sees that their love can lead to a tragic end.

Pushkin highly appreciated this tragedy. He called the images of Romeo and Juliet "charming creations of Shakespearean grace", and Mercutio - "refined, affectionate, noble", "the most wonderful face of all tragedy." On the whole, Pushkin spoke of this tragedy in the following way: “It reflected Italy, contemporary to the poet, with its climate, passions, holidays, bliss, sonnets, with its luxurious language, full of brilliance and concetti.”

The tragedy "Julius Caesar" completes the cycle of historical chronicles and prepares the appearance of the great tragedies of Shakespeare. The playwright used the material from Plutarch's Comparative Lives and created an original historical tragedy, in which he gave a deep understanding of the problems of state power, the nature of a politician, the relationship between the philosophical views of a politician and his practical actions, the problems of morality and politics, personality and people. Turning in "Julius Caesar" to the historical conflicts of the 1st century. BC, when in Rome there was a transition from republican rule to a regime of autocracy, Shakespeare also had in mind the socio-political conflicts in contemporary England, where the isolated position of feudal lords was replaced by absolutist power.

Shakespeare sympathizes with the Republicans, showing their valiant service to society, but at the same time he is aware that the Caesarians act in accordance with the requirements of the time. Brutus's attempts to restore the republic are doomed to failure, as he acts contrary to the dictates of the times. He agrees to the assassination of Caesar because he sees in him the main opponent of the republic. But Brutus fails to convince the people of the good of republican government, since the people, in accordance with the spirit of the times, maintain a regime of autocracy at that time. The people are ready to recognize Brutus as a ruler, but they want to see in him a new, better Caesar. The voice of the people is tragically at odds with what Brutus is striving for; the people say: "let him become Caesar", "in him we will crown all the best of Caesar." Convinced that the republic is doomed, Brutus commits suicide.

If in the chronicles the people were one of the active forces, one of the many heroes, then in "Julius Caesar" the people for the first time in Shakespeare's dramas become the main character. Both Republicans and Caesarians are forced to reckon with him. The image of the people is especially expressive in the scene of the political dispute between the Republicans and the Caesarians in the forum over the corpse of the just killed Caesar. This dispute is settled by the people, who take the side of the Caesarian Mark Antony. The tragedy "Julius Caesar" testifies to the deep penetration of Shakespeare into socio-historical contradictions, into the tragic conflicts of society.

In the second period of creativity in Shakespeare's worldview, significant changes take place. They were determined by the playwright's attitude to new phenomena in the socio-political life of English society. The absolutist power more and more obviously revealed its corruption, lost its progressive significance. Contradictions emerged between Parliament and Queen Elizabeth. With the coming to power of James I Stuart (1603), a reactionary feudal regime was established in the country. The contradictions between parliament and the royal power deepened even more. The masses of the people were in a distressed situation. The crisis of the feudal-absolutist system and the discrepancy between the policy of the Stuarts and the interests of the bourgeoisie caused the growth of bourgeois opposition to absolutism. The prerequisites for a bourgeois revolution are emerging in the country.

Under these conditions, Shakespeare departs from the belief in an ideal monarch. The critical pathos of his work intensifies. Shakespeare opposes both feudal reaction and bourgeois egoism.

The cheerful, sunny, carnival character of many works of the first period of creativity is replaced by heavy reflections on the troubles in the life of society, on the disorder of the world. The new period of Shakespeare's work is characterized by the formulation of great social, political, philosophical problems, a deep analysis of the tragic conflicts of the era and the tragedy of the personality of the transitional time. This was the period of the creation of great tragedies, in which Shakespeare conveyed the historical nature of the tragic collisions and catastrophes that arose in the era of the collapse of the patriarchal-knightly world and the entry into the arena of history of cynical predators representing new capitalist relations.

The second period of Shakespeare's work opens with the tragedy Hamlet (Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, 1600-1601). The sources of the tragedy were the "History of the Danes" by Saxo Grammaticus, "The Tragic Tales" by Belforet, "The Spanish Tragedy" by Thomas Kyd, and Thomas Kyd's play about Hamlet, which has not come down to us.

In different eras, Shakespeare's "Hamlet" was perceived differently. The point of view of Goethe is known, expressed by him in the novel “The Years of the Teaching of Wilhelm Meister” (1795-1796). Goethe viewed tragedy as purely psychological. In the character of Hamlet, he emphasized the weakness of the will, which did not correspond to the great deed entrusted to him.

VG Belinsky in the article “Hamlet, Shakespeare's drama. Mochalov as Hamlet (1838) expresses a different view. Hamlet, according to V. G. Belinsky, defeats the weakness of his will, and therefore the main idea of ​​the tragedy is not weakness of the will, but “the idea of ​​disintegration due to doubt”, the contradiction between dreams of life and life itself, between the ideal and reality. Belinsky considers the inner world of Hamlet in the making. Weakness of will, therefore, is regarded as one of the moments of the spiritual development of Hamlet, a man who is strong by nature. Using the image of Hamlet to characterize the tragic situation of thinking people in Russia in the 30s of the 19th century, Belinsky criticized reflection, which destroyed the integrity of an active personality.

I.S. Turgenev in the 60s of the XIX century. refers to the image of Hamlet in order to give a socio-psychological and political assessment of the "Hamletism" of "superfluous people". In the article "Hamlet and Don Quixote" (1860), Turgenev presents Hamlet as an egoist, a skeptic who doubts everything, does not believe in anything, and therefore is not capable of action. Unlike Hamlet, Don Quixote in Turgenev's interpretation is an enthusiast, a servant of an idea who believes in the truth and fights for it. I.S. Turgenev writes that thought and will are in a tragic gap; Hamlet is a thinking man, but weak-willed; Don Quixote is a strong-willed enthusiast, but half-mad; if Hamlet is useless to the masses, then Don Quixote inspires the people to action. At the same time, Turgenev admits that Hamlet is close to Don Quixote in his implacability to evil, that people perceive the seeds of thought from Hamlet and spread them around the world.

In Soviet literary criticism, a deep interpretation of the tragedy "Hamlet" was given in the works of A.A. Anikst, A.A. Smirnov, R.M. Samarin, I.E. Vertsman, L.E. Pinsky, Yu.F. .* * See: Anikst A.A. The work of Shakespeare. - M., 1963; his own. Shakespeare: The Dramatist's Craft. - M., 1974; Smirnov A.A. Shakespeare. - L.; M., 1963; Samarin P.M. Shakespeare realism. - M., 1964; V e r c m a n I.E. Shakespeare's Hamlet. - M., 1964; Pinsky L.E. Shakespeare: Fundamentals of Dramaturgy. - M., 1971; Shvedov Yu.F. The evolution of Shakespeare's tragedy. -M., 1975.

A student at the University of Wittenberg, Hamlet at the court of the Danish king Claudius in Elsinore feels lonely. Denmark looks like a prison to him. Already at the beginning of the tragedy, a conflict is indicated between the humanist thinker Hamlet and the immoral world of Claudius, between a freedom-loving personality and absolutist power. Hamlet perceives the world tragically. The Prince deeply understands what is happening in Elsinore. Conflicts at the court of Claudius, he comprehends as a state of peace. Hamlet's intellect, his wise aphoristic judgments reveal the essence of relations in the society of that time. In Hamlet, as a tragedy of a thinking person in an unjust society, the hero's intellect is poeticized. The mind of Hamlet is opposed to the unreasonableness and obscurantism of the despotic Claudius.

Hamlet's moral ideal is humanism, from the positions of which social evil is condemned. The Ghost's words about the crime of Claudius served as an impetus for the beginning of Hamlet's struggle against social evil. The prince is determined to take revenge on Claudius for the murder of his father. Claudius sees Hamlet as his main antagonist, so he tells his courtiers Polonius, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to spy on him. The perceptive Hamlet unraveled all the tricks of the king, who tried to find out about his plans and destroy him. The Soviet literary critic L. E. Pinsky calls Hamlet the tragedy of the knowledge of life: “... A hero who is active by nature does not perform the expected act because he knows his world perfectly. This is a tragedy of consciousness, awareness ... "*

*Pinsky L.E. Shakespeare: Fundamentals of Dramaturgy. - S. 129.

The tragic outlook of Hamlet, his philosophical reflections are caused not so much by what happened in Elsinore (the murder of Hamlet's father and the marriage of his mother Queen Gertrude with Claudius), but by the consciousness of the general injustice prevailing in the world. Hamlet sees the sea of ​​evil and reflects in his famous monologue "To be or not to be" about how a person should act when faced with rot in society. The monologue "To be or not to be" reveals the essence of Hamlet's tragedy - both in relation to the external world and in his inner world. The question arises before Hamlet: how to act at the sight of the abyss of evil - to reconcile or fight?

To be or not to be is the question; What is nobler - in spirit to submit to the Slings and arrows of a furious fate Or, taking up arms against the sea of ​​troubles, to slay them with Confrontation? (Translated by M. Lozinsky)

Hamlet cannot submit to evil; he is ready to fight against the cruelty and injustice reigning in the world, but he is aware that he will perish in this struggle. Hamlet has the idea of ​​suicide as a way to end "longing and a thousand natural torments", however, suicide is not an option, since evil remains in the world and on the conscience of a person ("That's the difficulty; what dreams will be dreamed in a death dream..." ). Further, Hamlet speaks of social evil, causing indignation in an honest and humane person:

Who would bear the whips and mockery of the century, The oppression of the strong, the mockery of the proud, The pain of contemptible love, the slowness of judges, The arrogance of the authorities and insults, Inflicted on meek merit ...

Reflections on the long-term disasters of mankind, on the sea of ​​evil, make Hamlet doubt the effectiveness of those methods of struggle that were possible at that time. And doubts lead to the fact that the determination to act for a long time is not realized in the action itself.

Hamlet is a strong-willed, energetic, active nature. With all the strength of his soul, he is directed to the search for truth, to the struggle for justice. Hamlet's painful thoughts and hesitations are the search for a more correct way in the fight against evil. He hesitates in fulfilling his duty of revenge also because he must finally convince himself and convince others of Claudius' guilt. To do this, he arranges a “mousetrap” scene: he asks wandering actors to play a play that could expose Claudius. During the performance, Claudius betrays himself with his confusion. Hamlet is convinced of his guilt, but continues to delay revenge. This causes in him a feeling of dissatisfaction with himself, mental discord.

Hamlet resorts to bloodshed only in exceptional cases, when he cannot but react to obvious evil and meanness. So, he kills Polonius, sends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern spying on him to death, and then kills Claudius himself. He speaks harshly and cruelly to his loving Ophelia, who turned out to be a tool in the hands of his enemies. But this evil of his is not intentional, it is from the tension of his consciousness, from confusion in his soul, torn apart by conflicting feelings.

The noble character of Hamlet, poet and philosopher, seems weak from the point of view of those who stop at nothing to achieve their goals. In fact, Hamlet is a strong man. His tragedy lies in the fact that he does not know how to change the unjust state of the world, that he is aware of the ineffectiveness of the means of struggle that he has, that an honest, thinking person can prove his case only at the cost of his death.

Hamlet's melancholy arises as a result of the understanding that "time has gone out of its joints" and is in a state of disorder and trouble. In the composition of the tragedy, the prince's lyrical and philosophical monologues occupy a large place, in which a deep awareness of the spirit of the times is expressed.

The general philosophical nature of Hamlet's reflections makes this tragedy close to other epochs as well. Hamlet realizes that he cannot overcome the evil that reigns in the world; knows that after the death of Claudius, evil will not disappear, for it is contained in the very structure of the social life of that time. Referring to those around him, Hamlet says: "Not one of the people pleases me." And at the same time, for Hamlet the humanist, the ideal is a beautiful human personality: “What a masterful creation - a man! How noble of mind! How boundless in his abilities, forms and movements! How precise and marvelous in action! How like an angel he is in deep insight! How like a god he is! The beauty of the universe! The crown of all living! Hamlet sees the embodiment of this ideal in his father and in his friend Horatio.

The development of the plot in the tragedy is largely determined by the feigned madness of the prince. What is the meaning of Hamlet's supposedly insane actions and statements? In order to act in the crazy world of Claudius, Hamlet is forced to put on a mask of madness. In this role, he does not need to be hypocritical and lie, he speaks the bitter truth. The mask of madness corresponds to the spiritual discord of the prince, the impulsiveness of his actions, the insane courage in the struggle for truth under the tyranny of Claudius.

Tragic accident plays a big role in the plot. At the end of the tragedy, a cluster of accidents is given - the heroes participating in the duel exchange rapiers, a glass with a poisoned drink falls to the wrong person, and so on. The tragic outcome approaches with inexorable inevitability. But it comes in an unexpected form and at an unforeseen time. The unreasonableness of the social structure confuses both reasonable and reckless plans and causes the tragic inevitability of "accidental punishments, unexpected murders."

Hamlet is slow in fulfilling his duty, but he is ready to act at any moment, and in the final scene for him "readiness is everything." Hamlet is a heroic personality. He is ready to fight against evil and affirm the truth even at the cost of his own death. It is no coincidence that after all the tragic events of the deceased Hamlet, at the behest of Fortinbras, they are buried with military honors. Before his death, Hamlet expresses his wish that people know about his life and struggle. He asks Horatio to reveal to the world the causes of the tragic events, to tell the story of the Prince of Denmark.

Hamlet is a realistic tragedy that reflected the complexity of the time when Renaissance humanism entered a time of crisis. The tragedy itself expresses the idea of ​​the need for an objective depiction of life. In a conversation with the actors, Hamlet expresses views on art that are fully consistent with the aesthetic positions of Shakespeare. First of all, the flashy effects of those who are ready to "regenerate Herod" are rejected; it is proposed to conform "action with speech, speech with action" and "not overstep the simplicity of nature"; the essence of art is formulated; “to hold, as it were, a mirror in front of nature, to show the virtues of her own features, arrogance - her own appearance, and to every age and estate - its likeness and imprint.”

The main historical collision of the end of the XVI century. - the conflict between the world of knightly heroism and the criminality of absolutist power - is respectively embodied in the images of two brothers, Hamlet's father and Claudius. Hamlet admires his father-hero and hates the hypocritical, treacherous Claudius and everything that stands behind him, i.e. a world of vile intrigues and general corruption.

The tragedy "Othello" (Othello, the Moor of Venice, 1604) was created based on the novella "The Moor of Venice" by Geraldi Cinthio. The story of love and the tragic death of Othello and Desdemona is shown by Shakespeare against a broad social background. Representatives of the government of Venice appear in the tragedy - the doge, senators Brabantio, Gratiano, Lodovico; the military environment is depicted - Iago, Cassio, Montano. Against this background, the fate of Othello and Desdemona acquires a deep socio-psychological meaning.

Moor Othello is an outstanding personality. Thanks to his valor, he achieved a high position in society, became a Venetian commander, general. The life of this warrior was full of dangers, he had to see a lot and endure a lot. From all the trials, Othello emerged as a brave and courageous man, retaining the purity and ardor of feelings. It embodies the Renaissance ideal of a beautiful person. The noble Moor is smart and active, brave and honest. For this, the daughter of the Venetian senator Desdemona fell in love with him:

I fell in love with her with my fearlessness, She fell in love with me with her sympathy. (Translated by B. Pasternak)

The love of Othello and Desdemona was a heroic challenge to traditional conventions. This love was based on deep mutual understanding and trust.

The character of Desdemona is related to the character of Othello. Desdemona is also characterized by fearlessness and gullibility. For the sake of her beloved, she runs away from home and leaves Venice when Othello is appointed governor of Cyprus. Othello calls her his "beautiful warrior". In the captivating appearance of Desdemona, courage is combined with tenderness. But if Desdemona remains a harmonious and whole person to the end, then Othello let "chaos" into his soul, and this caused a catastrophe. Desdemona maintains confidence in Othello; but his confidence is shaken under the influence of the intrigues of the base and treacherous Iago.

Not knowing how to explain the reason that Othello has changed for her, Desdemona understands that this reason is not jealousy. She says:

Othello is smart and doesn't look like jealous vulgar people...

And when the servant Emilia asks Desdemona if Othello is jealous, she confidently answers:

Of course not. Tropical sun All these shortcomings burned in him.

Desdemona, like no one, understands the soul of Othello. Indeed, jealousy rises in Othello not as a result of suspicion, vindictiveness or ambition, but as a manifestation of a sense of deceived trust, offended dignity. By tragic irony, Othello considers it not Iago, who deceived the gullible Moor, but pure and faithful Desdemona, to be the culprit of the feeling of deceived trust. Othello says about himself:

He was not easily jealous, but in a storm of feelings he fell into a rage ...

A.S. Pushkin thus characterized Othello: “Othello is not jealous by nature - on the contrary: he is trusting.”

Othello loves Desdemona dearly, even when he decides to kill her. He thinks that he is restoring justice, doing his duty. Believing in Iago's slander, he believes that he cannot allow Desdemona to deceive others. He is full of consciousness of a high duty to people: the murder of Desdemona means for him the elimination of lies as a general danger. The tragedy of Othello is the tragedy of deceived trust, the tragedy of being blinded by passion. Love for her determined Othello's attitude to people, to the world. When their union was harmonious, Othello perceived the world as beautiful; when he believed in the dishonesty of Desdemona, everything appeared before him in a gloomy chaotic form.

Honest Othello becomes a victim of Iago's evil intrigues, not realizing that he is deceiving him. Shakespeare does not directly indicate the reasons for Iago's hatred of Othello, although Iago speaks of his desire to achieve a career, jealousy of Othello, his lustful feeling for Desdemona. The main thing in the character of Iago is the Machiavellian desire to achieve advantages over other people at any cost. Iago, of course, is smart and active, but his abilities, his "valor" are entirely subordinated to his selfish plans. Iago's "valor" is individualistic and immoral. He formulates his main interest as follows: "Stuff your wallet tight." The schemer Iago is cynical and hypocritical. His hatred for Othello is explained by the fundamental difference between their natures, their views, their attitude to life. Othello's nobility is the negation of Iago's bourgeois egocentrism. That is why he cannot reconcile himself to the affirmation of Othello's ethical principles in life. Iago resorts to base means to push the straightforward Othello from his noble life path, to plunge him into the chaos of individualistic passions.

Shakespeare the realist showed which way a person can go, freed from feudal fetters. A person could become bright and morally beautiful, like the heroic figure of Othello, or base, immoral, like the cynic Iago. Moral inferiority turns the freedom of the individual into its opposite, i.e. into slavish dependence on dark passions and selfish interests. Iago acts against Othello and Desdemona with slander and deceit. He takes advantage of Othello's gullibility, plays on the hero's ardent temperament, on his ignorance of the mores of society. The rapid transition of the noble Othello from heroics to blinding by dark passion indicates that the free-spirited Renaissance personality was vulnerable, because the level of social relations of that time did not allow the humanistic ideal of personality to be fully realized in reality. Shakespeare showed this tragedy of a valiant personality who found himself drawn into the real base relations of bourgeois society and unable to protect himself from dark passion.

The episode of "recognition" reveals the human dignity of the hero, his moral greatness. With spiritual glee, Othello learns that Desdemona loved him and was faithful to him, but at the same time he is shocked that the worst thing happened: he killed the innocent and devoted to him Desdemona. Othello's suicide in the final scene is the punishment of himself for his departure from faith in man. The tragic ending, therefore, affirms the moral victory of nobility over the dark forces of evil.

The conflict between the individual and society in a new aspect is shown in the tragedy "King Lear" (King Lear, 1605-1606). This is a tragedy of human dignity in an unjust society.

The essence and evolution of Lear’s character was very accurately defined by N.A. Dobrolyubov: “Lear has a really strong nature, and general servility to him only develops it in a one-sided way - not for great deeds of love and common good, but only for the satisfaction of one’s own, personal whims. This is perfectly understandable in a person who is accustomed to consider himself the source of all joy and sorrow, the beginning and end of all life in his kingdom. Here, with the external scope of actions, with the ease of fulfilling all desires, there is nothing to express his spiritual strength. But now his self-adoration goes beyond all limits of common sense: he transfers directly to his personality all that brilliance, all that respect that he enjoyed for his dignity; he decides to throw off power, confident that even after that people will not stop trembling at him. This insane conviction makes him give his kingdom to his daughters and, through that, from his barbaric senseless position, pass into the simple title of an ordinary person and experience all the sorrows associated with human life. “Looking at him, we first feel hatred for this dissolute despot; but, following the development of the drama, we become more and more reconciled with him as with a man and end up filled with indignation and burning malice no longer towards him, but for him and for the whole world - to that wild, inhuman situation that can lead to such debauchery even of people like Lear.

*Dobrolyubov N.A. Sobr. cit.: In 9 volumes - M; L., 1962. T. 5. - S. 52.

** Ibid. - S. 53.

"King Lear" is a social tragedy. It shows the delimitation of different social groups in society. The representatives of the old knightly honor are Lear, Gloucester, Kent, Albany; the world of bourgeois predation is represented by Goneril, Regan, Edmond, Cornwall. Between these worlds there is a sharp struggle. Society is in a state of deep crisis. Gloucester characterizes the destruction of social foundations as follows: “Love is cooling, friendship is weakening, fratricidal strife is everywhere. There are riots in the cities, in the villages of discord, in the palaces of treason, and the family bond between parents and children is crumbling ... Our best time has passed. Bitterness, betrayal, disastrous unrest will accompany us to the grave ”(Translated by B. Pasternak).

It is against this broad social background that the tragic story of King Lear unfolds. At the beginning of the play, Lear is a king with power, commanding the fate of people. Shakespeare in this tragedy (where he penetrates more deeply into the social relations of the time than in his other plays) showed that Lear's power is not in his kingship, but in the fact that he owns riches and lands. As soon as Lear divided his kingdom between his daughters Goneril and Regan, leaving himself only the kingship, he lost his power. Without his possessions, the king found himself in the position of a beggar. Ownership in society has destroyed patriarchal kinship human relations. Goneril and Regan swore their love for their father when he was in power, and turned their backs on him when he lost his possessions.

Having gone through tragic trials, through a storm in his own soul, Lear becomes a man. He recognized the hard lot of the poor, joined the life of the people and understood what was going on around him. King Lear gains wisdom. In the emergence of a new view of the world, a meeting in the steppe, during a storm, with a homeless unfortunate Poor Tom played a big role. (It was Edgar Gloucester, who was hiding from the persecution of his brother Edmond.) In the shocked mind of Lear, society appears in a new light, and he subjects it to merciless criticism. Lear's madness becomes epiphany. Lear sympathizes with the poor and reproaches the rich:

Homeless, naked wretch, Where are you now? How will you repel the blows of this fierce weather - In rags, with an uncovered head And a skinny belly? How little I thought of this before! Here's a lesson for you, arrogant rich man! Take the place of the poor, Feel what they feel, And give them a share of your excess As a token of the highest justice of heaven. (Translated by B. Pasternak)

Lear speaks indignantly about a society dominated by arbitrariness. Power appears to him in the form of a symbolic image of a dog chasing a beggar who runs away from him. Lear calls the judge a thief, a politician who pretends to understand what others do not understand is a scoundrel.

The noble Kent and the jester remain loyal to Lear to the end. The image of the jester plays a very important role in this tragedy. His witticisms, paradoxical jokes boldly reveal the essence of relations between people. The tragicomic jester tells the bitter truth; his witty remarks express the people's point of view on what is happening.

The storyline connected with the fate of the Earl of Gloucester, the father of two sons, sets off the fate of Lear, gives it a generalizing meaning. Gloucester also experiences the tragedy of ingratitude. He is opposed by his illegitimate son, Edmond.

The humanistic ideal is embodied in the image of Cordelia. It does not accept both the old knightly world and the new Machiavellian world. In her character, a sense of human dignity is emphasized with special force. Unlike her hypocritical sisters, she is sincere and truthful, does not fear the despotic temper of her father and tells him what she thinks. Despite the restraint in the manifestation of feelings, Cordelia truly loves her father and courageously accepts his disfavor. Subsequently, when Lear, having gone through severe trials, gained human dignity and a sense of justice, Cordelia was next to him. These two beautiful people are dying in a cruel society.

At the end of the tragedy, good triumphs over evil. The noble Edgar will become king. As a ruler, he will turn to the wisdom that Lear found in his tragic fate.

The tragedy "Macbeth" (Macbeth, 1606), which was created on the material of R. Holinshed's "Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland" is devoted to the problem of the tragic state of the state and the individual under a tyrannical regime.

Macbeth is a tyrant and a murderer. But he did not immediately become so. The image is revealed in development, in dynamics, in all the complexity and inconsistency of its inner world. The struggle between remorse and ambitious impulses in the soul of Macbeth, the realization in the end of the meaninglessness of his bloody deeds - all this distinguishes him from an ordinary villain and makes him a tragic character.

In the first act, Macbeth appears as a hero in a majestic scene of victory over the enemies of Scotland. This is a strong, brave, courageous warrior. Macbeth is kind by nature and not devoid of humanity. He achieved fame through his exploits. Confidence in his strengths and the possibilities of his nature causes in him a desire to become even more majestic, to achieve even greater glory. However, the social structure of that time put limits on the development of the individual, perverted the limitless abilities of a person. So, Macbeth's valor turns into ambition, and ambition pushes him to commit a crime - the murder of Duncan in order to achieve supreme power. The perversion of valor by ambition is very rightly characterized by the words of the witches from the first scene of the tragedy: "The beautiful is vile, and the vile is beautiful." In the actions of Macbeth, the line between good and evil is increasingly blurred.

The images of disgusting witches, predicting the future fate of Macbeth, symbolize the inhumanity that was in his intentions and deeds. Witches do not represent any fatal force that directs the behavior of the hero. They express just what already arose in the thoughts of Macbeth. The criminal decisions made by Macbeth are determined by his own will, not by fatal force. Criminal acts are increasingly pushing towards the rebirth of the individual. From a kind and valiant man, Macbeth becomes a murderer and tyrant. One crime leads to another. Macbeth can no longer refuse to kill, trying to keep the throne:

I'm already so bogged down in the bloody mire, That it will be easier for me to step forward, Than to go back through the quagmire. In the brain, my terrible plan is yet to be born, And the hand strives to accomplish it. (Translated by Yu. Korneev)

As Macbeth's despotism becomes apparent to all, he finds himself all alone. Everyone recoiled from the tyrant.

Through crimes, Macbeth wants to change fate, intervene in the course of time. He is already afraid of missing something and by incessant bloody deeds is trying to get ahead of the actions of alleged opponents. The tyrant makes his way to his “tomorrow” with the help of crimes, and “tomorrow” pushes him more and more towards an inevitable end. The atrocities of the tyrant provoke opposition. The whole society rises up against the despot. It seems to Macbeth that the forces of nature have also gone against him - Birnam Forest is marching on Dunsinan. These are the warriors of Macduff and Malcolm, hiding behind green branches, moving in an irresistible avalanche against Macbeth and crushing him. One of the characters in the tragedy, the Scottish nobleman Ross, speaks of the essence of lust for power:

Oh love of power, You devour what you live!

Having spoken out against humanity, Macbeth dooms himself to complete isolation, loneliness and death. Lady Macbeth is fanatically devoted to her husband, whom she considers a great man. She is just as ambitious as he is. She wants Macbeth to be King of Scotland. Lady Macbeth is determined to achieve power and supports her husband, helps him overcome moral doubt when he plans to kill Duncan. Lady Macbeth thinks that it is enough to wash the blood from her hands - and the crime will be forgotten. However, her human nature fails and she goes insane. In her insane, somnambulistic state, she tries to wash the blood off her hands and can't. On the day of her husband's death, Lady Macbeth commits suicide.

Compared to other Shakespearean tragedies, the tragic atmosphere in Macbeth is very dense. It is pumped up in connection with the development of the theme of coming to power through crime. The action becomes more compressed, concentrated and impetuous; it usually occurs at night and against the backdrop of a storm; a large place is occupied by the supernatural element (witches, visions), performing the role of ominous forebodings and omens. However, in the end, the darkness dissipates, humanity triumphs over evil.

Shakespeare's tragedies are characterized by a deep insight into the essence of the tragic contradictions of their time. In Shakespeare's dramaturgy, the socio-political conflicts of the Renaissance are surprisingly truthfully reflected. The profound changes in life associated with a gigantic upheaval in history, when feudalism was replaced by a new bourgeois system - this is the basis of the tragic in Shakespeare. Shakespeare's historicism lies in comprehending the main tendencies of the real struggle unfolding between the old and the new, in revealing the tragic meaning of the social relations of that time. With all his naive-poetic view of the world, Shakespeare was able to show the importance of the people in the life of society.

Shakespeare's poetic historicism introduced new content into the tragic theme, restructured the tragic as an aesthetic problem, giving it new and unique qualities. The tragic in Shakespeare differs from medieval notions of the tragic, from Chaucer's view of the tragic expressed in The Canterbury Tales (The Monk's Prologue and The Monk's Tale). According to the medieval idea, tragedy could happen to people of high position, living in happiness and forgetting about the power of Providence. Such people are subject to the vagaries of fortune, regardless of their character, their merits and demerits. Their very high position was the cause of pride, so the catastrophe was always close. According to medieval ideas, fortune brought down misfortunes on a person completely unexpectedly and for no reason. Man is helpless before the wisdom of providence, and no one is able to escape the blows of fate. The medieval concept of the tragic did not proceed from the character of a person and his collision with fate, but from a belief in the omnipotence of supernatural forces, therefore, in the tragic works of medieval literature, the epic, narrative beginning prevailed over the dramatic.

The tragic in Shakespeare is free from the idea of ​​fatalism, fate. And although his heroes refer to both God and fortune, Shakespeare shows that people act on the basis of their desires and will, but on the way they encounter life circumstances, i.e. with the will and desires of other people expressing personal, public and state interests. From the clash between the people themselves, who represent society and humanity, both victories and defeats flow. Tragic is inherent in people themselves, in their struggle, and does not depend on fatalistic predetermination. The tragic fate of the hero, the inevitability of his death is a consequence of his character and life circumstances. Much happens by chance, but in the end everything is subject to necessity - Time.

The supernatural in Shakespeare's tragedies - ghosts and witches - is more a tribute to folklore motives than a manifestation of the superstition of the playwright himself, it is a poetic convention and a peculiar technique in depicting characters and forcing a tragic atmosphere. Both Hamlet and Macbeth act according to their own aspirations and will, and not at the behest of supernatural forces. Shakespeare and his heroes do not always understand the meaning of tragic events, but it is always clear that they occur according to the laws of causality, according to the harsh laws of time.

Necessity in Shakespeare appears not only as the historical movement of Time, but also as the certainty and indisputability of the natural moral foundations of human life. In public life, universal humanity is necessary. Morality based on human justice is the ideal to which people should strive and the violation of which leads to tragic consequences.

The tragic in Shakespeare is dialectical. Society can violate natural moral relations and lead heroes to death (Romeo and Juliet), and the hero, due to a number of his negative properties, can commit evil and cause damage to society (Macbeth), and at the same time the hero and society can be guilty in relation to each other ( King Lear). Everything depends on the real complexity of the social contradictions of the time and the psychological conflicts of each individual. The struggle between good and evil goes on not only in the public arena, but also in the human soul.

The conflict in Shakespeare's tragedies is extremely tense, sharp and irreconcilable, and it unfolds as a clash of two antagonistic forces. In the foreground - the struggle of two strong heroes, embodying different characters, different life principles and views, different passions. Hamlet and Claudius, Othello and Iago, Lear and Goneril, Caesar and Brutus - these are the opposite characters who have entered into a fight. But the noble hero of Shakespeare fights not only against some individual antagonist, he enters into a struggle with the whole world of evil. This struggle reveals the best spiritual possibilities of the hero, but it also causes evil. The struggle goes on simultaneously in the soul of the hero himself. The hero painfully searches for truth, truth, justice; truly tragic are the mental suffering of the hero at the sight of the abyss of evil that opened before him; but he himself, in search of the truth, somewhere makes a mistake, sometime comes into contact with evil, hiding under the guise of good, and thereby hastens the tragic denouement.

The actions of the tragic heroes of Shakespeare, outstanding people, affect the whole society. The characters are so significant that each of them is a whole world. And the death of these heroes shocks everyone. Shakespeare creates large and complex characters of active and strong people, people of reason and great passions, valor and high dignity. Shakespeare's tragedies affirm the value of the human personality, the uniqueness and individuality of a person's character, the richness of his inner world. The life of the human soul, experiences and suffering, the inner tragedy of a person are of interest to Shakespeare above all. And this also affected his innovation in the field of the tragic. The image of the inner world of the characters reveals their humanity so deeply that it causes admiration and deep sympathy for them.

A number of Shakespeare's heroes - Macbeth, Brutus, Anthony ("Antony and Cleopatra") - are guilty of their tragedy. But the notion of guilt is incompatible with many noble heroes. The fact that young Romeo and Juliet are dying is the fault of a society that is hostile to sincere and integral human feelings. Hamlet, Othello, King Lear had mistakes and errors that did not change the moral basis of their noble characters, but in the world of evil and injustice led to tragic consequences. Only in this sense can one speak of their "tragic guilt." Together with these heroes, completely pure natures, such as Ophelia, Cordelia, Desdemona, suffer and die.

In the catastrophe caused, both the real perpetrators of evil, and those who bear the “tragic guilt”, and those who are completely innocent perish. The tragedy in Shakespeare is far from that "poetic justice", which consists in a simple rule: vice is punished, virtue triumphs. Evil eventually punishes itself, but good endures tragic suffering, immeasurably greater than the hero's mistake deserves.

Shakespeare's tragic hero is active and capable of moral choice. He feels responsible for his actions. If circumstances, society contradict the ideals of morality and violate them, then the moral choice of the characters is in the struggle against circumstances; in irreconcilability to evil, even if it leads to their own destruction. This is most evident in Hamlet.

The episode of "recognition", awareness of error and guilt, insight before death is saturated in Shakespeare's tragedies with the most intense experiences of the characters and the most important moral ideas. This episode is characterized by deep ideological and psychological content. The episode of "recognition" is important in the tragedy as the triumph of the moral principles of truth and goodness, as a result of the internal struggle and suffering that the hero endured. This episode illuminates the whole life of the hero with a new light, affirms the greatness of the human spirit and the importance of the moral foundations of life.

The characters of the villains in Shakespeare's plays also differ in their individuality. They have a will, a mind that actively serve insidious and ambitious plans. These villains are the embodiment of a real phenomenon of the era - Machiavellianism. Free mind appears in them in an extremely individualistic form, as an effective pursuit of selfish goals. Shakespeare's villains are by no means conventional figures of abstract evil; they are the concrete and typical evil of the bourgeois system. Envy, malice and hatred are the main characters of the villains. But Shakespeare did not try to present them as fiends. Villains are also people, but for various reasons they have lost their humanity. Sometimes it wakes up in them to emphasize the uselessness of their existence, devoid of moral principles (Edmond, Lady Macbeth).

Shakespeare expressed the humanistic faith in the kindness and nobility of man, in his indomitable spirit and creative energy. He affirmed human dignity and the greatness of human accomplishments. Out of all catastrophes and troubles, human nature emerges undefeated. Shakespeare's true humanism is his optimism. This optimism was not fair-hearted, since Shakespeare was aware of the power of evil and the misfortunes that it brings. The optimism of Shakespeare's tragedies is in the triumph over despair and in the mighty belief in the victory of man over social evil.

The versatility of the depiction of life and the depiction of characters is invariably revealed in the combination and interpenetration of the tragic and the comic. This was Shakespeare's innovation, the discovery of a new way in depicting man and society.

Shakespeare was also an innovator in the plot and compositional structure of tragedies. In his tragedies, a second storyline appears. Side storylines give the impression of the versatility of life and a wide coverage of reality. The technique of parallelism of characters and plot lines, used for comparisons and contrasts, is supplemented in Shakespeare's tragedies with images of nature. Confusion in the souls of the characters, the tragic struggle of passions, reaching the highest tension, are often accompanied by a storm in nature ("King Lear", "Macbeth").

The complexity of the structure, the free flow of events in Shakespeare's tragedies in many respects anticipate the poetics of the novel of the 19th and 20th centuries. Saturation with action, drama of characters, mystery of events, panoramic image of history, freedom in time and space, bright contrast - all these features of Shakespeare's tragedies find further development in the genre of the novel.

In the last, third, period of Shakespeare's work, he remained true to the ideals of humanism, although he no longer had any illusions about the humanism of the new capitalist order. Having not found an embodiment in life, the ideals of humanism in Shakespeare's creative fantasy took the form of a dream about the future, about a beautiful new world. This dream, in the absence of the possibility of realizing it in reality, was embodied in the form of fantastic elements, pastoral scenes and allegories, characteristic of Shakespeare's work of the last period. The artistic method of The Winter's Tale and The Tempest is deeply logical, aesthetically necessary and is a further step in the evolution of Shakespeare's work.

Pericles, Cymbeline, The Winter's Tale, The Tempest represent a new aesthetic quality. They combine genre features of tragicomedy, pastoral drama and allegory. In the dramas of the third period, Shakespeare turns to mixing fantasy with reality, to folklore motifs, to fairy tales and utopian situations, to picturesque scenes unfolding against the backdrop of nature. In Shakespeare's late tragicomedies, the lyrical-heroic principle dominates, the romance of exceptional events. These plays are characterized by the theme of opposing society and nature, cruel court customs and idyllic rural life. However, the break with society is here a form of moral and ethical criticism of this society, and not a call to flee from it. It is no coincidence that the heroes return to society in order to continue the fight against evil.

The tragicomedy The Winter's Tale (1610-1611) was written in the spirit of folk poetry. This work condemns the despotism of kings and poeticizes the kindness of the villagers. The whole play is built on a sharp contrast between the tyranny of the royal court and the humanity of the peasant shepherds. The Sicilian king Leontes, who enjoys unlimited power, decided to brutally deal with his wife Hermione, jealous of her Bohemian king Polyxenus. and Hermione, finds shelter in Bohemia with an old shepherd who becomes her named father. Loss fell in love with the son of King Polyxenes Prince Florizel. Disregarding class differences, Florizel wants to marry Loss. When Polixenes refuses to consent to this marriage, Florizel and Loss leave Bohemia. The ideal of the equality of people is affirmed in the words of the Loss about what is above the shack and the Orc the same sun shines in the sky.

Good in this play triumphs over evil. Leontes eventually realizes his guilt and regains happiness with Hermione.

Of great importance in the philosophical content of the play is the image of the choir - Time. In the prologue to the fourth act, commenting on the fate of the heroes of the play, Time expresses the idea of ​​development, the idea of ​​incessant changes in the life of society. Time sets the perspective of developments, puts Hermione's sad story in a certain place in the general flow of history. From the point of view of the eternal laws of development, tragic events are only separate moments that are overcome, become a thing of the past, become a legend. On the scale of historical time, good inevitably wins. In The Winter's Tale, Shakespeare expressed his belief in a wonderful future for mankind.

Shakespeare's dreams of a just society are expressed in the fantastic plot of the tragicomedy The Tempest (The Tempest, 1611). Landed on the island after the shipwreck, Gonzalo dreams of arranging everything here differently than in the Kingdom of Naples. He wants to abolish officials and judges, destroy poverty and wealth, abolish inheritance rights and land enclosures. Thus, Gonzalo seeks to eradicate the evil that prevails in an unjust society. However, Gonzalo also expresses naive wishes: to abolish trade, science and labor and live only on what nature itself gives. In Gonzalo's monologue, the influence of the ideas of Thomas More's "Utopia" is tangible.

Gonzalo's utopian dreams are opposed to a real society where atrocities are committed. Twelve years ago, Antonio seized power in Milan, expelling the rightful duke, his brother Prospero. Prospero and his daughter Miranda find themselves on an island inhabited by fantastic creatures. However, there is evil here too. The ugly savage Caliban, a monster born of a witch, taking advantage of the trust of Prospero, who did a lot of good for him, decided to dishonor Miranda. The wizard Prospero conquers Caliban, who embodies the power of dark instincts, and does good deeds with the help of the good air spirit Ariel.

The play reveals the conflict between good and evil. The image of the humanist scientist Prospero is the embodiment of a good mind and its beneficial effect on people. Wise Prospero transforms people, making them reasonable and beautiful.

Prospero is omnipotent on the island, the spirits of mountains, streams, lakes, forests are subject to him, but he wants to return to his homeland, to Italy, and again plunge into the hectic life of society, fight against evil. Shakespeare expressed in The Tempest love for humanity, admiration for the beauty of man, faith in the advent of a beautiful new world. The humanist poet places hope on the minds of future generations who will create a happy life.

In the article “A Ray of Light in the Dark Kingdom”, N.A. Dobrolyubov defined the global significance of Shakespeare as follows: “Many of his plays can be called discoveries in the field of the human heart; his literary activity moved the general consciousness of people to several levels, to which no one had climbed before him and which were only pointed out from a distance by some philosophers. And that is why Shakespeare is of such universal significance: he designates several new stages of human development.

*Dobrolyubov N.A. Sobr. cit.: In 9 volumes - M; L. -1963. - T. 6. - S. 309-310.

The characters created by Shakespeare are multifaceted, they combine the beginnings of the tragic and the comic, as it happens in life itself.

In the realism of the Renaissance and in the work of Shakespeare there are their own conventional forms. Conditionally, for example, the place of action. The action of Shakespeare's plays can take place in Denmark, Scotland, Sicily, Bohemia, but the playwright always had England in mind, portrayed the conflicts, characters and customs of his homeland. Shakespeare's dramas are polyphonic. They combine various poetic elements, different plot motifs, and they are revealed in different aspects and variations. Shakespearean realism often manifests itself in a fabulously romantic form, in fantastic, allegorical images, in a hyperbolic and metaphorical style, in a pathetic and musical mood, in an effective stage form. The most important problem for Shakespeare is the problem of human character. At the center of the plot of most of Shakespeare's dramas is a person who is revealed in the struggle taking place in the present. Shakespeare does not give any background to his characters. The person in Shakespeare's works is connected with the life of contemporary society for the playwright. A.S. Pushkin spoke about the versatility of Shakespeare’s characters: “The faces created by Shakespeare are not, like those of Moliere, types of such and such a passion, such and such a vice, but living beings, full of many passions, many vices; circumstances develop before the viewer their diverse and multifaceted characters.

* Pushkin-critic. - S. 412.

Shakespeare conveyed the national flavor of English reality, the character of English folk culture. No one before him could depict the course of history itself, show the various strata of society in a single dynamic system.

Shakespeare captured in his works the turning point of the era, the dramatic struggle between the old and the new. His works reflected the movement of history in its tragic contradictions. Shakespeare's tragedy is based on the plot material of history and legend, which reflects the heroic state of the world. But on this legendary and historical material, Shakespeare raised acute contemporary problems. The role of the people in the life of society, the relationship between the heroic personality and the people are revealed with amazing philosophical depth in the tragedy Coriolanus (Coriolanus, 1608). The valiant commander Coriolanus is great when he represents the interests of his native Rome, the interests of the people, winning a victory in Corioli. The people admire their hero, appreciate his courage and directness. Coriolanus also loves the people, but knows little of their life. The patriarchal consciousness of Coriolanus is not yet capable of grasping the developing social contradictions in society; therefore, he does not think about the plight of the people, refuses to give them bread. The people turn away from their hero. In Coriolanus, expelled from society, found himself alone, exorbitant pride, hatred for the plebs wakes up; this leads him to treason against the fatherland. He opposes Rome, against his people, and by this dooms himself to death.

The nationality of Shakespeare is that he lived by the interests of his time, was faithful to the ideals of humanism, embodied the ethical principle in his works, drew images from the treasury of folk art, depicted heroes against a wide folk background. In the works of Shakespeare - the origins of the development of drama, lyrics and the novel of modern times.

The folk character of Shakespeare's drama is also determined by language. Shakespeare used the richness of the spoken language of the inhabitants of London, gave the words new shades, new meaning *. The lively folk speech of the heroes of Shakespeare's plays is full of puns. The imagery of language in Shakespeare's plays is achieved by the frequent use of precise, pictorial comparisons and metaphors. Often the speech of the characters, mainly in the plays of the first period, becomes pathetic, which is achieved by the use of euphemisms. Subsequently, Shakespeare opposed the euphuistic style.

* See: Morozov M. Articles about Shakespeare. - M, 1964.

In Shakespeare's plays, verse speech (blank verse) alternates with prose. Tragic heroes mainly speak in verse, and comic characters, jesters - in prose. But sometimes prose is also found in the speech of tragic heroes. The poems are distinguished by a variety of rhythmic forms (iambic five-foot, six-foot and four-foot iambic, hyphenation).

The speech of the characters is individualized. Hamlet's monologues are philosophical and lyrical in nature; Othello's lyrical speech is characterized by exotic imagery; Osric's speech ("Hamlet") is pretentious. Shakespeare's language is idiomatic and aphoristic. Many Shakespearean expressions have become catchphrases.

Soviet literary criticism considers Shakespeare's work as realistic. The Soviet theater played a huge role in revealing the realistic essence of Shakespeare's works. Soviet translators did a lot to develop the creative heritage of Shakespeare.

In the works of a number of Soviet Shakespeare scholars, the problems of Shakespeare's worldview, the periodization of his work, the theatrical history of his plays, the problems of realism and nationality are raised. Social attention in Soviet Shakespeareology was given to the problem of "Shakespeare and Russian Literature".

Shakespeare's comedies are among the most remarkable examples of Renaissance European comedy. Shakespeare first of all turned to ancient Roman comedy and to the Italian "learned comedy" of the 16th century, which was significantly influenced by it. The heroes of comedies, overcoming difficulties on the path of life, build their happiness with their inherent optimism, which affirms faith in a person and his capabilities. Heroes are energetic, cheerful, resourceful and witty. Young people are lovers fighting for their love, surrounded by many characters - people of different backgrounds. The theme of love and true friendship.; holiday atmosphere, laughing comedies. Synthesis of the traditions of the people and Renaissance-Italian comedies. Spirit of youth.

The structure of the comedy: the lovers cannot connect. They are active, they create their own destiny. It ends in marriage, having overcome external obstacles (prohibitions, parents) and internal (character of the characters). Natures elemental / man. Draw!! The important hero - the jester - is smart, wears only the mask of a fool. Fools are simpletons.

The evolution of Shakespearean comedies: the first "Comedy of Errors" - a comedy of situations. The motive of duality, through the twins. “The Taming of the Shrew” is the theme of a split personality, a movement towards the tragedy of an insoluble conflict. 12th Night is a dark comedy. The world of poetic feelings and fun coexists in comedies with dramatic conflicts and even tragic motives. Although bright fun triumphs over gloomy hypocrisy, disinterested feelings prevail over class prejudices. The basis of comedy situations is random coincidences of circumstances that drastically change the fate of people. Despite the vagaries of fate, a person must himself fight for his happiness.

The comedy "The Taming of the Shrew" was written by Shakespeare in 15 (93?), but for the first time it was published only after his death - in 1623. There are still unresolved disputes about the sources of this comedy.

In 1594, an anonymous play was published - "A funny invented story, called - the taming of one shrew." Everything in the anonymous play - the characters with their personalities, even the main "moral" of the play - corresponds to Shakespeare's comedy. There are only minor differences. Anonymous does not take place in Padua, but in Athens; all the names of the characters are different: the main character is called Ferrando, the heroine is always abbreviated as Ket; she has not one, but two sisters - Emilia and Filena, each of whom is wooed by one young man, while Shakespeare has one sister who has several admirers; Anonymous does not have a secret marriage, and the whole outcome is unclear.

The alternation of episodes and the development of action in both plays are the same, and in some places one of them directly copies the other. However, the text itself is different, and there are only six lines in the entire play that match exactly.

Shakespeare was characterized by such a way of processing other people's plays when, borrowing the plot and images, he creates a completely new text, where he uses only two or three phrases or expressions of the old play, but at the same time, all its content unusually deepens, decorates and fills with a completely new meaning. . In The Taming of the Shrew, Shakespeare showed a subtle understanding of human nature. There is controversy among commentators on this play about its morality. Some tried to see in the play a defense of the medieval principle of unconditional subordination of a woman to a man, others considered it simply as a joke, devoid of ideological content.

Of all the characters in the play, only three are bright, well-developed characters: these are Katarina and Petruchio, and Bianca. The hero of the comedy Petruchio is a typical man of modern times, brave, free from prejudices, full of strength. He longs for struggle, success, wealth, and meets a worthy opponent in the person of Katarina. Catarina, pacified by her smart fiancé Petruchio, turned into an ideal wife in good manners. The duplicity of the stiff Bianca is contrasted with the sincerity of the obstinate Katarina. At the end of the play, when a kind of test of wives takes place, it turns out that Bianca, who used to be meek by nature, has turned into a quarrelsome capricious, while Katarina herself has become the embodiment of meekness and friendliness. The play ends with her famous monologue, in which she affirms the natural weakness of women and calls them to submit to their husbands.

All other heroes of the play are conditional figures, stereotyped grotesques. This corresponds to the farcical nature of the action: all sorts of tricks, brawls, sheer laughter, without lyricism, tender, ideal feelings, which are in the almost simultaneous, farcical "Comedy of Errors".

Shakespeare shared the opinion generally accepted in his era that the husband should be the head of the family. But at the same time, by showing the richness of Katarina's nature, he emphasizes the humanistic idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe internal equivalence of women and men.

The modern reader does not quite understand the compositional connection between the beginning and the main theme of the play.

However, Shakespeare wanted to show what distinguished the aristocrats in contemporary society. He shows this with a fairly striking example of a coppersmith.

Coppersmith Christopher Sly falls into a drunken sleep at the threshold of the tavern. The lord returns from the hunt with huntsmen and servants and, finding the sleeping man, decides to play a trick on him. His servants take Sly to a luxurious bed, wash him in fragrant water, and change into an expensive dress. When Sly wakes up, he is told that he is a noble lord who has been overcome with madness and has slept for fifteen years, dreaming that he is a coppersmith. At first, Sly insists that he is a peddler by birth, a comber by education, a bugbear by vicissitudes of fate, and by his present trade a coppersmith, but gradually he allows himself to be convinced that he is really an important person and married to a charming lady (in fact, this is the lord's page in disguise) . The lord cordially invites a traveling acting troupe to his castle, initiates its members into a prank plan, and then asks them to play a hilarious comedy, ostensibly to help an imaginary aristocrat get rid of an illness.

So, it should be noted that such an introduction and showing the necessary aspect of the life of aristocrats is a very important element in this work.

Thus, Shakespeare reveals not only the main idea, but also shows how society is having fun.

However, the main thing in the play can be called one condition on which the whole comedy stands. This is the Baptist condition.

He announces to Bianca's suitors that he will not marry Bianca until he finds a husband for his eldest daughter. He asks for help to find teachers of music and poetry for Bianchi, so that the poor thing does not get bored in forced seclusion. Hortensio and Gremio decide to put aside their rivalry temporarily in order to find a husband for Katarina. This is not an easy task, because the devil himself cannot cope with it, the main character is so malicious and stubborn for all that.

However, as noted above, the ending is unpredictable. Katarina takes the place of Bianchi, surprising everyone with her meekness and friendliness.

So, it should be noted that Shakespeare's work is diverse, each of his dramas, comedies, tragedies is unique, since it covers, in addition to the problems of the present, the psychological aspect of the personality. The worldview of the playwright was influenced by events and political changes. Shakespeare's work of all periods is characterized by a humanistic worldview: a deep interest in a person, in his feelings, aspirations and passions, sorrow for the suffering and irreparable mistakes of people, a dream of happiness for a person and all mankind as a whole.

The main idea of ​​the Renaissance was the idea of ​​a worthy person. Time has subjected this idea to a tragic test, the evidence of which was the work of Shakespeare. When creating his works, Shakespeare was often at the mercy of the literary heritage of his predecessors, but the appeal to him served only as a form for the works that he endowed with a completely new, deep content. True, feelings are the main aesthetic principle of Shakespeare. No false falsehood, no false pathos, which is why everything that came out of his pen is so impressive.

The essence of tragedy in Shakespeare always lies in the clash of two principles - humanistic feelings, that is, pure and noble humanity, and vulgarity or meanness, based on selfishness and selfishness.

According to Shakespeare, the fate of each person is the result of the interaction of his character and surrounding circumstances. Shakespeare with iron logic shows how the best people, the most noble, intelligent and gifted, perish under the onslaught of dark forces (Hamlet, Lear), how easily evil sometimes takes possession of a person’s soul and what terrible consequences this leads to (Macbeth).

Here finds expression that special feeling of life, tragic and at the same time heroic, which at the end of the Renaissance arises among humanists as a result of the collapse of their ideals under the onslaught of reactionary forces. This, on the one hand, is a feeling of the collapse of medieval beliefs and institutions, of all the “sacred ties” of feudalism, which gave rise to a feeling of a gigantic catastrophe, the collapse of a great world that lived for many centuries, on the other hand, this is the consciousness that the new world, which is replacing the old, brings with it even worse forms of human enslavement, the spirit of unbridled predatory, the realm of the “chistogan”, these are the fundamental features of emerging capitalism. Hence the feeling of a global cataclysm, the collapse of all foundations, the feeling that people are wandering along the edge of an abyss into which they can and do fall off every minute. Loyalty to nature, following the natural inclinations of human nature, are no longer sufficient criteria for behavior and guarantees of happiness. Man, freed from all illusions, comes to the realization that he is only a "poor, naked, two-legged animal" (the words of Lear).

Based on this, many critics talk about the "pessimism" of the second period of Shakespeare's work. However, this term requires a reservation. Depressive pessimism, leading to despondency and refusal to fight, is alien to Shakespeare. First of all, no matter how terrible the suffering and catastrophes depicted by Shakespeare are, they are never aimless, but reveal the meaning and deep regularity of what is happening to a person. The death of Macbeth, Brutus or Coriolanus shows the fatal force of passions or delusions that grip a person when he does not find the right path. On the other hand, even the most severe tragedies of Shakespeare do not breathe hopelessness: they open up prospects for a better future and affirm the inner victory of truth over human baseness. The death of Romeo and Juliet is at the same time their triumph, since over their coffin reconciliation takes place between the warring families, who give their word to erect a monument to their love. "Hamlet" ends with the death of Claudius and the defeat of the vicious Danish court; with the accession of Fortinbras, a new era must begin, allowing hope for a better life. Similarly, Macbeth ends with the death of the tyrant and the crowning of a legitimate and good ruler. In Lear, the old king dies enlightened and imbued with love for truth and people. At the cost of the suffering he endured, Lear from a “poor, naked, two-legged animal” turns into a Man, in his simple humanity greater than the former Lear, invested with a royal dignity. Shakespeare's tragedies exude cheerfulness, a courageous call to struggle, although this struggle did not always promise success. The heroic character of this pessimism is very far from fatalistic despair.

Shakespeare's work is distinguished by its scale - the extraordinary breadth of interests and scope of thought. His plays reflected a huge variety of types, positions, eras, peoples, social environment. This wealth of fantasy, as well as the swiftness of the action, the richness of the images, the strength of the depicted passions and the volitional tension of the characters, are typical of the Renaissance. Shakespeare depicts the flourishing of the human personality and the richness of life with all the abundance of its forms and colors, but he brought all this to a unity in which regularity prevails.

The sources of Shakespeare's dramaturgy are diverse, and, however, he mastered everything borrowed in a peculiar way. He took a lot from antiquity. His early Comedy of Errors is an imitation of Plautus' Manechmas. In "Titus Andronicus" and "Richard III" the influence of Seneca is very noticeable. The "Roman" tragedies of Shakespeare go back not only in plot, but also partly ideologically to Plutarch, who in the Renaissance was a teacher of love of freedom and civic feelings. In the works of Shakespeare, sensually cheerful and expressive images of ancient mythology are constantly encountered.

Another source for Shakespeare was the art of the Italian Renaissance. The plots of "Othello", "The Merchant of Venice" and several other comedies were borrowed by him from Italian novelists. In The Taming of the Shrew and some other comedies, one can detect the influence of the Italian commedia dell'arte. We often come across Italian costumes, proper names and all sorts of motifs in Shakespeare's plays, which originate from completely different sources. If from antiquity Shakespeare learned concreteness and clarity of images, artistic logic, distinctness of speech, then the Italian Renaissance influences contributed to the strengthening of aesthetic and pictorial features in his work, his perception of life as a whirlwind of colors and forms. Even more significantly, both of these sources strengthened the humanistic basis of Shakespeare's work.

But basically, along with these attractions, Shakespeare continues the traditions of folk English drama. This includes, for example, the mixture of the tragic and the comic that he systematically used, which was forbidden by the representatives of the learned classicist trend in the dramaturgy of the Renaissance.

In Shakespeare, we observe a motley mixture of persons and events, an unusually fast pace of action, its rapid transfer from one place to another. This liveliness, brilliance, ease of style, abundance of movement and striking effects are very characteristic of folk drama. Its highest manifestation lies in the fact that for his humanistic ideas he finds a truly folk form of expression - concrete, extremely clear and truthful in his sincere simplicity. This applies not only to the speeches of the jester in King Lear, which represent the quintessence of folk wisdom, but also to the statements of characters of refined education, such as Hamlet.

Shakespeare's realism is inextricably linked with the people. Shakespearean realism is based on a living, direct relationship to all the phenomena of life. At the same time, Shakespeare not only truthfully depicts reality, but also knows how to penetrate deeply into it, notice and reveal what is most essential in it. Shakespeare's own views on the realistic essence of art are expressed in Hamlet's conversation with the actors (act III, scene 2), where Hamlet condemns all affectation, hyperbolism, effect for the sake of effect, demanding the observance of measure and proportion, naturalness, correspondence to reality.

Shakespeare's realism is manifested in the fact that he depicts phenomena in their movement and mutual conditioning, noticing all the shades and transitions of feelings. This gives him the opportunity to draw whole people in all their complexity and at the same time in their development. In this respect, Shakespeare's character building is also profoundly realistic. Emphasizing typical features in his characters, having a general and fundamental significance, he at the same time individualizes them, endowing them with various, additional features that make them truly alive. Shakespeare's characters change and grow in struggle.

The realism of Shakespeare is also found in the accuracy of the analysis of the emotional experiences of his characters and the motivation of their actions and motives.

A sharp change in attitude is experienced by all the heroes of great tragedies. Their personal motives and specific conditions for the development of a spiritual crisis are different for them, their spiritual reactions and behavior are not the same, the degree of moral shock in all of them is extreme, and their painful experiences are not limited to personal fate and indicate a crisis state of epochal conviction. The doubts of tragic heroes are many-sided, but directed towards a certain center, focusing on the state of society and the problem of man.