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The Works of Shakespeare

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RUSANGU UNIVERSITY

SCHOOL OF HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES

DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGES AND LITERATURE

ENGL 210 Shakespeare Notes

LECTURER SAMBOKO, B. M.

There are many outstanding people in history: - our heroes… our role models….

Politicians: Napoleon, Adolf Hitler, Winston Churchill, Abraham Lincoln, John F Kennedy, Margaret Thatcher, Mahatma Gandhi, Kenneth Kaunda

Community Service: Mother Teresa, George Muller, David Livingstone

Religious: Apostle Paul, the other apostles, Ellen G White, Anderson, The pope, Martin Luther,

Sports: Neymar, Messi, Ronaldo, Benzema - Michael Jordan, Pele, Maradona

Music: Lady Gaga, jZ, Tupak, Michael Jackson, Jim Reeves, Jimmy Hendricks,

Literary Circles: Before Shakespeare the great names in literature were:

o Homer – Ancient times - well known for his great epics

o Dante – Middle Ages – wrote brilliantly on circumstances of human existence

o Aristotle – the great philosopher

ENTER SHAKESPEARE – THE LITERARY GIANT

Spelling of Shakespeare:

Spelling not yet standardized, thus name spelled in different ways

• Shakespeare, Shakspere, Shackspere, Shaxper, Shagspere, Shaxberd, etc.

Shakespeare: The most well known playwright of Elizabethan times is Shakespeare.

But there were also other writers who in their time were just as, or even more famous than him.

WHAT MAKES SHAKESPEARE STAND OUT? – The volume of his works

Plays firmly attributed to Shakespeare

■ 14 COMEDIES – funny play – with amusing events – ended in marriage / or happily

o Midsummer Night’s Dream, Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, As You Like It, Much Ado about Nothing…

■ 10 HISTORIES – Richard III, Richard II, Henry IV…

■ 10 TRAGEDIES – ends in death

← Hamlet, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, Julius Caesar…

■ 4 Romances – ( chivalry and love) Pericles,

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