Tudor government was one of strong central authority, in the person of earlier monarchs, especially Henry VIII, and Shakespeare’s contemporary Elizabeth I. Moreover, before Shakespeare was born, great changes had started taking place in England and continued to be relevant during his life. Humanism was present in the writings of Thomas More and the Reformation gradually left a new religious and political system with Elizabeth I becoming the champion of the Protestant cause in Britain. What unified England more than anything else was the papal bull of 1570, excommunicating Elizabeth and relieving her subjects of their loyalty to her. Contrary to the Pope’s intentions, Englishmen rallied to their queen and she became a symbol of Englishness and nationalism. The most famous military achievement of the time was the defeat of the great Spanish Armada in 1588. Elizabeth also successfully overcame the threats to her position from the Stuart dynasty in the person of Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots. Mary Stuart represented the interests of Catholics who might wish to recover influence in Britain but was also the mother of James, who was chosen to inherit Elizabeth’s throne. Elizabeth had Mary imprisoned and executed.
Significant changes in economy and society included the beginning of consolidation of land under the ownership of one man in each district, called enclosure. England was manufacturing and exporting huge amounts of cloth and the feudal order began to decline, as knights became obsolete. The standards of living were improving for those who could afford to buy bigger houses with more furniture.
Literature, for the first time since Chaucer, saw a new productive phase start with poets and playwrights like Edmund Spencer with The Faerie Queen, Christopher Marlow with his Dr. Faustus and William Shakespeare. The Elizabethan period represented the height of the English Renaissance and the humanist principles which underlie this historical period are reflected in literature through a great revival of interest in Classical literature and the presence of anthropocentric themes.
The older genres coincided in Shakespeare’s time with the traditional medieval works. The most significant example of medieval drama is known as the morality play. Moralities apparently evolved side by side with the mysteries and in England were, like them, acted by trade guilds, though they were composed individually and not in cycles. They too have a primarily religious purpose, though their method of attaining it is different.
Significant changes in economy and society included the beginning of consolidation of land under the ownership of one man in each district, called enclosure. England was manufacturing and exporting huge amounts of cloth and the feudal order began to decline, as knights became obsolete. The standards of living were improving for those who could afford to buy bigger houses with more furniture.
Literature, for the first time since Chaucer, saw a new productive phase start with poets and playwrights like Edmund Spencer with The Faerie Queen, Christopher Marlow with his Dr. Faustus and William Shakespeare. The Elizabethan period represented the height of the English Renaissance and the humanist principles which underlie this historical period are reflected in literature through a great revival of interest in Classical literature and the presence of anthropocentric themes.
The older genres coincided in Shakespeare’s time with the traditional medieval works. The most significant example of medieval drama is known as the morality play. Moralities apparently evolved side by side with the mysteries and in England were, like them, acted by trade guilds, though they were composed individually and not in cycles. They too have a primarily religious purpose, though their method of attaining it is different.
The mysteries endeavoured to make the Christian religion more real to the unlearned by dramatizing significant events in Biblical history and by showing what these events meant in terms of human experience.
The moralities, on the other hand, employed allegory to dramatize the moral struggle that Christianity envisions as present in every man: the actors are “every man” and the qualities within him, good or bad, and the plot consists of his various reactions to these qualities as they push and pull him one way or another, that is, in Christian terms, toward heaven or hell. The purpose of the morality is more overtly didactic than the mystery, but most of the moralities share with the mysteries a good deal of rough humour.
The development of the drama into a sophisticated art form required another influence: the classics. In the middle of the century we find a schoolmaster, Nicholas Udall, writing a classical comedy in English, based upon the Latin comedies his students had been reading. He called it Ralph Roister Doister. About the same time another comedy, classical in form but English in content, was amusing the students at Cambridge. It was called Grammar Gurton’s Needle. Lively, vivid, native English material put into the regular form of the Latin comedies of Plautus and Terence: this is the fortunate combination that anticipated the comedies of Shakespeare. Ralph Roister Doister contains a classical “miles gloriosus” (cowardly braggart soldier) who is the remote ancestor of Shakespeare’s Sir John Falstaff in Henry IV.
The Latin tragedies of Seneca had a similar influence. They were constructed in five acts and had violent and bloody plots, resounding rhetorical speeches, and ghosts among the cast of characters. Moreover Seneca is full of references to Fortune, a Roman goddess who turned her wheel and brought those who had reached the top down to the bottom.
Poets of the period tried to adopt classical forms to the English language, the sonnet being the most notable example. On the other hand, as the century developed, writing was becoming increasingly secular. It was the last century when mystery plays and morality plays were still popular.
Increased public interest in theatrical performances created a need for a special place to watch them. In 1576 James Burbage, one of the Earl of Leicester’s players, built a structure to house their performances and called it The Theatre. Among the most famous theatres in London are The Curtain (1588), The Rose (1594) and The Globe (1598), which saw many of Shakespeare’s premieres, and is a typical example of an Elizabethan playhouse. It was round or hexagonal and had such main parts like the stage, a gallery, a pit and a roof. The stage was a platform with a movable curtain and two doors. The gallery included the seats for the aristocracy and the rich. The pit was located just in front of the stage and was used by the lower classes. Only the gallery was covered by the roof. Rich costumes and tapestries and curtains contrasted with simple stage props. Machines were used for descends (ghost appearances, for instance) and traps for the exit of actors. Women were not allowed to act and young males in disguise would usually take their parts. Playhouses were run by entrepreneurs and their activity had to bring profits. This created a special relationship between them and the playwrights (well exemplified in the Oscar-winning film “Shakespeare in love”.