Shakespear's Third Period

             The Works of Shakespeare's Third Period
             Throughout Shakespeare's lifetime it is agreed by most scholars that he has written 37 plays. Although the exact date of several of these plays is uncertain, his remarkable career is generally divided into four periods. The third period, from 1600, includes many of Shakespeare's greatest tragedies and "problem" or "bitter" comedies. To many this period of Shakespeare's writing is considered to be his greatest. It is within this period that he wrote some of his best and most popular works. The four most famous tragedies written during this period are: Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth.
             First performed in 1603, Hamlet is probably the best known of Shakespeare's works. In the play, King Hamlet (Senior) is dead. His brother, Claudius, succeeds him to the throne (despite Hamlet having a living, sane son). Despite it seeming incest in that day and age Claudius cements his hold on the Danish throne by marrying his brother's widow, Gertrude. When Hamlet (Junior) arrives at Denmark nothing but chaos follows. His father's ghost informs him of his uncle's foul deeds (the murder of Hamlet's father) "Murder most foul, as in the best it is, But this most foul, strange, and unnatural (Hamlet: Act 1. Scene 5. Line 33)." Hamlet is then placed in a state of quandary. Throughout the play Hamlet on and off debates committing suicide to rid him of his troubles. The following excerpt of Hamlet is a famous soliloquy in which Hamlets debates committing suicide:
             To be, or not to be: that is the question:
             Whether 't is nobler in the mind to suffer
             The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
             Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
             And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep:
             No more; and by a sleep to say we end
             The heartache and the thousand natural shocks
             That flesh is heir to,--'t is a consummation
             Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sle...

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Shakespear's Third Period. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 10:54, March 28, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/78534.html