Anglistik Basis

Shakespeare

• study Shakespeare in context: 1. synchronic approach = studies texts from the same historical period; 2. diachronic approach = studies how texts relate to each other across different periods (eg. Shakespeares influence on modern literature

• → the synchronic approach also differs between 2 other models: 1. (Old) Historicism = literature reflects the mindset of its era, history exists outside of the text; texts are shaped by historical and societal context but do not affect history the same way (shaped not shape), narrow concept of literature; 2. New Historicism = Literature is part of history and helps create ideas about society (politics, power, gender, religion, etc.), texts both reflect and help create historical ideas, literature is both shaped by its historical context and actively helps shape historical ideas, values, and power structures

• periods of modern british literature

→ Renaissance (Shakespeare) > Restoration / 18th century > Romantic period > Victorian age > Modernism > Postmodernism

The British Renaissance (Shakespearean era)

• “Renaissance” means rebirth and refers to the revival of interest in Greek and Roman antiquity

• Rediscovery and translation of classical texts

• Growth of Humanism (focus on human potential, education, rhetoric)

• Increasing interest in science and new ways of understanding the world

• Many traditional ideas were being questioned

Society and Politics

• Renaissance society believed in a hierarchical universe, the monarchy was legitimised; Renaissance’s worldview included hierarchy, sovereignty, cosmic order, as well as microcosm/macrocosm

• The royal court was the center of political and cultural life

• Literature was often produced for or around the court

• The Tudor monarchy needed ideological justification; literary texts functioned to present Queen Elizabeth I as a legitimate and powerful ruler

• During the Renaissance, people believed that society, nature, and the universe were all ordered in the same harmonious way; Shakespeare's tragedies often explore what happens when that order breaks down

Shakespearean tragedies

• Tragedy is a subtype of drama

• Drama is one of the 3 major literary genres (drama, poetry, prose) > unlike poetry and prose, drama is written to be performed, not just read

• Drama is less about what is told than how it is presented on stage (through staging, costumes, actors, etc)

• defining feature is the relationship between actors and audience, as a play can only exist when it’s being performed

• a play never has a fixed meaning, every new production is a new interpretation > The meaning of a dramatic text is inseparable from its performance history, because each staging offers a new interpretation

Aristotles definiton of tragedy

• “Tragedy is the imitation (mimesis) of an action performed on stage that produces an emotional effect on the audience.” → Tragedy is about actions and their consequences

• 6 elements of Tragedy, 2 key elements are characters and plot

• tragedies include a tragic hero and that is someone of extremely high status because their fall has greater consequences and creates a stronger emotional effect on the audience

What is the source of tragedy? Where does tragedy come from?

• a tragedy happens when a person's own choices collide with forces they cannot fully control

• the tragic hero is not simply a victim, and they are not completely responsible either

• their downfall comes from a combination of:

  1. Their own actions (doing)

  2. External forces acting on them (undergoing)

= The tragic hero's downfall results from the interaction between personal choices and larger forces such as fate, society, or political circumstances

Shakespeare Tragedy Example 1 Macbeth

Macbeth: [...] He’s here in double trust:
First, as I am his kinsman and his subject,
Strong both against the deed; then as his host, Who should against his murtherer shut the door, Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been
So clear in his great office, that his virtues
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongu’d, against The deep damnation of his taking-off;
And Pity, like a naked new-born babe,
Striding the blast, or heaven’s Cherubins, hors’d Upon the sightless couriers of the air,
Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,
That tears shall drown the wind. – I have no spur To prick the sides of my intent, but only
Vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself
And falls on th’other-

• Larger forces: The witches predict Macbeth will become king (they do not force him but they influence him)

• Individual choices: Macbeth chooses to murder and become a tyrant

= The witches represent external forces, but Macbeth still freely chooses to act. His tragedy therefore results from both prophecy and personal ambition, illustrating the tension between fate and free will that is central to Aristotelian tragedy

• Macbeth recognizes that Duncan is protected by multiple forms of authority: family loyalty, political hierarchy, and the moral order of kingship. However, despite understanding these obligations, Macbeth chooses to act because of his "vaulting ambition." His downfall therefore does not result simply from fate or external forces, but from the interaction between his personal desire and the wider social and cosmic order he violates. Shakespeare presents Macbeth as a tragic hero whose own actions bring about his destruction, while also showing how those actions are shaped by forces beyond himself

Shakespeare Example 1 Julius Caesar:

CASSIUS: Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world Like a Colossus, and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs, and peep about
To find ourselves dishonourable graves.

Men at sometime were masters of their fates.
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
Brutus and Caesar: what should be in that ‘Caesar’? Why should that name be sounded more than yours? Write them together: yours is as fair a name.

Sound them: it doth become the mouth as well. Weigh them: it is as heavy. Conjure with ‘em:‘Brutus’ will start a spirit as soon as ‘Caesar’. Now in the names of all the gods at once,

Upon what meat does this our Caesar feed
That he is grown so great? Age, thou art shamed!

• the play “Julius Caesar” is often read as exploring political order

• “what should be in that Caesar?” = Cassius questions Caesars right to supreme authority; he argues that Caesar is just a regular man, why should he be more important that Brutus; why should one man rule over another

→ this directly challenges Renaissance ideas about hierarchy and sovereignty

• “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves”

• Renaissance thinking assumed society had a natural hierarchy, people also believed that God or the stars determined one's place in society

• Cassius argues that they are not "underlings" because of fate but because they choose to submit, ultimately says that humans can change the political order

• challenges the idea that the political order is divinely fixed

This passage illustrates Shakespeare's crisis of Renaissance sovereignty because Cassius challenges the traditional belief that rulers possess a natural or divinely sanctioned authority. By asking, "What should be in that 'Caesar'?", he questions why Caesar should stand above other men. The famous line, "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves,"rejects the idea that fate or the cosmos determines political hierarchy and instead emphasizes human agency. In doing so, Cassius undermines the Renaissance ideal of a fixed social and political order. The passage therefore presents sovereignty as something that can be questioned and contested rather than accepted as part of a divinely ordained hierarchy

Shakespeare Example 2 Julius Caesar:

Brutus: [T]his is my answer: not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved Rome more. Had you rather Caesar were living, and die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live all freemen? As Caesar loved me, I weep for him. As he was fortunate, I rejoice at it. As he was valiant, I honor him. But, as he was ambitious, I slew him. [...]

Antony: O masters! If I were disposed to stir Your hearts and minds to mutiny and rage,
I should do Brutus wrong, and Cassius wrong, Who (you all know) are honourable men.
I will not do them wrong. I rather choose
To wrong the dead, to wrong myself and you, Than I will wrong such honourable men.

• “not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved Rome more” shows that sovereignty is in crisis, Brutus argues that the loyalty and love to a state is more important than the loyalty for one ruler; to protect the republic the ruler had to die

• “Had you rather Caesar were living, and die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live all freemen” Brutus believes in the restoration of order

• Anthony rejects this idea though, which shows that there is no easy solution to this problem

Shakespeare Example 3 The Tempest:

GONZALO (TO ALONSO): Had I plantation of this isle, my lord − [...] GONZALO: And were the king on’t, what would I do?
SEBASTIAN (to ANTONIO): Scape being drunk, for want of wine. GONZALO: I’th’commonwealth I would by contraries

Execute all things. For no kind of traffic
Would I admit, no name of magistrate;
Letters should not be known; riches, poverty And use of service, none; contract, succession, Bourn, bound of land, tilth, vineyard, none; No use of metal, corn, or wine, or oil;

No occupation, all men idle, all;
And women too − but innocent and pure;
No sovereignty −
SEBASTIAN (to ANTONIO): Yet he would be king on’t.
ANTONIO: The latter end of his commonwealth forgets the beginning.

• This passage questions whether political authority is necessary for social order

• Gonzalo imagines an ideal society on the island, he imagines a world where everyone lives peacefully and equally, without rulers or government

• Shakespeare does not simply endorse the idea of a society without a ruler. Instead, by having Sebastian and Antonio expose its contradictions, he invites the audience to question whether such an ideal society is actually possible

Shakespeare Example 3 King Lear:

Humble thy bellyful! Spit fire, spout rain!
Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire are my daughters; I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness.
I never gave you kingdom, called you children; You owe me no subscription. Why then, let fall Your horrible pleasure. Here I stand your slave, A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man. But yet I call you servile ministers,
That will with two pernicious daughters join Your high-engendered battles ’gainst a head So old and white as this. O ho, ’tis foul!

• This passage illustrates Shakespeare's crisis of Renaissance sovereignty because Lear's loss of kingship is mirrored by chaos in both nature and his own mind. By addressing the storm and the elements, Lear reflects the Renaissance belief that the human world (the microcosm) corresponds to the natural universe (the macrocosm)

• The violent storm symbolizes the collapse of political and cosmic harmony after Lear disrupts the natural hierarchy by giving away his kingdom.

• The image of Lear's "head" under attack also echoes the Renaissance concept of the king as the head of the political body. Shakespeare therefore shows that when legitimate sovereignty is broken, both the state and the natural world fall into disorder

Shakespearean comedies

What is comedy?:

• comedy originated in ancient folk rituals and festivals and traditionally focuses on ordinary people, using harmless flaws, misunderstandings, and laughter to move from confusion to reconciliation

• the flaws these “inferior people” portray are funny because they do not cause serious harm

• the audience laughs as long as no serious pain is caused (. awkward behaviour, misunderstandings, etc.), then it stops being comedy

→ Why do we laugh?

• Bergson argues that laughter is human, requires a temporary absence of sympathy, and is fundamentally a social phenomenon shared with others; it also is a bodily reaction rather than a purely rational decision

Shakespeare comedic techniques

• Shakespeare creates comedy through devices such as asides, disguise, cross-dressing, prologues and epilogues, and dramatic irony, which produce misunderstanding and humorous confusion

Example Shakespeare The Twelfth Night:

• In Twelfth Night, Shakespeare uses disguise, cross-dressing, mistaken identity, and lower-class characters to create comic misunderstandings that are ultimately resolved in reconciliation and marriage

shakespearean tragedies vs comedies

according to Aristotle, comedy imitates ordinary or morally imperfect people whose harmless mistakes provoke laughter, whereas tragedy portrays noble characters whose errors lead to suffering and evoke pity and fear

Narrativity

Story = chronological organised sequence of events, content of what is told

Plot = logical connection between events,

Discourse = how something is told, by whom to whom

Real reader = the actual present reader

Implied Reader = a hypothetical reader; the reader the story is implied for; this person needs or will relate easily to the work they're reading

narrator ⟷ addressee = they engage in a relationship

telling = direct characterisation

showing = indirect characterisation

Narrations

1st person narrator:

• 1st person narrator is a character within the story who narrates events from their own limited and subjective perspective

• the first person narrator is both the narrating-I and the experiencing-I

authorial narrator:

• authorial narrator is a third-person narrator who exists outside the story world and has an omniscient perspective

• the narrator knows the characters' thoughts, emotions, memories, and may also comment on past and future events

• generally considered reliable

figural narrative situation:

• figural narrative situation is narrated in the third person but presents events through the consciousness of one or more reflector characters

• the narrator remains a third-person narrator, while the reflector character is the consciousness through which we perceive events

• even though it offers a limited and subjective perspective, the focalization can shift between different reflector characters, allowing the reader access to multiple, sometimes contradictory, viewpoints

Voice & Focalisation difference

• voice concerns who narrates the story, whereas focalisation concerns through whose perspective the story is perceived

Voice

Voice is the category that describes the different types of narrators according to Gérard Genette:

• heterodiagetic: does not belong to the story world, not a character in the story (the same as authorial narrator)

• homodiagetic: situated within the story world; narrates their own story (same as 1st person narrator)

• autodiagetic: The narrator is inside the story and is the main character/protagonist

→ an autodiegetic narrator is a type of homodiegetic narrator who tells their own story as the protagonist, whereas a homodiegetic narrator is any narrator who exists within the story world as a character

• intradiagetic: character exists inside a frame story, they tell an embedded story, they don’t necessarily tell their own life story

→ they are inside the main story and are now telling another story

→ an intradiegetic narrator can also be autodiegetic if the embedded story they tell is about themselves

• extradiagetic: narrator tells the main/frame story, is usually outside that narrative level

Frame narrative:

• initial framing: the frame story comes before the embedded narrative and introduces it

• terminal framing: the frame story returns after the embedded narrative and concludes it

Focalisation

• asks the question through whose perspective we perceive the events

• external: limits the reader to observing characters actions and dialogue without access to their inner thoughts or feelings

• internal: presents events through the perspective and consciousness of a character, giving the reader access to their thoughts, feelings, and perceptions

• fixed focalisation: restricts the perspective only to one character's perspective

• variable focalisation: the narrative shifts between different characters' points of view, giving the reader access to the perceptions, thoughts, or experiences of more than one character; different characters' perspectives appear at different points in the narrative

• multiple focalisation: the same event is shown from several perspectives

• zero focalisation: omniscient perspective in which the narrator knows more than any individual character

Empiricism

• Empiricism is the philosophical belief that all knowledge comes from experience, especially through the senses

• John Locke argued that the mind is born as a blank slate and gains knowledge through sensory experience and reflection

• the rise of the novel is closely connected to empiricism, as novels present detailed accounts of individual experience and observation as a source of knowledge

• → this was supported by expanding print culture, the emergence of the public sphere, and the growth of trade and consumer society in the eighteenth century

Robinson Crusoe as an empiricist text

• one of the first English novels; is influenced by earlier forms of writing about individual experience and by the empiricist ideas of the new science

• being stranded on an island, Crusoe behaves like an empiricist by observing his surroundings, conducting practical experiments, and drawing conclusions from experience

• Robinson Crusoe is an empiricist text because it presents knowledge as something that is acquired through observation, experience, experimentation, and reflection. Robinson carefully observes his environment, explores the island, experiments with farming, building, and other practical tasks, and learns from trial and error. The novel is written as a first-person diary and travel narrative, creating the impression of an authentic record of lived experience

• it reads as a personal diary, travel report, autobiography, instructions manual, etc…

• he explores the island to gain knowledge, carefully observing its geography, plants, animals, weather, and climate

• Robinson then applies this knowledge practically by growing crops, building tools and an oven, and using the island's resources efficiently

• His experiments (e.g. farming, baking, using tobacco) illustrate the influence of empiricism and the new scientific method

American Literature: Realism

• emerged at the end of the Civil War in 1865

• portrays everyday life and ordinary people in a believable and detailed way

• realistic fiction is about characters who are shaped by their environment; firmly anchored in their time and place; social context is important

• realism pays attention to everything even on how people speak (dialect, etc.); upbringing, social status, education

• it pays close attention to realistic details, including everyday speech, habits, and settings

• puts emphasis on the daily struggle of characters and characters are depicted in a moment of crisis

• tends to avoid symbolism and telling names and it prefers open endings (skepticism) to sentimental endings

Example Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn

• characters beliefs are shaped by environment, eg. he believes slavery is normal because he grew up in a society that treats slavery as the norm → he gradually questions those after spending more time with Jim which shows that people are not only shaped by their environment but they can also challenge it; HB being a child narrator also helps that he has more opportunities to broaden his horizon as these values haven’t manifested themselves yet

• instead of everyone speaking standard English, the characters speak differently depending on:

  • education,

  • region,

  • race,

  • social class

• Twain describes Twain description the setting feels like a real society, with detailed descriptions of

  • schools,

  • churches,

  • families,

  • slavery,

  • poverty,

  • everyday work

• Huck’s moral crisis of the society’s believe that Jim should return to his “owner”, but he goes willingly against social expectations → personal and moral crisis

American Literature: Naturalism

• Naturalism is influenced by Charles Darwin's theory of evolution → the ability to survive depends on adaptation to the environment

• Naturalism argues that people are shaped by both:

  • external forces → environment, poverty, society, nature

  • internal forces → instincts, biology, heredity

Example Call of the Wild:

• Buck begins life as a domesticated dog but finds himself in a completely unfamiliar and harsh environment after being kidnapped

• he must adapt to extreme hunger, violence, harsh working conditions, etc. in order to survive

• Buck was not naturally suited to the Yukon at first, but he changes

• the environment forces him to abandon his old values → forces him to develop new survival strategies like stealing food

• his behaviour is driven by biological instincts (like hunger) rather than rational moral choices

• Buck's old moral rules do not help him survive anymore, so the passage suggests that under extreme conditions, natural instincts replaced his civilized values

• Buck's transformation reflects Darwinian ideas of survival of the fittest