(32) Lesson 4a: Hamlet

Early Theatre in England

Most evolved out of church services in the 10th and 11th centuries. It became popular around 1350 when religious leaders encouraged mystery cycles (Bible stories) and miracle plays (stories about the saints’ lives), which were performed in everyday language instead of Latin to teach Christianity to largely illiterate audiences.

Elizabethan Theatre

Refers to plays written and performed during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558-1603). This period in England experienced a literary renaissance producing many great playwrights including Ben Johnson, Christopher Marlowe, and most notably William Shakespeare with great playwrights like Ben Jonson, Christopher Marlowe, and William Shakespeare, featuring popular comedies, tragedies, and histories enjoyed by all social classes.

William Shakesphere (1564 to 1616)

An English playwright and poet widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in English literature. He produced several plays, poems, and sonnets, and was known for tragedies like Hamlet and Macbeth, comedies like A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Twelfth Night, and histories like Henry IV and Richard III. His works deeply influenced literature, theatre, and the English language.

Richard Burbag

A leading actor of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men (later the King’s Men) and a major performer of the Elizabethan stage. He originated famous roles including Hamlet, Othello, and King Lear, and likely played the first Romeo, helping shape Elizabethan acting and character development.

The 6 (typical) Components of the Elizabethan Theatre Layout

The Heavens, Upper Stage, Inner Stage, Main Stage, Open Yard, and Galleries.

The Heavens

A canopy supported by pillars with a hut on top that shaded and protected actors from weather in Elizabethan theatre. It represented the sky and heavens and was often painted with golden stars. The hut stored props and created sound effects like thunder, bells, and cannon fire.

Upper Stage

A chamber-like area mainly used for bedroom and balcony scenes in Elizabethan theatre.

Inner Stage

A recessed performance area in Elizabethan theatre used mainly for indoor scenes, featuring a curtain that could open or close for scene changes.

Main Stage

The main acting area in Elizabethan theatre where most of the action occurred, especially outdoor scenes.

Open Yard

The audience area in Elizabethan theatres where people paid one penny to stand and experience the performance in all weather. The patrons, often called “groundlings,” would commonly interact loudly with the actors by shouting or throwing snacks.

Galleries

The three levels of seating in Elizabethan theatres, with increasing prices on higher tiers. Wealthier audience members paid more for better views, protection from rain, and greater distance from the crowded open yard full of 500-or-so commoners.

Script

A written text of a play containing dialogue, stage directions, and actions for actors to perform. In a dramatic work, the term also describes a speech, often in verse, addressed to the audience by one or more of the actors introducing a play, a character, or a situation at the opening of a play.

Monologue

a speech that is delivered by a character to another character or to the audience. It can be a long, uninterrupted speech or a series of shorter speeches that are all related to the same topic. It is usually used to reveal something about the character’s thoughts, feelings, or motivations.

Soliloquy

A type of monologue that is delivered by a character who is alone, intended to reveal the character’s innermost thoughts, feelings, and motivations, as if the character is speaking to themselves.

The 5 Main Elements of Elizabethan Theatre

Prologue, Chorus, Induction, Acts, and Epilogue

Prologue

The opening section in an Elizabethan play that introduces the background information, characters, themes, setting, context, and tone. It helps allow the audience to grasp the significance of the events that will follow.

Chorus

An actor or group of actors who deliver speeches that introduce, explain, or comment on the events and themes of an Elizabethan play.

Induction

An introductory section before the main story of an Elizabethan play, often featuring short scenes or characters that help establish context or frame the action.

Acts

Major divisions of a play that organize the plot and structure the progression of events.

Epilogue

A speech, poem, or concluding section delivered at the end of an Elizabethan play that comments on the events, outcome, or themes of the story.

Prose

The expression of language in its ordinary form, following the natural flow and structure used in everyday speech and writing.

Verse (Poetry)

The expression of language in a structured form that follows specific rhythms, patterns, or rules that differ from ordinary speech and writing.

Iambic Pentameter

“Iambic” refers to the two-beat unstressed-stressed pattern, and “pentameter” refers to the five repeating units. It is a poetic line made up of five iambs, usually totaling ten syllables, with alternating unstressed (short) and stressed (long) syllables.

The Audience

In Elizabethan England, theatre attracted both wealthy and lower-class audiences and became one of the most popular forms of entertainment.

The words in square brackets are stage directions, which:

Give instructions to actors or readers; are not spoken aloud by performers; and often describe actions, gestures, or movements on stage.

Comic Relief

The use of humorous scenes, characters, or dialogue within a tragic play to relieve tension created by emotional or violent events.

Shakespeare’s 8-step Tragic Plot Structure

A common structure found in many Shakespearean tragedies, influenced in part by Ancient Greek tragedy. It consisted of Exposition, Inciting Incident, Peripeteia, Hamartia, Hubris, Anagnorisis, Catastrophe, and a Glimpse of Restored Order.

The Great Chain of Being

A hierarchical belief in the Elizabethan era that God created a fixed natural and social order for all things. From highest to lowest, it ranked God, angels, royalty, commoners (ordered by gender and wealth), animals (by intelligence), plants, and finally non-living things like rocks and minerals.

Catastrophe

In Elizabethan tragedy, the final phase of the plot in which the conflict ends in disaster, suffering, or death (a catastrophe). It serves as the conclusion of the protagonist’s downward spiral and often appears inevitable to the audience.

Suspense

A moment in an Elizabethan tragedy when events briefly seem as though the protagonist may avoid disaster, creating tension and uncertainty for the audience.

Glimpse of Restored Order

The final phase of many Elizabethan tragedies, in which order or stability begins to return after chaos and suffering. Although the tragic figure often dies, society or the remaining characters move toward renewed understanding or balance.

Elizabethan Tragic Hero

A tragic hero in Elizabethan theatre, often of high social status, whose downfall is caused primarily by internal conflict, personal choices, or flaws. The character often realizes too late that their own actions contributed to the tragedy.