Types of Comedy

Name:- Kubavat Kishan

Roll no:- 13

M.A semester no :-1

Paper no :- 2

Year:- 2014-15

Paper name :-The Neo- Classical Literature

Assignment Topic :- Types of Comedy

Submitted to :- Department of English

 M.K.Bhavnagar University

What  is comedy ?

   Comedies have been written since the time immemorial. In Greece Aristophanes wrote tragedies. In England Shakespeare and Ben Jonson drew inspiration from the ancient comedy writers. Comedy can be defined as a drama of entertainment and laughter. It’s purpose is to give relief to the tired minds. The general view has been that comedy provides laughter and laughter serves as a sort of change from the serious preoccupations of life. Many people consider comedy as a sort of inferior art

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    Aristotle has devoted the whole of his “Poetics” to the study of tragedy but he gives only a short paragraph on comedy. According to the Greek philosopher, comedy is the representation of a character of a lower time. By lower, Aristotle does not mean morally bad but only ridiculous. He defines the ridiculous as something ugly that arouses laughter. Bergson in essay “On Laughter” says that laughter of comedy appeals to our intelligence.

     In ordinary conversation the words comedy and comic are used for anything that is funny or laughable. When we speak of a comedy we generally mean a play which has a pleasant atmosphere and happy ending. IT must be amusing much has been written about the philosophy of laughter.

Another theory of laughter suggest that it is an expression of pleasure and thankfulness at our own comparative good luck. To laugh at a fat women is to express our satisfaction in not being ourselves fat. If we laugh at other’s weakness, it is because we ourselves are happy to be free from them.

 Laughter is always not free from cruelty or selfishness. Sometimes we laugh a  somebody and sometimes we laugh with somebody. The real great characters in literature make us laugh with them. The real great characters in literature make us laugh with them. Cervantes Don Quixote, Shakespeare’s falstaf, Dickens Mr.pickwick are loveable characters with whom we enjoy laughter. In short we can summarise the following characteristics of comedy …….

Ø  Comedy is a play which arouses laughter. Its primary purpose is to amuse and entertain.

Ø  It provides relaxation relief to our tired minds. Laughter is necessary for human health.

Ø  We laugh at the oddities and eccentricities of others. It gives us a sort of relief that we are free of such oddities.

Ø  A pure comedy has no other purpose except to amuse . There is a pure entertainment. In such plays we do not laugh at other characters but we laugh with them.

Ø  Sometimes comedy and satire are closely related. Its purpose may be corrective or satirical. It exposes the follies and weakness of society or people.

Ø  In nutshell a comedy has a pleasant atmosphere. It ends happily. There is a general atmosphere of laughter and pleasure . though Aristotle and other Greeks regarded it as as inferior art, it is an important genre of our literature.

Now we are discuss about types of comedy .

1) Romantic comedy

2) The comedy of Humours

3) Comedy of Manners

4) Black or dark comedy

5) The sentimental comedy

Now All types of comedy discuss in detail

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Romantic comedy

Romantic comedy is the most popular of all the forms of entertainment. Shakespeare’s comedies are romantic comedies. It grew out of national tastes and traditions. in this kind of comedy the dramatist do not care for any rules laid by the ancient writers. The three unities are thrown to the wind. There is a free mixture of the comic and the tragic. This kind of tragedy is more realistic because life is not wholly  tragic or wholly comic. It is the mixture of both. Shakespeare knew this and mingled the yarn of joys and sorrows. It’s aim is not corrective or satiric. It is innocent, good-natured laughter. It is marked by love and laughter. Follies are of course exposed but the laughter is gentle and sympathetic. Even when the dramatist laughs, he laughs with sympathy. we laugh with people and not at them

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In the word of Charlton, “ The Shakespearean comedy is not satiric, it is poetic. it is not conservative it is creative . it is imaginative and not rational. It is the vision of an artist , not a critic’s  exposition”

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The world of Shakespeare an comedy is a “rainbow world love in idleness”. The action often takes place in some distant and far off land. The land is full of peace and happiness. It may be the forest of Arden or the shore of llyria or Messina. These are not real place but the dreamlands. Here, the lovers have no other business except  lovemaking.

Shakespeare’s beautiful romantic comedies are ‘Twelfth Night’, ‘A Mid Summer night’s Dream’, ‘As you like it’, ‘The winter’s Table’, and ‘The Temst’. Shakespeare says , “Music is food of love”. These plays are musical and full of dance and marry-making. There are also clownish characters who make us laugh. There is free mingling of romance and realism. The setting always poetic but it is skillfully related to the real life.

                Shakespeare’s comedies are full of sunny atmosphere , the idyllic nature humanity and laughter.      

  

The comedy of Humours

The comedy of Humours is a phrase generally used in connection with Ben Jonson. Ben Jonson was the most influential dramatist of Shakespeare’s time. His comedies include ‘Everyman in His Humour’,  ‘Every out of His Humour’, ‘The Silent Woman’, ‘volpone’, ‘The Alchemist’, and ‘Bartholomew fair’.his comedy is not true to life but larger then life. Each character represents some human passion or weakness. ‘Humour’ according to Ben Jonson is the human temperament. The passion that rules one life is humour , according to him.

Ben Jonson’s comedy is satirical in nature. His comedies generally take places in London. His purpose is to satirise the follies and weaknesses of his characters. Ben Jonson borrowed the word humour from medieval doctors who believed that human bodies were made of four humaours.

Let us see the four humours in detail :-

Elements	Nature	Qualities
1)      Earth	Sanguine worldly, practical &unsentimental	Ordinary human being with reasonable feelings and emotions
2)      Fire	Choleric	Angry, hot-temperde and Energetic
3)      Water	Lymphatic	Cold and Spiritless
4)      Air	Melancholic	Sad and cynical

    

According to this theory, man’s health and his whole character was thought to depend on the balance between the four humours in the body. Ben Jonson succeeded in writing comedies based on this theory of humour.   

Comedy of Manners

The comedy of Manners is a phrase often used in literary history and criticism. It developed during the Restoration age (1660-1700). The comedy of manners reflects the culture of the upper class in which manners are supreme. It is more or less satirical. Congreve, Wycherley wrote the comedy of Manners. It deals with the surface of the Restoration high up.

The characteristic of the comedy of Manners:-

        I.            This type of comedy reflects and presents the manners, modes, conventions of the upper classes of society.

      II.            If focuses on the life, manners, ways, love- intrigues and foppery of the upper and the aristocratic classes.

    III.            The scene of these comedies were generally laid in big cities like London.

    IV.            The locale or setting is generally laid in clubs, coffee houses, gambling houses etc.

      V.            It was in such places that the fops and gallants and fashionable, gay ladies assembled

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    VI.            These comedy-writers were influenced by Moliere and other foreign dramatists.

  VII.            It was probably the reaction against too much of Puritanism of the earlier age.

Congreve was the supreme master of this type of comedy . His notable comedies are :- ‘The Old Bachelor’, ‘The Double Dealer’, ‘ Love for Love’, ‘ The way of the world’.

Wycherley (1640-1716) wrote four plays ‘ Love in a Wood’, ‘The  Gentleman Dancing Master’,

‘The Country wife’ and ‘The plain Dealer’.

It is really   an artificial form of drama full of verbal wit and quite often bordering on obscenity.

Black or dark comedy

Sometimes in some plays there are no comic elements all though are called comedies. Even Shakespeare’s ‘Measure for Measure’ and ‘Troilus and Cressida’ are termed as black comedies.

The dark comedy can be destined s a play based on the belief that human beings exist in purposeless universe in which they are subject to forces beyond their control and understanding. Moral  and ehical values are meaningless. Life is nothing but a tragic force.

In modern drama we find many examples of dark comedies. Pinter’s  ‘The home-coming’, and Orton’s  Entertaining Mr. Sloane   are the remarkable examples.

The sentimental comedy

Sentimental comedy is a kind of drama that appeared in the early 18^th century. It was in reaction to ‘ the comedy of manners’. The comedy of manners as we have noted earlier was immoral and often bordered  on vulgarity or obscenity. The reaction ‘The Comedy of Manners’ was first expressed in Jeremy Collier’s short view of the immorality and  Profaneness of the English stage. The sentimental comedy was a reaction against the immoral comedy of the Restoration period.

The characteristic of the sentimental comedy :-

        I.            The sentimental comedy was written with the intention of expressing moral sentiments. It was too sentimental. There was sometimes unnecessary tear-jerking elements.

      II.            In the Sentimental Comedy dramatic reality was sacrificed in an effort to edify and instruct.

    III.            It appeals to the spectator’s emotions and sentiments.

    IV.            The characters were either good or bad. They looked more like caricatures then real human beings.

      V.            The triumph of virtue was always shown in the end. It was often far from reality.

‘The conscious Lover’ is an example of the fully developed Sentimental Comedy. It had some success on the stage but people never took them very seriously. The sentimental comedy was satirized by other comic writers of the age. A German dramatist Brecht(1898-1956) has influenced writers all over the world. Many writers have been encouraged to think that drama ought to be concerned with political or social problems

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Conclusion :-

as we have discuss about all type of comedies.

  

six parts of tragedy with reference to "Hamlet"

Name:- Kubavat Kishan

Roll no:- 13

M.A semester no :-1

Paper no :- 3

Year:- 2014-15

Paper name :-  The Literarytheory & Criticism

Assignment Topic:-six parts of tragedy with reference to  “Hamlet”

Submitted to :- Department of English

 M.K.Bhavnagar University

About Aristotle

Aristotle was a Greek Philosopher and scientist born in the Macedonian city of Stagirus, IN 384 BCE. At eighteen, he joined Plato’s Academy in Athens and remained there until the age of thirty-seven. His writings cover many subjects-including physics, biology, Zoology, metaphysics, logic, ethic, aesthetics,poetry, theater,music,rhetoric, linguistics, politics and government and constitute the first comprehensive system of western philosophy.

What is Tragedy?

According to Aristotle,

Ø It involues mimesis

Ø It is serious ;

Ø The action is complete and with magnitude

Ø It is made up of language with the “ aesthetic ornaments “ of rhythm and harmony

Ø These “aesthetic ornaments” are not used uniformly throughout, but are introduced in scparate parts of the work , so that, for instance, somebits are spoken and other bits are sung

Ø  It is performed rather than narrated

Ø It arouses the emotions of pity and fear and accomplishes a catharsis of these emotions.

Six parts of Tragedy

Aristotle asserts that any tragedy can be divided into six component parts, and that every tragedy is made up of these six parts with nothing else besides.

There is       1) The Plot (Fable)

2) Character (ethos) (Tragic Hero)

                3) Thoughts (Dianoia)

                4) Melody / Songs (Melos)

                5) Diction (lexis)

                6) Spectacle (Opsis)

Now, we are discuss about all parts of tragedies.

1) The Plot (Fable)

PLOT:-

“Plot is a soul of tragedy “

This lines show the importance of Plot in tragedy. Plot is the “first Principle” in tragedy, first step which is most important. Tragedy can imagine without character not without Plot. Plot is structure of tragedy and around which the materials parts are laid. Just as the soul is the structure of men.

Plot is divided in three parts.

1.   Beginning

2. Middle ( Climax )

3.  End

Beginning is related with introduction, in middle there is a turning point of any play and at last in the end shows morality of play. Plot is a “chain” among them three parts.

Plot must be “Complete”, “Simple”.

Plot must has three unities.

1.   Time

2.  Place

3.  Action

Plot must be of “a certain magnitude” and it has “an air of design”.

Plot must be complex also, simple plots have only a “change of fortune” but a complex plots have the things “reversal of intention”. Complex plot has knowledge to produce love or hate between the person destined for good and bad fortune.

CHARACTER (ethos)

 Character is also another important element of “Tragedy”. Character is that who performed as per his dialogues and role on the stage to represent the society.

Character must be “Moral able” and good also. Aristotle says that character is prior to action and there can be no action without character. Character is as important as action and other elements in Tragedy. In a perfect tragedy character will support plot through actions and incidents. Character is a chain of actions producing pity and fear in the audience.

“Even a woman may be good, and also a slave though the woman be said to be an inferior being, and the slave quite worthless”

Here is the description of “goodness” of character and good quality of tragedy. “True of life” is also an important theme in character. An idealization of character is a major personality of character.

The Tragic Hero:-

In tragedy Tragic hero is very important part and also called ideal in tragedy. As a tragic main hero, he must have to select very serious dialogues in the tragedy.

Aristotle says that “a good tragedy depend on plot, action and also on tragic hero, main protagonist of the ply should have all the characteristics of a good character.

How was tragic hero?

A good man – coming to bad end

A bad man – coming to good end

A bad man – coming to a bad end

A good man – coming to a bad end

 According to Aristotle Tragic hero must have to be ideal and kind person of life neither too virtuous nor too wicked. He should be a man of mixed character, neither blameless nor depraved.

THOUGHT (Dianoia)

Thought is the third an important element of tragedy.

“Where something is proved to be or not to be or a general maxim is enunciated “

A little thought appear the idea and personality of play, associated with how speeches should revel character.

Thought is related with someone’s “Imagination” and personal inner ideas of someone. If thought is positive and related with morality and new ideas of mind.

DICTION (lexis)

Diction is fourth element related with “the expression of the meaning in words”

Diction is a matter of an arrangement of words, dialogues and sequences.

 If some dialogues, words and sequences are coming properly throughout the character, image of tragedy also being good or proper.

SONG / MELODY (melos)

Songs, melodies, choral odes, lyrically dialogues are another features of the Greek tragedy. Song is a thing related with enjoy and entertainment.

Sometimes there are also sad songs in play.

Ex. In “Hamlet” there is a sad song in the scene of Ophelia’s madness.

Aristotle says that song is related with musical rhythm and effect in tragedy or play.

SPECTACLE (opsis)

 Spectacle is the last element of tragedy.

Spectacle is production of spectacular effects depends more an on the art of the stage.

Spectacle is good technique of presentation in drama. Tragedy is stage performance and connected with emotional attraction which recognize by spectacle.

Spectacle performs a role of “create a sense” not of the horror but only the monsters.

Now, lets discuss that how all the parts of tragedy given by Aristotle are in “Hamlet” or not.

Plot

Aristotle says the plot must be a whole with a beginning, middle and end. But in Shakespeare did not follow the rules given by Aristotle he has invented his own style of writing. ‘Hamlet’ is also such play. Play start with appearns of Ghost. In between lot of intrigues and other thing take place and in the end of the play most all the character died.

Aristotle’s concept of unity of action that came to be known as Freytag’s Triangle or Freytag’s Paramid. In the illustration below, let us see a graphic that can be employed to analyze the structure and unity of a narrative plot.

The German journalist and writer. Gustav Freytag, described the classical five act structure of play sin the shape of pyramid, and he attributed a particular function to each of the five acts.

ü Hamlet discovers Claudius is guilty (main plot)

ü But kills Polonious by mistake (sub plot)

           

The plays opens on a cold winter midnight on “ plat form before the castle “ of Elsinore, the Danish royal castle. Discovered first by a pair of watchmen , then by the scholar Horatio. The ghost resembles the recently deceased king Hamlet, whose brother Claudius has inherited the throne and married the king’s widow, Queen Gertrude. When Horatio and the watchmen bring prince Hamlet, the son of Gertrude and the dead king, to see the ghost, it speaks to him. Ordering Hamlet to seek revenge on the man who usurped this throne and married his wife, the ghost disappears with the dawn.

          Prince Hamlet devotes himself to clvenging his father’s death, but because he is contemplative and thoughtful by nature he delays, entering into a deep melancholy and even apparent madness. They employ a pair of Hamlet’s friends, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to watchman. Polonius, the pompous lord Chamberlain, Suggests that Hamlet may be mad with love for his daughter, Ophelia.

          A group of traveling actors comes to Elsionre, and Hamlet seizes upon an idea to test his uncle’s guilt. He will have the players perform a scene closely resembling the sequence by which Hamlet imagines his uncle to have murdered his father. Hamlet and Horatio agree that this proves his guilt. Hamlet goes to kill Claudius but finds him praying. And that true thinking killing Claudius while in prayer would send Claudius’s soul to heven.

          Hamlet goes to confront his mother in whose bedchamber Polonius has hidden behind a tapestry. Hearing a noise from behind the tapestry, Hearing a noise from behind  the is hiding there. He draws his sword and stabs through the fabric, killing Polonius.

          In the aftermath of her father’s death, Ophelia goes mad with grief and drowns in the river. Claudius convinces him that Hamlet is to blame for his father’s and sister’s deaths planning by Hamlet died. A foolish courtier named Osric arrives on Claudius’s orders to arrange the facing match between Hamlet and Laertes.

          Hamlet scores the first hit but declines to drink from the king’s proffered goblet instead, Gertrude takes a drink from it and is swiftly killed by the poison. Hamlet then stabs Claudius through with the poisoned sword and forces him to drink down the rest of the poisoned wine. Claudius dies, and Hamlet dies immediately after achieving his revenge.

At this moment a Norwegian prince named Fortinbras, who has led an army to Denmark and attacked Poland earlier in the play, enters with ambassadors from England, who report that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead. He moves to take power of theHoratio, fulfilling Hamlet’s last request, tells him Hamlet’s tragic story.

2) Character

According to Aristotle characters in tragedy should have the following qualities , “good or fine”, “Fitness of character”, “true to life”, “consistency”, “necessary or probable”, and “true to life and yet more beautiful”.

Character are most important any plays. Hamlet is also one of the most important characters in the play. He is a protagonist tragic hero of the play. A good man coming to end died.

H. N. Hudson :-

“ It is easy to invent with plausibility almost any theory respecting  (Hamlet), but very hard to make any theory hard to make any theory comprehend the whole subject”.

Two Hamlets in the play; one the sensitive young intellectual and idealist, the ‘sweet prince’ who expresses himself in unforgettable poetry and who is dedicated to truth; the other, a barbaric Hamlet who treats Ophelia & Gertrude so cruelly, who slays Polonius and sends Rosencrantz and Guildenster to their death. Dealy in revenge.

But then Shakespeare would not have achieved tragedy and the resulting work would have been no more than a potboiler.

3) Thought

According to Aristotle Plot and Character should move around the particular thought. Which are proper and appropriate to the characters, and end of the tragedy. The same with the play ‘Hamlet’ the main thought and theme is to take revenge.

In ‘Hamlet’ the murder of king Hamlet by Claudius, Ghost of king reveals crime to prince Hamlet and lays the sacred duty to taken revenge , Death of Polonius ,Ophelia, Gertrude, Guildenstern, Rosencrantz, madness of Hamlet/Ophelia, Plots and counter plots, reference to adultery and incest relations, nunnery scene, graveyard scene, fencing fight, poisoning.

His tortured soul is threadbare before us and it raises  play above a crude melodrama or revenge play.

Diction :-

Diction means “ choice of language”. In Hamlet proper and appropriate to the plot, characters and end of the tragedy, it is the choice of words to embellish language with beautiful ornaments in Hamlet great by Shakespeare.

                                Some of the play Hamlet like-------

Hamlet is known for the advice of Polonius to his son latters,

Polonius says ,

“ neither a borrower for a lender be,

Borrowing often dulls edge of husbandry ,

And lose the friend forever”

Hamlet tells his mother …….

“I will speak the daggers but use none”

                Hamlet speaks for the attitude Gertrude and for women in general,

“ Frailty thy name is women ”

Song or melody

According to Aristotle chorus should be fully integrated into the play like an actor; choral/odes/ melodious lyrical dialogue should countable to the unity of the plot.

The word chosen by Shakespeare also creates musical effects, language is according to the level of the character, Shakespeare dialogue and poetry are musical, melodious many Dialogue are famous of Ophelia poetry is one of such example.

Spectacle

in the play spectacle plays a vital rule.it help us in understand play in better way. It gives us editional information about the play. With the moving of scene spectsle also chansing. So we came to came to know about the action they where it take place.

For example in the movie Hamlet Big Palace, mirror scene , grave diging scene and statue of king.

 Thus, spectacle is used in the play hamlet very well.

Conclusion:-

Thus, plot,character, thoughts, melody/songs, Diction, Spectacle. All the parts of tragedy is used in the in the play very well by Shakespeare.

Major literary figures of Renaissance Literature

Name:- Kubavat Kishan

Roll no:- 13

M.A semester no :-1

Paper no :- 1

Year:- 2014-15

Paper name :-The Renaissance literture

Assignment Topic:- Major literary figures of renaissance literature

Submitted to :- Department of English

 M.K.Bhavnagar University

Major literary figures of Renaissance Literature

Introduction

The Age of Elizabeth is considered as a very remarkable age of English literature. In this age literature proceeds in many forms like prose, poetry, drama, novel and many others. And in creating this wonderful form of literature there is immense contribution of many great writers. Some very important of them are describe as under.

Poetry writers

we are discuss about the poetry writers of renaissance literature. In this we will discuss about the writer’s biography, his works and his style of working.

Ø     Edmund Spenser (1552-99)

Biography

Spenser was born in 1552. He was educated at the Merchant Taylors’ school and at Cambridge. He left Cambridge in 1576, and for a few years his movements are unknown , though he probably spent the time in the North of England . He comes into view in London during the year 1579 as a member of the famous literary circle surrounding Sir Philip Sidney and his uncle the Earl of Leicester. In 1580 Sidney’s patronage bore fruit, for Spenser was appointed secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, who had just been appointed Lord-Deputy of Ireland.

In Ireland Spenser remained for eighteen years, serving the English government in more than one capacity, and misery that afflicted the unhappy land. in 1589 he visited London to publish the first three books of The Faerie Queene. After remaining in London for nearly two years he return to Ireland; married an Irishwoman (1594); revisited London in 1595, bringing a second instalment of his great work. A rulned and disappointed man, he  repaired to London, where in the next year he died, “For lack of bread” according to the statement of Ben Jonson.

His poetry

Ø  The First of the poems that have descended to us is “ The Shepheards calendar”  (1579). The title adopted from a popular compilation of the day, suggests the contents ; a series of twelve eclogues, one for each one month of the year. Their style is deliberately archic, in keeping with the rustic characters, Spenser adopting the dialect and alliteration of the Midlands and North.

Ø  A volume of miscellaneous poems, including  “The Ruins of Time”, “ The Tears of the Muses” ,“Tale Mother Hubberd’s”, and  “The Ruins of Rome”, appeared in 1591.

Ø  In 1595 he published his “Amoretti”, eighty-eight petrarchan sonnets celebrating the progress of his love.

Ø  “Epithalamion”, a magnificent ode, rapturously jubilant, written in honour of his marriage, and clout’s come home Again, some what wordy, but containing some interesting personal details.

“open the temple gates unto my love,

Open them wide that she may enter in,

And all the posts adorn as doth behove,

And all the pillars deck with girlands trim

For to receive this saint with honour due,

That cometh into you.”

Ø  In 1596 appeared his “Four Hymns” and “Porthalamion” the latter not so fine as the great, ode of the previous year.

Ø  “The faerie Queene” in spite of the varotey and beauty of his shorter poems, “The faerie Queene is by far the most important of Spenser’s works.

Ø    His prose

In addition to this letters , which are often interesting and informative Spenser left one longish prose work, a kind of state paper in the form of a dialogue.

Ø   A view of the present state of Ireland (1594), it gives Spenser’s views on the settlement of the Irish question. His opinions are exceedingly hostile to the Irish, and his methods , if put in force, put in force, would amount to pure terrorism. The style of the pamphlet is quite undistinguished.

Ø   John Donne ( 1573-1631)

Ø   Biography

One of the most remarkable poet of the Age is John Donne. Donne , the son of a wealthy, merchant, was born in London 1573. His parents were Roman catholics, and he was educated in their faith before going on to oxford and Cambridge. He entered the Inns of court in 1592, Where he mingled wide reading with the life of a dissolute man-about-town.

In this years he wrote his Satires, the songs and sonnets , and the Elegies, but though widely circulatd in manuscript they were not published until 1633, after his death.

In 1615 he entered the Anglican church, after a severe personal struggle and in 1621 became Dean of St Paul’s, which position he held until his death in 1631. He was the first great Anglican preacher.

His poetry

Donne was the most independent of the Elizabethan poets and revolted against the easy, Fluent style, stock imagery and pastoral conventions of the followers of Spenser. He aimed at reality of thought and vividness of expression. His poetry is forceful, vigorous and in spite of faults of rhythm often strangely harmonious.

Ø  His cynical nature and keenly critical mind led him to write satires such as of “The progres of the soule”(1601).

Ø  His love poet the “Songs and sonnets” were written in the same period. He is essentially a psychological  poet whose primary concern is feeling. His poems are all intensely personal and revel a powerful and complex being.

Ø  Among the best known and most typical of the poems of this group are “Air and Angels”, “A Nocturnall Upon s. Lucies day”, “A valediction : forbidding mourning”, and “The Extasie”.

Ø  The following stanzas form “A valediction”; of weeping give some idea of Donne’s use of striking imagery and of the excitement of his rhythms:

“Let me power forth

My tears before thy face , and whil’st I stay here,

For thy face coines them , and thy stampe they beare,

And by this Mintage they are something Worth,

For thus they bee”.

Ø    His prose

Donne’s prose work is considerable both in bulk and achievement.

Ø  “The pseudo-Martyr” (1610) was a defence of the oath of allegiance.

Ø  “Igenatius His conclave” (1611) was a satire upon Igenatius Loyola and jesutis.

Ø  The best introduction to Donne’s prose is, however through his “Devotions”(1614), which give an account of his spiritual struggles during a serious illness.

Ø    The dramatist writers

we are discuss about the dramatist writers of renaissance literature. In this we will discuss about the writer’s biography, his works and his style of working.

Ø      William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

Ø     Biography

Shakespeare is the most famous dramatist writer of not only renaissance literature but all English literature. One of the most remarkable dramatist of Age of Elizabeth.

 The future dramatist , as we learn from church records, was baptized in the parish church at Stratford-on-Avon on April 26, 1564.He may have been born on April 23 , St George’s Day, which happens also to be the date of his death in 1616.Though more is known about Shakespeare’s life than most other Elizabeth and Jacobean writers because of his social status as a commoner, the low esteem in which his profession was held and the general  disinterest of the time in the personal lives of writers, few personal biographical facts about Shakespeare survive.

His will a hurriedly executed document, is dated 25,1616.His death occurred a month later, April 23.

His poetry

Shakespeare’s long narrative poems were among the earliest of his writings.

Ø  “Venus and Adonis”(1593), composed in six line stanza , showed decided signs of immaturity. Its subject was in accordance with popular taste; its descriptions were heavily ornamented and conventional; but it containcd individual lines and expressions of great beauty.

Ø  “The Rape of Lucrece”(1594), in the rhyme royal stanzas, is of less merit.

Ø  In 1599 a collection of verse called “ The passionate pilgrim ” appeared with Shakespeare’s name on the title – page.

Ø  In 1609 a collection of Shakespeare’s was printed by Thomas Thorpe, who dedicated the volume to a certain “ Mr W.H.’’ as being “the onlie begetter” of sonnets.

If Shakespeare had not been our greatest dramatist, he would still be numbered among our greatest lyrical poets.

His plays

Shakespeare’s plays have the reputation of being among the greatest in the English language and in western literature. Traditionally the plays are divided into the genres of tragedy, history and comedy they have been translated into every major living language, in addition to being continually performed all around the world.

It was not till 1623, seven years after his death , that the first Folio edition was printed . in contained thirty-six dramas , and these are now. Universally accepted as Shakespeare’s . In the Folio edition was plays are not arranged chronologically, nor are the dates of composition given.

Classification of the plays

It is customary to group the plays into that to some extent traverse the order given above.

Ø  The Early comedies      :- 

In these immature plays the plots are less original, the characters less finished , and the style lacks the power of the mature Shakespeare. Of this type are The comedy of Errors, Love’s Labour’s Lost , and The two Gentlemen of Verona.

ØThe English Histories

These plays show a rapid maturing of Shakespeare’s technique. He now being to busy himself with the developing character, such as Richard 2 or prince Hall. The plays in this group to which belong Richard 2,1 Henry 5 and Henry 6, contain much more blank verse than those of the earlier group.

ØThe Mature comedies

Here is the fine flower of Shakespeare’s comic genius. The comic spirit manifests itself at many levels the sophisticated wit of Beatrice and Bendick or the clowning of Dogberry and verges Much Ado about Nothing, the jovial good humor of sir toby Belch in Twelfth night ; the lighter clowning of Launcelot gobbo in The Merchant of venice ; The urbane worldly wise humour of touchstone in As you like It. The plays are full of vitality, contain many truly comic situations, and revel great warmth and humanity. In this group there is much prose. 

ØThe somber plays

In this group are All’s well that Ends Well, Measure for Measure and Troilus and Cressida . In them Shakespeare displays a savage desire to expose the falsity of romance and to show the sordid reality of life.

ØThe Great Tragedies

Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth and King Leare are the climax of Shakespeare’s  art. In intensity of emotion, depth of psychological insight and power of style they stand supereme.

ØThe Roman plays

These are based on North’s translation of plutarch’s Lives , and though written at fairly wide intervels, are usually considered as a group. Julius Caesal and Antony and Cleopatera and Coriolanus. Follow the great tragic period , and while the former, in sorring imagination and tragic power. Is truly great , both of them show some relaxation of tragic intensity.

ØThe last plays

A mellowed maturity is the chief feature of this group which Cymbeline, The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest.

His prose

Shakespeare’s prose appears all through the plays , sometimes in passages of considerable length. In the aggregate the amount is quite large. With regard to the prose the following points should be observed;

( A )  it is the common vehicle for comic scenes , though used too in serious passages.

(B) It represents the common speech of the seen in Hamlet, is Pithy and bracing. Even the rather stupied clowning that often takes place cannot altogether conceal its beauty.

His style

For lack of a better name we call Shakespeare’s style Shakespearian. One can instantly recognize it , even in other authors, where it is rarely visible.  It is a difficult, almost an impossible, matter to define it. There is aptness and qoutability in it ; expressions  have  passed into common speech.

The following specimen shows the average Shakespearian style, if such a thing exists all. It is not extremely elevated or poetical , but it is strong, precise and individual.

 thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,

Absent thee from felicity awhile,

And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,

To tell my story.

Hamlet

With such a style as this Shakespeare can compass the world of human emotion and he does so.

Thus, “he was the man” said, “who of all modern and perhaps ancient poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul”.

Ø   Ben Jonson ( 1573 – 1637 )

Biography

Ben Jonson was born at westminster, and educated at westminster school. Jonson’s birth and  the boy adopted the trade of his stepfather, who was a master bricklayer. Ben Jonson said that his family originally came from the folk of the Anglo – Scottish border counter , which genealogy is verified by the three spindles in the Jonson Family coat of arms.

His works

Ben Jonson was an English playwright, a poet and literary critic of the seventeenth century whose artistry exerted a lasting impact upon English poetry and stage comedy.

He popularized  for the Comedy of Humours. He is best known for the satirical plays Every Man in His Humour ( 1598 ) , Volpone or the Foxe (1605), The Alchemist (1610), and Bartholomew Fayre : A comedy ( 1614 ).

He is generally regarded as the second most important English dramatist after William Shakespeare plays during the region of James 1 . His plays divide conveniently into comedies and tragedies, for Jonson true to his classical models did not combine the two.

His early comedies , Every Man Out of His Humour (1599), Cynthia’s Revels (1600) , and The poetaster (1601) , the middle group of comedies, Volpone on the Fox (1605) , Epicoene, or the silent woman (1609) , The  Alchemist ( 1610), and Bartholomew Fayre (1614), represent as a group his best work.

The two historical tragedies Sejanus his fall (1603), and Catiline his conspiracy (1611), are composd on classical models.

His poetry

Jonson’s poetry like his drama, is informed by his classical learning. Some of his better known poems are close translations of Greek or Roman models. Jonson largely avoided the debates about rhyme and meter that had consumed Elizabethan classicists such as Thomas campion and Gabriel Harvey.

Although it is included among the epigrams, “on my first sonne” is neither satirical nor very short the poem intensely personal and deeplyfelt , typifies a genre that would come to be called to the ´lyric poetry’.

Underwood published in the expanded Folio of 1640, is a larger and more heterogeneous group of poems. It contains A celebration of charis , Jonson’s most extended effort at love poetry ;encomiastic poems including the poem to Shakespeare and a sonnet on Mary worth; the 1640 volume also contains three elegies which have often been ascribedto Donne.

Ø     Prose Writers

Roger Ascham ( 1515- 68)

Biography

He is representative of the earliest school of Elizabethan prose. Ha was born in Yorkshire, and educated privately and at st john’s college, Cambridge . He took part in the literary and religious disputes of the time , but managed to keep his feet on the shifting grounds of politics.

His works

His two chief works were Toxophilus (1545) a treatise in the from of dialogue on archery and The scholemasterm(1570), an educational work containing some ideas that were than fairly fresh and enlightening.

In Toxophilus he declares his intention of ‘writing this English matter in the English speech for English men’ in style he is plain and strong , using only the more obulous graces of alliteration and antithesis.

John Lyly ( 1554 ? -1606 )

Biography

He marks another stage in the march of English prose . He was born in kent, educated at Oxford and failing to obtain court part ronage became a literary man in London . and he died povertrystricken in London .

His works

We have already mentioned his comedies, which at the time brought him fame and money. But his first prose work Euphues, the Anatomy of wit (1579), made him one of the formost figures of the day. He repeated the success with a second part, Euphues and his England (1580)

Conclusion

                                                Thus Spenser, John Donne, William Shakespeare, Ben Jonson , Roger Ascham, John Lyly and many other writer gave their immense contribution to English literature.