Elizabethan Age

The Elizabethan Age is named after the reigning monarch of England at the time, Queen Elizabeth I. The epoch
began in 1558 when Queen Elizabeth I ascended the throne and ended with her death in 1603. Queen Elizabeth
was a great patron of the arts, extending her patronage to remarkable artists and performers, thus leading to a
surge in works of art produced. This is why the period is also referred to as the Golden Age, i.e., because of the
flourishing of arts and artists during this time.
During the Elizabethan Age, England was experiencing the effects of the Renaissance, which began as a
movement in Italy and then swept the rest of Europe in the 16th century.
The Renaissance, which means 'rebirth,' is seen as a reaction to Classicism. It inspired creators of the time to
focus on the human condition and individualism, and also led to the pioneering of various forms of arts and
literary styles, such as the development of the history play or the historical drama.
The Renaissance spurred artists to create great works of art and had a significant influence on the ideologies and
products of painting, sculpture, music, theatre and literature. Figures representing the English Renaissance
include Thomas Kyd, Francis Bacon, William Shakespeare and Edmund Spenser among others.
With the growing wealth and status of the English population as a result of the flourishing Golden Age and the
English Renaissance, Queen Elizabeth I was regarded highly by her subjects. She also painted her public image
as one devoted to England and its people, especially by calling herself 'The Virgin Queen,' who was married
solely to England.

Characteristics of the Elizabethan Age

The Elizabethan Age is marked by numerous religious, social, political and economic shifts, some of which we
will explore in the sections below.
The Religious Background of the Elizabethan Age
Queen Elizabeth's father, Henry VIII broke away from the Catholic Church and separated the Church of
England from Papal authority in 1534 to divorce his wife, Catherine of Aragon. This led to religious unrest in
England. After King Henry VIII's reign, i.e., during Edward VI's and Mary I's succession, the religious unrest
only increased. Queen Elizabeth I's religious tolerance led to a time of peace between religious factions. This is
the reason people celebrate her reign.
The Social Background of the Elizabethan Age
The social aspects of life during the Elizabethan Age had their merits and demerits. While there were no
famines, and harvest was bountiful during this period, people also lived in extreme poverty due to a wide wealth
gap among the different social groups.
Families that could afford to, sent their sons to school, while daughters were either sent to work and earn money
for the household or be trained to manage a household, do domestic chores and take care of children in the
hopes of them marrying well.
The population of England increased. This increase led to inflation, as labour was available for cheap. Those
who were able-bodied were expected to work and earn a living. Due to an increase in population, major cities,
especially London, were overcrowded. This led to rat infestation, filthy environments and the rapid spread of
diseases. There were multiple outbreaks of plague during the Elizabethan Age, during which outdoor gatherings
were banned, including theatre performances.
The political background of the Elizabethan Age
During the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, the Parliament was not yet strong enough to pit itself against Royal
authority. This changed after the succession of James I of the crown. An elaborate spy network and a strong
military foiled numerous assassination attempts on the Queen. Furthermore, Queen Elizabeth I's army and naval
fleet also prevented the invasion of England by the Spanish Armada in 1588, thus establishing England's and
consequently Queen Elizabeth I's supremacy in Europe. The period was also marked by political expansion and
exploration. The trade of goods thrived, leading to a period of commercial progress.
Literature of the Elizabethan Age
Some of the most significant contributions to the English literary canon emerged from the Elizabethan Age.
This section explores some of the popular playwrights and poets of the Elizabethan Age.
Writers and Poets of the Elizabethan Age
The most important playwrights and poets of the Elizabethan Age include William Shakespeare, Ben Jonson,
Christopher Marlowe and Edmund Spenser.
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was known as the 'Bard of Stratford' as he hailed from a place called
Stratford-Upon-Avon in England. He is credited with having written 39 plays, 154 sonnets and other literary
works. A prolific writer, much of the vocabulary we use today in our everyday lives was coined by William
Shakespeare.
William Shakespeare often performed a supporting character in the theatrical iterations of the plays he wrote.
He was a part-owner of a theatre company that came to be known as the King's Men as it received great favour
and patronage from King James I. Even during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, Shakespeare received patronage
from the monarch and often performed for her.
Because of the universal themes that characterise his works, such as jealousy, ambition, power struggle, love
etc., William Shakespeare's plays continue to be widely read and analysed today. Some of his most famous
plays include Hamlet (c. 1599-1601), Othello (1603), Macbeth (1606), As You Like It (1599) and Romeo and
Juliet (c. 1595).

Shakespearean Sonnet
The history of the Shakespearean Sonnet
The Shakespearean sonnet (sometimes called the English sonnet) is a form of sonnet created in England. It was
invented by the poet and playwright William Shakespeare who adapted it from the Petrarchan sonnet.
Shakespeare popularized this form and wrote 154 Shakespearean sonnets in his lifetime, many of which were
published in 1609.
Out of Shakespeare's 154 sonnets, 126 are dedicated to 'Mr W. H'. There has been a lot of speculation
surrounding who Mr W. H. is, with some academics arguing that it was a typo and others interpreting the
dedication as evidence for Shakespeare's attraction to men. The other 28 sonnets are dedicated to another
unknown figure, a mysterious 'dark lady' who is the subject of these poems.
Shakespearean sonnets have been popular since the Elizabethan period, with poets such as John Donne and
John Milton composing poems in this form. They are one of the most famous types of sonnet and are used
frequently in modern poetry.
Shakespearean Sonnet Examples
As Shakespeare wrote 154 Shakespearean sonnets, there are a lot of available examples written in this form.
Some of the most famous Shakespearean sonnets include 'Sonnet 18', 'Sonnet 27', and 'Sonnet 116'.

Poetry Explication:
Sonnet 18 (William
Shakespeare)
Shakespeare uses Sonnet 18 to praise his beloved’s beauty and
describe all the ways in which their beauty is preferable to a
summer day. The stability of love and its power to immortalize
someone is the overarching theme of this poem.

Summary: Sonnet 116

This sonnet attempts to define love, by telling both what it is and is not. In the first quatrain, the speaker says
that love—”the marriage of true minds”—is perfect and unchanging; it does not “admit impediments,” and it
does not change when it find changes in the loved one. In the second quatrain, the speaker tells what love is
through a metaphor: a guiding star to lost ships (“wand’ring barks”) that is not susceptible to storms (it “looks
on tempests and is never shaken”). In the third quatrain, the speaker again describes what love is not: it is not
susceptible to time. Though beauty fades in time as rosy lips and cheeks come within “his bending sickle’s
compass,” love does not change with hours and weeks: instead, it “bears it out ev’n to the edge of doom.” In the
couplet, the speaker attests to his certainty that love is as he says: if his statements can be proved to be error, he
declares, he must never have written a word, and no man can ever have been in love.

Shakespearean Drama
Shakespeare is known as the ‘Father of English Drama’. He is known as England’s national poet, and the “Bard
of Avon”. His works, including collaborations, consist of 38 plays,154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and
some other verses, some of the uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living
language and are performed more often than those of
any other dramatist.
Characteristics
-Shakespeare wrote 37 plays in about 24 years. -His
plays were written for performance.
-His dramas can be divided into histories, tragedies
and comedies.
-The protagonists in the early plays are historical
figures, including rulers of England.
-His play Hamlet is considered to be the epitome of
the Renaissance in which the protagonist achieves his
perfection only after death.
-His play Richard-III is the epitome of Machiavellian evil in which Shakespeare balances between the role of
the king and the role of the man.
-As the dramatist of the Renaissance Age, Shakespearean plays focus on the man, exploring his weaknesses,
depravities, flows etc.
-All the characters ranging from soldiers to kings speak English.
-His plays have been divided into five acts. However, the division was imposed on the Shakespearean play by
Nicholas Rowe; one of the first editors of Shakespeare.
-Most of the Shakespearean plays are problem plays in which the playwright does not provide any solutions and
the audience is supposed to decide.
-Shakespeare, in his plays, goes into the depth of human behaviour and redefines the geography of the human
soul.
-His final plays move against the wave of Jacobean Theatre that focused on blood tragedy and social comedy.
-One finds the traces of colonialism in his plays. e.g. In The Tempest Prospero enslaves Caliban who is the
native of that island.
List of Plays by William Shakespeare
All’s Well That Ends Well (1601–05) The Merchant of Venice (c. 1596–97)
Antony and Cleopatra (1606–07) The Merry Wives of Windsor (between 1597 and
1601)
As You Like It (1598–1600) A Midsummer Night’s Dream (c. 1595–96)
The Comedy of Errors (1589–94) Much Ado About Nothing (probably 1598–99)
Coriolanus (c. 1608) Othello (1603–04)
Cymbeline (1608–10) Pericles (c. 1606–08)
Hamlet (c. 1599–1601) Richard II (1595–96)
Henry IV, Part 1 (c. 1596–97)
Henry IV, Part 2 (1597–98) Richard III (c. 1592–94)
Henry V (c. 1599) Romeo and Juliet (c. 1594–96)
Henry VI, Part 1 (1589–92) The Taming of the Shrew (between 1590–94)
Henry VI, Part 2 (1590–92) The Tempest (c. 1611)
Henry VI, Part 3 (1590–93) Timon of Athens* (between 1605–08)
Henry VIII* (first produced 1613) Titus Andronicus (between 1589–92)
Julius Caesar (first produced 1599–1600) Troilus and Cressida (c. 1601–02)
King John (c. 1594–96) Twelfth Night (c. 1600–02)
King Lear (1605–06) The Two Gentlemen of Verona (probably between
1590–94)
Love’s Labour’s Lost (between 1588 and 1597) The Two Noble Kinsmen* (c. 1612–14)
Macbeth (1606–07) The Winter’s Tale (c. 1609–11)
Measure for Measure (c. 1603–04)

ROMEO AND JULIET

Romeo and Juliet, a play by William Shakespeare, written about 1594–96 and first published in an unauthorized
quarto in 1597. An authorized quarto appeared in 1599, substantially longer and more reliable. A third quarto,
based on the second, was used by the editors of the First Folio of 1623. The characters of Romeo and Juliet have
been depicted in literature, music, dance, and theatre. The appeal of the young hero and heroine—whose
families, the Montagues and the Capulets, respectively, are implacable enemies—is such that they have become,
in the popular imagination, the representative type of star-crossed lovers.
Shakespeare’s principal source for the plot was The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Juliet (1562), a long
narrative poem by the English poet Arthur Brooke, who had based his poem on a French translation of a tale by
the Italian Matteo Bandello.
Shakespeare sets the scene in Verona, Italy. Juliet and Romeo meet and fall instantly in love at a masked ball of
the Capulets, and they profess their love when Romeo, unwilling to leave, climbs the wall into the orchard
garden of her family’s house and finds her alone at her window. Because their well-to-do families are enemies,
the two are married secretly by Friar Laurence. When Tybalt, a Capulet, seeks out Romeo in revenge for the
insult of Romeo’s having dared to shower his attentions on Juliet, an ensuing scuffle ends in the death of
Romeo’s dearest friend, Mercutio. Impelled by a code of honour among men, Romeo kills Tybalt and is
banished to Mantua by the Prince of Verona, who has been insistent that the family feuding cease. When Juliet’s
father, unaware that Juliet is already secretly married, arranges a marriage with the eminently eligible Count
Paris, the young bride seeks out Friar Laurence for assistance in her desperate situation. He gives her a potion
that will make her appear to be dead and proposes that she take it and that Romeo rescue her. She complies.
Romeo, however, unaware of the friar’s scheme because a letter has failed to reach him, returns to Verona on
hearing of Juliet’s apparent death. He encounters a grieving Paris at Juliet’s tomb, reluctantly kills him when
Paris attempts to prevent Romeo from entering the tomb, and finds Juliet in the burial vault. There he gives her
a last kiss and kills himself with poison. Juliet awakens, sees the dead Romeo, and kills herself. The families
learn what has happened and end their feud.

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