How Characterization and Narration Influence the Themes of Shakespeare's Plays

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07 11 2021
How Do Characterization and Narration Influence the Themes of Shakespeare's Plays
Shakespeare's literature has won an unparalleled universal reputation right from the Elizabethan era to modern times. His works are still relevant in contemporary literature, and his legacy is alive in our schools, film, theatre, and television. Consequently, few dramatists can challenge his dominance because of such unrivaled literary prowess since his plays have been performed on professional and amateur stages alike and translated into numerous languages globally. Shakespeare's plays have been staged and recreated by various popular playwrights and producers, and they have expressly impacted other artists` works. Prominent dramatists and novelists like Tom Stoppard, Charles Dickens, William Faulkner, and Bertolt Brecht have been inspired by his poetry, characterization, narration style, and story plots to re-create and interpret his works befitting audiences of their times. All these literary works re-creations with the drive to immortalize Shakespeare's ingenuity in literature owe to his ability to use narration and characterization to influence themes in his plays.
As observed in Hamlet's opening lines, "who's there?", the sentence instantly sets the identity theme in the play. According to Paul Ricoeur, the "who is there" question must be countered in a narrative because it is the only way to reveal one's identity. Ricoeur further opines that the narrative identity notion pegs on the conviction that identities are conceptualized through narration. Though oblivious of Ricoeur's philosophy, Shakespeare ingeniously creates a story in the context of the "who's there" question to prompt an answer from himself, thus allowing him to use his signature narration technique to paint the play's identity theme. Shakespeare was a skilled artist that told his stories in clear and continuous proses to convey a message to his audience in simple but yet unanticipated ways. For instance, in Hamlet's second line, "stand and unfold yourself," he hits the audience with suspense to discover the characters' identities on stage. The use of characterization suspense ensures that the audience keenly follows the play since one needs to watch the entire play to discover his characters, or at least realize that the identities of some characters are partially concealed.
Customary to his works, we realize that every moment of Shakespeare's Hamlet is an occasion for characters to reveal their identities to the audience. Shakespeare executes this act through his excellent narration skills while keeping in touch with the audience. He employs performance cues while at the same time creating characters that remain visualized in the audience's minds throughout the play.
Moreover, Shakespeare mastered the art of anonymous characterization. He used characters that were well known to the audience in their minds but never really discovered their identities. Guildenstern and Rosencrantz were well known to Shakespeare's audience in his plays, but the audience never unearthed their identities since the two did not get the chance to share their stories on stage. For many years, their identities had been limited in Shakespear...