This play from 1608, later in Shakespeare’s career, belongs to a group of Roman plays. When Shakespeare wanted to address dangerous issues, he often turned to Rome as a setting rather than risk setting the action in England. Amongst the Roman plays are Titus Andronicus, Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, and Timon of Athens; some critics include Troilus and Cressida, a play set during the Trojan War. All except Tro are tragedies. Please note the shifts from verse to prose.
Cor explore such themes as these:
- a man untrue to his nature cannot succeed
- many of us see things as black or white while pretending to see and value grays
- few of us value and can balance the importance of both words and deeds
- we should never trust the rabble--a few words of demagoguery will easily sway ordinary citizens
- t is rarely safe and good to say precisely what one thinks
- a mother who breeds her son solely for soldiering may create a monster
- Volumnia derives much of her character from Spartan ideals of motherhood
- we define traitor and treachery in more than one way
- a great warrior may lack compassion for both cowards and those of only ordinary courage
- remember that Britons claimed descent from Brut, a Roman descended from Aeneas, a Trojan we see parallels between Achilleus in The Iliad, Turnus in The Aeneid, and both C M Coriolanus and Tullus Aufidius in our play; where in this play lie the parallels to Hektor of The Iliad and Aeneas of The Aeneid?
notes_for_reading_shakespeare.pdf |