The story of the creation of Shakespeare's tragedy King Lear. Conflict and main images of the tragedy King Lear. King Lear

Shakespeare is an unmatched talent

The versatile talent of William Shakespeare was revealed to the maximum in his time, leaving future generations with invaluable literary treasures. Today, each of his plays is something truly unique.

In each of them, he reveals with particular accuracy and detail the characters and actions of the characters, who are always forced to act under pressure from the outside. As the author of such world-renowned plays as Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Macbeth, Twelfth Night, The Merchant of Venice and King Lear, Shakespeare can answer almost any question of concern to the modern world. human soul. Times go by, and only the shell of the world lends itself to change. The problems remain the same, and are passed down more and more violently from generation to generation.

It may not be more difficult

I would like to note that King Lear is one of the most difficult plays by Shakespeare. Its difficulty lies in the fact that the author displays here the image not only of a distraught king, who, at the peak of his madness, understands the whole tragedy of what is happening, but also of the entire royal entourage, including the king's children. Here, in addition to the theme of madness, the theme of love, betrayal, mercy, the theme of fathers and children, the change of generations and much else can be traced, which is difficult to immediately notice.

Shakespeare was always famous for writing between the lines - the essence is hidden not behind a single word, but behind a couplet, behind a set of words. Lear gradually begins to understand the evil that reigns in life. The main conflict of the work arises from family relations in the royal family, on which the fate of the entire state depends. In this work, like in no other, there is a crushing fall into the abyss of madness that King Lear is experiencing. He is forced to descend to the level of a beggar and reflect on the key issues of life, being in the shoes of the simplest person.

King Lear - analysis and opinions

In the 1800s, a certain Charles Lam declared that Shakespeare's King Lear could not be staged in any theater without losing the colossal meaning and energy of the work, which was invested by the author. Taking this position, he enlisted the support of the eminent writer Goethe.

In one of his articles, Lev Tolstoy was critical of the play. He pointed to a number of absurdities that were clearly manifested in the text. For example, the relationship between daughters and father. Tolstoy was annoyed by the fact that for 80 years of his life, King Lear did not know how his daughters treated him. In addition, there were several other oddities that caught the eye of such meticulous people as Leo Tolstoy. Thus, the plot of this tragedy seems very unlikely. The main problem is that Shakespeare is more of a "theatrical" than a "literary" person. Creating his plays, he counted, first of all, on the stage effect of the narration. If you watch the performance in the theater, you will notice that everything starts so rapidly that you do not have time to follow how the situation is developing. The whole effect of this beginning does not allow viewers to doubt the veracity of the relationship that King Lear carries. Shakespeare fully trusted this effect of instantaneous audience shock - a story gradually grows before the eyes of the audience, and soon, as if after the smoke has been scattered, clarity comes ...

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1 ... Zhiknowledge and creativityW. Shakespeare

W. Shakespeare, along with Cervantes, is undoubtedly the largest Western European writer of the late Renaissance, in his works brilliantly reflecting this era with all its contradictions. The renaissance, which Engels called "the greatest progressive revolution that humanity has experienced before."

The time of W. Shakespeare's work is the era of the flowering of human thought, freed from the millennial blinders and shackles of the medieval,

feudal-religious worldview, and at the same time - unprecedented until then, predation and oppression of man by man, the era of the greatest hopes and at the same time the most bitter disappointments. Both of these polar moments were reflected with exceptional force in the works of Shakespeare: the first - mainly in his comedies, the second - in his tragedies; but often they are peculiarly combined or crossed in the same works of him, in the same images of him.

William Shakespeare was born in 1564, but the legend, on April 23rd, was in the town of Stretford on Evan, almost in the very center of England. His father John Shakespeare was a well-to-do man, a glove-maker by profession. Little Shakespeare studied at a local school, where the main subject of communication was the Latin language and basic information on ancient history and literature.

Around 1587, Shakespeare moved to London, apparently carried away by the dream of acting and writing. In 1593 he joined the finest London troupe of the time, led by James Burbage. This latter, back in 1576, built the first theater building in London outside the city limits.

At the Burbage Theater, Shakespeare was at first an actor - apparently not particularly outstanding, playing only minor roles. But soon afterwards he became a shareholder of this theatrical enterprise and a director.

As an author, Shakespeare began by collaborating with other playwrights or by reworking other people's plays, a custom that was widely practiced in those days. But already in the early 90s, he began to write completely independent plays, usually providing them for the exclusive use of the Burbage troupe.

The works of Shakespeare that have come down to us can be divided into two unequal groups. One, very small, group is formed by non-dramatic works related to the early period of his work. These are two poems on ancient subjects: "Venus and Adonis" and "Disgraced Lucretia", several less significant poems and, finally, one of the heights of Shakespeare's poetry - a collection of 154 sonnets.

The most probable time for the creation of the sonnets is 1593-1600. In 1609, the only lifetime edition with a dedication was published, which to this day continues to be one of Shakespeare's mysteries.

The most specific thematic cycle in Shakespeare's collection is represented by the first seventeen sonnets. They have one theme: a wish to a wonderful young man to continue himself in posterity, not to forget how fleeting earthly life and earthly beauty are. This is a kind of introduction to the book, which could have been written to order and, possibly, even before the poet's personal relationship to a friend, filled with admiration and sincere love, arose. The poet always maintains a distance, either necessary for his feeling close to worship, or dictated by social difference, if we accept the version that the addressee of the sonnets was a young aristocrat. Love gives poetry inspiration, but it gets eternity from it. Sonnets 15, 18, 19, 55, 60, 63, 81, 101 speak about the power of poetry capable of conquering Time.

The poet's love is accompanied by a painful feeling that a friend is impermanent in his affection. This also applies to his poetic predilections. A rival poet appears. The second part of the collection is dedicated to the Swarthy Lady. The changed type of beauty sounds like a challenge to the tradition dating back to the heavenly love of F. Petrarch, and is contrasted with his angelic blonde Donna. Shakespeare emphasizes that his "sweetheart steps on the ground." Although love is sung by Shakespeare as unshakable in its value, descended from heaven to earth, it is open to all the imperfection of the world, its suffering, which is ready to take on itself.

These sonnets, printed only in 1609, were no doubt written by Shakespeare back in the 90s. The circumstances in which Shakespeare's sonnets arose, and the possibility of autobiographical content in them, caused a lot of controversy. Some critics consider them to be a direct expression of what the poet truly experienced, while others - a continuous poetic fiction in the style of "Petrarchism", which was extremely widespread in the poetry of that time. Undoubtedly, living personal experience and abstract poetic generalizations are combined here in a very complex way. It is not possible to find out the autobiographical element in Shakespeare's sonnets. The value of Shakespeare's sonnets is not in their biographical sense, but in their enormous ideological and artistic content, clothed in a form that is amazing in harmony. This makes Shakespeare's sonnets one of the highest examples of Western European poetry of the 16th-17th centuries.

Shakespeare's dramatic legacy is immeasurably greater. His plays are very varied in their inner character, depending on the time when they were written. We distinguish between three periods of the work of Shakespeare the playwright, and in each of these periods there is a predominance of certain genres.

The first period is characterized by deep optimism, the dominance of light, cheerful tones. This includes, first of all, a number of funny and picturesque comedies, often colored with subtle lyricism: "The Comedy of Errors." It should be added that the exact dating of some of Shakespeare's plays is very difficult and sometimes fluctuates within 2-3 years. "The Taming of the Shrew",

Two Veronese and Love's Labour's Lost, A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Merchant of Venice, Much Ado About Nothing, As You Like It, and Twelfth Night, Or Whatever.

At the same time, Shakespeare wrote a series of his chronicles: three parts "Henry VI", "Richard III", "Richard II", "King John", two parts "Henry IV" and "Henry V".

Three early tragedies of Shakespeare belong to this period: “Titus

Andronicus "," Romeo and Juliet "and" Julius Caesar ". The last of them, with its gloomy tragedy, is already a transition to the second period.

In the second period W. Shakespeare poses great tragic problems, and a strong stream of pessimism joins his deep faith in life, which never disappears. At this time, he writes his most famous tragedies: Hamlet, Othello, King Lear and Macbeth, and three more tragedies based on ancient subjects - Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus and Timon of Athens. He does not stop writing comedy at this time. But all the comedies created during these years, with the exception of "The Gossips of Windsor", still on the verge of the first period, contain such a bitter taste and a truly tragic element that we would now call them rather dramas. These are the plays: Troilus and Cressida and Measure for Measure.

Finally, in the third period, Shakespeare writes exclusively plays, which are only traditionally called "comedies", but in essence approach the dramas, since they are entirely based on acute dramatic situations and, although they end happily, are almost completely devoid of an element of gaiety. These are the plays: "Pericles", "Cymbelin", "Winter's Tale" and "The Tempest". Only at the very end did Shakespeare add to them yet another chronicle, apparently written in collaboration with other authors - "Henry VIII".

Shakespeare's comedies, written in the first period of his work, amaze with their liveliness, sparkling wit, tenderness and subtlety of colors. Under the cover of seemingly thoughtless amusement, which is an expression of the cheerfulness characteristic of the Renaissance, Shakespeare often touches here on major social problems and conflicts.

One of Shakespeare's earliest comedies, The Taming of the Shrew, has more than once confused commentators in terms of its morality. Some tried to see in the play a defense of the medieval principle of the unconditional subordination of a woman to a man, while others saw it simply as a joke devoid of ideological content. Both of these points of view separate Shakespeare's work from the era, which found a vivid reflection in it.

The comedy "A Midsummer Night's Dream" is a defense of the rights of free, self-determining love, which overcomes the oppressive fatherly power. Developing in this play the court genre of "masks", Shakespeare democratizes it, replacing the cold figures of ancient deities with living images of popular English beliefs, personifying the good forces of nature.

In The Merchant of Venice, two worlds are opposed to one another: the world of joy, beauty, friendship, spiritual generosity and the world of acquisitiveness, avarice, and anger.

In the comedy "Much Ado About Nothing" by Shakespeare, more clearly than in previous plays, the development of the human personality is shown, as well as the active interconnections of human feelings and destinies that lie in different planes.

In Twelfth Night, the ingenuous, quite real, albeit highly poetic, love of the clever and brave Viola for Orsino is shown alongside Orsino's slightly contrived, rhetorical passion for Olivia. At the same time, the Puritan-like stupid, secretly ambitious pedant Malvolio is ridiculed, the enemy of carefree fun, embodied in the images of the dissolute, but good-natured and witty uncle Olivia - Sir Toby, her frisky maid Maria and other servants.

Among the most complex of Shakespeare's comedic images is Falstaff, who appeared first in a number of scenes in Henry IV and then reappeared in The Gossips of Windsor. In this image, Shakespeare summarized one of the essential moments of the social process taking place at that time. Falstaff is an impoverished and degraded nobleman who fell into new living conditions. He got rid of all the illusions and prejudices of his class long ago, which gives him a certain charm, imparts inner freedom and disinterested cheerfulness. But this charm with which he is surrounded in "Henry IV" dissipates in "The Gossips of Windsor," where Falstaff decides to become practical and arrange his fate through a profitable marriage. As you know, this attempt ends in a shameful disaster for him.

Despite the fact that almost all conceivable vices of the era of primitive accumulation are combined in the image of Falstaff, there is still something positive in him, also associated with the spirit of the era. This is, firstly, his endless cheerfulness, falling in love with the material, sensual joys of life, typical of this era, and secondly, his brilliant wit, which delights the reader and critic because, along with insight, it expresses the freedom of the mind from all restrictions ... This is why Falstaff can laugh just as much at others as at himself. This liberated laughter and liberated thought constitute a deeply attractive, historically significant feature of Falstaff's image.

Shakespeare's comedies are full of adventures, accidents, surprises. They are dominated by the idea of \u200b\u200b"fortune" or "luck", which expresses the feeling characteristic of Renaissance people of the boundless expanse of life that has opened up to them, with the impossibility of taking everything into account and foreseeing everything in advance. This feeling awakens in a person not fear of life, but, on the contrary, faith in it and the desire to experience one's own happiness. Despite the frequent presence of an acutely dramatic element in them, Shakespeare's comedies are deeply optimistic.

The chronicles of Shakespeare that arose at the same time are of a more severe character. Depicting in them the recent past of England, Shakespeare sets off in them those moments that resonate with living modernity and, as it were, help to resolve pressing political problems.

One of the main themes of Shakespeare's chronicle is the revelation of the evil that in the past was caused to the country by large feudal lords, ambitious and rebellious. Such are the violent barons depicted in Henry VI or in Henry IV. Contrasting this feudal anarchy with the idea of \u200b\u200ba solid, centralizing government of royal power, Shakespeare, however, is far from blind admiration for the person of the king. He admits that if the king is not worthy of his dignity and is guilty of the misfortunes of his country, he can and should be deposed.

In Shakespeare's chronicles, we see a series of weak, incapable, vicious, and even criminal kings. In "Richard II" a weak-willed and eccentric tyrant is depicted, falling under the unlimited influence of the favorites, squandering the people's wealth and alienating all the active forces of the country. Intoxicated by the thought of the divine origin of his power, King Richard II is convinced that no one can demand account of actions from the anointed of God. As a result of his blindness, he is deprived of the throne and dies a miserable death.

Even more revealing is the image of Richard Gloucester, who, through a series of murders and crimes, reaches the throne. Shakespeare endowed him with the worst features of the era of primitive accumulation, portraying him as the most complete predator - an immoralist.

With his wild arbitrariness, Richard sows anarchy around him, and when Richmond revolts against him, the tyrant finds no support either in the nobility or among the people and quickly dies. Only in one of his chronicles did Shakespeare try to create the image of an ideal sovereign: this is Henry V, who, in Shakespeare's view, suppressed violent feudal lords and rules the country relying on broad public opinion.

Thanks to his acquaintance with Falstaff in his youth, he learned how ordinary people live and what they think, and now, having become king, he continues to behave the same way. On the eve of the Battle of Azincourt, in disguise, he walks around the English camp and easily chatting with the soldiers to find out their true thoughts and feelings. In accordance with this, Shakespeare, deviating from history, strongly democratized the image of Henry. And yet the image of Henry V has an overly contrived character in this chronicle.

Very important for assessing Shakespeare's way of portraying the past is his view of the causes of historical events. Putting forward, in accordance with the prevailing views of the era, the will of strong personalities or the role of chances, Shakespeare, along with this, already notes something completely new. This is the idea of \u200b\u200b"time", understood by him as a set of circumstances, main forces and tendencies of the era.

In his tragedies, Shakespeare raises the most burning questions of contemporary historical reality. The collapse of the great hopes that the humanists nourished found deep expression in them. The essence of Shakespeare's tragedy always lies in a catastrophic collision of powerful tendencies of "time" embodied in the images of strong, heroic personalities.

A different sense of the tragic arises in those works of Shakespeare that were created in the second period of his work. In "Hamlet", "Othello", "King Lear" it is shown how the emerging bourgeois relations come into cruel contradiction with humanistic principles. Here the illusory nature of these principles is revealed in the face of a victorious individualistic society, which brings an imaginary freedom to a person and destroys his essence and natural dignity. Formally free, a person becomes a playground of impersonal circumstances that stifle him and break his claims to reason, strength and beauty.

Still, one cannot speak of complete dominance of pessimism in these tragedies. No matter how terrible the catastrophes depicted here are, they are never aimless, but reveal the deep meaning and regularity of what is happening to a person. From the most severe tragedies of Shakespeare, there is by no means fatalism, a sense of hopelessness. It is not so much about their "happy ends" as about the fact that, along with dark forces, images of human nobility are given, which internally triumph over them.

Shakespeare's tragedies are full of vigor, a courageous call to struggle, even if this struggle does not necessarily promise success. The heroic character of such pessimism is far from fatalistic despair.

The first of Shakespeare's great tragedies, Hamlet, is also the most difficult to interpret. Hamlet's confusion, his inaction, and seeming lack of will perplexed most critics. The true reason for Hamlet's strange behavior must be sought as much in his spiritual properties as in that special kind of conflict in which he found himself with reality. A young dreamer, full of optimism and faith in life, but inexperienced, completely lost in science and reflection, keeping until then aloof from court life, Hamlet suddenly discovers such aspects of reality that he did not know.

In Othello, the opposition of the humanistic personality to the surrounding predatory society is also given, but in a more disguised form. The character of Othello's jealousy is consistent with the character of his love: it is not a wounded noble sense of honor, but also not the bourgeois feeling of a husband-owner, whose rights have been encroached upon. It is a feeling of the greatest insult, inflicted by the absolute truthfulness and mutual trust that united Othello and Desdemona. Othello's antagonist in the tragedy is Iago. This is a typical representative of primitive accumulation, predatory and cynical. His "worldview" boils down to two theses: the first is "pour money into the wallet", the second is that any thing can be given any form and that the value of things depends on the point of view.

Around 1610, Shakespeare's work loses its sharpness. One senses fatigue and disappointment in him, no doubt explained by changes in the political and social situation - a sharp decline in Renaissance sentiments under the feudal-reactionary regime of Jacob I Stuart. Royal tutelage over the theater led to the triumph of tragicomedies in it - plays devoid of genuine tragedy; works of this kind, slightly disturbing the viewer, were mainly intended only to entertain him, delivering sharp and entertaining impressions.

The last plays of Shakespeare, by their external features, could be classified as belonging to this genre. Nevertheless, Shakespeare puts significant ideological content in them, but only transposes it in a special way.

For "Pericles", "Cymbelin", "Winter's Tale", "Tempest" is characterized by a fabulous tone. Shakespeare does not depict in them typical life situations and the struggle of passions in a particular setting. He takes the viewer to an imaginary world - to distant semi-fairy lands or legendary antiquity, and against this poetic background shows in a simplified, crystal clear form the collisions of human feelings that always end well.

At the same time, representatives of the younger generation are invariably depicted - kind and pure creatures, engulfed in mutual love, incapable of evil and cruelty, as if called upon to found a new human society, more moral and happier than the world of greed and anger in which they were doomed to live parents. It must be said that this world of evil and the bright images opposing it are devoid of any concrete historical coloring in these plays, and the concepts of "good" and "evil" acquire here an abstract and absolute character.

Such a fairy-tale play, dreamy and abstract, is The Tempest. Its central character, Prospero, is the embodiment of justice, harmony and reason, a sage who understands everyone and everything, is a cross between a living person and an allegory. And around him grouped a number of creatures - also semi-allegorical, - people and spirits, pure or vicious, beautiful or ugly, - whom he, with the help of magical powers under his control, controls, punishing and forgiving his former offenders, re-educating bad will, leading to happiness and a harmonious life worthy of it.

The play ends with Prospero, having realized his plans, parting with the enchantments, giving up the power over the spirits, and returning to ordinary human existence. This is Prospero's highest moral victory, but at the same time there is a shade of sadness in his last remarks. Critics see here Shakespeare's personal confessions, a hint of his own thoughts and feelings at the time when he was finishing this play. Soon after graduation, Shakespeare said goodbye to the theater. This work is traditionally considered one of the last in his work.

shakespeare Lear literature

2. The originality of the work "King Lear" by W. Shakespeare

"Krol Lear" is a multifaceted canvas, even on a Shakespearean scale, which is distinguished by its exceptional complexity and large-scale intensity of feelings and passions.

In King Lear, Shakespeare attempts to solve the problems that were already raised in Timon of Athens. These problems include, first of all, the problem of an ethical plan - ingratitude towards a person who, for one reason or another, has lost power over people, and the problem of a social plan - the selfish aspirations of people as secret or obvious driving springs of actions, the ultimate goal of which is material prosperity. and the satisfaction of ambitions. But the solution to these problems in the play is offered in a form that allows us to say that Shakespeare the artist, creating a tragedy about the legendary British ruler, entered into a consistent and sharp polemic with Shakespeare - the author of Timon of Athens.

In search of a plot for a new tragedy, Shakespeare turned to Holinshed, whose chronicle contained a short story about the fate of the ancient British ruler Leir. However, now the very approach of Shakespeare to the source turned out to be different from that which was characteristic of the first period of his work. In the 90s of the 16th century, Shakespeare chose such episodes from Russian history in Holinshed's book that, differing in their inherent drama, made it possible to create a play full of stage tension, while deviating only minimally from the presentation of reliably known facts. Now he was interested in a plot from a legendary story, which would give more freedom in the dramatic treatment of this episode.

The Holinshed passage was not the only source for Shakespeare's work on King Lear. Through the efforts of Shakespearean scholars it has been proved with a sufficient degree of persuasiveness that the text of Lear contains elements that testify to the playwright's acquaintance with a number of other works whose authors turned to the history of the ancient British king. In addition, certain plot and lexical details of Shakespeare's play make it possible to assert that in the course of working on the tragedy, the playwright also used works of his predecessors and contemporaries that were not related to the story of the legend of Lear. The research carried out by Professor Muir led him to the conclusion that "King Lear" reflects Shakespeare's acquaintance with almost one and a half dozen works, the main of which, in addition to Holinshed, was the anonymous play about King Leir, "The Mirror of the Rulers", "The Fairy Queen" by Spencer, "Arcadia "Sydney, and published in 1603 by Samuel Harsnett" Declaration of egregious papal fraud. " In these books, Shakespeare found both a description of the events underlying both plot lines of the tragedy, and rich material that entered the figurative system of the play. All this does not detract from the originality of the tragedy.

The play can be called modern, because it was related to that reality by the fact that the problem of ungrateful children in relation to their parents was very widely discussed in London society.

One such high-profile case was the case of Sir William Allen dating from 1588-1589: it turned out that this eminent businessman, who played an important role in the company of merchant adventurers, the former Lord Mayor of London, was essentially robbed by his children. Commenting on this case, C. Sisson notes: "We can reasonably assume that Shakespeare knew the story of Sir William and his daughters, since he was undoubtedly in London at the time when the whole city was talking about this story." And, if the story was loud, it could have leaked outside London and become news for the whole country.

A similar trial took place at the beginning of the 17th century. Pointing to this trial as a possible impetus that prompted Shakespeare to begin work on the tragedy of King Lear, Professor Muir writes: “Perhaps the plan was suggested to him by the true story of Sir Brian Annesley, about whom in October 1603, a year before how Shakespeare began his play, it was stated that he was unable to independently manage his property. Two of his daughters tried to declare him insane in order to take possession of his property; however, the youngest daughter, named Cordell, filed a complaint with Cecil, and when Annesley died, the Lord Chancellor's court confirmed his will. "

K. Muir, analyzing the coincidences between the story of Anesli and the content of Shakespeare's tragedy, very carefully comments on this fact: "It would still be dangerous to assume that this topical story became the source of the play." Such caution is understandable and fully justified. The history of a private person, in whose relations the chancellor had to intervene with his daughters, contained clearly not enough material in order to create a work on its basis, which is one of the world heights of philosophical tragedy.

But, at the same time, one cannot neglect such an insightful observation of Professor C. Sisson, who drew attention to the following pattern: “There is something more than a coincidence,” Sisson writes, “that Lear's story first appeared on the London scene soon after the great excitement in London by the story of Sir William Allen. The court of the Lord Chancellor dealt with his case for a long time - in 1588-1589, and the premiere of the play "The True Story of King Leir", on which to a certain extent Shakespeare's great tragedy is based, took place, apparently, a year later. " It should be added to Sisson's observation that in 1605, that is, shortly after the Annesley trial, this play was again entered into the register, published and staged. And the following year, the London public became acquainted with Shakespeare's tragedy.

Obviously, these chronological coincidences are based on a very complex chain of circumstances. The story of Lear and his ungrateful daughters was known to the English even before Holinshed. There is no doubt that the story of the legendary king of Britain is not so much based on historical events as it is a folk story about grateful and ungrateful children transferred into the genre of historical legend; the happy ending, preserved in all pre-Shakespearean adaptations of this legend, the image of triumphant kindness that wins the fight against evil, especially clearly betrays its connection with folk tradition.

The artistic excellence of King Lear found the highest praise in the work of Professor Muir, who states: “I believe that no more expressive example of Shakespeare's skill as a playwright can be found. He combined a dramatic chronicle, two poems and a pastoral novel in a way that does not create any sense of incompatibility; and this is a magnificent skill even for Shakespeare. And the resulting play absorbed ideas and expressions from his own earlier writings, from Montaigne and from Samuel Harsnett.

But such a high assessment of the artistic genius and perfection of King Lear is not shared by all scientists. In the writings of many Shakespearean scholars the opinion is expressed according to which "King Lear" is marked by features of compositional looseness and is full of internal contradictions and ambiguities. Researchers holding such a point of view often try to attribute the appearance of such contradictions, at least in part, to the fact that, in search of material for his tragedy, Shakespeare turned to works belonging to the most diverse literary genres and often interpreting similar events in different ways. Even Bradley, questioning the good quality of the dramatic texture of King Lear, wrote: "Reading King Lear, I have a double impression ..." King Lear "seems to me the greatest achievement of Shakespeare, but it seems to me not his best play" 8. In confirmation Bradley cites a lengthy list of passages that are, in his opinion, "improbabilities, incompatibilities, words and deeds that raise questions that can only be answered by guesswork," and allegedly prove that "in King Lear," Shakespeare is less than usual , took care of the dramatic qualities of the tragedy. "

In modern Shakespearean studies, sometimes even more far-reaching attempts are made to explain the compositional originality of King Lear - attempts that, in fact, generally take this tragedy outside the framework of realistic Renaissance drama and, moreover, bring it closer to common genres of medieval literature. This is how, for example, M. Mack acts in his work, asserting: “A play becomes understandable and significant if we consider it, taking into account literary types, in reality related to it, such as a chivalric romance, morality and vision, and not psychological or a realistic drama with which it has very little in common. "

Researchers who criticize the imperfection of the composition of "King Lear", by and large, reserve only a small right to question the pattern and sequence of only some episodes of the tragedy. The circumstances of the death of Lear and Cordelia may fall into the number of such vicissitudes, which in turn casts doubt on the regularity of the ending as a whole. It is quite indicative that the same Bradley mentions precisely the circumstances under which the heroes die as one of the compositional shortcomings of King Lear: “But this catastrophe, unlike catastrophes in all other mature tragedies, does not seem inevitable at all. She's not even convincingly motivated. In reality, it is like a thunderclap in the sky, cleared up after the passing storm. And although from a broader point of view one can fully recognize the significance of such an effect and one can even with horror reject the desire for a "happy ending", this broader point of view, I am ready to argue, is neither dramatic nor tragic in the strict sense of the word. "

There is no need to prove that Bradley's position objectively leads to the rehabilitation of the well-known vivisection performed on the text of King Lear by the 17th century poet laureate Naum Tate, who, to please the tastes prevailing in his time, composed his own prosperous ending to the tragedy in which Cordelia marries Edgar ...

The composition of "King Lear" undoubtedly differs in a number of features from the construction of other mature Shakespearean tragedies. However, the text of "King Lear" does not provide any good reason for seeing contradictions or illogicality in the composition of this play. "King Lear", unlike "Timon of Athens", is a work whose completeness is impossible to doubt. It was written after Othello, a play that, according to many researchers, including Bradley, is distinguished by a remarkable mastery of composition; after King Lear, Macbeth was created - a tragedy strictly ordered in terms of composition and therefore earned Goethe's opinion as "Shakespeare's best theatrical play." And we hardly have the right to assume that at the time of the creation of King Lear, Shakespeare, for some unknown reason, lost his wonderful, masterful possession of dramatic technique.

Researchers who see in the compositional features of King Lear the result of the miscalculations or negligence of Shakespeare the playwright are simply unable to reconcile these features with the rationalistic schemes that dominate their aesthetic thinking. In fact, the specific characteristics of the play about King Lear should be seen as a collection of artistic techniques deliberately used by Shakespeare to maximize the impact on the audience.

The most significant compositional element that distinguishes King Lear from the rest of Shakespeare's tragedies is the play's elaborate parallel storyline that depicts the story of Gloucester and his sons. Both the set of problems that arise in describing the fate of Gloucester, and the dramatic material of the parallel storyline itself, is a very close analogy to the main plot branch, depicting the story of the king of Britain. Since the days of Schlegel, it has been noted that such repetition fulfills an important ideological function, exacerbating the feeling of the universality of the tragedy that befell King Lear. In addition, the parallel storyline allowed Shakespeare to deepen the demarcation of opposing camps and show that the source of evil is not only the impulsive motives of individual actors, but also a thoughtful and consistent philosophy of selfishness.

Another compositional element, which plays a much greater role in King Lear than in the rest of Shakespeare's tragedies, is the close kinship between the main characters. Five of them are directly or indirectly related by kinship with Lear, two with Gloucester. If we also take into account that as the finale approaches, the prospect of the unification of the Gloucester clan and the Lear clan becomes more and more realistic - in other words, the prospect of uniting the nine main characters by kinship is created - it is clear what a huge burden the portrayal of blood relatives bears in this play. relationships. They increased the degree of sympathy for the hero and the acuteness of indignation generated by the spectacle of the ingratitude of "loved ones".

Of course, these remarks do not exhaust the question of the specifics of the composition of King Lear. Therefore, in the course of further analysis of the place that King Lear occupies among other Shakespeare's tragedies, we will have to repeatedly, in one form or another, address the issue of compositional features of the play.

In Shakespeare's writings, it was repeatedly and quite rightly noted that the dominant place in King Lear is occupied by the picture of the collision of two camps, sharply opposed to each other, primarily in terms of morality. Given the complexity of the relationship between the individual characters that make up each of the camps, the rapid evolution of some characters and the development of each of the camps as a whole, these groups of characters entering into irreconcilable conflict can only be given a conventional name. If the classification of these camps is based on the central plot episode of the tragedy, we will have the right to talk about the collision of the camp of Lear and the camp of Regan - Goneril; if we characterize these camps according to the characters that most fully express the ideas that guide the representatives of each of them, it would be more correct to call them the camps of Cordelia and Edmund. But, perhaps, the most fair division of the characters in the play into the camp of good and the camp of evil. The true meaning of this convention can be revealed only as a result of the entire study, when it becomes clear that Shakespeare, creating King Lear, did not think in abstract moral categories, but imagined the conflict between good and evil in all its historical concreteness.

The key problem of the whole tragedy lies precisely in the evolution of the camps that have come into conflict with each other. Only with the correct interpretation of this evolution is it possible to understand the ideological and artistic richness of the play, and, consequently, the worldview with which it is imbued. Therefore, the solution to the problem of the internal development of each of the camps should, in essence, be subordinated to the entire study of the conflict and the development of individual images.

There are three main stages in the evolution of the camps. The starting point is the first scene of the tragedy. On the basis of this scene it is still very difficult to imagine how the forces that are destined to become camps opposing each other in irreconcilable conflict will consolidate and polarize. From the material in the first scene, one can only establish that Cordelia and Kent are guided by the principle of truthfulness and honesty; on the other hand, the viewer has the right to suspect that the unbridled eloquence of Goneril and Regan is fraught with hypocrisy and pretense. But in order to predict in which of the camps the rest of the characters will find themselves later - such as Cornwall and Albany, and first of all, Lear himself - the scene does not give precise indications.

The second stage covers the longest part of the tragedy; it begins with the 2nd scene of Act I and continues until the last scene of Act IV, when the audience witnesses the final unification of Lear and Cordelia. By the end of this period, there is essentially no character left who is not involved in any of the opposing factions; the principles that govern each of the camps become absolutely clear, and the patterns inherent in these camps begin to manifest themselves more and more tangibly.

Finally, in the fifth act of the tragedy, when the final clarity of the camps is achieved, a decisive clash of the opposing groups takes place - a clash prepared by the entire previous dynamics of the development of each of the camps. Thus, the study of these dynamics is a necessary prerequisite for the correct interpretation of the ending of the tragedy of King Lear.

The camp of evil is consolidating the most intensively. The unification of all its main representatives occurs, in fact, already in the 1st scene of Act II, when Cornwall, approving of Edmund's "valor and obedience", makes him his first vassal. From that moment on, the camp of evil seizes the initiative for a long time, while the camp of good is still in the stage of formation for a long time.

Each of the characters that make up the camp of evil remains a highly individualized artistic image; this way of characterization gives the depiction of evil a special realistic credibility. But despite this, in the behavior of individual characters, features can be distinguished that are indicative of the entire grouping of characters as a whole.

In this regard, the image of Oswald is of undoubted interest. Goneril's butler throughout most of the play is deprived of the opportunity to act on his own initiative and only willingly fulfills the orders of his masters. At this time, his behavior is distinguished by duplicity and arrogance, hypocrisy and deceit, which are for this dressed-up and oiled courtier a means of making a career. Straightforward Kent gives an exhaustive description of this character, who acts as his complete antipode: "... I would like to be a pimp out of servility, but in fact - a mixture of a swindler, a coward, a beggar and a pimp, the son and heir of a court bitch" When, just before his death for the first time, Oswald has the opportunity to act on his own initiative, in his characterization a hitherto unknown combination of features is revealed. We mean his behavior in the scene of the meeting with the blind Gloucester, where Oswald, driven by the desire to receive the rich reward promised for the head of the count, wants to kill a defenseless old man. As a result, it turns out that in the image of Oswald - albeit in a crushed form - deceit, hypocrisy, arrogance, self-interest and cruelty are combined, that is, all the features that, to one degree or another, determine the face of each of the characters that make up the camp of evil.

The opposite technique is used by Shakespeare in the depiction of Cornwall. In this image, the playwright singles out the only leading character trait - the unbridled cruelty of the duke, who is ready to betray any of his opponents to the most painful execution. However, the role of Cornwall, as well as the role of Oswald, does not have a self-sufficient meaning and performs, in essence, a service function. Cornwall's disgusting, sadistic cruelty is not of interest in itself, but only as a way of allowing Shakespeare to show that Regan, about whose gentle nature Lear speaks, is no less cruel than her husband. Therefore, compositional techniques are quite natural and explainable, with the help of which Shakespeare, long before the finale, removes Cornwall and Oswald from the stage, leaving only the main carriers of evil on the stage by the time of the decisive collision between the camps - Goneril, Regan and Edmund.

The starting point in the characterization of Regan and Goneril is the theme of the ingratitude of children in relation to their fathers. The above description of some of the events typical of London life at the beginning of the 17th century should have shown that cases of deviations from the old ethical norms, according to which the respectful gratitude of children to their parents was something for granted, became so frequent that the relationship between parents and the heirs turned into a serious problem that worried the most diverse circles of the then English public.

In the course of revealing the topic of ingratitude, the main aspects of the moral character of Goneril and Regan are revealed - their cruelty, hypocrisy and deceit, covering up the selfish aspirations that govern all the actions of these characters.

The ways that Shakespeare chose to characterize Regan and Goneril are distinguished by a very remarkable originality. After Tamora from Titus Andronicus, the evil sisters of Cordelia are the first detailed female negative characters. But if the Queen of the Goths was a true devil in which vengefulness and cruelty were brought to superhuman proportions, then Goneril and Regan are women characterized by Shakespeare in a very restrained realistic manner. Assessing the impression made by the images of Goneril and Regan on the audience, D. Danby reasonably remarked: “However, they are not monsters. There is not even a shadow of melodrama in their depiction. On the contrary, Shakespeare makes an effort to make them normal people. They are normal in the sense that they do what we, unfortunately, expect from people. They are also normal in the sense that their behavior gradually became the standard of behavior. But in reality Shakespeare goes beyond that. Goneril and Regan are remarkable not only for their normalcy. They are also remarkable for their respectability. "

As a rule, the negative characters of mature Shakespearean tragedies, always endowed with hypocrisy and duplicity, become frank only in monologues that cannot be heard by other actors; the rest of the time, such characters demonstrate an excellent ability to hide their true plans. But Regan and Goneril are never alone with the audience; they are therefore compelled to speak only by hints or short remarks “to the side” about self-serving intentions that guide their actions. These hints, however, become more and more transparent as the finale approaches; in the initial part of the tragedy, the behavior of Regan and Goneril is capable of misleading the audience for a while.

At the first stage of the disclosure of these images, the egoism of Regan and Goneril is quite clearly colored by selfish traits. The sisters' selfishness is quite clearly manifested already in the first scene, when Regan and Goneril try to outmaneuver each other in flattery, so as not to miscalculate when the kingdom is divided. In the future, from the words of Kent, the viewer learns that the conflict between the sisters, weakening Britain, has gone too far, and Kuran's remark indicates that Goneril and Regan are preparing for war with each other. At the same time, it is quite natural to assume that each of the sisters aims to extend their power throughout the country.

However, as soon as Edmund comes into view of Regan and Goneril, the young man turns out to be the main object of their desires. From this moment on, the main motive in the actions of the sisters becomes a passion for Edmund, for the sake of which they are ready for any crime.

Given this circumstance, some researchers quite decisively divide the carriers of evil, united in one camp, into different types. “The forces of evil,” writes D. Stumpfer, “acquire a very large scale in King Lear, and there are two special variants of evil: evil as an animal principle, represented by Regan and Goneril, and evil as theoretically grounded atheism, represented by Edmund. You shouldn't mix these varieties. "

Of course, it is impossible to unconditionally accept such a categorically formulated point of view. Striving to get Edmund as her husband, each of the sisters thinks not only about quenching their passion; to a certain extent, they are guided by political considerations, for in the energetic and decisive Edmund they see a worthy candidate for the British throne. But, on the other hand, if Regan and Goneril remained the only representatives of the evil principle in the tragedy, it would hardly be possible to say with confidence that they are carriers of self-serving, selfish principles characteristic of the "new people" by their behavior. This obscurity is eliminated by the sisters' alliance with Edmund. Thus, Shakespeare solves the problem of the image of selfishness and evil.

Speaking about the symbolism that the author uses in his play, one should first of all turn to the image of the storm. The symbolic character of the picture of the raging elements shaking nature at the moment when Lear's mind is clouded is beyond doubt. This symbol is very capacious and ambiguous. On the one hand, it can be understood as an expression of the general nature of the catastrophic shifts taking place in the world. On the other hand, the picture of the indignant element grows into a symbol of nature, outraged by the inhuman injustice of those people who at this very time seem invincible.

The thunderstorm begins when Lear's requests and threats are shattered by the calm impudence of egoists who are confident in their impunity; even in the first folio, the beginning of the thunderstorm is marked by a remark at the end of scene 4 of Act II, even before Lear leaves for the steppe. Therefore, some researchers view the thunderstorm as a kind of symbol of order, opposing the perverse relations between people. This assumption is directly expressed by D. Danby: "Thunder, judging by Lear's reaction to it, may be order, not chaos: an order, in comparison with which our small orders are just shattered fragments."

Indeed, the fury of the elements and human malice in "King Lear" correlate in about the same way as in "Othello" the terrible storm at sea and the cold hatred of Iago correlate: the storm and treacherous pitfalls spare Desdemona and Othello, and the egoist Iago knows no pity ...

It is necessary, nevertheless, to note the main difference between Shakespeare's "King Lear" from all previous adaptations of this plot and from subsequent distortions of Shakespeare's tragedy in favor of the prevailing aesthetic tastes is not the death of the king himself. It is the death of Cordelia that informs the tragedy of the severity that in the 18th century frightened away visitors to the Royal Theater of Drury Lane from the true Shakespeare, and which subsequently forced and forces critics of the Hegelian persuasion to look for "tragic guilt" in Cordelia herself, condemning the heroine for her lack of compliance, pride, etc. etc. Therefore, the answer to the question of what considerations Shakespeare was guided by, choosing Cordelia's death as one of the components of the final of the tragedy, is of the most direct importance not only for understanding the image of the heroine, but also for understanding the whole tragedy as an ideological and artistic unity.

The death of Cordelia is closely connected with the interpretation of the utopian theme in Shakespeare's tragedy. It was Shakespeare who owes undeniable merit as the author who first included this topic, both socially and ethically, in the plot of the ancient legend of King Lear. And if, at the same time, Shakespeare followed his predecessors in a plot plan and depicted Cordelia's triumph, his tragedy would inevitably turn from a realistic artistic canvas, in which the contradictions of his time were reflected with the utmost acuteness, into a utopian picture, depicting the triumph of virtue and justice. It is quite possible that Shakespeare would have acted this way if he had turned to the legend of King Lear in the early period of his work, when the victory of good over evil seemed to him a fait accompli. It is also possible that Shakespeare would have chosen a happy ending for his work if he had worked on King Lear simultaneously with the creation of The Tempest. But at a time when Shakespeare's realism reached its highest rise, such a decision was unacceptable for the playwright.

The death of Cordelia most expressively proves Shakespeare's idea that on the way to the triumph of good and justice, humanity still has to endure a difficult, cruel and bloody struggle with the forces of evil, hatred and self-interest - a struggle in which the best of the best will have to sacrifice peace, happiness and even life. Therefore, the death of Cordelia organically brings us to the complex question of the perspective that looms in the finale of the play, and, consequently, of the attitude that the poet possessed during the years of the creation of King Lear.

The question of the end result, which comes to the development of the conflict in "King Lear", is still controversial. Moreover, in recent years, one can notice a revival of controversy regarding the nature of the worldview that permeates the tragedy of the legendary British king.

The starting point of the disputes that are waged on this issue by Shakespearean scholars of the 20th century is largely the concept set forth at the beginning of the century by E. Bradley. Bradley's position is complex. It contains contradictory elements; their development can give rise to diametrically opposed views on the essence of the conclusions that Shakespeare makes in King Lear.

An important place in Bradley's concept is occupied by the idea of \u200b\u200bthe contrasting opposition of the camps of good and evil. Analyzing the fate of the representatives of the latter camp, Bradley makes an absolutely precise observation: “This evil only destroys: it does not create anything and, apparently, can exist only due to what is created by the opposite force. Moreover, it destroys itself; it instills enmity among those who represent it; they can hardly unite in the face of an imminent danger that threatens them all; and if this danger were averted, they would immediately grab each other's throats; sisters don't even wait for danger blowjob. After all, these creatures — all five of them — were already dead weeks before we first saw them; at least three of them die young; the outbreak of their inherent evil turned out to be fatal for them. "

Such a sound view of the evolution of the camp of evil and the internal laws inherent in this camp allowed Bradley to sharply oppose the statements of his contemporaries about the pessimism of King Lear, including the opinion of Swinburne, who believed that in the play there is “no dispute of forces, who came into conflict, nor a judgment rendered at least by lot ", and which accordingly called the tonality of the tragedy not light, but" the darkness of divine revelation. "

...

"King Lear": a summary of the play

British King Lear is going to marry his three daughters, divide the land into three parts and give them as dowry, handing over the reins of government to their husbands. He himself plans to live out his life, taking turns visiting his daughters. Before the division of the land, the proud Lear wanted to hear from the children how much they love their father, and to give them what they deserved.

The two eldest daughters of Goneril and Regan swore to their father their unearthly love for him and, having received equal shares of land, became the wives of the Dukes of Albania and Cornwall. The youngest daughter Cordelia, to whom the King of France and the Duke of Burgundy were wooing, sincerely loving her father, was pure in spirit and did not want to show off her feelings. She said nothing. When the king was outraged by such disrespect, she said that she would not marry, since she would have to give most of the love to her husband, not her father.

The king, not seeing the disinterested purity of his daughter, renounced her, depriving her of her dowry and dividing the land between the elder sisters. The earl of Kent, a loyal subject of the king, stood up for Cordelia, for which Lear expelled him from Britain. The Duke of Burgundy refused a landless bride, and the wise king of France, seeing the girl's purity, gladly took her as his wife. The eldest daughters, believing that the father is out of his mind, decide to stick together and remove the king from power as much as possible.

The illegitimate son of the Earl of Gloucester, Edmund decides to get rid of his brother Edgar in order to get his father's love, inheritance and honorary title. He shows his father a letter supposedly written by his brother, where Edgar persuades him to kill his father together. And he tells his brother that the count wants to destroy him. The trusting Gloucester disowned his own son and put him on the wanted list. Edgar is forced to hide, pretending to be crazy Tom.

The king is visiting Goneril, who has cut the staff of his servants in half, and ordered her own not to indulge her father. The exiled Kent, disguised and calling himself Kai, becomes a loyal servant of the king. The neglect of his daughter and her yard offended the father. Cursing her, the king went to Regan. She kicks her father out into the street on a stormy night. The King, the Fool and Kent take refuge from the weather in a hut, where they meet Edgar, who pretends to be crazy.

Goneril, along with Regan and her husband, plots to get rid of the king. Overhearing this, Gloucester secretly decides to help Lear, who has lost his mind from grief, by sending him to Dover, where the headquarters of the French forces attacked decapitated Britain. Edmund, trying to serve the king's daughters, informs about his father's plans. Distraught with anger, Regan's husband, the Duke of Cornwall, rips out Gloucester's eyes. The servant, trying to stop the duke, wounds him and Cornwell dies. The leader of the exiled Earl of Gloucester becomes Edgar in the guise of the mad Tom and leads him to the king.

Goneril returns home with Edmund and learns that her husband does not support their behavior. She promises her heart to young Gloucester and sends it back. Regan's widow also shows her love to Edmund. He swears to each of them to be faithful.

Kent brought the king to Cordelia. She is shocked by her father's insanity and persuades the doctors to heal him. Waking up, Lear asks for forgiveness from his daughter. Edgar meets Goneril's servant Oswald, who is tasked with destroying Gloucester. After fighting him, Edgar kills him and takes Goneril's letter. With this letter he goes to the Duke of Albania, from which it becomes known about the relationship between his wife and Edmund. Edgar asks the Duke, if the British win, the opportunity to get even with his brother.

Both armies are preparing for battle. The battle was won by the British army, led by Edmund and Regan. Goneril, guessing about his sister's plans for Edmund, is jealous and decides to get rid of his sister. Edmund rejoices at taking Cordelia and the king prisoner. He sends them to prison and gives special instructions to the guard. The Duke of Albania demands the extradition of the king with his youngest daughter. However, Edmund disagrees. While the sisters quarrel over Edmund, the duke accuses all three of high treason and, showing Goneril's letter, summons someone who can fight the traitor. Edgar comes out and, having defeated his brother in battle, calls his name.

Edmund realizes that retribution has come for what he did to his brother and father. Before his death, he confessed that he had ordered to kill the king and Cordelia, and ordered to urgently send for them. Unfortunately, it was too late. The unfortunate king carried the dead Cordelia, which was hanged by the guard, and the courtier reported that Goneril, having poisoned her sister, stabbed herself.

Unable to withstand the death of Cordelia, the king's life, full of suffering and torment, is interrupted. And the loyal subjects who survived understand that one must be persistent, as required by the rebellious time.

Characteristics of the characters

"King Lear", according to critics, is more a piece of reading, rather than staged. The play is full of events, but the main place in it is occupied by the philosophical reflections of the characters.

Rich world of characters
Each character created by the author skillfully and truthfully has a special character, inner world. Each hero has his own personal tragedy, into which Shakespeare devotes the reader.

The king is strong and confident from the first scenes. However, at the same time, he is selfish and blind, because of which he loses his crown, power, respect and his own children. His mind comprehends the truth as much as possible at the moment of insanity of the mind. The creation of the rest of the images of the work is close to the system of classic division of characters into positive and negative.

The main idea of \u200b\u200bthe play

The work is based on the eternal problem of fathers and children, depicted by the example of two families - King Lear and the Earl of Gloucester. In both cases, fathers are humiliated and betrayed by their children. But it cannot be said that they are innocent victims of what happened. The pride and arrogance of King Lear, the inability to see the truth, the tendency to rash and categorical decisions led to a tragic outcome. The illegality of conceiving a son, who felt second-rate and by any means tried to win a position in society, is the reason for Edmund's behavior.

In King Lear, family relations are closely intertwined with social and political issues. In these three plans one and the same theme of the clash of pure humanity with heartlessness, self-interest and ambition takes place. Lear at the beginning of the tragedy is a king of the medieval type, like Richard II, intoxicated with the illusion of his omnipotence, blind to the needs of his people, disposing of the country as his personal estate, which he can divide and give away as he pleases. From everyone around him, even from his daughters, he demands only blind obedience instead of sincerity. His dogmatic and scholastic mind requires not a truthful and direct expression of feelings, but external, conventional signs of obedience. This is used by his two eldest daughters, hypocritically assuring him of their love. They are opposed by Cordelia, who knows only one law - the law of truth and naturalness. But Lear is deaf to the voice of truth, and for this he suffers severe punishment. His illusions of the king's father and man are dispelled. However, in his violent downfall, Lear is renewed. Having experienced myself the need for deprivation, he began to understand much of what was previously inaccessible to him, and began to look differently at his power, life, humanity. He thought about the "unfortunate, naked poor", "homeless, with a hungry belly, in a leaky rags" who, like him, are forced to fight the storm on that terrible night (Act III, scene 4). The monstrous injustice of the system that he supported became clear to him. In this reincarnation of Lear is the whole meaning of his fall and suffering.

Alongside the story of Lear and his daughters, the second storyline of the tragedy unfolds - the story of Gloucester and his two sons. Like Goneril and Regan, Edmund also rejected all family and family ties, committing even worse atrocities out of ambition and self-interest. With this parallelism, Shakespeare wants to show that the incident in the Lear family is not an isolated one, but a common one, typical of the “spirit of the times”, when, according to Gloucester, “love grows cold, friendship dies, mugs rise against one another, in cities and villages there are strife in palaces - treason, and the bonds are broken between children and parents. " This is the disintegration of feudal ties, characteristic of the era of primitive accumulation. The dying world of feudalism and the emerging world of capitalism gurtrge "" "confront truth and humanity in this tragedy.

28. The originality of Shakespeare's tragedies. Analysis of Macbeth.

Shakespeare rejects the idealization of man. The person is contradictory. No goodies (other than Kardelia). Time does not tolerate the best (the intrigues of low people reveal contradictions in good heroes). A person in a crazy world (a person in a mind - crazy actions; a crazy person - insight). Mannerism style - flashy contrasts, contradictions that cannot be resolved. Each of the heroes has a rich nature. The heroes of Shakespeare's tragedies are extraordinary people, endowed with titanic spiritual powers. They may be delusional, make mistakes, but they are always interesting. They have such human qualities that cannot fail to attract attention. Shakespeare tries not to make any moral assessments - Shakespeare urges us to come closer to understanding human nature. In most tragedies written in adulthood, evil triumphs. Outwardly, it can fail. Man is far from perfect. The gaze is always at people significant, interesting, energetic, strong-willed. Shakespeare's understanding of man: man, personality, in all its diversity. Macbeth understands the difference between good and evil. He realizes that by committing murder, he is violating the moral laws in which he believes. Having committed murder, Macbeth loses his peace forever: he ceases to believe others, he is possessed by suspicions. He achieved power, but deprived himself of the opportunity to enjoy it. The tragedy of Macbeth is that he, once a wonderful and noble man, a true hero in his personal qualities, fell under the influence of bad passion and lust for power pushed him into many insidious crimes. But Macbeth does not fight to the end, does not surrender, even when everyone is against him, for the hero's soul lives in him to the end, albeit tainted by his bloody crimes. Macbeth is a talented commander, strong-willed and unbending man, fearless in battle, cruel and at the same time mentally subtle in everything that concerns himself. W. Shakespeare creates the tragedy Macbeth, the protagonist of which is such a person. The tragedy was written in 1606. "Macbeth" is the shortest of the tragedies of William Shakespeare - it contains only 1993 lines. Its plot is borrowed from History of Britain. But its brevity did not in the least affect the artistic and compositional merits of the tragedy. In this work, the author raises the question of the destructive influence of one-man power and, in particular, the struggle for power, which turns the brave Macbeth, a valiant and glorified hero, into a villain hated by all. Even stronger sounds in this tragedy W. Shakespeare's constant theme is that of just retribution. Just retribution falls upon criminals and villains - a mandatory law of Shakespeare's drama, a kind of manifestation of his optimism. His best heroes die often, but villains and criminals always die. In Macbeth, this law is especially evident. W. Shakespeare in all his works pays special attention to the analysis of both man and society - separately, and in their direct interaction. The conflict in Macbeth is that two worldviews fought in him. On the one hand, a person serves himself, but on the other, he and a member of society who serves him.

The story of the creation of Shakespeare's tragedy King Lear. Conflict and main images of the tragedy King Lear. King Lear - analysis and opinions

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