List of Shakespeare plays
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Shakespeare's plays are a canon of approximately 39 dramatic works written by English poet, playwright, and actor William Shakespeare. The exact number of plays—as well as their classifications as tragedy, history, comedy, or otherwise—is a matter of scholarly debate. Shakespeare's plays are widely regarded as being among the greatest in the English language and are continually performed around the world. The plays have been translated into every major
living language A modern language is any human language that is currently in use. The term is used in language education to distinguish between languages which are used for day-to-day communication (such as French and German) and dead classical languages such a ...
. Many of his plays appeared in print as a series of quartos, but approximately half of them remained unpublished until 1623, when the posthumous First Folio was published. The traditional division of his plays into tragedies, comedies, and histories follows the categories used in the First Folio. However, modern criticism has labeled some of these plays "
problem plays The problem play is a form of drama that emerged during the 19th century as part of the wider movement of realism in the arts, especially following the innovations of Henrik Ibsen. It deals with contentious social issues through debates between th ...
" that elude easy categorisation, or perhaps purposely break generic conventions, and has introduced the term
romances Romance (from Vulgar Latin , "in the Roman language", i.e., "Latin") may refer to: Common meanings * Romance (love), emotional attraction towards another person and the courtship behaviors undertaken to express the feelings * Romance languages, ...
for what scholars believe to be his later comedies. When Shakespeare first arrived in London in the late 1570s or early 1580s, dramatists writing for London's new commercial playhouses (such as The Curtain) were combining two strands of dramatic tradition into a new and distinctively Elizabethan synthesis. Previously, the most common forms of popular English theatre were the Tudor morality plays. These plays, generally celebrating
piety Piety is a virtue which may include religious devotion or spirituality. A common element in most conceptions of piety is a duty of respect. In a religious context piety may be expressed through pious activities or devotions, which may vary among ...
, use
personified Personification occurs when a thing or abstraction is represented as a person, in literature or art, as a type of anthropomorphic metaphor. The type of personification discussed here excludes passing literary effects such as "Shadows hold their ...
moral attributes to urge or instruct the
protagonist A protagonist () is the main character of a story. The protagonist makes key decisions that affect the plot, primarily influencing the story and propelling it forward, and is often the character who faces the most significant obstacles. If a st ...
to choose the virtuous life over Evil. The characters and plot situations are largely symbolic rather than realistic. As a child, Shakespeare would likely have seen this type of play (along with, perhaps, mystery plays and miracle plays). The other strand of dramatic tradition was classical aesthetic theory. This theory was derived ultimately from Aristotle; in
Renaissance England The English Renaissance was a cultural and artistic movement in England from the early 16th century to the early 17th century. It is associated with the pan-European Renaissance that is usually regarded as beginning in Italy in the late 14th cent ...
, however, the theory was better known through its Roman interpreters and practitioners. At the universities, plays were staged in a more academic form as Roman closet dramas. These plays, usually performed in Latin, adhered to classical ideas of unity and decorum, but they were also more static, valuing lengthy speeches over physical action. Shakespeare would have learned this theory at grammar school, where Plautus and especially Terence were key parts of the curriculum and were taught in editions with lengthy theoretical introductions.


Theatre and stage setup

Archaeological excavations on the foundations of the Rose and the Globe in the late twentieth century showed that all London English Renaissance theatres were built around similar general plans. Despite individual differences, the public theatres were three stories high and built around an open space at the center. Usually polygonal in plan to give an overall rounded effect, three levels of inward-facing galleries overlooked the open center into which jutted the stage—essentially a platform surrounded on three sides by the audience, only the rear being restricted for the entrances and exits of the actors and seating for the musicians. The upper level behind the stage could be used as a balcony, as in ''
Romeo and Juliet ''Romeo and Juliet'' is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetim ...
'', or as a position for a character to harangue a crowd, as in ''
Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and ...
''. Usually built of timber, lath and plaster and with thatched roofs, the early theatres were vulnerable to fire, and gradually were replaced (when necessary) with stronger structures. When the Globe burned down in June 1613, it was rebuilt with a tile roof. A different model was developed with the Blackfriars Theatre, which came into regular use on a long term basis in 1599. The Blackfriars was small in comparison to the earlier theatres, and roofed rather than open to the sky; it resembled a modern theatre in ways that its predecessors did not.


Elizabethan Shakespeare

For Shakespeare, as he began to write, both traditions were alive; they were, moreover, filtered through the recent success of the University Wits on the London stage. By the late 16th century, the popularity of morality and academic plays waned as the English Renaissance took hold, and playwrights like
Thomas Kyd Thomas Kyd (baptised 6 November 1558; buried 15 August 1594) was an English playwright, the author of ''The Spanish Tragedy'', and one of the most important figures in the development of Elizabethan drama. Although well known in his own time, ...
and
Christopher Marlowe Christopher Marlowe, also known as Kit Marlowe (; baptised 26 February 156430 May 1593), was an English playwright, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. Marlowe is among the most famous of the Elizabethan playwrights. Based upon the ...
revolutionized theatre. Their plays blended the old morality drama with classical theory to produce a new secular form. The new drama combined the rhetorical complexity of the academic play with the bawdy energy of the moralities. However, it was more ambiguous and complex in its meanings, and less concerned with simple allegory. Inspired by this new style, Shakespeare continued these artistic strategies, creating plays that not only resonated on an emotional level with audiences but also explored and debated the basic elements of what it means to be human. What Marlowe and Kyd did for tragedy, John Lyly and
George Peele George Peele (baptised 25 July 1556 – buried 9 November 1596) was an English translator, poet, and dramatist, who is most noted for his supposed but not universally accepted collaboration with William Shakespeare on the play ''Titus Andronicus' ...
, among others, did for comedy: they offered models of witty dialogue, romantic action, and exotic, often pastoral location that formed the basis of Shakespeare's comedic mode throughout his career. Shakespeare's Elizabethan tragedies (including the history plays with tragic designs, such as ''Richard II'') demonstrate his relative independence from classical models. He takes from Aristotle and
Horace Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 – 27 November 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his ' ...
the notion of decorum; with few exceptions, he focuses on high-born characters and national affairs as the subject of tragedy. In most other respects, though, the early tragedies are far closer to the spirit and style of moralities. They are episodic, packed with character and incident; they are loosely unified by a theme or character. In this respect, they reflect clearly the influence of Marlowe, particularly of ''
Tamburlaine ''Tamburlaine the Great'' is a play in two parts by Christopher Marlowe. It is loosely based on the life of the Central Asian emperor Timur (Tamerlane/Timur the Lame, d. 1405). Written in 1587 or 1588, the play is a milestone in Elizabethan p ...
''. Even in his early work, however, Shakespeare generally shows more restraint than Marlowe; he resorts to grandiloquent rhetoric less frequently, and his attitude towards his heroes is more nuanced, and sometimes more sceptical, than Marlowe's. By the turn of the century, the bombast of ''Titus Andronicus'' had vanished, replaced by the subtlety of ''Hamlet''. In comedy, Shakespeare strayed even further from classical models. ''The Comedy of Errors'', an adaptation of ''
Menaechmi ''Menaechmi'', a Latin-language play, is often considered Plautus' greatest play. The title is sometimes translated as ''The Brothers Menaechmus'' or ''The Two Menaechmuses''. The ''Menaechmi'' is a comedy about mistaken identity, involving a se ...
'', follows the model of new comedy closely. Shakespeare's other Elizabethan comedies are more romantic. Like Lyly, he often makes romantic intrigue (a secondary feature in Latin new comedy) the main plot element; even this romantic plot is sometimes given less attention than witty dialogue, deceit, and jests. The "reform of manners," which Horace considered the main function of comedy, survives in such episodes as the gulling of Malvolio.


Jacobean Shakespeare

Shakespeare reached maturity as a dramatist at the end of Elizabeth's reign, and in the first years of the reign of
James James is a common English language surname and given name: *James (name), the typically masculine first name James * James (surname), various people with the last name James James or James City may also refer to: People * King James (disambiguat ...
. In these years, he responded to a deep shift in popular tastes, both in subject matter and approach. At the turn of the decade, he responded to the vogue for dramatic satire initiated by the boy players at
Blackfriars Blackfriars, derived from Black Friars, a common name for the Dominican Order of friars, may refer to: England * Blackfriars, Bristol, a former priory in Bristol * Blackfriars, Canterbury, a former monastery in Kent * Blackfriars, Gloucester, a f ...
and St. Paul's. At the end of the decade, he seems to have attempted to capitalize on the new fashion for tragicomedy, even collaborating with John Fletcher, the writer who had popularized the genre in England. The influence of younger dramatists such as John Marston and Ben Jonson is seen not only in the problem plays, which dramatize intractable human problems of greed and lust, but also in the darker tone of the Jacobean tragedies. The Marlovian, heroic mode of the Elizabethan tragedies is gone, replaced by a darker vision of heroic natures caught in environments of pervasive corruption. As a sharer in both the Globe and in the King's Men, Shakespeare never wrote for the boys' companies; however, his early Jacobean work is markedly influenced by the techniques of the new, satiric dramatists. One play, '' Troilus and Cressida'', may even have been inspired by the War of the Theatres. Shakespeare's final plays hark back to his Elizabethan comedies in their use of romantic situation and incident. In these plays, however, the sombre elements that are largely glossed over in the earlier plays are brought to the fore and often rendered dramatically vivid. This change is related to the success of tragicomedies such as '' Philaster'', although the uncertainty of dates makes the nature and direction of the influence unclear. From the evidence of the title-page to '' The Two Noble Kinsmen'' and from textual analysis it is believed by some editors that Shakespeare ended his career in collaboration with Fletcher, who succeeded him as house playwright for the King's Men. These last plays resemble Fletcher's tragicomedies in their attempt to find a comedic mode capable of dramatising more serious events than had his earlier comedies.


Style

During the reign of Queen Elizabeth, "drama became the ideal means to capture and convey the diverse interests of the time." Stories of various genres were enacted for audiences consisting of both the wealthy and educated and the poor and illiterate. Later on, he retired at the height of the Jacobean period, not long before the start of the Thirty Years' War. His verse style, his choice of subjects, and his stagecraft all bear the marks of both periods. His style changed not only in accordance with his own tastes and developing mastery, but also in accord with the tastes of the audiences for whom he wrote. While many passages in Shakespeare's plays are written in prose, he almost always wrote a large proportion of his plays and poems in iambic pentameter. In some of his early works (like ''Romeo and Juliet''), he even added punctuation at the end of these iambic pentameter lines to make the rhythm even stronger.Introduction to ''Hamlet'' by William Shakespeare, Barron's Educational Series, 2002, p. 11. He and many dramatists of this period used the form of blank verse extensively in character dialogue, thus heightening poetic effects. To end many scenes in his plays he used a rhyming
couplet A couplet is a pair of successive lines of metre in poetry. A couplet usually consists of two successive lines that rhyme and have the same metre. A couplet may be formal (closed) or run-on (open). In a formal (or closed) couplet, each of the ...
to give a sense of conclusion, or completion. A typical example is provided in ''
Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...
'': as Macbeth leaves the stage to murder Duncan (to the sound of a chiming clock), he says, Shakespeare's writing (especially his plays) also feature extensive wordplay in which double entendres and rhetorical flourishes are repeatedly used. Humour is a key element in all of Shakespeare's plays. Although a large amount of his comical talent is evident in his comedies, some of the most entertaining scenes and characters are found in tragedies such as '' Hamlet'' and histories such as ''
Henry IV, Part 1 ''Henry IV, Part 1'' (often written as ''1 Henry IV'') is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written no later than 1597. The play dramatises part of the reign of King Henry IV of England, beginning with the battle at ...
''. Shakespeare's humour was largely influenced by Plautus.


Soliloquies in plays

Shakespeare's plays are also notable for their use of soliloquies, in which a character, apparently alone within the context of the play, makes a speech so that the audience may understand the character's inner motivations and conflict. In his book ''Shakespeare and the History of Soliloquies'', James Hirsh defines the convention of a Shakespearean soliloquy in early modern drama. He argues that when a person on the stage speaks to himself or herself, they are characters in a fiction speaking in character; this is an occasion of self-address. Furthermore, Hirsh points out that Shakespearean soliloquies and "
asides An aside is a dramatic device in which a character speaks to the audience. By convention, the audience is to realize that the character's speech is unheard by the other characters on stage. It may be addressed to the audience expressly (in charac ...
" are audible in the fiction of the play, bound to be overheard by any other character in the scene unless certain elements confirm that the speech is protected. Therefore, a Renaissance playgoer who was familiar with this dramatic convention would have been alert to Hamlet's expectation that his soliloquy be overheard by the other characters in the scene. Moreover, Hirsh asserts that in soliloquies in other Shakespearean plays, the speaker is entirely in character within the play's fiction. Saying that addressing the audience was outmoded by the time Shakespeare was alive, he "acknowledges few occasions when a Shakespearean speech might involve the audience in recognising the simultaneous reality of the stage and the world the stage is representing." Other than 29 speeches delivered by choruses or characters who revert to that condition as epilogues "Hirsh recognizes only three instances of audience address in Shakespeare's plays, 'all in very early comedies, in which audience address is introduced specifically to ridicule the practice as antiquated and amateurish.'"


Source material of the plays

As was common in the period, Shakespeare based many of his plays on the work of other playwrights and recycled older stories and historical material. His dependence on earlier sources was a natural consequence of the speed at which playwrights of his era wrote; in addition, plays based on already popular stories appear to have been seen as more likely to draw large crowds. There were also aesthetic reasons: Renaissance aesthetic theory took seriously the dictum that tragic plots should be grounded in history. For example, '' King Lear'' is probably an adaptation of an older play, ''
King Leir ''King Leir'' is an anonymous Elizabethan play about the life of the ancient Brythonic king Leir of Britain. It was published in 1605 but was entered into the Stationers' Register on 15 May 1594. The play has attracted critical attention princ ...
'', and the Henriad probably derived from '' The Famous Victories of Henry V''.William Shakespeare. (n.d.) Retrieved from: https://www.britannica.com/biography/William-Shakespeare/Shakespeares-sources There is speculation that '' Hamlet'' (c. 1601) may be a reworking of an older, lost play (the so-called '' Ur-Hamlet''), but the number of lost plays from this time period makes it impossible to determine that relationship with certainty. (The ''Ur-Hamlet'' may in fact have been Shakespeare's, and was just an earlier and subsequently discarded version.) For plays on historical subjects, Shakespeare relied heavily on two principal texts. Most of the Roman and Greek plays are based on Plutarch's ''
Parallel Lives Plutarch's ''Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans'', commonly called ''Parallel Lives'' or ''Plutarch's Lives'', is a series of 48 biographies of famous men, arranged in pairs to illuminate their common moral virtues or failings, probably writt ...
'' (from the 1579 English translation by
Sir Thomas North Sir Thomas North (28 May 1535c. 1604) was an English translator, military officer, lawyer, and justice of the peace. His translation into English of Plutarch's ''Parallel Lives'' is notable for being the main source text used by William Sha ...
), and the English
history play History is one of the three main genres in Western theatre alongside tragedy and comedy, although it originated, in its modern form, thousands of years later than the other primary genres. For this reason, it is often treated as a subset of trage ...
s are indebted to Raphael Holinshed's 1587 ''Chronicles''. This structure did not apply to comedy, and those of Shakespeare's plays for which no clear source has been established, such as ''
Love's Labour's Lost ''Love's Labour's Lost'' is one of William Shakespeare's early comedies, believed to have been written in the mid-1590s for a performance at the Inns of Court before Elizabeth I of England, Queen Elizabeth I. It follows the King of Navarre and ...
'' and '' The Tempest'', are comedies. Even these plays, however, rely heavily on generic commonplaces. While there is much dispute about the exact
chronology of Shakespeare's plays This article presents a possible ''chronological listing of the composition of the plays of William Shakespeare''. Shakespearean scholars, beginning with Edmond Malone in 1778, have attempted to reconstruct the relative chronology of Shakespear ...
, there is a general consensus that stylistic groupings largely reflect a chronology of three-phases: # Histories and comedies – Shakespeare's earliest plays tended to be adaptations of other playwrights' works and employed blank verse and little variation in rhythm. However, after the
plague Plague or The Plague may refer to: Agriculture, fauna, and medicine *Plague (disease), a disease caused by ''Yersinia pestis'' * An epidemic of infectious disease (medical or agricultural) * A pandemic caused by such a disease * A swarm of pes ...
forced Shakespeare and his company of actors to leave London for periods between 1592 and 1594, Shakespeare began to use rhymed couplets in his plays, along with more dramatic dialogue. These elements showed up in '' The Taming of the Shrew'' and ''
A Midsummer Night's Dream ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' is a comedy written by William Shakespeare 1595 or 1596. The play is set in Athens, and consists of several subplots that revolve around the marriage of Theseus and Hippolyta. One subplot involves a conflict amon ...
.'' Almost all of the plays written after the plague hit London are comedies, perhaps reflecting the public's desire at the time for light-hearted fare. Other comedies from Shakespeare during this period include '' Much Ado About Nothing,'' ''
The Merry Wives of Windsor ''The Merry Wives of Windsor'' or ''Sir John Falstaff and the Merry Wives of Windsor'' is a comedy by William Shakespeare first published in 1602, though believed to have been written in or before 1597. The Windsor of the play's title is a ref ...
'' and ''
As You Like It ''As You Like It'' is a pastoral comedy by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1599 and first published in the First Folio in 1623. The play's first performance is uncertain, though a performance at Wilton House in 1603 has b ...
.'' # Tragedies – Beginning in 1599 with ''
Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and ...
'', for the next few years, Shakespeare would produce his most famous dramas, including ''
Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...
,'' '' Hamlet,'' and '' King Lear.'' The plays of this period address issues such as betrayal, murder, lust, power and egoism. # Late romances – These plays romances, including '' Pericles, Prince of Tyre'', '' Cymbeline'', '' The Winter's Tale'' and '' The Tempest'', are so called because they bear similarities to
medieval romance literature As a literary genre, the chivalric romance is a type of prose and verse narrative that was popular in the noble courts of High Medieval and Early Modern Europe. They were fantastic stories about marvel-filled adventures, often of a chivalric ...
. Among the features of these plays are a redemptive plotline with a happy ending, and magic and other fantastic elements.


Canonical plays

Except where noted, the plays below are listed, for the thirty-six plays included in the First Folio of 1623, according to the order in which they appear there, with two plays that were not included ('' Pericles, Prince of Tyre'' and '' The Two Noble Kinsmen'') being added at the end of the list of comedies and ''
Edward III Edward III (13 November 1312 – 21 June 1377), also known as Edward of Windsor before his accession, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from January 1327 until his death in 1377. He is noted for his military success and for restoring r ...
'' at the end of the list of histories.


Comedies

# '' The Tempest'' LR # '' The Two Gentlemen of Verona'' # ''
The Merry Wives of Windsor ''The Merry Wives of Windsor'' or ''Sir John Falstaff and the Merry Wives of Windsor'' is a comedy by William Shakespeare first published in 1602, though believed to have been written in or before 1597. The Windsor of the play's title is a ref ...
'' # ''
Measure for Measure ''Measure for Measure'' is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1603 or 1604 and first performed in 1604, according to available records. It was published in the ''First Folio'' of 1623. The play's plot features its ...
'' PP # '' The Comedy of Errors'' # '' Much Ado About Nothing'' # ''
Love's Labour's Lost ''Love's Labour's Lost'' is one of William Shakespeare's early comedies, believed to have been written in the mid-1590s for a performance at the Inns of Court before Elizabeth I of England, Queen Elizabeth I. It follows the King of Navarre and ...
'' # ''
A Midsummer Night's Dream ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' is a comedy written by William Shakespeare 1595 or 1596. The play is set in Athens, and consists of several subplots that revolve around the marriage of Theseus and Hippolyta. One subplot involves a conflict amon ...
'' # '' The Merchant of Venice'' PP # ''
As You Like It ''As You Like It'' is a pastoral comedy by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1599 and first published in the First Folio in 1623. The play's first performance is uncertain, though a performance at Wilton House in 1603 has b ...
'' # '' The Taming of the Shrew'' # ''
All's Well That Ends Well ''All's Well That Ends Well'' is a play by William Shakespeare, published in the ''First Folio'' in 1623, where it is listed among the comedies. There is a debate regarding the dating of the composition of the play, with possible dates rangin ...
'' PP # '' Twelfth Night'' # '' The Winter's Tale'' LR PP # '' Pericles, Prince of Tyre'' LR FF # '' The Two Noble Kinsmen'' LR FF


Histories

# ''
King John King John may refer to: Rulers * John, King of England (1166–1216) * John I of Jerusalem (c. 1170–1237) * John Balliol, King of Scotland (c. 1249–1314) * John I of France (15–20 November 1316) * John II of France (1319–1364) * John I o ...
'' # ''
Richard II Richard II (6 January 1367 – ), also known as Richard of Bordeaux, was King of England from 1377 until he was deposed in 1399. He was the son of Edward the Black Prince, Prince of Wales, and Joan, Countess of Kent. Richard's father died ...
'' # ''
Henry IV, Part 1 ''Henry IV, Part 1'' (often written as ''1 Henry IV'') is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written no later than 1597. The play dramatises part of the reign of King Henry IV of England, beginning with the battle at ...
'' # '' Henry IV, Part 2'' # ''
Henry V Henry V may refer to: People * Henry V, Duke of Bavaria (died 1026) * Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor (1081/86–1125) * Henry V, Duke of Carinthia (died 1161) * Henry V, Count Palatine of the Rhine (c. 1173–1227) * Henry V, Count of Luxembourg (121 ...
'' # '' Henry VI, Part 1'' # '' Henry VI, Part 2'' # '' Henry VI, Part 3'' # ''
Richard III Richard III (2 October 145222 August 1485) was King of England and Lord of Ireland from 26 June 1483 until his death in 1485. He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty. His defeat and death at the Battl ...
'' # ''
Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disa ...
'' # ''
Edward III Edward III (13 November 1312 – 21 June 1377), also known as Edward of Windsor before his accession, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from January 1327 until his death in 1377. He is noted for his military success and for restoring r ...
'' FF


Tragedies

# '' Troilus and Cressida'' PP # '' Coriolanus'' # '' Titus Andronicus'' # ''
Romeo and Juliet ''Romeo and Juliet'' is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetim ...
'' # '' Timon of Athens'' PP # ''
Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in a civil war, and ...
'' # ''
Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...
'' # '' Hamlet'' # '' King Lear'' # ''
Othello ''Othello'' (full title: ''The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice'') is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare, probably in 1603, set in the contemporary Ottoman–Venetian War (1570–1573) fought for the control of the Island of Cypru ...
'' # ''
Antony and Cleopatra ''Antony and Cleopatra'' (First Folio title: ''The Tragedie of Anthonie, and Cleopatra'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. The play was first performed, by the King's Men, at either the Blackfriars Theatre or the Globe Theatre in around ...
'' # '' Cymbeline'' LR Note: Plays marked with LR are now commonly referred to as the " late romances". Plays marked with PP are sometimes referred to as the "
problem plays The problem play is a form of drama that emerged during the 19th century as part of the wider movement of realism in the arts, especially following the innovations of Henrik Ibsen. It deals with contentious social issues through debates between th ...
". The three plays marked with FF were not included in the First Folio.


Dramatic collaborations

Like most playwrights of his period, Shakespeare did not always write alone, and a number of his plays were collaborative, although the exact number is open to debate. Some of the following attributions, such as for ''The Two Noble Kinsmen'', have well-attested contemporary documentation; others, such as for ''Titus Andronicus'', remain more controversial and are dependent on linguistic analysis by modern scholars. * '' Cardenio'' (a lost play or one that survives only as a later adaptation, '' Double Falsehood'') – Contemporaneous reports suggest that Shakespeare collaborated with John Fletcher. * '' Cymbeline'' – ''The Yale Shakespeare'' suggests that a collaborator may have been responsible for parts or all of Act III scene 7 and Act V scene 2 * ''
Edward III Edward III (13 November 1312 – 21 June 1377), also known as Edward of Windsor before his accession, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from January 1327 until his death in 1377. He is noted for his military success and for restoring r ...
'' – Brian Vickers concluded that the play was 40% Shakespeare and 60%
Thomas Kyd Thomas Kyd (baptised 6 November 1558; buried 15 August 1594) was an English playwright, the author of ''The Spanish Tragedy'', and one of the most important figures in the development of Elizabethan drama. Although well known in his own time, ...
. * '' Henry VI, Part 1'' – Some scholars argue that Shakespeare wrote less than 20% of the text. * ''
Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disa ...
'' – Generally considered a collaboration between Shakespeare and Fletcher. * ''
Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...
'' – Thomas Middleton may have revised this tragedy in 1615 to incorporate extra musical sequences. * ''
Measure for Measure ''Measure for Measure'' is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1603 or 1604 and first performed in 1604, according to available records. It was published in the ''First Folio'' of 1623. The play's plot features its ...
'' – May have undergone a light revision by Middleton. * '' Pericles, Prince of Tyre'' – May include work by George Wilkins, either as collaborator, reviser, or revisee. * '' Timon of Athens'' – May have resulted from collaboration between Shakespeare and Middleton. * '' Titus Andronicus'' – May have been written in collaboration with or revised by
George Peele George Peele (baptised 25 July 1556 – buried 9 November 1596) was an English translator, poet, and dramatist, who is most noted for his supposed but not universally accepted collaboration with William Shakespeare on the play ''Titus Andronicus' ...
. * '' The Two Noble Kinsmen'' – Attributed in 1634 to Fletcher and Shakespeare.


Lost plays

* ''
Love's Labour's Won ''Love's Labour's Won'' is a lost play attributed by contemporaries to William Shakespeare, written before 1598 and published by 1603, though no copies are known to have survived. Scholars dispute whether it is a true lost work, possibly a sequ ...
'' – A late sixteenth-century writer, Francis Meres, and a bookseller's list both include this title among Shakespeare's recent works, but no play of this title has survived. It may have become lost, or it may represent an alternative title of one of the plays listed above, such as '' Much Ado About Nothing'' or ''
All's Well That Ends Well ''All's Well That Ends Well'' is a play by William Shakespeare, published in the ''First Folio'' in 1623, where it is listed among the comedies. There is a debate regarding the dating of the composition of the play, with possible dates rangin ...
''. * '' Cardenio'' – Attributed to William Shakespeare and John Fletcher in a
Stationers' Register The Stationers' Register was a record book maintained by the Stationers' Company of London. The company is a trade guild given a royal charter in 1557 to regulate the various professions associated with the publishing industry, including print ...
entry of 1653 (alongside a number of erroneous attributions), and often believed to have been re-worked from a subplot in Cervantes' '' Don Quixote''. In 1727, Lewis Theobald produced a play he called ''
Double Falshood A double is a look-alike or doppelgänger; one person or being that resembles another. Double, The Double or Dubble may also refer to: Film and television * Double (filmmaking), someone who substitutes for the credited actor of a character * ...
'', which he claimed to have adapted from three manuscripts of a lost play by Shakespeare that he did not name. ''Double Falshood'' does re-work the Cardenio story, but modern scholarship has not established with certainty whether ''Double Falshood'' includes fragments of Shakespeare's lost play.


Plays possibly by Shakespeare

Note: For a comprehensive account of plays possibly by Shakespeare or in part by Shakespeare, see the separate entry on the Shakespeare Apocrypha. * ''
Arden of Faversham ''Arden of Faversham'' (original spelling: ''Arden of Feversham'') is an Elizabethan play, entered into the Register of the Stationers Company on 3 April 1592, and printed later that same year by Edward White. It depicts the real-life murder ...
'' – The middle portion of the play (scenes 4–9) may have been written by Shakespeare. * '' Edmund Ironside'' – Contains numerous words first used by Shakespeare, and, if by him, is perhaps his first play. * ''
The London Prodigal ''The London Prodigal'' is a play in English Renaissance theatre, a city comedy set in London, in which a prodigal son learns the error of his ways. The play was published in quarto in 1605 by the stationer Nathaniel Butter, and printed by Thom ...
'' and '' A Yorkshire Tragedy'' – Both plays were published in quarto as works of Shakespeare, in 1605 and 1608, and were included in the Third Folio. However, stylistic analysis considers these attributions unlikely. * ''
Sir Thomas More Sir Thomas More (7 February 1478 – 6 July 1535), venerated in the Catholic Church as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, judge, social philosopher, author, statesman, and noted Renaissance humanist. He also served Henry VIII as Lord ...
'' – A collaborative work by several playwrights, including Shakespeare. There is a "growing scholarly consensus" that Shakespeare was called in to re-write a contentious scene in the play and that "Hand D" in the surviving manuscript is that of Shakespeare himself. * '' The Spanish Tragedy'' – Additional passages included in the fourth quarto, including the "painter scene", are likely to have been written by him.


Shakespeare and the textual problem

Unlike his contemporary Ben Jonson, Shakespeare did not have direct involvement in publishing his plays and produced no overall authoritative version of his plays before he died. As a result, the problem of identifying what Shakespeare actually wrote is a major concern for most modern editions. One of the reasons there are textual problems is that there was no copyright of writings at the time. As a result, Shakespeare and the
playing companies Play is a range of intrinsically motivated activities done for recreational pleasure and enjoyment. Play is commonly associated with children and juvenile-level activities, but may be engaged in at any life stage, and among other higher-functio ...
he worked with did not distribute scripts of his plays, for fear that the plays would be stolen. This led to bootleg copies of his plays, which were often based on people trying to remember what Shakespeare had actually written. Textual corruptions also stemming from printers' errors, misreadings by compositors, or simply wrongly scanned lines from the source material litter the Quartos and the First Folio. Additionally, in an age before standardized spelling, Shakespeare often wrote a word several times in a different spelling, and this may have contributed to some of the transcribers' confusion. Modern editors have the task of reconstructing Shakespeare's original words and expurgating errors as far as possible. In some cases the textual solution presents few difficulties. In the case of ''Macbeth'' for example, scholars believe that someone (probably Thomas Middleton) adapted and shortened the original to produce the extant text published in the First Folio, but that remains the only known text of the play. In others the text may have become manifestly corrupt or unreliable ('' Pericles'' or '' Timon of Athens'') but no competing version exists. The modern editor can only regularize and correct erroneous readings that have survived into the printed versions. The textual problem can, however, become rather complicated. Modern scholarship now believes Shakespeare to have modified his plays through the years, sometimes leading to two existing versions of one play. To provide a modern text in such cases, editors must face the choice between the original first version and the later, revised, usually more theatrical version. In the past editors have resolved this problem by conflating the texts to provide what they believe to be a superior ''Ur-text'', but critics now argue that to provide a conflated text would run contrary to Shakespeare's intentions. In '' King Lear'' for example, two independent versions, each with their own textual integrity, exist in the Quarto and the Folio versions. Shakespeare's changes here extend from the merely local to the structural. Hence the ''Oxford Shakespeare'', published in 1986 (second edition 2005), provides two different versions of the play, each with respectable authority. The problem exists with at least four other Shakespearean plays (''
Henry IV, part 1 ''Henry IV, Part 1'' (often written as ''1 Henry IV'') is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written no later than 1597. The play dramatises part of the reign of King Henry IV of England, beginning with the battle at ...
''; '' Hamlet''; '' Troilus and Cressida''; and ''
Othello ''Othello'' (full title: ''The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice'') is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare, probably in 1603, set in the contemporary Ottoman–Venetian War (1570–1573) fought for the control of the Island of Cypru ...
'').


Performance history

During Shakespeare's lifetime, many of his greatest plays were staged at the
Globe Theatre The Globe Theatre was a theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare. It was built in 1599 by Shakespeare's playing company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, on land owned by Thomas Brend and inherited by his son, Nicholas Brend, and gra ...
and the Blackfriars Theatre. Shakespeare's fellow members of the Lord Chamberlain's Men acted in his plays. Among these actors were Richard Burbage (who played the title role in the first performances of many of Shakespeare's plays, including '' Hamlet'', ''
Othello ''Othello'' (full title: ''The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice'') is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare, probably in 1603, set in the contemporary Ottoman–Venetian War (1570–1573) fought for the control of the Island of Cypru ...
'', ''
Richard III Richard III (2 October 145222 August 1485) was King of England and Lord of Ireland from 26 June 1483 until his death in 1485. He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty. His defeat and death at the Battl ...
'' and '' King Lear''),
Richard Cowley Richard Cowley (died 1619) was an actor in English Renaissance theatre, a colleague of William Shakespeare and Richard Burbage in the Lord Chamberlain's Men and the King's Men. Cowley was in the c. 1591 production of ''The Seven Deadly Sins'', ...
(who played Verges in '' Much Ado About Nothing''),
William Kempe William Kempe (c. 1560–c. 1603), commonly referred to as Will Kemp, was an English actor and dancer specialising in comic roles and best known for having been one of the original players in early dramas by William Shakespeare. Roles associat ...
, (who played Peter in ''
Romeo and Juliet ''Romeo and Juliet'' is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetim ...
'' and, possibly, Bottom in ''
A Midsummer Night's Dream ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' is a comedy written by William Shakespeare 1595 or 1596. The play is set in Athens, and consists of several subplots that revolve around the marriage of Theseus and Hippolyta. One subplot involves a conflict amon ...
'') and
Henry Condell Henry Condell ( bapt. 5 September 1576 – December 1627) was a British actor in the King's Men, the playing company for which William Shakespeare wrote. With John Heminges, he was instrumental in preparing and editing the First Folio, the col ...
and John Heminges, who are most famous now for collecting and editing the plays of Shakespeare's First Folio (1623). Shakespeare's plays continued to be staged after his death until the
Interregnum An interregnum (plural interregna or interregnums) is a period of discontinuity or "gap" in a government, organization, or social order. Archetypally, it was the period of time between the reign of one monarch and the next (coming from Latin '' ...
(1649–1660), when all public stage performances were banned by the Puritan rulers. After the English Restoration, Shakespeare's plays were performed in playhouses with elaborate scenery and staged with music, dancing, thunder, lightning, wave machines, and fireworks. During this time the texts were "reformed" and "improved" for the stage, an undertaking which has seemed shockingly disrespectful to posterity.
Victorian Victorian or Victorians may refer to: 19th century * Victorian era, British history during Queen Victoria's 19th-century reign ** Victorian architecture ** Victorian house ** Victorian decorative arts ** Victorian fashion ** Victorian literature ...
productions of Shakespeare often sought pictorial effects in "authentic" historical costumes and sets. The staging of the reported sea fights and barge scene in ''
Antony and Cleopatra ''Antony and Cleopatra'' (First Folio title: ''The Tragedie of Anthonie, and Cleopatra'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. The play was first performed, by the King's Men, at either the Blackfriars Theatre or the Globe Theatre in around ...
'' was one spectacular example. Too often, the result was a loss of pace. Towards the end of the 19th century, William Poel led a reaction against this heavy style. In a series of "Elizabethan" productions on a thrust stage, he paid fresh attention to the structure of the drama. In the early twentieth century,
Harley Granville-Barker Harley Granville-Barker (25 November 1877 – 31 August 1946) was an English actor, director, playwright, manager, critic, and theorist. After early success as an actor in the plays of George Bernard Shaw, he increasingly turned to directi ...
directed quarto and folio texts with few cuts, while Edward Gordon Craig and others called for abstract staging. Both approaches have influenced the variety of Shakespearean production styles seen today.Bristol, Michael, and Kathleen McLuskie (eds.). ''Shakespeare and Modern Theatre: The Performance of Modernity.'' London; New York: Routledge; Introduction, 5–6. .


See also

*
Chronology of Shakespeare's plays This article presents a possible ''chronological listing of the composition of the plays of William Shakespeare''. Shakespearean scholars, beginning with Edmond Malone in 1778, have attempted to reconstruct the relative chronology of Shakespear ...
* Elizabethan era * List of Shakespearean characters *
Shakespeare on screen The '' Guinness Book of Records'' lists 410 feature-length film and TV versions of William Shakespeares plays, making Shakespeare the most filmed author ever in any language. , the Internet Movie Database lists Shakespeare as having writing credit ...
* Shakespeare's late romances * '' The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)'' *
Music in the plays of William Shakespeare Music in the plays of William Shakespeare includes both music incidental to the plot, as song and dance, and also additional supplied both by Shakespeare's own company and subsequent performers.David Lindley, ''Shakespeare and Music'' (2014) 1408143 ...
* ''
Returning to Shakespeare Returning to Shakespeare is a non-fiction book written by Brian Vickers the literary scholar, and published by Routledge, London, in 1989. The book's main focus is a collection of previously published critical essays by Vickers pertaining to Shak ...
'' by Brian Vickers


References


Bibliography

* *


Further reading

* Murphy, Andrew (2003). ''Shakespeare in Print: A History and Chronology of Shakespeare Publishing''. Cambridge University Press. . * Maric, Jasminka, "Filozofija u Hamletu", Alfa BK Univerzitet, Belgrade, 2015. * Maric, Jasminka, "Philosophy in Hamlet", author's edition, Belgrade, 2018.


External links


Complete text of Shakespeare's plays
listed by genre, with other options including listing of all speeches by each character
Summaries of Shakespeare's plays
List of all 27 of Shakespeare's plays with summaries, and images of the plays being performed.
Complete list of shakespeare's plays with synopsis


Also publication years and chronology of Shakespeare's plays
Folger Digital Texts

Modern Translations, Study Guides, context and biography of William Shakespeare, of Shakespeare's plays, and his sonnets


A directory of Web resources for online Shakespearean study. Includes play synopses, a works timeline, and language resources.
Shake Sphere
Summary and analysis of all the plays, including those of questionable authorship, such as ''Edward III'', '' The Two Noble Kinsmen'', and '' Cardenio''.
''Shakespeare''
at the British Library – resource including images of original manuscripts, new articles and teaching resources. {{Shakespeare's plays, state=expanded Lists of plays