Social And Historical Contexts In Literature English Literature Essay

Written by Sophocles as portion of a series ( 496-431 ) , the nature of Antigone, much like King Lear, can be seen as a calamity based on the supporters “ Hamartia ” or tragic defect frequently sing the surplus of a good quality. The nature of characters within both texts can basically be seen as the cardinal component to the plotline as most, if non all characters portion a relationship with one another, and the thought of surplus of quality finally becomes the cause of the characters downfall as the plot line progresses. One comparing that can be made between the two texts include that Antigone and King Lear are both centred on the thought that the nature of both texts are between political relations and relationships and the consequence the two have on each other ( with mention to Antigones ‘ lineage and Lears ‘ position ) . From the direct line of Oedipus, Antigone and the impression of the drama centres around a household expletive which impacts on the lives of those who are within that line. The nature of Antigone is considered peculiar in the sense that she does non suit in with the conventional “ diacetylmorphine ” factor, much like Cordelia in Lear who defy those superior to them in order to accomplish what they feel is in their best involvement. In the instance of Antigone, it is in respects to the entombment of her brother and what she believes is right. This incident sets the plot line for the drama, and so renders the province and single as juxtaposed. As a character, she is perceived as righteous and believes herself to be devoted to the Godhead Torahs of the Gods, which in bend allows for the drama to dramatize the VEX relationship between legality and justness. She is a free agent from the province as she is basically noncompliant against Creons orders, oppugning her duties to the province as a adult female and Lear ‘s duties to his land.

Like Antigone, King Lears major “ challenge ” puts frontward how to keep katharsis as the audience develops both a sympathetic mentality and deep revoltion at the same clip. The Elizabethans believed, or pretended to believe, that the natural universe reflected a hierarchy that mirrored good authorities and stable monarchy. The nature of King Lear ( like Antigone ) is centred on Lear ‘s battle with relationships with his girls, and current political personal businesss which necessarily become amalgamate together with the likes of Lears doppelganger Gloucester, and his boies Edgar and Edmund.

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King Lear involves Lear ‘s current province as an old adult male with the first scene of set uping about every important construct within the plot line. Act one besides emphasises similarities in both the places that Antigone and Cordelia are in as they are both entrapped within two state of affairss which finally consequence the patterned advance of the drama, every bit good as establishes Lears eventual decent into lunacy proposing that the dramas tragic stoping, like that of Antigone is foreseen. The character nature of Lear throughout the continuance of the drama alterations, with the supporter ab initio basking the power he has, and “ does non react good to expostulations, challenges or contradictions ” ( Richardson, I. 2005 ) . Initially Lear ‘s defects can be seen through his tragic flaw as he basically values his position above all yet does non desire to prosecute in needed duties. This can be seen as a comparative trait seen besides in Antigone, who goes against her duties as a adult female to the province, yet is obligated to her household and the entombment of her brother. However unlike Antigone, King Lear ‘s position is so demised drastically with the patterned advance of the drama when Lear so becomes more childish, animalistic and “ huffy ” peculiarly in scene ( Ed Friedlander 2005 ) when he runs out into the storm. This can be seen when ab initio he requests 100 knights to guard him, and they are so taken away from him by Reagan and Lear furies by saying “ O, ground non the demand! Our basest mendicants are in the poorest thing otiose. Allow non nature more than nature demands ; Man ‘s life ‘s every bit inexpensive as beast’saˆ¦ ( Richardson, I. 2005 ) .

The tragic nature of both King Lear and Antigone is emphasised throughout the drama as towards the latter Acts of the Apostless, the nature of the character begins to alter as the secret plan of the drama “ begins to inspissate ” . Imitation and mimesis are a cardinal construct within classical calamity. It is “ achieved by realistic scenes and word picture, which presents a valid moral point ” ( category press release, ENGL230, UOW ) . It besides assists audience members in associating to the characters presented on phase, and allows for constructs such as katharsis to be successfully achieved and the construct of a tragic drama to make its primary purpose. Both King Lear and Antigone are representations of the tragic, and successfully prosecute the audiences ‘ empathy, peculiarly for their supporters and their eventual ruin. Within King Lear, mimesis introduces the construct of Renaissance Humanism, which allows for imitation to be “ explored extensively for the apprehension of human mistake and self finding cause for characters and state of affairss to be easy related to by the audience ” ( Class press release, ENGL230, UOW ) . Most readers conclude that Lear is merely unsighted to the truth, as he already acknowledges his favouritism for Cornelia over both Goneril and Reagan oppugning the nature of his characters development and whether or non he learns from his past errors and develops farther into an basically “ better and more insightful human being ” ( Daughtry, D. 2005. ) . Lear creates his ain ruin as opposed to Antigone, whose destiny is sealed by the Gods, and from his actions he does non to the full retrieve his sense of saneness ; nevertheless he does emerge as a low person by the terminal of the drama who realizes that he loves Cordelia above everything else, including his right to govern as a male monarch one time more.

Antigones nature can be seen as that of the tragic hero ; nevertheless a clear contrast can be seen in the initial nature of both of the supporters as character development allows for comparings to be made against King Lear and Antigone. The tragic hero must hold a tragic defect to get down with, and in Antigones instance it can be argued that every bit opposed to King Lear, she does non externally display hubris, this is seen more in the nature of Creon. It is understood that Antigones ruin is a merchandise of self finding for her household and Godhead intercession from the Gods which affects the both of their results. Creon the male monarch besides plays a important function as much like the character of King Lear, can be seen as the 1 who suffers the most in the sense that he loses everything by the terminal of the drama including his boy and his married woman, merely as in King Lear. The construct of peripetia, the reversal of luck can besides be seen in the nature of the drama as although no one character benefits from what occurs, it seems that the nature of Antigone is that everybody is affected by the expletive, and no character remains able to triumph.

The production of Antigone and King Lear was set centuries apart, and is avoidable through the conventions of the contexts of the public presentation every bit good as those in which the drama was written. The usage of linguistic communication plays a important portion within Antigone and King Lear, as it basically establishes the drama and allows for the audiences perceptual experience and apprehension of what is happening on phase to develop. The huge difference over clip mostly impacts the Language within both Antigone and King Lear as it is apparent that linguistic communication has developed in order to bring forth more significance of what is being acted on phase to the audience, leting them to successfully see the calamity that is being played before them.

Unlike the complexness of the linguistic communication in King Lear, the linguistic communication and duologue of Antigone offers a much more simple and dialogic in the sense that it generates treatment and duologue with the audience. It is didactic and aims to convey or reason a point to the audience based on what the drama is approximately. The chorus is a important facet of Antigone as they convey the lineation of the drama to the audience, every bit good as act consequently with truth. This point is accepted by the audience rendering the chorus every bit flawed as they frequently do n’t picture the truth. The linguistic communication of Antigone nowadayss echt jobs to the audience and frequently inquiries the construct of social political relations doing the duologue of Antigone subject driven, less complex and more symbolic contrasting that of King Lear which is presented as more logical. Spoken duologue of the drama was besides apparently spoken more poetically and figuratively through similes such as “ Roused by Polynices to help his claim like an bird of Jove shouting with snow tipped wings and bloody claws and oral cavity agape ” . ( QUOTE )

The linguistic communication of King Lear is presented to the audience through persuasive and passionate addresss which Shakespeare has filled with symmetricalness, metaphor and rhetorical inquiries ( McEvoy, K. 2005. ) . Examples of this can be seen in the addresss of Lear ‘s girls and when they are professing their love to him. Significantly, Cordelia fails this trial of rhetoric as she can non show her feelings to her male parent adequately through linguistic communication, and the miscommunication between them sets the action of the drama into gesture. ( McEvoy, K. 2005. ) Dialogue in King Lear besides adds to the physique up of the audience ‘s psychotherapeutic experience as he weaves cagey and deep significance metaphors into the address.

Lear compares himself and Cordelia to “ birds in the coop ” and courtiers to “ aureate butterflies ” which give the position of the beautiful being contained and bring forth empathy for characters on the phase in peculiar Lear and Cordelia. This peculiarly occurs when Lear emerges with Cordelia ‘s organic structure and he states “ Howl, ululation, ululation, ululation! O, you are work forces of rocks: Had I your linguas and eyes, I ‘d utilize them so that Eden ‘s vault should check. She ‘s gone everlastingly! I know when one is dead, and when one lives ; she ‘s dead as Earth ” ( Richardson, I. 2005 ) . It severes any chance of a happy stoping and creates the ultimate tragic stoping of the drama. Addresss are frequently thematic and contain dramatic jibberish. Lears nice into lunacy is emphasized through his ramblings and those of the sap which demonstrates 3 beds at the same time and plays with the audiences desire to do significance from them. Lear and the fools non-sensical linguistic communication besides impacts storyline-decent into madness/psychological harm facets every bit good as besides create a helter-skelter effect/ confusion perchance on intent in order to ordain reason and the construct of a traumatic craze. Thus the linguistic communication within both texts is important to the overall secret plan line in the sense that without it, intending could finally be derived from the drama, get the better ofing its overall intent of being a calamity.

Significant contrasts and comparings can be made when detecting the intended audiences of both King Lear and Antigone, as both dramas emerge out of different societal and historical contexts. This allows for a series of different constructs and thoughts to be produced and performed to the audience based on the huge spread between contexts. Antigone can be considered as perchance the most influential of ancient texts/plays as it was winning in many competitions within Athens and draws in a series of constructs to make with the political relations and belief system of Ancient Greece. This was a drama that was designed to entertain the audience and was produced by Sophocles as portion of a series written during the aureate age for Athenian citizens of the 5th century ( BC ) every bit good as writers in Athens ( 480-404BC ) and was frequently produced to audiences at festivals and drama competitions. Such competitions included the festival the Great Dionysia, which was a festival devoted to calamities which were in high demand and popular. Sophocles was involved in assorted political activities including his function as commissioners crafting a response to the devastation of the Athenian expeditionary force in Sicily during the Peloponnesian War which would hold appealed to politically involved audience members merely every bit good as the general populace who were in support of this. Womans were non allowed to star in dramas, alternatively adult females were portrayed by male histrions have oning masks, a clear contrast to Shakespeare ‘s Lear where both male and female are cast within the drama. The context of Antigones tragic public presentation within the festival of City Dionysia meant that theater was an incorporate facet of the public life in Athens. Athenian theater was non limited to spiritual constructs, nevertheless a big figure of dramas were based and drawn from Grecian mythology as it was familiar to the audience and allowed for a displacement in focal point as the audience basically knows what will happen on the phase. Much like in Antigone, the intended audience of King Lear achieve a sense of cognizing what the secret plan line will eventuate into every bit early symbols and subjects within the dramas first portion intimation towards eventual calamity.

William Shakespeare ‘s original King Lear, was performed ab initio to a Jacobean and Elizabethan audience and can be considered is a dateless text of cosmopolitan relevancy. It was believed to be written circa 1605 with its first recorded public presentation on the 26 December in 1606 and was theatre orientated based more so on the folio version as opposed to the 4to. Its authoritative Grecian calamity construction has allowed for such textual inventiveness that even 400 old ages subsequently it is still studied as a modern-day text. Context plays a critical function in respect to the reading and grasp of any production or public presentation as it determines which facets and values within the original text will be highlighted or concentrated on. This can be seen through Grigori Kozintsev ‘s 1969 production and Sir Richard Eyre ‘s 1998 production of King Lear. ( Ed Friedlander 2005 ) Both Kozinstev and Eyre have adapted elements of the ‘Tragedy of King Lear ‘ in order to underscore the untypical natures of their single readings and readings and affect their single contexts. ( Ed Friedlander 2005 ) Shakespeare ‘s seventeenth century Jacobean/Elizabethan audience upheld the natural order of the existence, and had a stiffly graded category construction. It was associated with the Globe theater and West Minister Abbey and was presented to the audience on a thrust phase in order to make a sense of familiarity and to promote utilizing their imaginativeness to understand and acquire significance from the plot line. The impression of ‘divine rights of male monarchs ‘ ruled the province and along with the belief that human nature was the cardinal footing of society. King Lear besides demonstrates force and indignity more diagrammatically in Lear as opposed to Antigone, which demonstrates no in writing force at all as the audience, was more diverted by eyeglassess. The audience of this context would hence hold received Cordelia ‘s vocal indifference to Lear in, Act I Scene I, as an turbulence of natural order, and hence would hold predicted the at hand political, societal and intrinsic death of Lear and his Kingdom. ( McEvoy, K. 2005 )

The nature of King Lear and so its characters differs to those of Antigone, and is frequently deemed “ un-performable ” in the sense that it contains excessively many fickle and perchance assorted secret plan lines which are over overdone in nature, and have a series of unneeded and inconsistent characters. Reasons which support this include the usage of modern multiple characters ( Daughtry, D. 2005 ) that are used to play different parts doing them perchance non on phase at all times, and holding the capacity to make confusion. With this being said, Many modern-day authors of Lear such as Brooks believes, that Shakespeare has produced this drama for a society to ‘do what they like with ‘ and that the significance will be for the minute of the public presentation, and therefore representations of Lear will suit any hegemony, due to the timeless facets of human nature. ( Ed Friedlander 2005 )

The outgrowth of Shakespeare ‘s King Lear and Sophocles Antigone through different societal and historical contexts has so led to many comparings and contrasts to be made on both texts. One can reason that the nature of characters within the drama are so similar despite the huge clip period, every bit good as they both follow the impression of tragic characters, and similar background context finally effects the development of the character and so the result of the drama. The success of these dramas is due to the intended audience ‘s perceptual experience of the dramas and Shakespeare and Sophocles ‘ ability to bring forth a narrative which is understood and relates good to the audience through the method of moving and duologue which entreaties to the audience. Both dramas epitomise the construct of calamity and portray the narrative in a memorable and appealing manner through these issues, leting the audience to go captivated in the narrative blossoming on phase and emanate from a psychotherapeutic experience-purged.

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