This essay examines the conditions for translation into Swedish, and reception of Shakespeare’s dramatic works during the 19th century. By looking at the critical discussion around Shakespeare in Sweden from 1790 until 1850, and the biographies of several translators, the conclusion is that the Romantic movement was a crucial component in introducing his plays, as well as a modernization of political and literary culture after the French revolution. The essay also aims to tie a specific play – The Tragedy of Coriolanus, one of Shakespeare’s later tragedies – which was performed in Stockholm in 1866 to the political conditions of modernity, with its focus on class struggle and the taming of public opinion. The play dramatizes the for democracy as against aristocracy and tyranny – an issue well alive in the late 19th century. By situating the text of the play as a narratological homology for political and capitalist modernity, Shakespeare is brought into sharp relief as a thoroughly modern playwright, whose problems still concern us today.

The purpose of this study is to treat one aspect of Shakespeare's political views, his views on monarchy as found in the two great English history tetralogies, and to compare them to the monarchical views of his age.

The purpose of this thesis is to design the sets and costumes for William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night or What You Will adapting to the sixteenth century Italian commedia dell' arte style.

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In Shakespeare’s Othello, Othello faces societal pressures of racism as he marries Senator Brabantio’s White daughter Desdemona. This creates the main plot, and the villain of the play, Iago, plots against him which leads to the destruction of Othello’s reputable character. Othello is transformed into a violent, murderous husband by Iago’s villainous ploy fueled by using racial slurs, and Othello’s final form matches the name his enemies assign him. Stripping Othello of his name and portraying him as “the Moor”, a term used to describe a category of Black persons viewed as barbaric, is a tactic used throughout time and is rooted in historical strategies for identity destruction and racism. The reader witnesses this tactic in a play written some 400 years in the past, but the problem still lingers in America where racism is commonly expressed through “Speech Acts”. Just a short time ago, Paul Robeson, a famous actor of Othello, faced these same problems while pursuing his spot on the stage. In consideration of today’s time, the movement “Say His Name” started following the death of George Floyd only two years ago, and this signifies the persistence of racism alongside the importance of names. Using slurs or refusing to use a person’s rightful name is a form of racial identity destruction witnessed from Shakespeare’s time, to Paul Robeson’s portrayal of the character, and into America’s now as the phrase “Say His Name” has become a staple in the fight against police brutality on Black persons in America.

William Shakespeare and Margaret Cavendish each published plays and poems focusing on the precarious implications and cultural enactments of female chastity in their time. Their lives and writing careers bookend a time when chastity's place in English politics, religion, and social life was perceived as crucial for women while also being challenged and radically redefined. This paper engages in period-specific definitions of virginity and chastity, and with modern scholarship on the same, to explore the historicity of chastity and how representations of self-enforced chastity create opportunities for female political power in certain fiction contexts. Through a comparison of the female protagonists of Measure for Measure and Assaulted and Pursued Chastity—Isabella and Travellia—I argue that both characters are able to assert and gain practical forms of power within their respective systems of government, and not just in spiritual or economic spheres.

Shakespeare's play, The Merchant of Venice, is one of the most misunderstood plays in the playwright's canon. Although the play's popularity is evidence by its history of successful production, critics have looked with puzzlement at the drama because Shakespeare combined three tales having no apparent relationship into one play. The story of the man who is willing to give up his life for his friend, the tales of the caskets, and the love story of the Christian for the Jewess do have a common general theme of love. But there is another underlying theme which is significant to the meaning of the play--the theme which examines the importance of worldly wealth. In the Antonia/Bassanio story, wealth is important because it brings Antonio to the point of sacrifice. In the Bassanio/Portia tale, wealth has made the lady Portia desirable yet must have no importance to Bassanio when he chooses the casket. The Lorenzo/Jessica story demonstrates not only disregard for worldly wealth but the apparent squandering of it. There are also problems in the characters of Antonio and Shylock. Antonio's melancholy is difficult to explain, and Shylock has been interpreted in nearly as many ways as there have been actors who have played to part. All of these difficulties, including that of supposed disunity, are resolved when the play is examined in the atmosphere of its creation. The play historically was born to a nation struggling for material wealth. Its dramatic inheritance was that of the Christian religious tradition brought from the medieval times in the form of the miracle plays. The unifying element of the miracle cycles was the allegory of Christian salvation. And thus it is this same Christian allegory which unties The Merchant of Venice. The Christian allegory also defines in a satisfying way the specific love which each of the seemingly unrelated tales exemplifies. The allegory brings together the apparently dissimilar attitudes toward worldly wealth. I is within the Christian allegory that the roles of Antonio and Shylock, as well as all the minor characters, are precisely determined. It is the purpose of this study to delineate the Christian allegory and thereby identify the dominating and unifying theme of the play. It is the purpose of this study (1) to show that the play contains much of the symbolic allegory which was prevalent in the language of the Church in medieval times, (2) to demonstrate that the allegorical traditions are present in all parts of the play, and (3) to reveal that the Christian allegory makes all aspects of the drama contribute to the entirety of its effects.

In a study of the tragic elements in Shakespeare's comedies, it is necessary to distinguish between the tragic and the comic and to note their relationship, before considering the subject proper.

In As You Like It 5.4.107-08 we receive Rosalind returning as herself—a woman—no longer in the guise of Ganymede, the "boy" page. Her first lines upon returning are repetitive: "To you I give myself, for I am yours [To Duke Senior] / To you I give myself, for I am yours [To Orlando]." However, comparing Folio versions of these lines produces a provocative variant. In the third and fourth folios, these lines are no longer a repetitious patriarchal pledging, but a tender dialogic exchange—much like vows—between Rosalind and Orlando. While none of our modern Shakespeare editions make a note of this variant emendation, this article traces the editorial history and mystery surrounding As You Like It 5.4.107-08 from seventeenth-century editors to our modern ones—with an emphasis on the shift in Shakespeare editing during the eighteenth century—to suggest the variant emendation warrants consideration for text and performance. Furthermore, the article examines the plausibility of the third and fourth folio's emendation in congruence with Early Modern conceptions of companionate marriage, parental consent, and marriage rites.

In As You Like It 5.4.107-08 we receive Rosalind returning as herself”a woman”no longer in the guise of Ganymede, the boy page. Her first lines upon returning are repetitive: To you I give myself, for I am yours [To Duke Senior] / To you I give myself, for I am yours [To Orlando]. However, comparing Folio versions of these lines produces a provocative variant. In the third and fourth folios, these lines are no longer a repetitious patriarchal pledging, but a tender dialogic exchange "much like vows" between Rosalind and Orlando. While none of our modern Shakespeare editions make a note of this variant emendation, this article traces the editorial history and mystery surrounding As You Like It 5.4.107-08 from seventeenth-century editors to our modern ones with an emphasis on the shift in Shakespeare editing during the eighteenth century to suggest the variant emendation warrants consideration for text and performance. Furthermore, the article examines the plausibility of the third and fourth folios emendation in congruence with Early Modern conceptions of companionate marriage, parental consent, and marriage rites.