Eliot was a man of conservative, right-wing views (recently his reputation has been affected by allegations of anti-Semitism in some of his work) and a believer in a variety of traditional values. In his criticism, he focuses on the concept of the objective correlative – by which he means that there should be a congruence between a dramatic character’s state of mind, the language used to refer to it and the reasons causing that state of mind. Famously, he relates this concept to the character of Hamlet and, noting the language used so brilliantly to describe his feverish imagination, concludes that the situation in which Hamlet finds himself is not sufficient to account for this great anguish. Hence, he finds, the play must be accounted a failure. As can be imagined, this has been a controversial conclusion and it has come in for a great deal of debate subsequently. To some extent, Eliot in his later years softened his earlier stance on this and other positions – but then again, many men find it impossible to sustain the rigorous positions they took when younger once they have been more fully infused with the sympathy for human frailties that often comes with age.

In other aspects of his criticism, most notably in the essay ‘Tradition and the Individual Talent,’ Shakespeare is recognised as the genius he is generally taken to be. In this essay, Eliot argues for the importance of placing literary works within not just the context of contemporaneous events but also in the context of previous works written about the same subject matter or in the same tradition. By drawing so frequently upon the works of the past, therefore, Shakespeare shows that he is not only conversant with the lessons of the past but is able to use commonly available material to indicate his own ideas and feelings about the way of the world. This is similar to Sir Isaac Newton’s famous dictum that, by following the properly observed scientific methods of past experiments, we are able to ‘stand on the shoulder of giants.’ Consequently, even with works primarily of romantic imagination, such as the Sonnets, are still rooted in the traditions of the past by the adoption (and indeed adaptation) of the sonnet style and structure.

Critics who take a Marxist viewpoint, therefore, look to see how Shakespeare was able to draw upon these ideas in his work and whether he was, so to speak, on the right side (i.e. the proletariat rather than the capital-owners). In this vein, therefore, Marxist critics of Shakespeare look at plays with revolutions or outbreaks of rebelliousness such as the first part of Henry VI and Julius Caesar and consider the reason for these events and the ways they are suppressed. They look at struggles between the high and mighty (for example in Coriolanus or Macbeth) as struggles for power by capitalists who only exist as viable members of society through suppression of the working classes. Repression takes place through Repressive State Apparatus (e.g. the use of force by police and army) and through Ideological State Apparatus (e.g. religion, worship of kings, education). Additionally, romances between characters are analysed in terms of their reliance upon economic factors rather than emotional factors such as love. Miranda in The Tempest, for example, falls in love with the first man she sees who is not her father or the monstrous Caliban – could such love have a meaningful human factor or is it a representation of Miranda’s desire to escape from a society dominated by her father and keen to take anyone as a husband for the sake of economic freedom? Similarly, the romance between the eponymous Henry V and the French princess may be considered as, instead of a tender romance between young lovers, a means by which the ruling classes reproduce power systems in the next generation by which they can continue to rule in the same way that they have done in the past.

Marxist critics will not that, coming several centuries before Marx was in fact born, it is hardly to be expected that Shakespeare would be able to elucidate all the complexities of the class struggle without access to Marxist thought. Consequently, this helps explains the other parts of the plays and poetry that do not work well with Marxist analysis. On the other hand, careful scrutiny of Shakespeare’s work as a whole has persuaded many influential critics that the author had no overwhelming philosophical position so much as he had understanding and sympathy for human beings in all walks of life.  

More voyages and events occur (somewhat reminiscent of what Henry Ford is supposed to have said about history that it was just ‘one damned thing after another’). Finally, more reversals enable Pericles to be reunited with his daughter and eventually his wife, who had taken up employment as a Priestess of Diana for lack of other opportunities. Consequently, the resolution is the reunion of the family which must be accorded a happy ending, even though audience members might wonder to themselves what kind of domestic bliss such a family might be expected to enjoy.

The play itself is thought to have been written sometime between 1603-8, since a published version from 1609 appears to be a garbled version relying on someone’s memory of a performance (although this is largely speculation). The fairly chaotic way in which the play has been put together has encouraged some people to believe that a collaborator may have been involved – then again, there are some people who are very willing to sense upon any excuse to argue that Shakespeare was not the author of almost any of his works.

The play was probably written shortly before its performance in 1611, although it may have been written sometime previously. By this time, James I had been ruling England, Wales and Scotland for some eight years and the country, newly united, was overcoming the trauma, rebellion and plague that marked the end of the Elizabethan era. Times were still interesting but had come to be a little more settled. Cymbeline himself was believed to have been one of the earliest kings of England, or at least a part of it, and was active during the Roman conquest and occupation. That he ends up reconciling his country with the Roman Empire and both resolve to live in peace together thereafter is perhaps a comment on the political settlement of the Stuart court.

The action centres on the character of Imogen, who is the daughter of Cymbeline and a deceased queen. A new step-mother queen has taken the place of Imogen’s mother and seems intent on sowing seeds of discord. However, Cymbeline does not need much encouragement in doing the same thing and determines that Imogen must marry the oafish Cloten, a son of the new queen. When Imogen reveals that she is already married to the virtuous but comparatively poor Posthumus Leonatus, the course of the action is set. Posthumus is banished and leaves his colleague Pisanio at the English court to represent his interests. Meanwhile, the devilish Roman soldier Iachimo wagers that he can seduce Imogen and contrives to have himself hidden in a chest in her bedchamber, from which he emerges to examine her sleeping form and steal a bracelet. With this as evidence, he attempts to have Imogen put to death by her husband. The faithful Pisanio intervenes and Imogen’s death is faked and she goes off to live under an assumed identity. Various kinds of sub-plots and adventures fill the stage before the ultimate resolution which resembles (prefigures, more accurately) an Agatha Christie story with Hercule Poirot gathering all the characters together in a circle and each one contributes her or his own little piece of knowledge to the conclusion. As discussed above, peace breaks out after all the bad guys conveniently die or repent or just shuffle off stage.

These features are common in the Romances: a semi-happy ending after a series of adventures and misadventures featuring numerous changes of scene and ups and downs. Numerous meanings may be found in the course of the play and there is, as the saying goes, something for everyone here.

The plot concerns the eponymous Athenian protagonist who is initially a rich and happy resident of the city. The play begins with a lavish party that Timon gives and during which he gives away gifts and money to his various guests. It is clear that Timon is known for this tendency and he basks in the friendship that he feels he receives as a result of his role of benefactor. Alas for him, the situation soon changes because his largesse leaves him with a cash flow problem and, when creditors arrive at the house demanding immediate payment, Timon dispatches his servants to ask for repayments from his friends. Inevitably, all of his so-called friends refuse to help and Timon is pitched out of his house. He resolves to live in the forest and adopts a misanthropic attitude as part of which he makes a variety of speeches condemning humanity, the people of Athens and the world in general.

Fortune changes again, however, since Timon stumbles across a hoard of underground treasure and is again rich. Athenian ambassadors, among others, come to try to tempt him to return to civilization but Timon is adamant in his misanthropy (despite receiving evidence of the genuine friendship of one Flavius, although this evidence is unfortunately compromised since Flavius is Timon’s servant). Instead, he gives the money to the rebel Alcibiades who will use it to conquer the city and to some sex workers who he hopes will spread venereal disease among the good citizens of Athens. Having achieved these last acts of churlishness, Timon dies with more curses on his lips and the play ends. There are some more sub-plots but these are so slight as to offer little to the body of the play.

Bertolt Brecht considered the play to be a form of experimental theatre and pointed out the unusual structure and ending in support of this claim. Although it is divided into the customary five acts and written in the conventional verse form, the division appears to be arbitrary and alternative means of organisation seem just as possible. However, it is difficult to imagine that any high profile staging of the play could be successful in the contemporary theatre.

The play is set in pre-Republican Rome times, with the city state contending with other Italian city states so as to establish hegemony over the Italian peninsula. Coriolanus (his name is an honorific awarded as the result of defeating the people of a city of the same name) returns to Rome in triumph, with many opportunities opening up to him. Alas for him and the people of Rome, he is a very patrician figure who professes to believe that personal honour, family loyalty and the unwillingness to compromise are appropriate traits in a commander. Alas further for the people of Rome, no better opposing figure is made available to prevent the rise of Coriolanus to positions of power: in a very prescient scene, Coriolanus decides to place the opinion of his (extraordinarily rich but badly-educated) mother above the obvious needs of the people. This being a tragedy (which is announced in the title), the audience will know that the bodies will soon start to be piled up across the stage.

Owing to the inevitable disruptions among the aristocracy, Coriolanus is exiled from Rome and hastens to join some enemy state (he is a real conservative, placing his own beliefs above those of expedience); his ability to join up with enemy armies leads to him threatening the safety of Rome itself at the head of enemy powers (the ability of Shakespeare to speak across the centuries is very evident here). Warfare continues and the poor, as ever, suffer the most as Coriolanus attempts to demonstrate that his ‘values’ are worth the deaths and misery of the unenfranchised poor. Pretty much the only positive aspect to be taken from the conclusion of the play is that the aristocrats again quarrel over the spoils of battle and Coriolanus is identified as an outsider and, hence, punished. Cutthroats (available in every country in every era) are hired to silence Coriolanus. Violence leads to more violence.

As the Pharaoh of Egypt, Cleopatra is ruler of an extremely powerful nation, not just in respect to its historical and cultural legacy but because Egyptian corn and grain fed the Roman state – who controlled Egypt controlled the Empire to a considerable extent. Marc Antony was previously seen in Shakespearian terms as the ultimate victor of the Tragedy of Julius Caesar – Octavius may become the first emperor but Antony is the real hero of the (disastrous) conservative counter-revolution. In this play, written probably around 1606, Antony has left the other members of the triumvirate and travelled to Egypt to secure it for their personal interests. Once there, he fell in love with Cleopatra, whom he describes in extravagant terms (‘Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale her infinite variety’) which nevertheless indicate that she is a mature woman rather than the young woman to whom romantic literature is conventionally aimed. For Cleopatra, the situation is more complex: Antony represents a possibly safe harbour for her people who might otherwise be eaten up by wolfish invaders and, as a woman alone on the throne, being able to call upon such a man would be a definite advantage. A further dimension to the thematic structure of the play is provided by the contrast between Egypt and Rome: Cleopatra embodies on a personal nature the people of Egypt in a way which Shakespeare’s audience would have identified as pre-modern; Antony, on the other hand, was a powerful influencer of Rome’s destiny but not the embodiment of it and this, by contrast, would seem to the Shakespearian audience as modern. Yet both pre-modern and modern protagonists enter into tragedy because of the personal relationship between them. Death is inevitable, of course.

The narrative structure of Antony and Cleopatra is very complex – the action dashes back and forth across the Mediterranean with battles and the actions of the ‘Great Men’ previously thought to determine historical progress intertwined with the personal lives of the major characters (this play is one of reasons why it has become to suggest that, were Shakespeare alive today, he would be writing television series such as The Wire or maybe the new Battlestar Galactica). If there is a lesson to be learnt from Antony and Cleopatra, it is (as recurs in the Late Comedies), that compromise is not just necessary for the survival of the human species but is in fact the only ethical response to life and society.

The play opens in front of Madea’s house in Corinth with the nurse of Madea and Jason’s two children lamenting the fact that Madea’s husband has taken a royal bride, the daughter of Creon. Madea, the nurse tells, spends her nights mourning and raging, calling on the vows that she and Jason spoke together. The nurse reveals her fear that Madea may do something horrible to the children, because she looks at them hatefully. The children’s tutor comes out with the children and tells the nurse that Creon is going to banish Madea and her two children. The tutor tells the nurse not to let Madea know. She agrees and tells the tutor to get the children out of sight for fear that Madea may see them and fly into one of her common rages.  He leaves  and Madea is heard inside lamenting her plight.

Her husband has betrayed her, broken their vows. She shouts that she  A chorus comes by the comfort her. The nurse tells them what has happened. The chorus and the nurse hear Madea calling on Themis and Artemis for revenge. The nurse, afraid tells the chorus that her mistress will do something horrible, very soon.  The chorus wonders if Madea will see them. The nurse goes in to get Madea. She comes out and confides in her friends, lamenting the fact that she is not only a woman, but a foreigner with no family. She reveals that she killed her brother to marry Jason.  The chorus sympathizes with her. While they are speaking, Creon comes up and tells her that she and her children are banished. Madea begs him to let her stay one day to arrange some kind of provision for her children. Creon reluctantly agrees.  When Creon leaves Madea tells the chorus that she will kill both the king and his daughter by poison. She swears by Hecate, the goddess of witchcraft that Jason will not go unpunished.

After she has finished speaking, Jason comes over to her and tells her that he married Creon’s daughter for Madea’s own good and for the good of their sons. He tells her that she should have been greatful. She retorts and tells him that if it was really for their good, he would have consulted her first and asked for her blessing. Jason retorts by saying that women only care about their night life and if it is no good, they feel wronged. Madea reminds him that she saved his  life when he was searching for the golden fleece. He returns that the goddess of love Cypris saved his life, giving Madea no credit and writing her off as crafty to try to say so. He offers to provide for the children. Madea refuses his help. He leaves her.

King Aigeus of Athens comes to visit Madea. She tells him of her toubles and begs him to give her a safe haven at his palace. She makes him swear by all the gods to protect her if Jason or Creon come to try to drag her away. He swears and leaves.

Madea then plots how to murder the princess and king with the chorus. She comes up with a plan to summon Jason and apologize. She also decides to get her children to beg the princess not to send them into exile with their mother. She poisons a dress and diadem and decides to have the children deliver them; Madea also reveals that she will kill her children. She sets her plan in motion. Jason comes at her request and does not see through her apology. After a brief hesitation, he allows the children to take the dress and diadem and petition the

Some time later the tutor comes to Madea telling her of what happened to the princess. He explains that the woman was burned to death by the poison on the dress and diadem and when her father came to embrace the remains of his daughter, he became stuck to the dress and died with her. Madea is overjoyed. She now finishes the last of her plan. The  chorus begs her not to kill her children, appealing to her mother’s heart. Madea kills them anyway. Jason comes up to Madea’s place and meets the chorus. The chorus tells him that his two sons are dead. He opens the door and sees Madea in Helios’ chariot drawn by dragons. The bodies of their children are in the chariot with her.

 She gloats in her triumph, feeling pain at her children’s death; she refuses to allow him to touch, keep, or bury the bodies of the children and fly’s away in the chariot, promising to atone every year for their blood guilt. Jason calls the gods to witness how he has been wronged and the play ends.

 The play is set in Thebes. Oedipus, whose name means swollen foot, has recently been elected king. He has solved the Sphinx’s riddle and saved the town, thereby winning his right to be king and marry the queen Jocasta. The riddle: “What is it that walks on four feet and two feet and three feet and has only one voice; when it walks on most feet, it is weakest?” Oedipus’ reply was man: when we are children we crawl on all fours, when we are adults we walk on two feet, when we are old we use a cane. 

The town’s people are thrilled with Oedipus until the next disaster comes. There cattle are dying, the woman are dying in child birth and giving birth to stillborn babies, the crops are not growing, people are dying everywhere. It is in this context that the first scene opens. The priests and supplicants come to Oedipus. He asks a priest to be the spokes person for the people. The priest begs Oedipus to do something about the plague. He recalls how Oedipus relieved the town of the Sphinx and asks the king to come up with a plan to rid them of this new trouble. Oedipus reveals that he has been thinking long and hard on the subject, devoting nights to it. He tells the people that he has sent his brother’s wife, Creon, to see Apollo’s Oracle at Delphi.

It turns out, that Creon is late, but according to Oedipus, “today’s the day” he will return, (Fagles 575). Just as the priest and king are talking, Creon arrives wearing a laurel with bright berries, signifying that he has good news. The king greets him and asks him what the god has told him. Creon at first is hesitant to share what the Oracle has spoken in front of the townspeople, priests, and supplicants. The king instructs him to speak and let everyone hear him. Creon then tells the listeners that Apollo requires that they find and rid themselves of Laius’s murder. Laius was the king before Oedipus.  The priests began to pray and Oedipus jumps on the mystery immediately.  He addresses the entire town of Thebes, the Chorus, and states that they will only find relief when they find the old king’s murder. He tells them to speak up if they know anything at all about the murder. No one answers. Seeing this, Oedipus curses the murder condemning him to a lifetime of exile in agony, and he adds that if the murder lives with him in the castle, that the same curse fall on himself as well.

A leader of the people speaks up and swears that he is not the killer. He also tells Oedipus of a prophet in the land: Lord Tiresias.  Oedipus tells the leader that he has sent two escorts in the same hour. Finally, after a long wait, Tiresias comes before the king. His words are not pleasing. The blind prophet, led by his guide boy tells the king that he will not reveal that he knows. Oedipus is enraged and lights into the blind man. The prophet and the king go back and forth until Oedipus accuses the prophet of murdering the old king. It is then that the blind prophet reveals that Oedipus is the murder that he seeks, the blight on the land. Oedipus again becomes enraged and accuses Creon of conspiring against him with the prophet. The prophet tells Oedipus that his marriage and his children are horrors. Oedipus in a rage tells the prophet to leave and returns to his castle. He misses the prophet’s crucial words: the man reveals that the town’s people may think that Oedipus is a stranger, but he is really Theban born. He also says that Oedipus will not find joy in this revelation, because he will be revealed as both brother and father to his children, and son and husband to his wife.

Creon hears of Oedipus’ hurtful accusation and confronts the king. Oedipus remains stubborn in his view, but his wife Jocasta comes in and tries to soothe the two men. Creon leaves the palace. Jocasta learns a little bit about the fight from the Chorus, but not what the two men said.

Oedipus tells his wife about what the blind prophet said about him. She scoffs and tells him that her former husband, Laius went to see the Oracle as well. It told the Laius that his son would kill him. Jocasta reassures him that this did not come to pass because they put the boy on Mount Cithaeron to die with his ankles fastened.  She concludes that there is nothing to worry about. Her words strike a chord in Oedipus when she says that the king was killed at a place where three roads meet on Cithaeron.  He interrogates her, asking her to be precise.  She informs him that it was in a place called Phocis where to two roads meet, one from Daulia and one from Delphi. He asks her how long ago it was. She tells him that as soon as Laius was reported dead, Oedipus showed up and solved the riddle and became king.

Oedipus is deeply troubled by this new information. He asks his wife to describe the king to him. She tells him that the king was on a wagon with a herald and an armed guard.  He is even more disturbed. He tells his wife that he thinks that he has called down a dreadful curse on himself and his family. Oedipus asks his wife exactly where she heard this story and she tells him of the servant who alone survived the attack on the king.  He asks where the man is now and Jocasta reveals that she sent him away at his request after he saw Oedipus on the throne. Oedipus demands that an escort be sent to bring him back, quickly. Jocasta, still feeling at ease, does as he says.

Oedipus explains his worries to her. He recounts his lineage, telling her that his Polybus, king of Corinth and Merope are his parents. He also reveals that once at a banquet, a drunken man told him that the king and queen of Corinth were not his real parents. Disturbed by this outburst, Oedipus tells Jocasta that he went to the Oracle at Delphi to find out. Apollo, he tells her, spurned him and told him that he was fated to marry his mother and produce incestuous children. It also told him that he was doomed to kill his father. After hearing that, he continues, he ran from Corinth to keep the prophecy from coming true.

He then reveals that as he was making his way toward the triple crossroad where the king died, he saw a herald, a wagon, and a man sitting on a bench in the wagon. The man, he reveals was very much like the King Laius Jocasta described. He tells Jocasta that the men were going to force him from the path and that the driver struck him in the head, rousing his anger. He kills everyone except one survivor. Now afraid, tells his wife of the curse: no one can welcome him into their house and he is to wander in exile.

Jocasta tries to get him to drop his worries. The old servant, she assures him, told her that thieves attacked the king, not a single man. Jocasta then goes out to pray with the Chorus. While they are praying a messenger from Corinth shows up with news that Oedipus’ father Polybus is dead and has left him the kingdom.

Jocasta, overjoyed tells her husband. He shares his fear about accidently murdering his father and marrying Merope. He reveals that this is the reason he ran from Corinth. Hearing this, the messenger reveals that Merope and Polybus were not his birth parents.

Slowly the story surrounding Oedipus’ birth and family unfolds. He learns that he was left on Mount Cithaeron with his ankles bound. The messenger tells him that a shepherd gave Oedipus to him. Oedipus learns that the servant belonged to Laius.  Jocasta hears this and suddenly turns.  She begs Oedipus to call off the search for the murder. He refuses. Jocasta runs into the castle.

The shepherd servant of Laius finally arrives. Oedipus questions him and learns that his wife gave the child to him and told him to bind his ankles and leave him on Cithaeron. He learns that the shepherd servant took pity on the babe and gave him to the messenger from Corinth. He learns that the messenger gave him to Polybus and Merope.  Oedipus asks the shepherd straight out who the child’s father was. The shepherd, regretting to tell it to him finally says that Laius is the father. With this the mystery is solved.  With this the prophecy of the Oracle comes full circle. He has killed his father. He has married his mother and they have four children.

In agony, he rushes into the castle, asking for his sword. The servants do not go near him. Jocasta hangs herself once she puts the pieces together. Taking her down from the beam, Oedipus takes two brooches from her robes and gouges his eyes out with them, dooming himself to wander blind, in exile, in suffering.  Creon returns to the castle and takes over the affairs of the kingdom. Oedipus begs him to take care of his daughters, Antigone and Ismene. He hugs them one last time and Creon banishes Oedipus from the kingdom, giving Oedipus no promise concerning his daughters

Returning victorious from a battle, Macbeth comes across a coven of three witches, who prophesy that he will become first Thane of Cawdor (this is an aristocratic title) and then king. Macbeth’s instinct is to ignore this and continue to act as a loyal and virtuous servant of the king. However, his composure is rocked when a messenger arrives almost immediately thereafter to inform him that King Duncan has indeed made him Thane of Cawdor, as the previous incumbent expired heirless. Macbeth informs his wife of the events but is in an agony of indecision over what to do. His wife is much more enthusiastic to embrace the apparent destiny and persuades her husband to take action (‘screw your courage to the sticking place’). This action is to murder Duncan, who is conveniently coming to stay at the Macbeth castle. Macbeth is finally convinced and kills the king and places the blame on innocent servants by planting the bloody dagger on them. He immediately has the servants killed in an attempt to close the case. This, however, proves impossible. Although he is crowned king, Macbeth finds himself becoming increasingly tyrannical in the attempt to suppress suspicions and eventually rebellion. His wife, meanwhile, cannot forget the murders and begins suffering nightmares about the act (‘Is this a dagger I see before me?”) and acting in an obsessively compulsive way by trying to wash imaginary blood from her hands (‘Out, damned spot’). It is clear that this is all going to end very badly.

The language and action of the play is extremely disturbing and full of a sense of claustrophobic evil. The witches are said to have genuine magic spells as part of their dialogue and, at one stage, a mysterious third murderer appears who may be a manifestation of the devil. Partly because of this, the play has a reputation for being so unlucky that actors will not even speak its name (it is called ‘the Scottish play’) for fear of bringing down some form of ill luck on themselves. Then again, there is another story that Macbeth was used as a kind of emergency fall back play when audiences were too small to support the actors’ wages. However, this is a much less entertaining tradition.