Last Plays Flashcards
Context 1
We know that Shakespeare strongly favored Susanna, since upon his death he willed her all of his property and most of his wealth. The strong connection Shakespeare felt with Susanna is worth noting in relation to his final plays. Between 1608 and 1612 he penned four plays about powerful, weary old men whose suffering and bad behavior is redeemed by their loving daughters. Possibly why this play steered from a tragedy to a romantic comedy filled ending, through losing his daughter Leontes spends the rest of his life regretting his past mistakes until he is reunited and redeemed by the love and acceptance of his daughter that he presumed dead
Critics
Jonson deemed as one of his rivals states that he felt that Shakespeare’s epic histories, which spanned long time periods and various geographies, compromised the tragic effect.
Genre
It was first printed at the end of the Comedies section in the First Folio in 1623. Stating it to seem more like a comedy than a tragedy like his other plays such as Romeo and Juliet. However, this play carries several genres such as comedy, tragedy, romance.
Inspiration
Shakespeare’s principal source was Robert Greene’s popular novella Pandosto: The Triumph of Time, first published in 1588 and then reprinted in 1607 as Dorastus and Fawnia. Although there are frequent linguistic echoes of Greene’s tale, Shakespeare changed the character names and introduced several alterations to the plot.
He makes Leontes’ suspicion of Hermione more groundless than in the original and revises the original story’s tragic ending: in Greene’s version, the Leontes character kills himself after discovering he has lusted after his own daughter. Possibly he changed this ending as he loved his daughter paternally and felt it was disrespectful to keep this same ending in shadow of his own daughter
Extra context
The bear used to maul antignous is speculated to be a real life bear adding fear to the audience as well as it being performed indoors at the Blackfriars causing certain lines and dramatic methods to seem more intimate and pronounced adding fear and lust into the audience as most plays were performed outside
