Most Read

Shakespeare and love

11 June 2006, 18:00 PM
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
By Prodip Kumar Dey Sylhet
11 June 2006, 18:00 PM
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) has a strong claim to be regarded as the greatest dramatist of all time. Perhaps the most significant thing about Shakespeare is that his plays deal with the wide variety of themes. One of the dominant themes of Shakespeare's play is love. In the comedies, love is at the heart of the plays. The plots usually deal with one, two, or even three lovers. Good, healthy, and happy relationships end in marriage used as a symbol of harmony and happiness. The capacity to give and receive love is what makes a hero or heroine in the comedies as witnessed by such characters as Orlando and Rosalind. In the tragedies, love is often defenceless against evil. Lady Macduff cannot stop either herself or her children from being murdered on the orders of Macbeth, despite her goodness and innocence. Cordelia is the only one of Lear's daughter, who really loves him, but her capacity for love does not save her life, and indeed she dies almost as a result of it. However, love is the basis of all decency and goodness in the tragedies.

Love can be a tremendous source of strength, but it can also become a force for evil. Lady Macbeth loves her husband, and it is possible that this love became perverted into desire to see him as a king at any cost. Othello loves his wife blindly but when it turns into jealousy by Iago it destroys both man and wife. Hamlet's love for his parents makes him cruel against his mother-"I must be cruel only to be kind".

In Shakespeare love is the ability to commit oneself utterly to the care and service of another person. It is shown as a prime human need, and even the most evil characters such as Goneril and Regan, sometimes fall in love. It is immensely strong, has vast powers of healing and reconciliation. Romeo and Juliet and Antony and Cleopatra are the evidence of Shakespeare's craftsmanship on love.

Google News LinkFor all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel.

Love between the friends also has been portrayed in Merchant of Venice, thus Shakespeare himself has shown deep love and respect for his friend in Sonnet-18, by immortalising him through his it.