William Shakespeare Stories, Sivapradayini [ebook reader 8 inch txt] 📗

Love’s Labour’s Lost – Happy ending

The play's central comic device is that four young men, dedicated to study and the renunciation of women, meet four young women and inevitably abandon their unrealistic ideals.
The play opens as
Ferdinand, the king of Navarre, and three of his noblemen—Berowne (Biron), Longaville, and Dumaine (Dumain)—

debate their intellectual intentions.
Ferdinand
Berowne
Longaville
Dumaine

Their plans are thrown into disarray, however, when the Princess of France, attended by three ladies (Rosaline, Maria, and Katharine),

arrives on a diplomatic mission from the king of France and must therefore be admitted into Navarre's park.
The gentlemen soon discover that they are irresistibly attracted to the ladies. Their attempts at concealing their infatuations from one another are quickly exploded. Their next and more considerable problem, however, is to cope with the young ladies' devastating wit, through means of which the gentlemen are thoroughly put down. Adding to this romantic landscape, Shakespeare provides a group of entertaining eccentrics: Nathaniel (the curate), Holofernes (a schoolmaster), Dull (the constable),
Costard (the clown), Mote (or Moth, a page), and Jaquenetta (a country girl).

Linking both groups is Don Adriano de Armado, a Spanish grandee whose absurd pretensions to poetic eloquence and love melancholy are squandered on the wench Jaquenetta. The play ends with a brilliant coup de théâtre in the arrival of Marcade: his news of the death of the French king introduces into the never-never land of Navarre a note of sombre reality that reminds both the young ladies and the gentlemen that wooing and marriage entail serious responsibilities.
Shakespeare's deliberate abstention from the customary “and they all lived happily ever after” conclusion of the genre is remarkable: “Jack hath not Jill.” To be sure, the audience is given a promise that the marriages will ultimately take place, after the gentlemen have had a year to think about themselves and come to maturity. Thus, the play ends with hope—perhaps the best kind of happy ending.


The Comedy of Errors – Happy ending

The play's comic confusions derive from the presence of twin brothers, unknown to each other, in the same town. Its twists of plot provide suspense, surprise, expectation, and exhilaration and reveal Shakespeare's mastery of construction.
Egeon, a merchant of Syracuse, is arrested in Ephesus because of hostilities between the two cities and, unable to pay the local ransom, is condemned to death. He tells the duke, Solinus, his sad tale: years earlier he and his wife had been shipwrecked with their infant sons, identical twins, and a pair of infant servants, also identical twins.
The parents, each with a son and a servant, were rescued but then permanently separated.
Antipholus of Syracuse, the son raised by Egeon, has for five years been seeking his mother and brother, while Egeon in turn has been seeking his missing son. Egeon's story wins from Solinus a day's respite to raise the ransom money.
Meanwhile, Antipholus of Syracuse (with his servant, Dromio)

has arrived in Ephesus, not knowing that his brother Antipholus of Ephesus (with his own servant, also named Dromio) is already there.
A series of misidentifications ensue. Antipholus of Syracuse is entertained by his brother's wife and woos her sister; he receives a gold chain meant for his brother and is chased by a goldsmith for nonpayment. He and his servant hide in a priory, where they observe Egeon on his way to execution and recognize the priory's abbess as their mother, Emilia. The play ends happily with Egeon's ransom paid, true identities revealed, and the family reunited.
Note: Name of the twin sons is Antipholus and name of the twin servants is also Dromio

Julius Caesar – Sad ending – Problem and tragedy

Written in 1599 (the same year as Henry V) or 1600, probably for the opening of the Globe Theatre on the south bank of the Thames, Julius Caesar illustrates similarly the transition in Shakespeare's writing toward darker themes and tragedy. It, too, is a history play in a sense, dealing with a non-Christian civilization existing 16 centuries before Shakespeare wrote his plays. Roman history opened up for Shakespeare a world in which divine purpose could not be easily ascertained.
The characters of Julius Caesar variously interpret the great event of the assassination of Caesar as one in which the gods are angry or disinterested or capricious or simply not there. The wise Cicero observes, “Men may construe things after their fashion, / Clean from the purpose of the things themselves” (Act I, scene 3, lines 34–35).
Human history in Julius Caesar seems to follow a pattern of rise and fall, in a way that is cyclical rather than divinely purposeful. Caesar enjoys his days of triumph, until he is cut down by the conspirators; Brutus and Cassius succeed to power, but not for long. Brutus's attempts to protect Roman republicanism and the freedom of the city's citizens to govern themselves through senatorial tradition end up in the destruction of the very liberties he most cherished. He and Cassius meet their destiny at the Battle of Philippi. They are truly tragic figures, especially Brutus, in that their essential characters are their fate; Brutus is a good man but also proud and stubborn, and these latter qualities ultimately bring about his death. Shakespeare's first major tragedy is Roman in spirit and Classical in its notion of tragic character. It shows what Shakespeare had to learn from Classical precedent as he set about looking for workable models in tragedy.
Based on Sir Thomas North's 1579 translation (via a French version) of Plutarch's Bioi parallēloi (Parallel Lives), the drama takes place in 44 BC, after Caesar has returned to Rome. Fearing Caesar's ambition, Cassius forms a conspiracy among Roman republicans. (For Caesar's view of Cassius, see video.) He persuades the reluctant Brutus—Caesar's trusted friend—to join them. Brutus, troubled and sleepless, finds comfort in the companionship of his noble wife, Portia. Caesar's wife, Calpurnia, alarmed by prophetic dreams, warns her husband not to go to the Capitol the next day (for Caesar's response, see video). Then, as planned, Caesar is slain in the Senate on March 15, “the ides of March.” His friend Mark Antony, who has expediently shaken the bloodied hands of the conspirators, gives a stirring funeral oration that inspires the crowd to turn against them. Octavius, Caesar's nephew, forms a triumvirate with Antony and Lepidus; Brutus and Cassius are eventually defeated at the Battle of Philippi, where they kill themselves to avoid further dishonour.
Caesar ‘s wife Calpurnia
Caesar’s nephew Octavius
Brutus wife Portia

The Two Noble Kinsmen- Sad ending

Theseus, duke of Athens

, is preparing to marry Hippolyta, queen of the Amazons

, accompanied by her sister, Emilia, and his friend, Pirithous, when he is called upon to wage war on the corrupt Theban king, Creon. Palamon and Arcite, two noble nephews of Creon, are captured.
As they languish in prison, their protestations of eternal friendship stop the instant they glimpse Emilia through a window, and they quarrel over her. Arcite is unexpectedly released and banished, but he returns in disguise; Palamon escapes with the help of the lovelorn Jailer's Daughter. The youths continue quarreling over Emilia, and, when Emilia is unable to choose between them, Theseus announces a tournament for her hand—the loser to be executed.
Arcite wins but is killed in a fall from his horse. Before he dies, the two young noblemen are reconciled, and Arcite bequeaths his bride to his friend. Meanwhile, the abandoned Jailer's Daughter, distraught from love for Palamon and fear for her father's safety, goes mad. She is saved by a devoted but unnamed Wooer, who courts her disguised as Palamon.
The theme of love versus friendship is evident throughout the play, as is the recurring chivalric ideal, demonstrated by the cousins' generosity of spirit even as they prepare to fight to the death.

Publication Date: 06-29-2010

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Dedication:
Pavithra My dear sister