The
language of Shakespeare
Shakespeare was very creative
in the way he used language. The correct use on language and the exhibition of
the social condition through specific use of language was a fact in the Tudor
period but Shakespeare used language to describe more specifically his
characters. He uses language as a game and changes syntax and chooses vocabulary
according to his dramatic purposes. He makes use of a rhetorical devices such as
hyperbole,
metaphors or phonetic games to bring to his plays the order and
harmony of the political system. During the Elizabethan period, the English
language was still in the process of fixation. That fact gave Shakespeare and
his contemporary playwrights the possibility to be more creative when using the
language in his writing.
The period in which
Shakespeare wrote is a time when there is a clash between language and reality.
Poetry is more a work of imagination than a representation of reality.
Several critics consider that
the use Shakespeare makes of language constructs his criticism and establishes a
difference between his speech and the colloquial use of language. Shakespeare
makes up words, coins others, uses Latin expressions wrongly and makes phonetic
games with words giving more than one meaning to a word used in the same
context.
In the
Elizabethan period there was an intense linguistic consciousness and that in
turn influenced the development of the language of the Elizabethan drama. In
Elizabethan drama the language of the dialog becomes more personal than ever
before, and represented the ordinary speech in being spontaneous and natural.
The use
of Rhetoric and colloquial style at the same time was not a contradiction as
rhetoric in the sixteen century formed part of a the language people spoke in
the street when using proverbs and puns and it could be understood by a varied
large number of people. Also, at the same time, playwrighters used rhetoric as a
source of parody and confusion, and Shakespeare used language words which have
different meanings. Shakespeare uses
rhetoric to criticize the extensive usage
but also to show its potentiality always making use of the colloquial language.
He creates new words based on the ordinary spoken language and uses Latin to
make fun of some characters who he criticises. He innovates language based on
every day words extending their meanings through metaphors or emphasizing some
of the less frequent elements.
Sources:
Visited 28 December 2008
http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/eng366/lectures/poetry.htm
Visited 05 January 2009
Visited 17 December 2008