William Shakespeare: 400 years later
April 22, 2016
Katherine Eggert
To be or not to be considered the greatest English speaking writer is a question that
has been asked about William Shakespeare for hundreds of years and one that is
still being asked on the 400th anniversary of his death on April 23. But for those
who have studied the “Bard” the answer is simple, says Katherine Eggert (A-Gert), an
English professor and Shakespeare expert at CU-Boulder.
CUT 1 “To say he’s the greatest author well he’s the greatest to me. But I think the
fact that he is, relatively speaking, so widely read makes that statement a valid one.
(:14) He’s great and he’s widely read. And so does that combine into the greatest?
Perhaps so.” (:19)
Eggert says there are a number of things that make Shakespeare so unusual. One is
the fact that 400 years after his death he remains relevant even in non-English
speaking cultures.
CUT 2 that “His impact has been world wide. Shakespeare continues to have
relevance in cultures that really had no attachment to England. Shakespeare is big in
China. Shakespeare is big in Korea. (:14) Why is that so? Partly, I think, we have to
credit the extraordinary nature of Shakespeare’s plays. He’s got an extremely wide
range. He doesn’t write in a single genre. His work develops a lot over the course of
his long career. He wrote 37 plays.” (:31)
And another reasons he remains relevant, says Eggert, is that Shakespeare created
memorable characters.
CUT 3 “Shakespeare’s characters were recognized as being memorable. So Hamlet
and Falstaff, for example, were immediately popular. And other writers referred to
them. Shakespeare kind of went out of fashion a little bit soon after his death as
authors do. But he was picked up pretty fast in the 18th Century. (:20) And it was
precisely to put the plays on the stage. They were recognized as great theater
pieces. And it’s because of these memorable characters that people could identify
with.” (:30)
It is that language and the way Shakespeare uses it that makes his plays so
enduring, says Eggert.
CUT 4 “His language is unparalleled. Its complexity. Its poetry. Its inventiveness. Its
playfulness. Shakespeare is unlike any other dramatist of his time. (:14) And I think
the reason that is so is Shakespeare makes you think thoughts that you didn’t know
how to think before. Because his language takes risks. Because he’s addressing
universal situations but from angles that you never considered before.” (:30)
-CU-