Shakespeare: A Tribute
"The first page I read made me a slave to Shakespeare for life."
"Whether or not the honor of being the originator falls to Sheakespeare, it was he who raised this type of drama to a level that we must still take to be the highest, totally beyond the imagination of most. And so there is little chance that anyone will match, much less surpass him."
"[Shakespeare] form[s] human beings feature by feature, but on a colossal scale- that is why we don't recognize them as our brothers. Then he brings them to life by breathing his spirit into them."
"Nature proclaims her wisdom through Shakespeare."
Meaning by Shakespeare
The first segment of this article takes an in-depth look at an interaction with Hamlet and Ophelia, following the play within a play, The Murder of Gonzago. The author discusses Hamlet's syntax and the various meanings behind his response to Ophelia.
Below are some relevant quotes from the second segment of the article.
"Like it or not, all we can ever do is use Shakespeare as a powerful element in specific ideological strategies"
"These essays rest on a principle which, undertaken in the spirit of Hamlet's corrosive play on 'meaning' also involves a reconsideration of the word 'by'."
"The plays have the same function as, and work like, the words of which they are made. We use them in order to generate meaning."
"Shakespeare doesn't mean: we mean by Shakespeare."
The last two segments of the article further explore the idea that meaning in Shakespeare is made, as opposed to found.
