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Jack Jones's avatar

Hello, I am new to Shakespeare, I am however a bible scholar, and quickly saw how this incredible writer as you stated, held up a mirror to the society around him. The corruption, greed, lust, ambition and vanity. His plays to me anyway, seem like divinely orchestrated retelling of Saul/David, Samson and Delilah or a myriad of characters in kings. The book of Job is in there as to Judas betrayal (do you betray the son of man with a kiss? - I see Goneril flattering the father she will ultimately betray). If you have not read the Holy Bible page to page (as Shakespeare himself did) please do. Reading it in the King James version also presents it in a similar tongue to the Bard. It continually makes me smile as one going in a linear direction to arrive at Shake spear (a blessing for sure!) to then circle back to my favourite of all literature, and have to remind myself the former did indeed come before the latter, even though at times it can even look the reverse! A prophet of his time and yet another quill of the ultimate stage Director (God), Shakespeare affronts what is around him, holding the hounds nose to its urine, and then rubbing to reveal the stench. Pockets of light emerge, often to be drowned by the darkness,, but to remerge at a later date, the light shines in the darkness but the darkness did not understand it

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Zach Kirshner's avatar

Excellent essay! Although I wish you had spent more time on my favorite character Prospero. So much to be said about the way he battles with the dualities of being human: good vs. evil, forgiveness vs. redemption, the corpus vs. the spirit.

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