Ophelia is a minor female character in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, but she has an important role by being a foil for all the corrupted characters in the play. She comes from an aristocratic Danish family, being that daughter of the king’s chief-counsellor, Polonius. She also has a brother called Laertes, who...

“Twelfth Night” is one of the finest comedies to have ever been created by Shakespeare. The play tells the story of the twins Viola and Sebastian. Shakespeare investigates the phenomenon of gender swapping. For the most part, Viola is dressed as a man. Comedy is derived exactly from this confusion...

The images of beauty and love in western poetry are pretty stereotypical, and the Shakespearean sonnet seems to be just as stereotypical a way to tell of a woman’s beauty as are those images. A sonnet has a form that needs to be met in order to call itself a...

On the surface, the first couple of scenes of Shakespeare’s comedy A Midsummer Night’s Dream strike a modern audience as oddly regressive with regard to gender relations. One of the primary themes, male domination, is readily apparent within the first scene. In a matter of lines, utmost obedience to one’s...

IntroductionIn his play, Much Ado About Nothing, William Shakespeare shows that although friends and family may play a role in influencing romantic choices, people ultimately choose whom they will fall in love with themselves. Protagonists Claudio and Beatrice attempt to match up their friends Beatrice and Benedick, although the two...