Shakespeare’s Characters
Shakespeare’s characters are considered to be universal; they are not limited to a specific time or place but are universal.
Here we will look into characters in different plays of Shakespeare and compare the list of characters in each play of Shakespeare (not covering all).
Brothers
There are two brothers in each character list in the following plays by Shakespeare:
Out of these five plays, only one has brothers who are not harming each other. In the remaining four plays, a brother is against the other brother, and in two plays, brothers are illegitimate.
In the three plays in which brothers show ill feelings, it is, in my opinion, the feeling of jealousy, which will be explained later.
In one play, ill feelings toward a brother are due to fulfilling materialistic desires.
Plays with the names of brother characters
Much Ado About Nothing
Don John is the illegitimate brother of Don Pedro.
He envies his brother’s social authority.
As you like it
Oliver is envious of Orlando and admits that he abhors his brother without any reason.
Hating a blood relative or a close relative without any reason shows jealousy.
King Lear
Edmund is the illegitimate brother of Edgar and plans to snatch Gloucester’s possessions from Edgar.
Hamlet
Claudius the king kills his brother Hamlet (senior), marries his wife, and becomes king. To fulfill his desires, he killed his brother.
Comedy of errors
Antipholus of Syracuse and Antipholus of Ephesus are twin brothers.
Dromio of Syracuse and Dromio of Ephesus are twin brothers.
Kings in Shakespeare’s plays
Shakespeare’s character list includes kings in his many plays.
He wrote about kings and queens. Maybe because of their huge impact on people, their effect is greater on people than that of the common man. Many can be inspired by kings and queens because they have authority.
Three plays by Shakespeare show kings with different attributes; these characters can be viewed as symbolic universal characters. Through kings in his dramas, it can be extracted that kings are also common men with authority and that they too have feelings like common men, which can affect kings; they could be bad or good.
Hamlet
King Claudius is the king who, for his own desires, killed his brother, and further, when he was frightened about his secrets opening, he decided to kill his nephew Hamlet.
Love’s Labour Lost
Ferdinand King of Navarre is a scholar and has taken the oath to maintain his scholarship for three years, but he could not keep his words and broke the oath when he fell in love with a princess.
This shows King’s weak side; he could not keep his words.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Obero, the king of fairies, is shown in the play with a desire for revenge on his wife, and he acts irregularly and offhandedly.
It would be difficult for an inconsistent King to deliver justice.
Servants and comical characters
Many plays by Shakespeare have characters that fall under the categories of both servants and comical characters. Some of these characters are mentioned below:
Love’s Labor Lost
Boyet is a comical character and attendant.
Costard is a clown.
The Merchant of Venice
Launcelot Gobbo is a servant and clownish figure.
Much Ado About Nothing
Margaret is a serving woman and makes jokes.
The Comedy of Errors
Dromio is a humorous character and is a slave in the play.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Puck is a jester.
As you like it
Touchstone is a clown in court.
Twelfth Night
Malvolio is a head servant.
Feste is the clown or fool.
Notable female characters’ fathers
It is noteworthy that many plays by Shakespeare have the character of a father for notable female characters. Below are a few examples.
Polonius is the father of Ophelia, who is a notable character in the play Hamlet.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Egeus is the father of Hermia.
Much Ado About Nothing
Leonato is the father of another notable lady named Hero.
As you like it
Duke Frederick and Duke (senior) are the fathers of Celia and Rosalind, respectively.
This is the observation that some types of characters are almost always seen in every play by Shakespeare. He has created many kings in his plays, like servants, comical characters, kings, and fathers of notable female characters.
What I think is that the servants in his play show that his characters are mainly from the elite class and have servants.
These characters could be seen in other authors’ plays as well, but in Shakespeare’s, they are mostly used.
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