Shakespeare’s classical plays

Abstract

Shakespeare's classical heroes are ambitious to make names for themselves. The aspiring heroes of Troilus and Cressida , Julius Caesar , Timon of Athens , Antony and Cleopatra and Coriolanus seem drawn from the classical past to dramatize a will to power or lust for dominion ( libido dominandi ) without bounds. In this they resemble Alexander the Great, as recorded by Plutarch and repeated by the Italian humanist Baldassare Castiglione in The Book of the Courtier (1528), soon translated into English (1561): Alexander the Great, upon hearing that in the opinion of one philosopher there were countless other worlds, began to weep, and when asked why, replied: 'Because I have not yet conquered one' - as if he felt able to conquer them all. The broad theme of ambition is not particular to the classical plays: it permeates the English histories and the tragedies from Richard III to Macbeth . Yet the classical heroes differ from their English and Scottish counterparts in privileging the literal achievement of a name over the standard objects of ambition, the conqueror's laurels or earthly crowns. The characters that Shakespeare drew from English chronicle history aim for dominion in the here and now - i.e. in the England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and France of their own day. Yet his classical heroes refuse geographical and temporal limitation. They want nothing more, or less, than to forge names for themselves that will hold sway for all time and not merely for the span of their natural lives.