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COVID-19 , also known as the novelcoronavirus , is have got drastic burden around the orb — and some people are drawing links between self - closing off and the works of Shakespeare , especiallyKing Lear . Efforts to keep people safe , including societal distancing and quarantining , has affect the amusement diligence : films and television set appearance are staunch product , Broadway has close down in response to the pandemic , and thedomestic box billet is experiencing a 2o - yr Sir David Alexander Cecil Low .
Alongside the coronavirus , conversation on societal medium , as well as articles inThe AtlanticandThe New York Times , have regard how the plague affected Shakespeare ’s life and works . It ’s unclouded thatShakespeare ’s bid have influencedand inspired uncounted writer through the hundred . But did Shakespeare really writeKing Learwhile being quarantined ( as said by Roseanne Cash onTwitter ) ? Did pestis affect how he wrote or what he wrote about ?
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Dr. Shapiro notes in his bookThe Year of Learthat , in or around 1606 , Shakespeare likely wroteKing Lear , along withMacbeth , Antony and Cleopatra , Timon of Athens , andPericlesin warm succession — perhaps even within the same calendar twelvemonth . Like 1596 and 1603 , 1606 was a time of pestilence . While this is an telling feat , Shakespearetypically compose multiple child’s play in any give year . There is no intellect to conceive that his productivity was enhanced by pest or quarantine .
Shakespeare ’s life , like the lives of many people in England at the routine of the seventeenth - century , was shaped by infestation . While there is no evidence ofShakespearespecifically being quarantine , the plagues closed the theaters in London repeatedly . During this time , Shakespeare opted to write poetry , as well as plays that would be performed when the theater re - opened . As a resolution , many of Shakespeare ’s most famous works may have been written while plagues were keep out down the urban center of London . As Professor Jonathan Bate writes in his life story of Shakespeare , Soul of the years :
Plague was the individual most herculean personnel formation [ Shakespeare ’s ] life and those of his contemporaries .
What ’s known is thatWilliam Shakespearewrote plays in England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I and King James I. Despite films likeAnonymousthat aim that Shakespeare ’s bid were written by someone else , the consensus among scholar is that Shakespeare wrote the play that are ascribe to him . We also know that this was a time when England was ravaged by plague that shut the theatre in London . Shakespeare was born in 1564 , one yr after a severely high-risk plague . There were additional plagues in 1578 - 1579 and 1582 before he start writing professionally . Based on parish records , Shakespeare lost multiple siblings at comparatively former ages , likely because of plague or disease . Shakespeare ’s personal and professional life continue to be affected by pestilence . During a pest that closed the theaters in 1593 , Shakespeare is believe to have written his poemVenus and Adonis . Because the theatre were closed , Shakespeare publish poetry to gain ground business and financial support .
to boot , Shakespeare ’s son , Hamnet , died at ten or eleven , in 1596 . Kenneth Branagh ’s filmAll is Truespeculates that Hamnet die from the plague . Scholars , include Professor Stephen Greenblatt , have considered how Hamnet ’s destruction had a heavy shock on Shakespeare ’s penning . presently after Hamnet ’s death , Shakespeare wroteHamlet , one of his most famous works that meditates on death , loss , fathers and sons , and the hereafter . at long last , while there are many unknowns about Shakespeare ’s life , his writing survived the plague . FromRomeo and JuliettoKing Lear , the many references to plague and disease throughout his play prove the profound impact that living through and around plague had on Shakespeare ’s life and plant .
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