How now, mine dear fellows!
Continuing with the themes of Literature Month, here is a ranking of my favorite plays by the Bard himself, William Shakespeare. A few years ago I had quite an intense "Shakespeare phase", when I figured that it would be cool to immerse myself in his classic texts and read a whole bunch of them. In my view, the playwright definitely deserves his iconic status, as many of those plays are among the very best literature that I have read. Here are my favorites!
My honorable mentions: Antony and Cleopatra, Richard III, The Merchant of Venice.
10. Henry V
"Once more unto the breach, my friends, once more"
Henry V is reflective of the brand of English nationalism from the time of its writing, for better (it can be seen as an interesting relic of its time) or worse (it makes it hard to relate to the characters and their motivations, especially for a modern-day pacifist who comes from two different countries, neither of which is England). Whatever one may think of the era's worldview inserting itself into the story, Henry V is literary gold regardless.
Shakespeare's language is beautiful throughout the text, with the highlight being Henry's iconic battle speech at the beginning of Act III. The use of prologues for each act, where the Chorus gives a poetic and symbolic account of what is going on in the larger story, is a neat storytelling device that sets the play apart from the Bard's other works.
9. The Tempest
"Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows"
If you haven't read any Shakespeare but are reading this list out of morbid curiosity and perhaps an urge to check his works out, I highly recommend The Tempest as your starting point. When I first decided to become familiar with Shakespeare, I asked my high school's homeroom teacher (the world's best teacher of Finnish and literature, by the way) about a good play to start with, and she recommended The Tempest. The story is simple and straight-forward enough to follow, so that it smooths out the challenges of diving off the deep end into the brand of ye olde English that Shakespeare's works are written in.
Tutorial-level easiness aside, The Tempest is a damn good story. Many scholars see it as the final play that Shakespeare wrote (there's some debate on that, due to varying accounts), and it is very fitting for that purpose - I won't give away major spoilers, but let's just say that the playwright who spent his whole career creating stories about vengeance where revenge ends up corrupting one's soul and ruining everything, finally wrote a positive story about wiggling one's way out of the endless chain of vengeance.
8. The Comedy of Errors
"How many fond fools serve mad jealousy!"
When I started reading Shakespeare, I expected the tragedies to be tragic and the histories to be historic, but I didn't expect the comedies to be all that funny - surely, the conventions of comedy have changed a lot in the last four hundred years?
Oh, how wrong I was. Out of all the Shakespeare plays I've read, The Comedy of Errors is the least beautifully written, least powerful, and least poetic. It makes it all the way to eighth place, and this is true, because it is funny as hell. It's honestly one of the funniest literary works I've read. The trope of mistaken identity is quite familiar to us from various movies and TV shows, but the Bard was ahead of the curve with the best-ever 'mistaken identity' story back in the day. You might not expect to hear this about a Shakespeare play, but seriously, I recommend reading this if you need a good laugh.
7. A Midsummer Night's Dream
"I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine"
A Midsummer Night's Dream gains massive points in my book for how genuinely lovely it is. It may not have as much to say about the world or humankind as many other Shakespeare plays, but it doesn't need to. It is a fantastical and dreamlike play, with beautiful passages of poetry flowing throughout the text. It may not be as amusing as its comedy counterpart The Comedy of Errors, but it is still the superior work when considering all factors.
The play also features one of Shakespeare's top five greatest characters - Puck, the trickster fairy. The fantasy storyline blends together with the plot of four human characters in the woods before an important wedding, as Puck decides to mix the bag with his powers. All of the play's best lines come from the mischievous Puck, who cements himself as the ultimate example of the 'wild card' character archetype.
6. Othello
"So will I turn her virtue into pitch,
And out of her own goodness make the net,
That shall enmesh them all"
One of the main reasons that I had for my sudden interest in Shakespeare a few years back was that his works have influenced modern literature (not to mention movies and television) like no other. Terms like "Shakespearean" are always thrown around by critics whenever a dynamic between characters is especially dramatic, or a character has an especially poetic arch, and this has always intrigued me. Reading many of his works certainly helped me see how many archetypes and tropes in modern literature were either created or at least boosted by the Bard, and one of the largest examples can be found in Othello.
The character of Iago is more or less the foundation for modern villains - specifically the type of villain who draws a balance of sympathy and despicability, by having an understandable motive (bitterness towards the main character) but taking his actions much too far. Iago is a fantastic character, and throughout the pages of Othello I realized just how many classic movie villains are at least somewhat based on that foundation. There is a lot else to enjoy with Othello, as well, including a fascinating setting on war-torn Cyprus, and an ahead-of-its-time look at racism. But the best part of the text for me is reading Iago's charismatic and horrifying soliloquies, and marvelling at how large of an impact the character has had on modern culture.
5. Romeo and Juliet
"These violent delights have violent ends"
There are three levels to understanding Romeo and Juliet. Level one is seeing it as a mere love story, a sweet staple of romance, a depiction of a dream-like relationship one could only fantasize about - that is how the play is often referred to in pop culture and how it is seen by many, even though the interpretation disregards the tragic overtones of the story. The second level is one that is thrown into conversation a lot by people trying to sound smart on the internet, and it has some truth to it even though I disagree: it is the cynical interpretation that Romeo and Juliet is a cautionary tale about two dumb kids who get themselves and others killed by being reckless, and it has nothing to do with actual romance.
Here is the third level, which I see as the most accurate interpretation: at its core, Romeo and Juliet is a sweet story about true love, and the play has a very romance-positive message. It is, however, also a critique of humanity's tendencies for violence and hatred, hence all the tragedy. The two main characters aren't "two dumb kids", but rather the only sane people in the story, as they realize the power of love over hate and just how much brighter the world could be if people learned to love one another.
That is what makes the ending of the play (spoiler alert to any individuals residing under large stones) so devastating; in the case of the Montagues and Capulets, the hate between the families outweighed the love between the star-crossed lovers, thus leading to their demise. But that isn't Shakespeare saying "Hey, this is just how the world works, so don't go falling in love you fools" like many people interpret it, but rather an extremely strong statement of "All of this could have been avoided, so please be like the idealistic kids and not like the war-mongering families around them".
4. Macbeth
"Or art thou but a dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?"
What really gets me about Macbeth is how it is essentially three different stories of three different genres at the same time, and those elements bounce off each other in a fascinating manner. Firstly, it's a political drama, filled with all sorts of royal backstabbing, shifting power dynamics and medieval court intrigue. Secondly, it's a psychological tale of the corruption of a man's soul, following the protagonist's journey from hero to villain, not unlike the story of Walter White in Breaking Bad (2008-2013). And last but definitely not least, it's a supernatural tale, filled with eerie witchcraft and epic prophecies.
In all three categories, Macbeth is one of the best in its kind across all aspects of fiction. The way the aspects of the story feed into one another is engaging to follow, as the creepy fantasy side becomes intertwined with the political games and the psychological character-driven plot. Amazing stuff.
3. King Lear
"When we are born, we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools"
Here's a bold statement: the role of Lear in King Lear is the single greatest role an actor can play. I can't think of any other fictional role that requires such skill and magnificence to pull off, and I would give so much money to see a stage production of Lear with the likes of Sir Ian McKellen or Anthony Hopkins in the lead role. The character of Lear, a once-great king who is slowly spiraling into a mental decline due to his old age as he struggles to rule his kingdom while passing it on to his treacherous children, is a thoroughly compelling anti-hero.
In addition to being a gripping depiction of aging and losing control, Lear has some of the most complex and interesting power dynamics from any Shakespeare play. The amount of various earls, dukes and heirs with various goals struggling throughout the hierarchy is quite a lot to take when reading the text, but the complicated plot threads and pieces lead to some of the Bard's finest storytelling and a heart-pounding final act.
2. Julius Caesar
"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves"
Julius Caesar is a big favorite of mine, largely for two strong reasons. First of all, there's the historical intrigue; while many of Shakespeare's works focus on various fascinating eras from history, Julius Caesar is particularly compelling in that sense. The culture and worldview of Ancient Rome come to life brilliantly through the dialogue, and the Bard does a brilliant job using word choices to make the play truly feel like the era in question. And the true story that the play is based on, with its various power dynamics and dramatic turns, is just so intriguing in its own right.
And that brings us to the second major selling point: the story of Brutus. While the play is called Julius Caesar, the title character isn't the most interesting character nor the one who appears the most. The story is largely told from the point-of-view of Brutus, the loyal-friend-turned-bitter-betrayer of Caesar. The play does an amazing job fleshing out his character, as he slowly turns against his mentor through a series of dramatic and soul-searching monologues. Truly gripping.
1. Hamlet
"There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy"
Shakespeare's plays are right up there with Bach's compositions and Da Vinci's paintings, in the league of works of art that define the human race and will outlive us all. And none more so than Hamlet. It is a story with so much to say about humanity, that it will never not be relevant and powerful. Between its eerie setting, psychological complexities, profound truths and dramatic scale, as well as its themes of vengeance, love and betrayal, Hamlet feels larger-than-life in the truest sense of the phrase.
Hamlet was the tenth Shakespeare play I read, and from the very first lines written, it felt different - larger in scope, more important, more epic. The way the setting is described in the first scene of Act I, as the two guardsmen encounter what may or may not be the ghost of Denmark's dead king on a dark winter night, feels creepy and spine-chilling - like you just know you're about to read something life-changing.
From thereon out, Hamlet proves to earn its place among the giants of literary history. There are moments so powerful that I can't quite find the words to describe the profound feeling they cause; a favorite of mine being scene III of Act III, where Hamlet sneaks into Claudius's room with the intent to kill him - but is stopped in his tracks when he sees that Claudius is praying. The lines of Hamlet pondering whether he can kill a man while he is showing repentance for his sins, the slight amount of humanity that is added to Claudius's villainous character arch through his moment of repentance, and the overall imagery of one man kneeling in prayer while the other watches from the shadows with murder and doubt in mind, is truly striking and unforgettable. I do hope that I get to see this play on stage some day.
Thank you for reading! Tune in next week for the final post of Literature Month, which is a big one: My top 10 favorite books of all time.
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