Critical Overview of Chinua Achebe's Novels Defining Women’s Roles in Nigerian Society



"Real tragedy is never resolved. It goes on hopelessly for ever."
Chinua Achebe (1930 - )
 
While making general estimates of Achebe’s women as seen in his novels in the historical perspectives, it is better to  cover the journey of Nigerian literature particularly novel up to Achebe.  In Achebe here is a glimpse of   present  Nigeria which was once a home to ethnically based kingdoms and tribal communities before it became a European colony. It can also be traced the facts in Achebe’s novels how in spite of European contact these kingdoms and communities maintained their autonomy and how the colonial era began, and how Nigeria became independent of British rule in 1960 and how After independence Nigeria experienced frequent coups and long periods of autocratic military and how finally a democratic civilian government was established. It will also examine how in this long run of Nigerian history, Achebe as a Nigerian writer flourished and how Achebe has drawn women as a cultural agent in these social evolution.

A literature review of Achebe’s text, Things Fall Apart  aims to explain the benefits of defining women’s roles in traditional Igbo society in pre-colonial era of Nigeria. It presents the conflicts inherent in masculine and feminine aspects of the novel. Things Fall Apart teaches tribal women’s role in social changes from my proposed experiments. In exploring the development of Okonkwo’s relationship with his sons and daughters and wives, Things Fall Apart is an interesting study if the novel develops themes of the awakening of self-awareness, and of the need to accept persons with very different perceptions and opinions about life. Again, it can be studied if the events in the book are realistic and believable, and the characters' actions and thoughts draw the reader directly into the plot, making the conflict come alive as a universal issue facing all tribal women.

The literary techniques and characterizations used in Achebe’s No Longer at Ease is aimed in explaining the results of independence of a new nation, Nigeria. The character of Clara  will allow each critical argument’s unique response to determine, to assess the value of womanhood and how social taboo is still bifurcating relations. To my research the character of Clara is invaluable for evaluating the model structure of Achebe’s foster new woman. It is also to be measured if Clara represents the common women; the immediate society she lives in is Nigeria in general, every day how she struggles with her taboo of osu to survive physically and psychologically. The society supplies her with the key necessities: an identity and a job. Her choices are few, but the one great choice is her: to live as a taboo or to revolt. Her choice to survive within the social parameter impacts the greater society: woman can go on despite whatever cruelties society imposes.

 Arrow of God can be studied as an adventure tale that indirectly leads us to confront the destruction of a heritage, the sources of human suffering, and the dangers of colonialism. These issues surface naturally through the interaction of the characters. Although the story is simply written, the vocabulary is challenging, and Achebe presents his book from varying perspectives. We have very little scope of studying women aspects here. However, the nature myth, fertility rites and spiritual ethos are built in matriarchal ideology. From eco-critical perspective we can define this Igbo world.

  A Man of the People   abounds with drama, conflict, and charismatic characters and topics, many and varied. These include such enduring human concerns as the fear of death, the need for true friendship, the importance of achieving great deeds and displaying virtuous traits (such as courage, loyalty, and leadership) and—perhaps most vital of all—the glory and wisdom to be found in the birth of a nation. On a basic narrative level, the novel reveals many ways in which we determine the fate of a newly built nation. Even though corruptions and voluptuousness are rampant in such a society where women are mere puppet in the hands of power politics, in few occasion women are found colossal structure of the society. It will study that mere ignorance of this fact will bring a collapse of a nation. 

  Anthills of the Savannah  is rich in significant human themes, including power, the problems of nation with divorced vision, culture and conflict, conformity and rebellion, loyalty and betrayal. It can be studied how these ideas are developed in a tense, suspenseful narrative, focused on the heroine, Beatrice, who finds herself a sophisticated mother figure in the alien world of a community of crooked power politicians. Here we will locate Beatrice, a new woman of Achebe, who is placed amongst a set of mysterious world of political charlatans, people who prey on the credulity of others and who make their careers out of deliberate but ingenious fraud.

  Ardhendu De

 Primary Sources:

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. Penguin Modern Classics. London, 2010. Print.
Achebe, Chinua. No Longer at Ease. Penguin Classics. London, 2010. Print.
Achebe, Chinua. Arrow of God. Penguin Modern Classics. London, 2010. Print.
Achebe, Chinua. A Man of the People. Anchor Books House, New York, 1967, 1989. Print.
Achebe, Chinua. Anthills of the Savannah. Penguin Modern Classics. London, 2001. Print.

Beatrice, Achebe’s New Nigerian Women Mouthpiece in "Anthills of the Savannah"


"An angry man is always a stupid man."
Chinua Achebe (1930 - )

One of the significant themes in "Anthills of the Savannah" is the way people particularly women reacts to with political handicaps of Nigeria. The women in Chinua Achebe’s "Anthills of the Savannah" shun and resent political handicaps of Nigeria. Educated mass of Nigeria who become impotent and corrupt of ideas, either through lack of vision or will, and who are ideologically with political imperfections are almost always condemned to misery in the nations through frequent coups and unrest. There seems to be no compassion or sympathy for the nation. The people seem only concerned with their own well-being and survival. As Achebe goes through the narrative, he points to corresponding ideas on the political vision of the fictional Kangan which is none but his beloved country, Nigeria where the story is embroidered. In the book he demonstrates a never-ending pattern of ruin and rebuilding, perpetuating the way and validating the role and the authority of the women.

In Chinua Achebe's novel "Anthills of the Savannah," Beatrice is portrayed as a significant female character who serves as a mouthpiece for the struggles and aspirations of Nigerian women. As the girlfriend of Chris, one of the novel's main characters, Beatrice represents the modern Nigerian woman who challenges traditional gender roles and societal expectations. She embodies intelligence, strength, and determination, using her voice to speak out against injustice and advocate for change. Beatrice's character highlights the complexities of women's experiences in a patriarchal society, offering a powerful portrayal of female empowerment and resilience. Through Beatrice, Achebe sheds light on the issues faced by Nigerian women and their role in shaping the nation's future.

Even before Europeans arrived during the colonial period, Achebe's native Nigeria was a patriarchal society. Ikem explains to Beatrice that their culture initially regarded women as lowly and unworthy of respect and then elevated them to a pedestal, where they could remain beautiful and admired but inconsequential. Similarly, the worship of goddesses was an important part of a village's spiritual life but had little to do with decisions regarding power structures. Stretching those points, it can be said that the colonial period widened the gender equality gap by providing African men with educational opportunities while African women received schooling in utilitarian skills to prepare them for domestic work. "Anthills of the Savannah" came at a time when women around the world had made great strides in asserting their relevance in and value to society. The story also contains a female trinity in the characters of Beatrice, Elewa, and Amaechina. Beatrice is well−educated, sophisticated, and independent, and she holds an administrative position in the government. Beatrice represents the positive aspects of the present. Elewa is a common woman who is highly emotional and uneducated. She supports herself by working in a small shop. Elewa represents the past. Amaechina is Elewa's infant daughter, and although she does not appear until the end of the novel, she is potential embodied. As Ikem's daughter, she represents the meaning of her name, "May the Path Never Close." She is hope for the future, even though the future currently looks grim.

Beatrice and Elewa may appear to have little in common, making their friendship surprising. However, their unwavering commitment to each other is undeniable. Despite their differences, they share a crucial bond—both have experienced the profound loss of the men they deeply loved. This shared grief connects them to each other and to the communal spirit. The naming ceremony for Amaechina holds immense significance as it showcases the women's refusal to let tradition fade simply because the father is absent. Beatrice, defying societal norms, assumes the role typically reserved for a man and names the infant. In witnessing this act, Elewa's drunken uncle doesn't scold the women but instead cheers for them. He recognizes that they represent a powerful force challenging the world's expectations. Their actions exemplify their determination to uphold the essential traditions of their culture, honoring their heritage and maintaining a meaningful connection to the spirit of their people. As the uncle exclaims, "That is how to handle the world!" (Chapter 18).

Again, Beatrice is the novel's single most spiritual character. Achebe identifies her strongly with the goddess Idemili, who was sent to Earth by the Almighty to moderate Power. When the Almighty saw how Power was raging across the Earth, he decided to send Idemili "to bear witness to the moral nature of authority by wrapping around Power’s rude waist a loincloth of peace and modesty." (Chapter 8) She was sent to Earth in a Pillar of Water connecting heaven and earth and has been worshipped ever since. On the night Ikem visits Beatrice and they discuss his newfound respect for the important role women should be given in society, Ikem tells her that it was not raining at his house but that when he started out to see her, it "was literally like barging into a pillar of rain"—a clear reference to the goddess. In another scene, Beatrice is summoned to the palace for a dinner. As the evening progresses, she notices that an American reporters becoming overly familiar and suggestive with Sam. Although Beatrice is not an admirer of Sam's, she is a patriot to her country and cannot stand to see its leader the object of such shameless overtures by a foreigner. In order to avert his attention, she throws herself at him, dancing with him. Once Sam is fully aroused and no longer thinking of the reporter, Beatrice leads him outside and explains her actions to him. Sam calls her a racist and sends her home immediately. This scene shows that Beatrice, like Idemili, is compelled to uphold peace and morality by wrapping a loincloth, so to speak, around Power's rude waist. 

When delving deeper into Beatrice's character in Chinua Achebe's "Anthills of the Savannah," we discover subtle clues that hint at her significance beyond being an ordinary government employee or citizen of Kangan. Her name, Beatrice, holds a profound meaning derived from the Latin root "beatus," signifying happiness and blessing. This association with joy and blessedness resonates in words like "beatify," "beatific," and "beatitudes." Achebe deliberately chooses this name for her instead of her father-given name, Nwanyibuife, meaning "A Woman Is Also Something." By drawing a parallel to Dante's Beatrice, who guides him through heaven in the Divine Comedy, Achebe underscores Beatrice's growth and acquisition of wisdom and presence. Her experiences highlight the enduring strength and unity of her people, even in the face of political turmoil and social unrest.

In "Anthills of the Savannah," Beatrice emerges as a compelling character, representing the resilience and aspirations of Nigerian women. Through her name and symbolic associations, she transcends the role of a mere government employee, embodying happiness, blessing, and wisdom. Achebe's portrayal of Beatrice serves as a testament to the enduring spirit of her people, demonstrating that even in the face of adversity, unity and strength prevail. As readers, we are reminded of the power of individual agency and the transformative potential of those who dare to challenge societal norms. Beatrice's journey is a testament to the indomitable human spirit and the capacity for change and growth.


Ref:


Killam, G.D., The writing of east and central Africa. Heinemann International Literature & Textbooks, 1985.

Arthur, Gakwandi, Shatto. Novel and Contemporary Experience in Africa. Holmes & Meier Publishers Inc, 1981.
E. Modupe Kolawole, Mary. “Mutiple Inscriptions and the Location of Women in China Achebe’s Novel”. Chinua Achebe An Anthology of Recent Criticism. Ed. Mala Pandurang, Pencraft International, Delhi, 2010.
- See more at: http://ardhendude.blogspot.in/2014/09/chinua-achebes-things-fall-apart-1958.html#sthash.G1jFSFJC.dpuf


Ref:

1. Killam, G.D., The writing of east and central Africa. Heinemann International Literature & Textbooks, 1985.
2. Arthur, Gakwandi, Shatto. Novel and Contemporary Experience in Africa. Holmes & Meier Publishers Inc, 1981.
3. E. Modupe Kolawole, Mary. “Mutiple Inscriptions and the Location of Women in China Achebe’s Novel”. Chinua Achebe An Anthology of Recent Criticism. Ed. Mala Pandurang, Pencraft International, Delhi, 2010.
4. Achebe, C. (1997, February 4). Anthills of the Savannah. https://doi.org/10.1604/9780385260459

William Shakespeare's Hamlet: Emotional Complexity of Personality and Intricacy of Plot




 “What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason!
how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how
express and admirable! in action how like an angel!
in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the
world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me,
what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not
me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling
you seem to say so.”— HAMLET  2.2.317




 The term tragedy or tragic drama is broadly applied specifically to literary and especially to dramatic representations of serious action, which eventuate in a disastrous conclusion for the protagonist (the chief character). More precise and detailed discussion of the tragic form properly begins with – although they should not end with – Aristotle’s classical analysis in the ‘Poetics’. Aristotle based his theory on introduction from the only examples available to him, the tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. Hamlet opens at Elsinore castle in Denmark with the return of Prince Hamlet from the University of Wittenberg, in Germany. He finds that his father, the former king, has recently died and that his mother, Queen Gertrude, has subsequently married Claudius, his father's brother. Claudius has assumed the title of king of Denmark. Hamlet’s sense that “something is rotten in the state of Denmark” is intensified when his friend and fellow student Horatio informs him that a ghost resembling his dead father has been seen on the battlements of the castle. Hamlet confronts the ghost, who tells him that Claudius murdered him and makes Hamlet swear to avenge his death. In order to disguise his feelings, Hamlet declares that from now on he will demonstrate an “antic disposition.” His behavior appears to everyone but Claudius to be a form of madness.

          In the subsequent two thousand years and more, many new artistically effective and serious plots ending in a catastrophe have been developed – types that Aristotle had no way of foreseeing. Many major tragedies in the brief following time between 1585 and 1625 by Marlowe, Shakespeare, George Chapman, Webster, Sir Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher deviate radically from the Aristotelian norm.

Since first performed in the early 1600s, the title role in William Shakespeare's Hamlet has remained a favorite of many actors because of the emotional complexity of Hamlet's personality. Nowhere is this complexity more apparent than in Hamlet's famous soliloquy in Act III, Scene 1. The soliloquy is a monologue in which a character reveals inner thoughts, motivations, and feelings. Shakespeare used the technique often, and his soliloquies are poetic and rich in imagery. In Hamlet, a play about a man whose mind may be his fatal flaw, the form reaches its highest level.

            In the narrowest sense of the term, Shakespeare took no trouble to be original. However, it would be misleading to say that he has summed up the tradition. Of him we can say what T.S.Eliot speak in his essay, ‘Tradition and Individual Talent’,

“The most individual part of work may be those in which the dead poets, his ancestors assert their immortality … vigorously.”

This excerpt from American poet Walt Whitman's famous “Song of Myself,” written in 1881, illustrates the author's conception of death as an integral part of living, an event to be faced with open arms and a lack of fear, an occasion, even, for joy.

 It is evident that, in writing Hamlet , Shakespeare to some extent adopted the drama tradition of the Senecan Tragedy, which is also known as the Revenge Tragedy or the Tragedy of Blood. This type of play derived from Seneca’s favourite material of murder, revenge, ghosts, mutilation and carnage, but while Seneca had relegated such matters to long reports of offstage actions by messengers,  Elizabethan dramatists usually represented them on stage to satisfy the apatite of the contemporary audience for violence and horror. Thomas Kyd’s ‘The Spanish Tragedy’(1586) established this popular form and received its significant after-effect in its own time, most famously in Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’, a play that adapted the revenge play conventions and turned them inside out. Says Rebecca Bushnell, in his ‘Tragedy, A Short Introduction’,“Hamlet is a revenge tragedy that questions every aspect and convention of the revenge tragedy plot while it reproduced them.”

             The play interrogates why revenge motivates a plot, not by directly questioning the value of revenge, but by differing it. Hamlet has raised the most important question for all those who are capable of inquiring into truth, into life, into existence. The most important question of all questions is: What is true happiness? And is there a possibility to achieve it? Is true happiness possible at all, or is all momentary? Is life only a dream, or is there something substantial in it too?

            One of the prominent features of Shakespearean Tragedy, according to Bradley is that it is pre-eminently the story of one person, of exceptional calamity and suffering that leads to the downfall and death of the hero. When the disconsolate Richard returns from Ireland to his troubled kingdom in the play to which Shakespeare gave the full title, ‘The Tragedy of King Richard the Second’, he insists that no one speaks to him of comfort.

“Let’s talk of graves, of worms and epitaphs
How some have been deposed, some slain in war,
Some haunted by the ghost they have deposed,
Some poisoned by their wives, some sleeping killed,
All murdered.”

            Thus for Shakespeare and his contemporaries, as much as for their ancient Greek and Roman predecessors, the very nature of tragedy seemed to require that it explored the sad stories of King or at least of men and women dignified by royal blood or civil authority. An exemplary dramatic fall one which stirred the emotions of pity and fear in lesser mortals had to be a fall from a height of influence and honour. Shakespeare’s Tragedies deal almost exclusively with the destinies of kings and princes on whose fortune depends those of the nation they rule.

            However, unlike the Greek Tragedies, which were the tragedies of Fate, Shakespearean Tragedy is to some extent a tragedy of character. Fate does play a very large and important part in this yet it is pre-eminently a tragedy of character, because in Shakespeare, Character is Destiny. The fault lies not in their stars, but in men themselves. In all Shakespearean Tragedies, we can trace the tragedy to a certain fatal error, or weakness or predisposition in the hero; he has in him something that offset all his virtue and brings about his downfall and death. In the case of the play of ‘Hamlet’, there is no doubt that the tragedy of the prince is due chiefly to a fault of his own character. There is in him, what may be called, a tragic flaw. Hamlet is by nature a reflective type of man very much given to philosophic speculation. It is true as the proverb says that a man must think before he acts. But Hamlet only thinks and thinks until he loses all his capacity for action. In this sense it is true to say that ‘Hamlet is a tragedy of reflection’ Hamlet is a thinker, a speculative intellect whose speculative intellect is tragically ineffective in this world of action – where a man is judged by what he  does and not by what he thinks. This world is a world of hard and stern reality and a man filled with moral idealism is doomed to tragic failure. In this sense, “Hamlet is a tragedy of moral idealism.” To quote Schelegel, a famous German critic,  “The poet loses himself with his hero in the labyrinth of thought, in which we find neither end nor beginning. The stars themselves, from the course of events, afford no answer to the question so urgently proposed to them. A voice commissioned, as it would appear, by heaven from another world, demands vengeance for a monstrous enormity, and the demand remains without effect. The criminals are at last punished, but as it were, by an accidental blow.”

The duality of happiness and unhappiness is the most fundamental and the most symptomatic, but there are a thousand and one dualities: the duality of love and hate, the duality of life and death, day and night, summer and winter, youth and old age, and so on, so forth. But the fundamental duality, the duality that represents all other dualities, is that of happiness and unhappiness. It knows nothing of unhappiness, it is pure happiness. It knows nothing of death, it is pure life. It knows nothing of darkness, it is pure light, and to know it is the goal. Gautama the Buddha went in search of this and one day, after six years' struggle, he attained to it. Your life is almost a vicious circle: one mischief leads to another and that one leads to still another. Mischiefs grow out of mischiefs -- only mischiefs can grow out of mischiefs. And you go on living and moving in circles and you don't know what else to do. You do good -- at least you think you are doing good -- but the good never happens; otherwise the world would have been overflowing with good.

            Though Shakespearean Tragedies are to some extent tragedies of character, a profound sense of Fate underlies all Shakespearean Tragedies. In this respect, Shakespeare was at times almost Greek in his outlook. This sense of Fate is powerfully expressed in King Lear,

“As flies to wanton boys are we to gods,
They kill us for their sport.”
The philosophy of the supremacy of Fate is also voiced by Hamlet:
“There is a divinity that shapes our ends.
Rough hew them how we will.”

According to Bradley, “The essence of a Shakespearean Tragedy is that fate represents a problem which alone is difficult for the hero at a time when he is least fitted to tackle it.” This means that if there had been any other problem the hero would have tackled it successfully. This also implies that any other hero would have tackled the problem easily. If Hamlet could change the place with Macbeth or Othello the problem would have been solved.

S. Freud
‘Conflict’ is the essence of Shakespearean Tragedy. The classical tragedians appreciated the conflict between Fate and Free Will. At the heart of every tragedy lies the universal struggle between the human inclination to accept fate absolutely and the natural desire to control destiny. Both Sophocles and Shakespeare would agree that the force of destiny and choice continually vie for control of human life. Yet each of these great playwrights espouses a perspective on the struggle born of specific time and culture. For the Greek Sophocles, Fate far overpowers human will; the harder a man works to avoid his Fate the more surely he catapults fourth into that very Fate. Sophocles’ characters ultimately surrender, after resistance, recognition and reversal, to their destinies. For Shakespeare, a Christian, the choice between good and evil represents man’s basic dilemma; for him, the human will is indomitable. Though fate may ultimately win, a man must fight to the death, if necessary, in order to remain the master of his own choices – choices that ultimately decide if and how his fate defeats him. To quote Andrew Sanders from his ‘The Short Oxford History of English Literature’, “Shakespearean tragic world is uncertain, dangerous and mortal and the catastrophes to which all his tragic dramas inexorably move are sealed by the deaths of their protagonists.”

The contrast between the two points of view is a noteworthy feature of any comparison between Sophocles’ ‘Oedipus Rex’ and Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’. Like ‘Oedipus Rex’ Hamlet begins with the death of a king. In ‘Oedipus’ and ‘Hamlet’ we might think at first as the heroes do, that the present crisis could be solved if you could find the murderer and then avenge the death of the king. However, that is exactly not the case.

While Hamlet knows that his world is out of joint, or rotten, he does not even know at first that there was a murder. He knows only that his father is dead and his mother has married his uncle. The twist in the play comes early on, when the ghost tells him who killed his father. Thus the truth that is the climax for Oedipus is the beginning of a frustrated plot of revenge for Hamlet.

Moreover, “…few would challenge the assertion that ‘Hamlet’ is the most problematic play ever written by Shakespeare or any other playwright.”, as Harry Levin says so. T.S. Eliot in his famous essay ‘Hamlet and His Problems’ (1952) acerbically note that,
“Few critics have ever admitted that ‘Hamlet the play is the primary problem, and Hamlet the character only secondary.”

Of its numerous problems some are adventitious arising from the text in which it has survived or from its indefinable relation to the source-play which has not. Some, as we may as well admit, are due to ambiguities unresolved by the dramatist; more have been created by the critics, for instance, T.S.Eliot’s verdict that, “Hamlet is an artistic failure.”  However some permanent and deep-seated problems of the meaning of the play remain.

The psychological method is less open to objection because after all, the Shakespearean  universe is peopled with men and women, so very like ourselves and yet so unaccountably different. Freud himself had decoded that the play, “Another of the great creation of tragic poetry, Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’ has its root in the same soil as ‘Oedipus Rex’. But the changed treatment of the same material reveals the whole difference in the mental life of these two widely separated epochs of civilization: the secular advance of repression in the emotional life of mankind. In Oedipus the child’s wishful fantasy that underlies it is brought into the open and realized as it would be in a dream. In ‘Hamlet’ it remains repressed; and just as in the case of Neurosis – we only learn of its existence from its inhibiting consequences.” (P-298)

Curiously Freud points out to the fact of historical difference in comparing Oedipus and Hamlet, even while he collapses them together as much the same character having ‘roots in the same soil’.  Moreover the German Critic Gustav Freytag, in ‘Technique of Drama’ (1863) introduced an analysis of plot of a five act play as a pyramidal shape, consisting of a rising action, climax and falling action.

As applied to Hamlet for example, the rising action begins after the opening scene and exposition, with the Ghost telling Hamlet that he has been murdered by his brother Claudius; it continuous with the developing conflict between Hamlet and Claudius, in which Hamlet despite setbacks, succeeds in controlling the course of events. The rising reaches the climax of the hero’s fortune with his proof of the king’s guilt by the device of the play-within-a play. (Act-3, Scene-2) Then comes the crisis, the reversal or ‘turning point’ of fortunes of the protagonist, in his failure to kill the King while he is at prayer. This inaugurates the falling action; from now the antagonist, Claudius largely controls the course of events, until the catastrophe or the outcome, which is decided by the death of the hero as well as of Claudius, the Queen and Laertes.

Here the question comes that there is no poetic justice in Shakespearean Tragedies. If character is destiny and if a character suffers for some error or weakness, there should be some proportion between crime and punishment. But we notice in Shakespearean Tragedy, the tragic characters suffer more than they deserve to. Hence, it is argued that there is no poetic justice in Shakespeare. Shakespeare’s rejoinder was that there is no poetic justice in Nature or Life where the Good and Bad suffer equally for no fault of theirs. Hence, in the region of poetic justice, where virtue is rewarded and vice is punished, Shakespeare has his own laws which are the laws of the living world and not of a theory.

To Conclude, the salient of the tragic drama Hamlet are, I do not claim, common to all Shakespearean Tragedies. To end with A.C.Bradley from his ‘Shakespearean Tragedy’,

“When Shakespeare writes tragedy he is an artist imposing an order and form upon the raw material of experience. Each of his characters is carefully moulded to fit an intellectual conception which the play in its totality is designed to embody. Every one of the tragedies is a separate attempt, if not finally to answer the great problem of man’s relation to the forces of evil in the world, at least to pose it in such a way that new facts may be freshly illuminated in terms of human experience. If no two tragedies are exactly alike, it is because the questions with which they deal are themselves so complex and many sided, and because Shakespeare’s insight into human experience is of infinite range. He approaches the great issue of human life from many angles, with different hypotheses and we have a resulting diversity in his plays.” 

Ref: Shakespearean Tragedy, A.C.Bradley

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