Shakespeare’s GenresFocus on Comedy

Shakespeare’s Genres

ComedyMerry Wives

Twelfth Night

TragedyTitus Andronicus

HistoryHenry V

RomanceThe Tempest

Comedy: Jokes are Serious. Really.

• Safe space to deal with fears and anxieties; or, don’t try this at home

• Safety valve for social tensions: carnivalesque• Verbal irony: saying one thing and meaning

another• Social regulation: laughter at someone• Social regulation and release (see carnivalesque):

laughter with someone

Safe space to deal with fears and anxieties; or, don’t try this at home

• If I slip on a banana and die it’s a tragedy

• If I slip on a banana and fall in a vat of chocolate, from which I emerge a sweet dessert but unharmed, it’s a comedy

Safety valve for social tensions: carnivalesque

Mardi Gras --Carnivalesque gender inversion, drinking and masking

Safety valve for social tensions: carnivalesque

Mardi Gras --Holiday foolery

Verbal irony: saying one thing and meaning another

You: That’s your new hairstyle? I’m really impressed with it. You must have done it yourself. What’s really amazing is how you trimmed the back. Me: You know I paid $150 for this haircut from a stylist. That’s not nice. Does it really look terrible?No: Of course not. I was only joking!Me:

It really looks bad, doesn’t it?

Social regulation: laughter at someone• Don’t be clueless• Don’t try to hard• Don’t try to be

inspirational in a nerdy way

Social regulation and release (see carnivalesque): laughter with someone

• We feel as one when we laugh together at our boss

• We feel as one when we laugh together at nerdy attempts to instill good values

Social regulation and release (see carnivalesque): laughter with someone

Festivity: Carnival’s corollary: release from social norms > celebration of social order through happy ritual

Renaissance Comedy• Carnival Release (disorder)• Festival togetherness (social order restored). Festival is

usually a marriage• Comedies have happy endings

• Happy ending creates safe space for rehearsal of tensions, anxieties or fears

• Happy ending brings the society together from those tensions, anxieties or fears

And always remember …