Riders to the Sea presents us with an almost claustrophobic world where suffering reigns supreme in human life. This one-act play widens, deepens, and universalizes the pathetic plight of hapless people who have no other place to live except Ireland’s mysterious islands off the shore. Synge selected this remote Aran Islands as the locale for his … Read more
There is no question that Shakespeare wrote Hamlet in the tradition of revenge tragedy. Shakespeare has used the revenge motive of killing the killer of a dead kinsman, just as we see in Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy. However, Shakespeare, as a dramatic genius, transcended his own time. He used the popular elements of contemporary revenge … Read more
It is almost commonplace in Shakespearean criticism to isolate three of his comedies as a separate group and dub them as “dark comedies.” These three comedies are, All’s Well That Ends Well, Troilus and Cressida, and Measure for Measure. When a play like Measure for Measure is called a dark comedy, the reference is at the atmosphere of vice and … Read more
Desire Under the Elms is a highly realistic drama of O’Neill, the action of which takes place in the Cabot-farm-house in the New England. The main theme of the play is the variations of the word ‘Desire’. Every character in the play desires something. In the broader sense ‘desire’ signifies possessive instinct or passion. As … Read more
O’Neill’s Desire under the Elms has the qualities of an ancient classical tragedy. Although the characters of the play belong to an ordinary stratum of life, their circumstances are fully tragic as all of them are propelled by their passion to their inevitable doom. Although O’Neill’s character refers a sad fate, their sufferings are caused … Read more
Eugene O’Neill has a great insight into the workings of the human psyche. In fact, the psychological aspect of his work supersedes all other considerations like sociological or political questions. O’Neill is a dramatist of the human psychology. His plays are, in a sense, close analysis of the psychological problems of various characters. All the … Read more
William Shakespeare wrote several romantic comedies, of which As You Like It is the finest. A romantic comedy is a play in which the romantic elements are mingled with comic elements. Although it is a pastoral comedy play, As You Like It works fine as a romantic comedy in its essence. While the romantic elements like delight and thrill … Read more
