OVERCOMING ISSUES WITH DRAMA

Drama seen as a means to tackle the problems of our century and beyond

"My tongue will tell the anger of my heart, or else my heart concealing it will break" -William Shakespeare

When a student reads and analyses some of the most famous pieces of Drama by Shakespeare, one can immediately imagine the strong impact they may have on him or her and on the society and people of all times, for their strong meaning. Some of the purposes of Drama are precisely these: to involve people and get them out of everyday life to live different experiences in order to make them aware of the issues that surround us, and it can help us to understand how to tackle them; to inspire people to be different and make a change in themselves; to send us a teaching, so that people can understand and discover things through Drama.

Firstly, through literature, artists of all ages, for instance William Shakespeare, wanted us to face, understand and analyse the current issues of the time.

Shakespeare, in each of his works, be it a tragedy or a comedy, wanted to go further and involve us in the story, which not only is it relatable in the past, but also still today.

People, seeing and reading a piece of Drama, should be able to identify themselves with the main characters and seeing how they resolve their problems, they may take inspiration and courage to follow their examples. This is not always possible, it is up to the artist to be able to bring his story into us.

Shakespeare, in Othello, for instance decided to deal with numerous themes, one of which is domestic abuse. This current issue has overwhelmed and moved me, and this can be an example of how literature sometimes can help people. By reading this work, anyone who is a victim of this serious problem can see how in a completely different century, women or men also faced this terrible situation. Drama can be extremely topical, and can affect the present, thanks and through its conventions.

For example, Shakespeare often makes use of the plot-sub-plot, that is a story within another story. In my opinion, this is an extremely modern technique, which makes us reflect on how much the playwright was projected towards the future.

Not only has Drama always had the purpose of making us see how in other centuries some issues were present, but it is also a way to get us out of the fog. It is like a suggestion, if we are addressing a topic like the one mentioned in the plays, we can escape from this situation and there are always possible solutions.

Thanks to literature, people could open their eyes to their problems and begin to understand how to overcome them.

Secondly, literature may have another purpose: to send us a message and a teaching. For example in the Taming of the Shrew, Shakespeare's aim was to make us understand that everything we see can be created by our minds, and that appearances can be deceiving. Through Drama, the playwright made us understand the importance of not trusting people immediately. He sent us a warning with this literary work, which must be taken into consideration in all eras: nothing is as it seems.

Furthermore, Shakespeare managed to do this thanks to his use of Dramatic conventions, thanks to his modern vision of the world and to and thanks to his willingness to help us understand how problems go tackle.

In his works, he always presented us characters, settings and stories that could still be relatable today. All the characters we have read about were dealing with extremely modern problems.

Although the time is different, one thing always remains the same: the issues and how to solve them. The cruelty of ambition, femicide, conflicts between parents and children, are all paramount issues that we are still trying to address today. If Shakespeare decided to deal with them it was only because he wanted us to be aware, yesterday and today, of what surrounds us and he wanted us to understand the solution.

In other words, I would like to say that the purpose of Shakespeare through literature was to make us experience situations that can be related to all eras. Literature is a groundbreaking way to help us discover and see new things and aspects of life that can help us grow.

Moreover, Shakespeare is still absolutely relevant nowadays, because all the themes he dealt with are unfortunately still afflicting our society in the 21st century.