95:... Shakespeare created a whole series of domestic fools for . greatest roles, Touchstone in "As You Like It,"(1599), Feste in "Twelfth Night,"(1600), and (the) fool in "King Lear,"(1605); helped Shakespeare resolve the tension between thematic material and the traditional entertainment role of the fool. Armin became a counter-point to the themes of the play and the power relationships between the theater and the role of the fool--he manipulates the extra dimension between play and reality to interact with the audience all the while using the themes of the play as his source material. Shakespeare began to write well-developed sub-plots expressly for Armin's talents. A balance between the order of the play and the carnivalised inversion factor of festive energy was achieved.
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music, storytelling, medieval satire, physical comedy and, to a lesser extent, juggling and acrobatics. Shakespeare not only borrowed from this multi-talented jester tradition, but contributed significantly to its rethinking. Whereas the court jester often regaled his audience with various skills aimed to amuse, Shakespeare's fool, consistent with
Shakespeare's revolutionary ideas about theater, became a complex character who could highlight more important issues. Like Shakespeare's other characters, the fool began to speak outside of the narrow confines of exemplary morality. Shakespeare's fools address themes of love, psychic turmoil, personal identity, and many other innumerable themes that arise in Shakespeare, and in modern theater.
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797:. Actors wore a ragged or patchwork coat. Often, bells hung along the skirt and on the elbows. They wore closed breeches with tights, with each leg a different colour. A monk-like hood covering the entire head was positioned as a cape, covering the shoulders and part of the chest. This hood was decorated with animal body parts, such as donkey's ears or the neck and head of a rooster. The animal theme was continued in the crest, which was worn as well.
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664:– Touchstone is a domestic fool belonging to the duke's brother Frederick. He is a wise fool, although Rosalind and Celia jokingly say he is a natural fool ("Fortune makes Nature's natural the cutter-off of Nature's wit", "hath sent this natural for our whetstone"). Accordingly, he is often threatened with a whip, a method of punishment often used on people of this category.
449:– One of Shakespeare's most multi-faceted clowns, Feste is employed by Olivia, but is equally at home in Orsino's house. Feste, the "wise fool," provides more than wit or entertainment, and is in fact the voice for the play's most important themes. Detached from particular loyalties, he can be trusted to speak truth not only to the other characters but also to the audience.
676:– Trinculo is considered to be a jester, but as he is only seen with Stephano and Caliban, he does not have the stage time to act out the qualifications of a traditional fool. At the end of the play, however, it is revealed that he works for both Stephano and the King of Naples. He is a domestic buffoon, and is outfitted accordingly.
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good. Lear, insisting on his fictitious majesty, seems ridiculous to him. All the more ridiculous because he does not see how ridiculous he is. But the Fool does not desert his ridiculous, degraded king, and accompanies him on his way to madness. The Fool knows that the only true madness is to recognize this world as rational.
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Fools have entertained a varied public from Roman through
Medieval times. The fool perhaps reached its pre-Shakespearean heights as the jester in aristocratic courts across Europe. The jester played a dynamic and changing role in entertaining aristocratic households in a wide variety of ways: songs,
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There is no contemporary parallel for the role of Fool in the court of kings. As
Shakespeare conceives it, the Fool is a servant and subject to punishment ('Take heed, sirrah – the whip ' 1:4:104) and yet Lear's relationship with his fool is one of friendship and dependency. The Fool acts as a
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Shakespeare closes the play with Feste alone on the stage, singing directly to the audience "of man's inexorable progress from childhood's holiday realm ... into age, vice, disillusionment, and death. ... pessimism is informed and sweetened, however, not only by the music to which it is set, but by
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Armin was a major intellectual influence on
Shakespeare's fools. He was attuned to the intellectual tradition of the Renaissance fool yet intellectual enough to understand the power of the medieval tradition. Armin's fool is a stage presence rather than a solo artist. His major skills were mime and
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Actors usually had props. They carried a short stick decorated with the doll head of a fool or puppet on the end. This was an official bauble or scepter, which had a pouch filled with air, sand, or peas attached as well. They wore a long petticoat of different colours, made of expensive materials
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Others argue that
Shakespeare's clowning goes beyond just comic relief, instead making the horrific or deeply complex scenes more understandable and "true to the realities of living, then and now." Shifting the focus from the fictional world to the audience's reality helps convey "more effectively
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The Fool does not follow any ideology. He rejects all appearances, of law, justice, moral order. He sees brute force, cruelty and lust. He has no illusions and does not seek consolation in the existence of natural or supernatural order, which provides for the punishment of evil and the reward of
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of the time, but their characteristics are greatly heightened for theatrical effect. The "groundlings" (theatre-goers who were too poor to pay for seats and thus stood on the 'ground' in the front by the stage) that frequented the Globe
Theatre were more likely to be drawn to these Shakespearean
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no longer make sense, the Fool in King Lear ridicules Lear's actions and situation in such a way that audiences understand the point of his jokes. His 'mental eye' is the most acute in the beginning of the play: he sees Lear's daughters for what they are and has the foresight to see that Lear's
383:– This clown is referred to as a "fool" in Act V, scene ii, but the word in this context simply refers to a silly man. He is not simple enough to be considered a natural fool, and not witty enough to be considered an artificial one. He is rather just a man from the country.
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commentator on events and is one of the characters (Kent being the other) who is fearless in speaking the truth. The Fool provides wit in this bleak play and unlike some of
Shakespeare's clowns who seem unfunny to us today because their
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mimicry; even his improvisational material had to be reworked and rehearsed. His greatest asset was as a foil to the other stage actors. Armin offered the audience an idiosyncratic response to the idiosyncrasies of each spectator.
484:– Nowhere in the play does Gobbo do anything that qualifies him as an official fool or jester. Still, he is considered as such, perhaps because he is called a "patch" and a fool, and also because of his (and his father's)
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my tongue"). It is possible that these terms refer rather to the idea of the clown. Either way, Gobbo is proof that
Shakespeare did not necessarily constantly discriminate in his qualifications of clowns, fools, and
557:, Puck comes closer to being the play's protagonist than any other Shakespearean fool. Though Bottom shares the fool role, Puck plays the more traditional fool, because he's genuinely clever and wise.
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One scholar agrees that the clowning in
Shakespeare's plays may have been intended as "an emotional vacation from the more serious business of the main action," in other words,
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Shakespearean fools are usually clever peasants or commoners that use their wits to outdo people of higher social standing. In this sense, they are very similar to the real
509:– similar to Touchstone, he is a domestic fool, considered by modern terms one of Shakespeare's least funny clowns, as his speech is bitter and his wit dark.
569:– Speed is a clever and witty servant. There is no mention of specific dress, or any indications of his or Launce's being a domestic fool or jester.
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472:– Launce is simple and pastoral. There is no mention of specific dress, or any indications of his or Speed's being a domestic fool or jester.
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contains a famous complaint at improvisational clowning (Act 3, Scene 2). Perhaps central to the Bard's redrawing of the fool was the actor
1061:"Should Puck or Bottom be considered the more important character in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream? - Homework Help - eNotes.com"
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reinforces the theme of love with his song in the second act to Sir Toby and Sir Andrew:
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Iyengar, Sujata, ed. (2014). "Shakespeare's Medical Language: A Dictionary". Bloomsbury.
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Character archetype recurring in the works of William Shakespeare
1011:"Introduction to Shakespeare's Clown Feste from Twelfth Night"
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was a great admirer of the popular actor who portrayed fools,
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202:the tolerance and acceptance of Feste himself."
1036:"The role of Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream"
894:"William Kempe - Shakespeare's Favorite Clown"
317:– although arguments can also be made for the
37:is a recurring character type in the works of
197:Youth’s a stuff will not endure. (II.iii.52).
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1115:ENotes.com "Shakespeare's Clowns and Fools"
737:. Unsourced material may be challenged and
264:. Unsourced material may be challenged and
61:. For Shakespeare himself, however, actor
152:just after the murder of the King; and as
757:Learn how and when to remove this message
284:Learn how and when to remove this message
1129:Twelfth Night – Analysis of Fools
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985:. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. pp.
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194:Then come kiss me, Sweet-and-twenty,
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1087:As You Like it: A Guide to the Play
24:King Lear and the Fool in the Storm
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182:What is love? ’tis not hereafter,
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866:"William Kempe | British actor"
191:In delay there lies no plenty,—
188:What’s to come is still unsure:
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977:Evans, G. Blakemore (1974).
603:Shakespeare Our Contemporary
553:– Jester to the fairy king,
492:of the matter sir," "Tears
226:List of Shakespearean fools
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164:the theme of the dramas."
146:'s suicide; the Porter in
1124:Royal Shakespeare Company
981:The Riverside Shakespeare
840:Warde, Frederick (1913).
583:Royal Shakespeare Company
520:A Midsummer Night's Dream
506:All's Well That Ends Well
1156:Shakespearean characters
843:The fools of Shakespeare
870:Encyclopædia Britannica
566:Two Gentlemen of Verona
550:Midsummer Night's Dream
469:Two Gentlemen of Verona
458:The Taming of the Shrew
694:'s famous soliloquies.
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405:The Comedy of Errors
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488:("This is the very
380:Love's Labours Lost
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494:exhibit
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329:Citizen
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281:(
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272:(
268:.
254:.
176:,
161:.
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