Shakespeare's Festive World: a Semiotic Study of Selected Plays by William Shakespeare

The introduction highlights the concept of "festivity" and how it reached its peak in the Elizabethan age. It also discloses Bakhtin's concept of the "carnivalesque" and sheds light upon the Semiotic theory. The first chapter examines the festive elements in A Midsummer Night's Dream (1595) and As You Like It (1599) as comedies. The second chapter focuses on the festive elements in two of Shakespeare's great tragedies: Othello (1602-3) and King Lear (1605). The third chapter discloses the festive elements in two of Shakespeare's late romances: The Winter's Tale (1610) and The Tempest (1611). The conclusion presents what is deduced from this research: In the comedies, festivity builds up until it reaches its peak with the marriages of the characters at the end. In the tragedies, Shakespeare employs festivity as a tool of intrigue. In the romances, the festive spirit reigns. Yet, the ambivalence of festivity remains as the most remarkable feature.