The Birth of Modern Romance Literature
Laura Goldman 2010
A candle lit dinner, two lovers walking on a beach at sunset, these are some of the images that come to mind when the word romance is conjured. However, during William Shakespeare’s time, romance both in his mind and the minds of other authors was of a different nature. The time of literature took place from the early 1500’s until the late 1600’s when the issue of romance was thought to be a matter of convenience than of actual love. William Shakespeare took some ideas from renaissance literature and added his own style to create his own romance genre. Shakespearean romance also called tragicomedy consisted of three themes comedy, tragedy, and romance which are the building blocks of all plays throughout history. Within renaissance romance stories, it is interesting to learn that stories were written and told from a male perspective, but the stories were geared toward a female audience and although, most people in the renaissance period were illiterate they experienced these stories on stage. The majority of renaissance romance themes consisted of adventures, magical worlds, and action oriented plots. The knight in shining armor wins the great battle and in reward he wins the fair maiden. This universal plot is the constant theme in stories such as King Arthur, Charlemagne, and Alexander the Great. Along with the idea of the chivalrous knight and the virtuous lovers, was the magical world that served as one of the main characters itself. The world of renaissance romance was filled with magical lands and beings that would help the human characters obtain what they desired.
Although, many notable literary works contained adventures and magic as the primary themes, they dealt with the relationships between human characters on a smaller scale than Shakespeare’s plays. This idea is translated into Shakespeare’s plays however, Shakespeare was an author whose main interests were the human characters and their relationships with one another were the most important aspects of the story. The significant relationships between Prospero, Miranda, and Ferdinand in “The Tempest” captures the attitudes of the renaissance era, a daughter’s duty to obey her father’s wishes to marry a proper suitor, the daughter to be chaste, and the suitor to be noble. Shakespeare with regards to “The Tempest” took these themes and the relationships to a more complex level, portraying the lovers as unassuming participants in Prospero’s ploy to get them to fall in love.
Shakespeare’s romance genre used the elements of the supernatural, adventures, human relationships, and a love story which, were all common themes of renaissance romance. Shakespeare was able to combine all of these ideas along with comedy, tragedy, and romance into this new genre that was titled Shakespearean romance. This combination of themes is also the reason way it is viewed as a tragicomedy; some characters like Prosper and Alonso represent the tragic elements of the story. The characters Antonio and Sebastian are comical in nature. Miranda and Ferdinand represent two of the romance aspects along with the magical elements of their world which, provide a romantic and dangerous atmosphere.
By taking a closer look at the themes that make up The Tempest plot, the visions behind both the renaissance and William Shakespeare’s romance theories for the purpose of storytelling become more apparent and present a clear representation of Shakespeare’s vision.
In the story of “The Tempest”, Shakespeare stays true to the original themes of Renaissance romance, but he brings new depth to what are often one-dimensional plots. Unlike more typical Renaissance plots, which focus on the hero’s fighting battles, the plot of “The Tempest” centers more on the relationships between the characters. The story is more about the relationships set in a background of a magical world. In “The Tempest”, the main female character, Miranda, is similar to women in Renaissance stories – a pure, innocent virgin who will bend to her father’s will. When her father, Prospero, tells her of how they came to the abandoned island, she passionately states how she would have fought for her father:
“Had I been any god of power, I would
Have sunk the sea within the earth or ere
It should the good ship so have swallowed and
The fraughting souls within her.” (851; Act 1 Scene 2 Line 10)
Prospero can be viewed as both the victim and the hero of the story. He is “the symbolic figure in which tragic events are rooted” (Lewis, “William Shakespeare: The Mixture of Styles in Shakespeare’s Last Play’s: The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest) .
Prospero relishes his success in matchmaking, he congratulates himself:
“They are both in either’s powers, but this swift business
I must uneasy make lest too light winning
Make the prize light.” (856; Act 1 Scene 2 Line 453)
In Renaissance romance, Prospero could take the roles of both the hero and the loser in battle. His main goals are to get off the island and to make Miranda and Ferdinand fall in love. He is the hero in that he is successful with the love match. However, he becomes the victim of his own obsession and in the end he decides to exile himself for good. Prospero is also the cause of the magical mishaps that occur throughout the play and he is responsible for bringing the “tempest” that causes the shipwreck in the beginning of the play. Prospero is also behind the magical spells of the story’s background. Although his desires are etched in realism, Prospero summons Ariel, a spirit, to do his bidding. By the end of the play, Prospero puts realism back into the unrealistic world. He sends away all the magical spirits and restores harmony. With realism restored, he has the “resolution achieved through realistic means” (Lewis, “William Shakespeare: The Mixture of Styles in Shakespeare’s Last Play’s: The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest) .
Prospero expresses his joy in the peaceful conclusion toward Ferdinand: “our revels now are ended”.
Ferdinand is the obvious “knight in shining armor”. His fight is for the love of Miranda and his freedom from Prospero’s prison. Both he and Miranda are ignorant of Prospero’s deception which allows them to think they are falling in love by their own free will. Ferdinand’s first encounter with Miranda is manipulated by Ariel pretending to be Miranda singing – having a deep effect on him:
“This music crept by me upon the waters,
Allaying both their fury and my passion
With its sweet air. Thence I have followed it,
Or it hath drawn me rather. But ’tis gone.
No, it begins again.” (856 Act 1 Scene 2 Line 395)
Prospero’s plan works and Ferdinand is immediately in love:
“Most sure, the goddess
On whom these airs attend!—Vouchsafe my prayer”. (856 Act 1 Scene 2 Line 425)This notion that marriage could be conducted for the purpose of love was a new idea. During the Renaissance, courtly love for marriage was rare. Although there was a high importance placed on matrimony, this was for financial, security, and reproductive purposes. Shakespeare, in being a man ahead of his time, wrote plays that dealt with the more modern theme of marriage for love.
These important aspects of both the Shakespearean and the Renaissance style of writing are only a few examples in this widely popular form of entertainment. There is no conclusive evidence to suggest that one style is better than the other, it is up the viewers and readers to decide which style they prefer, that is to say which style emotionally excites them. Both the Renaissance and William Shakespeare’s visions of the romance genre are and always will be part of world literature and both these style have continued to influence our modern romance literature.
The Issues in “The Tempest” that bring new ideas to traditional Renaissance romance are: love stories and father/daughter relationships as the main theme and the fantasy / magical elements as the secondary theme. Shakespeare was able to take many of the simple ideas of Renaissance romance and invent his own romance genre using fantasy and reality components. Shakespeare used the theme of unrequited love and also tried to convince the audience of his time to accept the idea that marriage should be about love and not about duty and honor. He conveyed to his audience that as long as two lovers “show therein gentleness, courtesy, and worth” a person should be able to marry for love (Goldstein 338). Shakespeare’s focus on human relationships instead of adventures can also be viewed as a mature departure within the Renaissance romance genre. Included with these themes is the combination of the magical world with the realistic world of complex human emotions and interactions which Renaissance stories usually lacked. Renaissance romance literature stuck more closely to the adventure idea of romance. In contrast, many of Shakespeare’s plays “carry with them pre-comic, pre-tragic tone of romance and never fall clearly into the purely tragic or the purely comic” (Still Dixon 81). He combines all three – comedy, tragedy and romance.
Works Cited
Gesner, Carol. “The Tempest as Pastoral Romance” Shakespeare Quarterly. 10.4 (1959):
531-539. Print.
Examples and Quotations on the importance of Pastoral Romance in William Shakespeare’s The Tempest.Goldstein, Neal L. “Love’s Labor’s Lost and The Renaissance Vision of Love.”
Shakespeare Quarterly. 25.3 (1974): 335-350. Print.
Examples and Quotations from William Shakespeare’s Love’s Labor’s Lost in relation to the Renaissance Vision of Love.Hillman, Richard. “The Tempest as Romance and Anti-Romance.” Shakespeare Quarterly.
55.2 (1985-1986): 141-160. Print.
Relating William Shakespeare’s The Tempest as a Romance and Anti-Romance.Sanders Regan, Mariann. Love Words: The Self and the Text in Medieval and Renaissance
Poetry. United Kingdom: Cornell University Press, 1982. Print.
Develops new theories on literary interpretation on the topic of Renaissance love Poetry, using examples of William Shakespeare’s sonnets and other poets works.Hyde, Thomas. The poetic Theology of Love: Cupid in Renaissance Literature. London and
Toronto: University of Delaware Press and Associated University Presses, 1986. Print.
Develops theories on love through Renaissance literature and gives examples on poetic theology.Lewis, Elizabeth. William Shakespeare: The Mixture of Styles in Shakespeare’s Last Play’s: The
Winter’s Tale and The Tempest. Bradley, A.C. Shakespeare and the Globe: Then and Now
Greenblatt, Stephen. The Norton Shakespeare Wells, Stanley, 2001.
http://www.literature-study-online.com/essays/shakespeare_last_plays.html
Discussion on the manner of styles Shakespeare incorporated the write his last two plays.
Tonkin, Humphrey. Five Lectures on Shakespeare’s Romances: Pericles, Cymbeline, The
Winter’s Tale, The Tempest. President’s College, University of Hartford, 2001.
http://uhaweb.hartford.edu/TONKIN/pdfs/romancesfivelectures.pdf
Discusses the importance of Shakespearean romance using examples from his four Romance genre plays.Still Dixon, Mimi. Renaissance Tragicomedy: Explorations in Genre and Politics. Tragicomic Recognitions: Medieval Miracles and Shakespearean Romance. New York AMS Press, 1987. Print.
Examples and in-depth research on Tragicomedy and Shakespearean Romance in the medieval and Renaissance period.Bevington, David. The Necessary Shakespeare: Third Edition. Pearson Education, Inc, 2009. Print
William Shakespeare’s most often read and produced plays, The Tempest.