Neo-Classical Era 1660-1798 Flashcards

1
Q

What dominated criticism of the play in the early eighteenth century?

A

The neo-classical perception of plot and charecter

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2
Q

What were the 7 characteristics of Neo-classicism?

A

Focused on values of objectivity, impersonalism, rationality, decorum, balance, harmony, proportions and moderation

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3
Q

What was the Neo-classicism art movement?

A

A severe and unemotional form of art harkening back to the grandeur of ancient Greece and Rome. It’s rigidity was a reaction to the overbred Rococo style and the emotionally charged Baroque style.

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4
Q

What did the main critics who defended Hamlet take for granted?

A

The necessity of the classical canon in principle

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5
Q

Who provides the most famous example of neo-classical treatments of the play?

A

Voltaire

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6
Q

Defences against Voltaire had to do what first?

A

At first had to weaken the neo-classical othodoxy

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7
Q

How did Lewis Theobald explain the absurdity of Hamlet calling death “the undiscovered country”?

A

He hypothesised that the, having just seen the ghost, it explains purgatory rather than death itself

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8
Q

What did William Popple praise (1735)?

A

The verisimilitude of Polonius’ character, deploring the actors tradition of only playing him as a fool

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9
Q

What scene did Joseph Addison praise?

A

The ghost scene

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10
Q

What soliloquy did Richard Steele praise and why?

A

The first one, due to the psychological insight

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11
Q

Why were the ghost scenes a particular favourite during this period?

A

The era was on the verge of the gothic revival

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12
Q

What did George Stubbes note about how Shakespeare made the ghost credible?

A

He used Horatio’s incredulity to make the ghost credible

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13
Q

What did Arthur Murphy believe the play was a “poetic representation” of?

A

“the mind of a weak and melancholic person”

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14
Q

What did George Calmon the elder single Hamlet out for in a general discussion of Shakespeare?

A

His skill with the supernatural element of drama

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15
Q

What unusual note did Aaron Will raise in 1735?

A

He praised the contradictions of Hamlets temperament (rather than condemning them as violations of decorum)

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16
Q

What reading gained popularity after the mid-century?

A

Psycological

17
Q

What did Tobias Smollet criticise as illogical?

A

Hamlet’s “To be or not to be” soliloquy, which he believed was illogical because of Hamlet’s actions.

18
Q

What was commonly defended as part of a grander plan?

A

The plays disparate elements

19
Q

What did Horace Walpole defend as ultimately more realistic and reflective than rigid separation?

A

The plays mixture of comedy and tragedy

20
Q

How did Samual Johnson echo Popple?

A

In his defence of the character of Polonius, he also doubled the necessity of Hamlets viscous treatment of Ophelia and skeptically viewed the necessary and probability of the climax

21
Q

What criticism occurred near the end of the century?

A

An attack on Hamlets character e.g George Stevens

22
Q

What understanding of Hamlet occurred in the late eighteenth century even before the Romantic movement?

A

The recognition that Hamlet (with Falstaff) was the first Shakespeare character to be understood as a personality separate from the play in which he appears

23
Q

What did critics and performers begin to view the play as towards the late eighteenth century?

A

Confusing and inconsistant

24
Q

Who had one of their characters say “Shakespeare meant…to represent the effects of a great action laid upon a soul unfit for the performance of it…A lovely, pure, noble, and most moral nature, without the strength of nerve which forms a hero, sinks beneath a burden which it cannot bear, and must not cast away.“?

A

Geothe, in ‘Wilheims Master Apprentice” (1795)

25
Q

What was the century’s changed view of Hamlets character called?

A

The shift in critical emphasis on plot (pre-1750) to an emphasis on the theatrical portrayal of the character (post-1750)