Shakespeare Characters: Never Quite What One Expects

I've lately come to appreciate how good Shakespeare truly is. I've always been a fan--but not because of his Great Genius or all the other labels people throw at approved-of writers. 

"Nothing new under the sun" applies to Shakespeare. I don't think Shakespeare is so great because he broke boundaries or transcended expectations blah blah blah. I think he is so great because he used archetypes and tropes in a way that captured human experience and human interest. He was the Agatha Christie of the playwright's world. He put things in the best order. He distilled a fundamental attitude or experience within a single character or scene. His writing is energetic and layered because he allowed it to be--likely, to allow for different actors to play various parts. 

(In some future post, I would point out the potential creativity and discipline of writing for money.) 

Here, I will point out that Shakespeare created lasting characters. They are archetypes, many times, but they are something more because they so exactly capture an archetype and then offer something on top of the archetype. 

Nuttiest play you will ever see.

Kate isn't just a shrew. She has her own personality and wit and ways of looking at the universe. Petruchio is her match, not her overlord. Likewise, Shylock and Falstaff have their own individualized and personalized backgrounds. The twins in Comedy of Errors are distinct. The relationships in Hamlet are believably dysfunctional because the characters come across as recognizable and real people. 

Even characters that I have ignored in the past--such as Henry VI--have something-extra that makes them not simply labels who stand on the stage and react to things. They have usable substance. 

Take Cymbeline, a play Shakespeare may not have written but obviously borrowed from him. Cymbeline feels like Shakespeare (or someone) took all his prior characters--including husbands and wives who feel jealousy--and threw them into a play alongside a bunch of his prior tropes. The play includes (I'm not kidding) kidnapped brothers grown to manhood living in the wilderness (Wales), Roman senators wandering around Briton trying to get tribute, an evil stepmother and an evil prince, and people continually running off to (again, I'm serious) Milford Haven (in Wales). The whole thing sounds like a Greek tragedy set in Swansea or Staten Island. 

I can't help but wonder if Shakespeare was badgered by his shareholders into writing a play and said, "Fine! You want a play?! Here's all my ideas in a single script--I'll trot them out one after another."

Or, since Shakespeare wasn't adverse to making money, he said, "Sure! Let's trot out all my best ideas and make a bundle!" 

The point here: only someone that good in the first place could do what Shakespeare or someone else did: use what they already had to make something that doesn't totally fall apart.