Shakespeare is more popular now than he was in his time. Do artists have to die for work to be appreciated?

Answer 1

You've got it all backwards. Shakespeare was more popular in his own time than now.

The proof? His plays and performances were solicited by the Queen, the King, and all their subjects. Rival playing troupes often bought copies of Shakespeare's plays to perform because they were then practically guaranteed a full house. And everybody, from the rich to the commoners, people who were pretty much illiterate, packed the theaters to watch Shakespeare. To give you an idea of the scope, every Shakespeare play was greeted with much the same fervor as J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books.

Nowadays, most high school students GROAN at the thought of all the "thee's" and "thou's" to be pored over. And how many ordinary people (by ordinary I mean NOT professors, teachers, librarians, intellectuals, and the like) do you know who truly LOVED Shakespeare's work with an intensity that surpasses their liking for J.K. Rowling's books? Few. A very fortunate few.

So in answer to your question, NO, artists DO NOT have to die for their work to be appreciated. I direct your attention to modern movie directors, writers both modern and old (Dan Brown, J.K. Rowling, JRR Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Mark Twain, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, L.M. Montgomery, etc., etc.), and musicians both modern and old (Maroon 5, Bach, Mozart, Beethoven etc.). The list goes on and on and on. I rest my case.

In fact, most writers enjoyed success when they were alive. Aside from the examples I've already listed, there's also Thomas Hardy, Margaret Mitchell (Gone With the Wind), O. Henry (king of the short story with a twist), Lewis Wallace (Ben-Hur), Lewis Carroll (Alice in Wonderland), J.D. Salinger (The Catcher in the Rye), S.E. Hinton (The Outsiders) and so on. With the exception of a few recluses, like Emily Dickinson.

P.S. - the only grounds one could have to argue that Shakespeare is more popular today than yesterday is that globalization has opened up the whole world to Shakespeare. Yet the fact remains that most people do NOT seek out his plays for pure pleasure. Even if more people are reading his plays (due to the nature of the school curriculum), that does not necessarily imply popularity. Assuming that by "popularity" you mean "being widely admired and sought after." If you can show me the orders rolling in for Shakespeare plays, maybe I'll reconsider my judgment. Otherwise, cheers!

Answer 2

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Answer 3

There are lots of reasons why Wm. Shakespeare is more popular today than in his own life time. You must appreciate that Wm. Shakespear was a very successful businessman and made a fortune from the ownership of his many theatres. It's not just the Globe here in London. He also owned half a dozen other theatres in East London - all called Rose by the way. Rose One, Rose Two etc.

Shakespeare's plays are popular because they are as relevant today as they were in his own time.

One of Wm. Shakespeare's' major successes was his ability to put the entire population of the world on stage. "All the world is a stage..." etc. This then means that every one of us is an actor playing a role on this world stage.

The expression "world stage" [from Shakespeare] is still widely used. As in for example, George W Bush strides the world stage.

Not only all of the above and more but that every single day one thousand productions of Wm. Shakespeare's plays go on stage around the world. Cannot think of any other person who has achieved that - after death.

Will we be listening to Elvis in 300 years from now?

Answer 4

Shakespeare was extremely popular in his time, and his works were a mainstay of the Globe theater in London. Some of the naughtier or more controversial ones brought down the wrath of the Queen, and of course, that made them more popular. In the context of the times, and the audience he could reach, Shakespeare was a hit, if not an enormously rich person because of it. In those days, the best a success could hope to achieve was a lifelong patron, who paid your bills, let you live in one of his properties, and made minimal demands on your time.

Shakespeare is popular today because the scope of his audience has broadened to encompass the whole world. And because his audience is more educated, and interested in such things as his little political digs, the sly references to royalty and all the other subtleties that make his plays so good.

Does someone have to die to be appreciated as an author? No. I think that most writers that happens to, were always good in their lifetime. The problem may have been that they did not get the publicity or attention their work warranted, and their unfortunate demises had the rather twisted benefit of drawing attention back to them as individuals, and then to the work.

A pity, because most of those writers, like artists who produce the paintings that sell for millions, never benefited from the original production of them.

Answer 5

Shakespeare is not necessarily more popular now. The theatre was the comman-mans past-time in Shakespearean times, like the TV or football is for us now (everyone went - it was cheap and the audience joined in, oranges were sold, prostitutes available, a big day out!).

However, the issues in his plays (love, hate, racism, jealousy, life, death, slavery, nature, cross-dressing! etc) are still relevant and transmit very well today. His plays have also become part of our history, vocabulary, education-system and modern-day theatre, and that is why he is still appreciated today.

Many artists/writers/musicians are more popular now because of technological advances (eg:internet) and the fact that many (like Van Gogh) were ahead of their time with regards to issues and ideas and therefore more highly appreciated after death by later generations.

To sum up, I think it has more to do with the individual and how ahead of their time they are - or, like Shakespeare, both ahead of his time and very influential in his own too.

Answer 6

Some artists do, but I question whether Shakespeare is one of them. He wrote to please the "groundlings" just as much as the nobles. His plays were pretty popular in their own day. He just didn't get published until after he died...

Often though, I think the artists that survive and the public comes to appreciate over time aren't necessarily the ones you would expect, or who are "the best".

Answer 7

Shakespeare was popular in his life-time, but as a playwright, and less as a poet. He did not own dozens of theatres, and in fact he did not even own one theatre: he was the member of a theatre company (The King's Men) who owned, together two theatres. He was quite rich (one of the richest men in his town, Stratford), but he was not considered the greatest poet of his time: when he died, he was not buried in Westminster Abbey, as Ben Jonson would later be.
If he seems more popular today than he was in his life time, it is because his popularity and fame are now world-wide, and because he became a mythical figure in the 18th century (the Bard) in England.

Answer 8

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Answer 9

Holger Syme, Professor of English and Drama at the University of Toronto, tells us if Shakespeare was as popular in his own time as he is now: http://www.vidoyen.com/questions/was-shakespeare-as-popular-in-his-own-time-as-he-is-now/answers/holger-syme

Answer 10

Shakespeare, allegedly, stole work from his students and his work is soo difficult to decipher, in this day and age, that it is only still being taught at school to torture English Lit students.