What Are We Watching in Shakespeare: The Play or the Act of Justice?

Abstract

Shakespeare’s works deal with law and justice, among other concepts. In fact, in some of his works, we see a variety of approaches to the implementation of these concepts. In the West, a large number of researchers in law and literature have written on these aspects of his plays. Though rare, there are even courses in law faculties on law and literature. In Turkey, also, there are some such recent developments in some private universities. The greatest poet and playwright that England ever produced, Shakespeare, delved into these subjects in the English legal world, which was quite different and complex, and were has been watched and read with pleasure for centuries. This study does not look into all his plays but concentrates on three of them extensively. Shakespeare was a playwright and also a businessman who owned his own theatre. The Sovereign, who is also the law giver, was among his protectors. As a consequence, his plays highlighting laws that were controversial in his homeland, took place in Venice in the Merchant of Venice, and Vienna in Measure for Measure. King Lear, in which inheritance was discussed, a topic close to the Sovereign’s heart, is presented as a fable. Here, this study looks at a number of striking quotations from his plays, especially on lawyers, and indicates other quotations. Shakespeare pointed to a large spectrum of approaches to these issues by the tangled structure of his plays. We feel both amazement and admiration for the realism with which these issues are depicted.