To begin with the latter issue it can be observed that the primary function of shipwreck in the plays is not to cause death and destruction, but to separate main characters, as many observers have stated.[i] A fatal outcome is very much the exception. Of course, there is the sinking of Antigonus’s ship off the …
Continue reading “Who are the victims of shipwreck – and what happens to them?”
Several commonalities or patterns concerning Shakespeare’s shipwreck plays can be found. One main conclusion is that almost all shipwrecks are caused by storms, sometimes in combination with a lee coast. In The Comedy of Errors, the storm is mainly identified by the dark sky (the ‘obscurèd light the heavens did grant’ CE 1.1.66). That Egeon’s …
In similar way as I did with sea language, I also created a list of all the shipwrecks in the plays. Similar to the use of “sea quotes” in general, the employment of shipwrecks—along with storms and pirates—appears more frequently in the latter half of Shakespeare’s writing career. In this table, I also attempted to …
Gurr found, that ‘six of the plays have shipwrecks’. Any result will depend on how one counts and what is included in the listing. In the following I present the results of my own count. I find, that in five plays, shipwreck – real or presumed – is central to the plot: In four plays, …
Shakespeare's Shipwrecks 