Becky Ellis questions the meaning of Shakespeare’s timelessness.

‘He was not of an age, but for all time!’ Jonson wrote in his poem to Shakespeare published with the first folio in 1623. Presumably, from this quote comes the phrase that Shakespeare is timeless, one of the few ‘facts’ about the Bard that every school child seems to have learnt. But what is behind this sense of timelessness? Jonson says that Shakespeare is for all time, but as a contemporary of Shakespeare what does that mean? Does he mean that Shakespeare will always be well-known – as is apparent from the fact that he has been in production ever since his first plays were performed in the early 1590s? Or does Jonson mean that the themes that Shakespeare writes about (love, jealousy, hate, revenge, misunderstandings and confusions – the very human emotions which are used throughout our modern literary canon) are the aspects that will outlive him? These must be timeless; we are still as human as those watching Shakespeare’s plays four hundred years ago. There have been love stories in every period, and likewise there have been people who wish to listen and watch.

Or, is this timelessness shown in the way that every child of school age in Great Britain has studied at least one of his works, and by the countless film adaptations and plays set in multiple periods which are constantly being produced? In York this term there has been The Winter’s Tale performed in the Drama Barn, Twelfth Night at the Theatre Royal, The Tempest being performed in week 8 for Student Action and Julius Caesar being performed at Monkgate. Each with only the individual director’s interpretation of the historic set and how to perform the four hundred year old lyrics.

The performance of Twelfth Night at Theatre Royal on the first of May even held a question and answer session between the cast and public for feedback from both sides. The theme of timelessness was one which seemed to occupy director Juliet Forster’s interpretation of the text. Instead of choosing one time and the usual interpretation behind those words, Forster went for all times, suggesting that her costumes were influenced from the Tudor period through to post World War One. The set – a cross between a birdcage and a gymnasium – was supposed to denote some fantastical world. But did this timeless impression work? Only the question and answer session cleared up doubts towards costumes which looked badly researched and in Olivia’s case, completely bizarre. Only in a fantasy world could any character wear a transparent mourning gown; Olivia, an example of modesty, piety and chastity was wearing a costume which could only be a cross between the burlesque and Victorian mourning weeds.

So timeless does not necessarily mean literally timeless, of no age, but of every one. But where should Shakespeare be set? She’s the Man (2006) and 10 Things I Hate About You (1999) claim to be adaptations of Twelfth Night and The Taming of the Shrew respectively. But apart from similar character names and a trace of a plot, these adaptations which reduce Shakespeare to American high-schools show very little of their original influence. The ideas of the plots are the same, they include the same emotions, and yet these productions are hardly timeless, even if unlike the fleeting moments of the stage productions they will still be around in a few years time.

But they have lost the language, the regular beat of iambic pentameter which is so typical of English poetry at this time. Shakespeare is timeless because of his language: everyone who has heard Twelfth Night’s opening line ‘If music be the food of love, play on, / Give me excess of it,’ should find it hard to doubt the reality of the torn anguish of Orsino’s love for love. Juliet’s despair, wishful thinking and pure love pull the audience deeper into both her emotions and the play as she declares, ‘what’s in a name? that which we call a rose/ By any other name would smell as sweet.’ Shakespeare’s grasp of poetry, combined with the ordinary people who deliver it, make these quotes so timeless.

But it is those fleeting moments on the stage when the audience can believe in the love of Romeo and Juliet, in the jealousy of Othello or the anguish of King Lear, that keep audiences going back for more. The infinitely more definitive film productions of Shakespeare lose the presence of the audience and the laughter of the constant humour. The beauty of drama is its different adaptations; no one performance can ever be the same, time has moved on. Every person can have their own opinions on how each play should be set, or each line performed, but good drama is timeless and is remembered for how its recurrent themes and words can be remembered and relived again and again.