“Be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them.”

Taken from Twelfth Night, Shakespeare’s twenty-third play, this quote is part of a joke played on the steward Malvolio. However, in the 21st century, this line is reused in everything from political speeches to inspirational Instagram posts. 

William Shakespeare is the most well-known and respected author in human history - and has inspired authors, playwrights and fellow creatives for centuries. His words have tormented young students, perplexed literary academics and woven their way into our common dialect and culture - chances are, you don’t even realise that you’re speaking in a Shakespearan tongue.

Think back to your GCSE English class: iambic pentameter, soliloquy, sonnets. These are linguistic practices synonymous with the Bard, whose impact and influence on English culture and dramatics is quite incalculable.

The great British playwright Christopher Marlowe preceded Shakespeare in the late 16th century, but was forgotten quickly once the comedies, tragedies and histories of William Shakespeare were written and performed. Doctor Faustus is a supernatural drama that is far less studied than, say, The Tempest, despite both featuring ideas and characters of a fantasy realm.

A large reason why Shakespeare is so fondly remembered is because his plays were incredibly popular at the time of their writing, rediscovered and repopularised in Victorian Britain and have been consistently adapted and restaged ever since.

His work is set in Shakespeare’s times - no reference to technology or global exploration. The world of the early 1600s was more localised and less diverse, but the narratives of these plays feel just as alive and real today.

Shakespeare’s greatest stories (which are most or all of his thirty-eight plays) are built on the foundations of strong and complex characters - his stories are human, the most exposing and rigorously human. This focused approach, moulding indelible protagonists and conflicts, means that reinventing these works, 400 years after their initial performances, is - in lack of a better term - easy.

Take Macbeth, the cursed Scottish play. Any anti-hero or fallen soldier in fiction ever since have been compared to the titular King. Macbeth is a character obsessed with the crown, obsessed with the highest position in the land and supported by an equally twisted and tormented partner. These dreams and aspirations are still held by us all - whether we’d like to acknowledge it is another issue, and speaks to the popularity of Shakespeare’s role in culture to say the unspoken, tapping into primal and authentic human emotion.

You can’t expect to write a new Shakespearean-style play and can’t hold yourself to the Bard’s high standards. However, you should follow his character-focused lead and aim to create memorable and intricate players for your narrative.

Paired with his iconic leads are the triad of genres Shakespeare’s plays structure themselves around. He wrote historical epics, playful comedies and entrancing tragedies. In many of his histories, Shakespeare used creative licence and rewrote the past - the leading example is the defaming and disgracing of Richard III, albeit to the benefit of pleasing his Queen whose grandfather, Henry VII, fought King Richard in the War of the Roses.

Shakespeare had a complete understanding of genre and used it to enhance and elevate his work, as well as playfully reworking and repositioning his stories within genre conventions.

As we remember William Shakespeare on what would have been his 460th birthday, use his impenetrable legacy to improve your writing: mould character and follow genre, but always leave room for play.

“We know what we are, but know not what we may be.” - Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5