Angels-SHAKESPEARE’S CONCEPT OF ANGELS

SHAKESPEARE’S CONCEPT OF ANGELS
The beloved English dramatist and poet William Shakespeare
(1564–1616) incorporated his eschatological ideas, including those
about angels, into his work, though one might argue that his biblical
knowledge was used lightly. His plays seem rather to reflect the dramatist’s
pure joy in the theater, his passion for words, and his often tonguein-
check delight in an intimate acquaintance with human nature.
One modern writer, Roger L. Cox, argues differently. In his book
Between Earth and Heaven: Shakespeare, Dostoevsky, and the Meaning of
Christian Tragedy (1969), Cox maintains that Shakespeare was
“indebted specifically to the New Testament, not to biblical commen
tators or religious reformers, and what [he] has borrowed is not merely
random phrases or quotable verses, but the very fabric of biblical
thought with its characteristic patterns of language and imagery.”
“Shakespearean tragedy,” writes Cox, “derives some of its principal
motifs and conceptions from the letters of St. Paul.”
Shakespeare’s work does seem to reflect that heaven is conceived
as God’s kingdom above the clouds, reserved for the souls of the righteous,
and that he held a belief in Satan or Lucifer and a hell where
the damned were eternally tormented by fire. His view of good and
evil angels forever whispering their exhortations and temptations at
the shoulders of mortals was based on the teachings of the church in
Shakespeare’s time.
In an introduction to Religion and Modern Literature: Essays in
Theory and Criticism (1975), editor G. B. Tennyson writes:
One might argue that the Globe Playhouse is quite a long way
from the church porch, that Shakespeare’s dramas are works
in which this world figures more prominently than the next,
works in which human action plays a greater role than divine
action. But much of this secularity is deceptive. . . . The
stature of a Hamlet or a Lear is a function of the religious
world-view that Shakespeare shared with his audience, for the
Elizabethan plays are descendants of the medieval drama of
religious inspiration.
Thus in Shakespeare angels are represented as the embodiment of
Goodness, Perfection, and Beauty; as singers of sweet songs; as messengers;
as guardians; as warriors for righteousness; and as compassionate
and merciful beings, understanding of human nature. Shakespeare
also frequently contrasts the good and evil angels, and often compares
virtuous women to angels.
Angels as the Embodiment of Goodness, Perfection, and Beauty
In Love’s Labour’s Lost, angels represent Good to the simpleminded
page Moth, but Shakespeare also uses the term to refer to a beautiful
woman. Boyet, attendant to the princess of France, relates to her
the details of a romantic plot, directed toward her by King Ferdinand,
which he has overheard in the woods. Moth is given his instructions
by the king and responds innocently: “For, ‘quoth the king,’ an angel
shalt thou see, / Yet fear not thou, but speak audaciously.” / The boy
reply’d, “An angel is not evil; / I should have fear’d her had she been a
devil” (5.2.105–8).
Angels are equated with Perfection in Two Gentlemen of Verona.
Valentine admits he has been “an idle truant, / Omitting the sweet
benefit of time / To clothe mine age with angel-like perfection”
(2.4.66).
Angels again represent Perfection in Henry VIII, when the lord
chancellor tells the archbishop of Canterbury and members of the
council chamber, “we are all men / In our own natures frail, and capable
/ Of our flesh; few are angels . . .” (5.2.57).
In The Tempest, Prospero, the banished duke of Milan, equates
angels with Beauty. Angry at his daughter Miranda’s attraction to the
shipwrecked Prince Ferdinand, Prospero compares the handsome
youth to the deformed slave Caliban, offspring of a witch. He tells
Miranda, “Thou think’st there are no more such shapes as he, / Having
seen but him and Caliban: Foolish wench! / To the most of men
this is a Caliban, / And they to him are angels” (1.2.481).
Angels as Sweet Singers
Shakespeare has a romp with the idea that angels are sweet singers
in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. After an attempt at playing a practical
joke on his fellow craftsmen by donning the head of an ass, Bottom,
the weaver, is left alone in the deep woods. To quell his fear, he begins
bellowing a song about birds. Meanwhile, Titania, queen of the fairies,
is sleeping nearby under a magic spell contrived by her husband,
Oberon. While she slept he streaked her eyelids with the juice of a
flower that would make her fall madly in love with the first thing she
saw upon waking. When she hears Bottom’s song the spell is activated.
“What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?” she asks, and upon seeing
the weaver, ass’s head and all, she declares her love (3.1.132).
Angelic choirs are likened to the music of the spheres in The Merchant
of Venice. As Lorenzo and his love Jessica enjoy a starry night, he
tells her,
Look how the floor of heaven
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold;
There’s not the smallest orb which thou behold’st
But in his motion like an angel sings,
Still quiring to the young-ey’d cherubims:
Such harmony is in immortal souls;
But, whilst this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
(5.1.58–65)
Angels as Messengers
The concept of angels as messengers is the basis for a quote from
young Arthur in the play King John. On learning that his trusted
Hubert, chamberlain to the king, has sworn to put out the boy’s eyes
with hot irons, Arthur is stunned and says, “And if an angel should
have come to me / And told me Hubert should put out mine eyes / I
would not have believ’d him” (4.1.68–70).
In Macbeth, the lord Lennox asks for an angelic messenger as war
looms: “Some holy angel / Fly to the court of England, and unfold /
His message ere he come; that a swift blessing / May soon return to
this our suffering county” (3.6.45).
Guardian Angels
A good example of the Shakespearean concept of guardian angels
is found in Henry VIII when an old woman brings the king news of the
birth of his daughter: “Now, good angels / Fly o’er thy royal head, and
shade thy person / Under their blessed wings!” she greets King Henry
(5.1.159–60).In Henry V, the archbishop of Canterbury addresses the king with
a similar salutation: “God and his angels guard your sacred throne, /
And make you long become it! (1.2.7–8).
Angels are again portrayed as guardians in Richard III. After the
ghost of Clarence wishes death upon King Richard, it turns to Henry,
earl of Richmond, and bestows a blessing: “Good angels guard thy battle!
live, and flourish!” (5.3.138). Earlier in the play, the ailing
duchess of York bids Lady Anne, “Go thou to Richard, and good
angels tend thee!” (4.1.93).
Guardian angels are called upon in Hamlet to bear the dead
prince’s soul to heaven. As Hamlet utters his final words and then is
silent, Horatio breathes, “Goodnight, sweet prince, / And flights of
angels sing thee to thy rest!” (5.2.371).
Angels as Warriors
Shakespeare often employs the biblical portrait of angels as powerful
warriors for righteousness. In Richard II, King Richard attempts
to reassure the duke of Aumerle of Richard’s royal power, in spite of
victories by Bolingbroke, the future King Henry IV. Richard compares
himself to the Sun rising, plucking “the cloak of night” from
the backs of the traitors. He tells Aumerle, “For every man that Bolingbroke
hath press’d / To lift shrewd steel against our golden crown,
/ God for his Richard hath in heavenly pay / A glorious angel: then, if
angels fight, / Weak man must fall; for heaven still guards the right”
(3.2.59–63).
In Richard III, the ghost of Buckingham curses King Richard in his
dream, then turns to the earl of Richmond, soon to be King Henry
VII, who is also dreaming of Buckingham, and says, “But cheer thy
heart, and be thou not dismay’d: / God and good angels fight on Richmond’s
side” (5.3.174–5).
In Macbeth, as Macbeth plans Duncan’s assassination, he considers
the life of the good king:
Besides, this Duncan
Hath borne this faculties so meek, hath been
So clear in his great office, that his virtues
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against
The deep damnation of his taking-off:
Striding the blast, or heaven’s cherubin, hors’d
Upon the sightless couriers of the air,
Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye. . . .
(1.7.16–24)Good and Evil Angels
Shakespeare’s treatment of the good and evil (or fallen) angels is
directly in line with his religious beliefs. In Measure for Measure,
Angelo is aware of good and evil at war within himself as he formulates
a plan to obtain sweet Isabellas’s sexual favors in exchange for
her brother’s life. He finds himself praying with “empty words” while
his mind “anchors on Isabel.” With heaven in his mouth and a “strong
and swelling evil” in his heart, Angelo reflects on the power of his
office, but realizes he is only human. “Let’s write good angel on the
devil’s horn,” he moans, “Tis not the devil’s crest” (2.4.16).
In the general confusion of The Comedy of Errors, Dromio of Syracuse
refers to an officer as “he that came behind you, sir, like an evil
angel, and bid you forsake your liberty” (4.3.20–21).
In Henry VIII, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey bids farewell to his servant
Cromwell, telling him, “I charge thee, fling away ambition: / By
that sin fell the angels; how can man, then, / The image of his Maker,
hope to win by it?” (3.2.441–3).
As Falstaff banters with the chief justice in Henry IV, the justice
chides him for his misleading of young Prince John: “You follow the
young prince up and down, like his ill angel” (1.2.186). Later, in a bar
scene, Falstaff refers to his page, saying, “There is a good angel about
him; but the devil outbids him too” (2.4.362).
In Macbeth, Malcolm tells McDuff, “That which you are my
thoughts cannot transpose; / Angels are bright still, though the brightest
fell” (4.3.21–22). Roger L. Cox, in Between Earth and Heaven, proposes
that this line comes from Luke 10:18: “I saw Satan fall like lightning
from heaven.”
Merciful Angels
Shakespeare’s work also shows he believed angels to be compassionate,
merciful, and understanding of human nature, much like
Christ. In Measure for Measure, Isabella, sister of Claudio, who is condemned
to die for causing his betrothed Juliet to become pregnant,
begs acting lord deputy Angelo for her brother’s pardon. Angelo
insists that Claudio is to be beheaded, and Isabella, soon to become a
nun, exhorts, “—but man, proud man! / Dressed in a little brief
authority,— / Most ignorant of what he’s most assured, / His glassy
essence—like an angry ape, / Plays such fantastic tricks before high
heaven / As make the angels weep; who, with our spleens, / Would all
themselves laugh mortal” (2.2.119–25).
In Henry VIII, the duke of Norfolk speaks well of Queen Katherine’s
love for her husband, comparing it with angelic love: “her that
loves him with that excellence / That angels love good men with;
even of her / That, when the greatest stroke of fortune falls, / Will
bless the king . . .” (2.2.35–38).
In Hamlet, King Claudius is overcome with guilt about his brother’s
murder and calls upon the angels for mercy and understanding: “O
limed soul, that, struggling to be free, / Art more engag’d! Help,
angels! Make assay” (3.3.68–69).
Women as Angels
Comparison between virtuous women and angels is often couched
in simile and metaphor in Shakespearean drama. In Henry V, as the
king attempts to woo Katherine, he tells her, “An angel is like you,
Kate, and you are like an angel” (5.2.110).
In Troilus and Cressida, it is the lady who makes the comparison:
“Women are angels, wooing” (1.2.312), Cressida says.
Shakespeare’s vision of angels is clear in Romeo and Juliet. As
Romeo courts Juliet beneath her window in the Capulets’ garden, she
sighs, “Ah me!” Romeo responds:
She speaks:—
O, speak again, bright angel! for thou art
As glorious to this night, being o’er my head,
As is a winged messenger of heaven
Unto the white-upturned wondering eyes
Of mortals that fall back to gaze on him
When he bestrides the lazy-pacing clouds
And sails upon the bosom of the air.
(2.2.26–33)
In Hamlet, the ghost of Hamlet’s father reveals the truth about his
own murder, and speaks of his widow as “my most seeming virtuous
queen,” now wed to King Claudius, the elder Hamlet’s killer. He refers
to her as “a radiant angel” (1.5.55).
The prince of Morocco in The Merchant of Venice believes be will
win the fair Portia by choosing a casket of gold from among two others,
one lead and one silver. Only by choosing the casket that contains
her picture will he win her hand. He reasons: “They have in England /
A coin that bears the figure of an angel / Stamped in gold; but that’s
insculp’d upon; / But here an angel in a golden bed / Lies all within”
(2.7.55-58).
In spite of numerous references to women as angels, however,
Shakespeare does provide a contrast to that notion. In Love’s Labour’s
Lost, Don Adriano de Armado fumes, “Love is a familiar, love is a
devil; there is no evil angel but love” (1.1.177–8). Nevertheless, he
ends his tirade with the admission that Cupid’s “disgrace is to be
called boy; but his glory is to subdue men.” Armado declares that he is
truly in love with the wench Jacquenetta. “Assist me, some extemporal
god of rhyme, for I am sure I shall turn sonneteer . . .” (1.1.189-91),
he closes.
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 144 contains perhaps his most striking contrast
to the idea that women are as angels:
Two loves I have of comfort and despair,
Which like two spirits do suggest me still;
The better angel is a man right fair,
The worser spirit a woman, colour’d ill.
To win me soon to hell, my female evil
Tempteth my better angel from my side,
And would corrupt my saint to be a devil,
Wooing his purity with her foul pride. . . .