Pick your Brutus,Caesar and Lady Macbeth from your vicinity

Arnima Dwivedi

It does not matter whether you really like literature or not, every student is introduced to the magician of writing ‘William Shakespeare’ in their English classes.

There has been much debate in the society about the relevance of Shakespeare writing in modern era followed by many contradictory opinions given by noble laureates over the issue. Here too is an opinion about the relevance of Elizabethan era writer in our so called modern society.

Died on April 23 1616, William Shakespeare is still alive in this world. He is still alive not only in the views of his admirers but his writings also find relevance in in actions of those who might have never read them.

Let us have a look on Shakespeare relevance:

To be a politician is all about power and ambition, and many people are "sacrificed" or "assassinated" in the journey of one politician's rise to power and Shakespeare knew it long ago. Remember the famous ‘et tu Brute’ (you too Brutus) from the popular Julius Caesar? The phrase became the last words of Julius after getting cheated by his best companion Brutus just for the sake of politics. Well now don’t you think that today, politics have many Brutus; many companions that depict the true character of Julius’s enemy in disguise.

We have heard the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav calling his opposition leader ‘Buaji’ and now just for you comparison lets go back to the great writer’s one of the greatest plays where Antony addresses public with ironical statement “And surely Brutus is an honorable man”.

In recent interview, politician Amar Singh said “I am not a political opportunist”. Well, doesn’t he sound like the Caesar killer?

Well that’s not where the relevance of the greatest writer of his times ends. I would say 'The Bard of Avon' still exist in the society in the form of Macbeth. His writings still find existence when people just for the sake of power, position and ambition transform themselves into Macbeth and his wife. Shakespeare still is alive in those where aggression, anger and desire transform into hazards of terrorism and riots. The writings of greatest writer of all centuries are still relevant when politics tries to murder humanism like Lady Macbeth provokes his husband to kill the king.

At least the honorable man – if watching the Earth from somewhere- would be relaxed to know that the generations have matured and do not follow Romeo Juliet. His soul would be calmed watching that youth of the present society understood the essence of his play and not the verbal meaning. They understood the immaturity shown in the play and decided to pull out maturity from it.

While he wanted to show the loyalty of Antony as a friend of Julius Caesar, you grasped the enmity of Brutus, while he wanted to aware you what extreme desires can do to you, you learnt what the easiest way to gain power is.

So yes, we can say that William Shakespeare is still alive in the hearts of those who honor his writings, but he dies! He dies every day when he sees hundreds of Brutus in politics, he dies each minute the present day Macbeth kills the king, He dies, while he wrote his works to remain alive, forever.