1. Key Words and Key Sections: Exploring Shakespeare
Mike Scott
School of English
University of Liverpool
TALC, Paris
This presentation is at

2. Starting Point Scott and Tribble (2006) studying Romeo and Juliet:
“All Shakespeare plays” is a suitable reference corpus
A large number of KWs are proper nouns: characters in the play
Others:
theme KWs (love, death etc.)
exclamations
pronouns
copula verbs
KWs of Shakespeare

3. Aims of the Paper To investigate KWs in all of Shakespeare's plays
To identify proportions of
character/place KWs
To locate “unexpected” KWs in terms of
character
distribution
KWs of Shakespeare

4. Methods Obtain all plays (OUP 1916 edition) Convert to .txt
Use WordSmith’s WordList tool to compute word-lists
Use KeyWords tool to compute KWs for each using all the plays as a reference corpus
Export the KWs for each into an Excel spreadsheet
Repeat 3-5 for all characters
Identify KW types; understand why they are key
KWs of Shakespeare

5. HTML from Online Library of Liberty
KWs of Shakespeare

6. the HTML source…
<div class="sp"><span class="ital_speaker">Lys.</span><p style="margin-top: -0.5em;">I am, my lord, as well deriv’d as he,</p>
<p class="p-no-indent1">As well possess’d; my love is more than his;<span class="milestone_right" title="Craig1916_line_100">100</span></p>
<p class="p-no-indent1">My fortunes every way as fairly rank’d</p>
<p class="p-no-indent1">If not with vantage, as Demetrius’;</p>
<p class="p-no-indent1">And, which is more than all these boasts can be,</p>
<p class="p-no-indent1">I am belov’d of beauteous Hermia.<span
KWs of Shakespeare

7. Clean up process Convert to XML (Dreamweaver) Custom program:
Remove standard headers
Convert to Unicode
Replace markup such as “deriv&8217;d” with “deriv’d”
Find XML markup for Dramatis Personae, build standard list of characters
Identify Act and Scene numbers, remove line numbers; separate out stage directions
Mark up all speech beginnings and endings
Export each speech to a file for each character
KWs of Shakespeare

8. Cleaned up <LYSANDER> <5%>
I am, my lord, as well deriv'd as he,
As well possess'd; my love is more than his;
My fortunes every way as fairly rank'd
If not with vantage, as Demetrius';
And, which is more than all these boasts can be,
I am belov'd of beauteous Hermia.
Why should not I then prosecute my right?
Demetrius, I'll avouch it to his head,
Made love to Nedar's daughter, Helena,
And won her soul; and she, sweet lady, dotes,
Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry,
Upon this spotted and inconstant man.
</LYSANDER>
KWs of Shakespeare

9. WordSmith Processing Wordlists:
of all the plays
of each play (batch, 37 lists)
of each character’s speeches (batch, 1313 lists)
Using the first wordlist as the reference corpus and exporting results to Excel, make KW lists …
of each play (batch)
of each character’s speeches (batch)
and KW databases of the plays & the characters
KWs of Shakespeare

10. Examine KWs Characters: Places: Pronouns: Themes, events:
FORTINBRAS, GERTRUDE, GUILDENSTERN, HAMLET, HAMLET'S,HORATIO, LAERTES, OPHELIA, PYRRHUS, ROSENCRANTZ
Places:
DENMARK, NORWAY
Pronouns:
I, IT, T, THEE, THOU
Themes, events:
MADNESS, PLAY,PLAYERS
Other (“unexpected”):
E'EN, LORD, MOST, MOTHER, PHRASE, VERY
KWs of Shakespeare

11. Most of these are uninteresting….
if you know the play you already know it concerns Hamlet and some other characters, that it’s set in Denmark and that Ophelia goes mad.
Approximately 50% are characters or places, compared with 30% in BNC, Scott & Tribble 2006:71)
KWs of Shakespeare

12. KW databases the KKWs of the plays: the KKWs of the characters:
I, HER, SIR, YOU, KING, LOVE, SHE, T, THY (6 or more plays each)
the KKWs of the characters:
SIR, HER, LORD, YOU, MASTER, THOU, CAESAR, MADAM, THY, LOVE, SHE, A, I, OUR, WARWICK (12 or more characters each)
KWs of Shakespeare

13. but the “others” and pronouns may be interesting
Why are such words “key” in this play?
“A word which is positively key occurs more often than would be expected by chance in comparison with the reference corpus.” (Help file, definition of keyness)
KWs of Shakespeare

14. but what about Negative KWs?
“A word which is negatively key occurs less often than would be expected by chance in comparison with the reference corpus.” (Help file, definition of keyness)
KWs of Shakespeare

15. All the negative KWs
A, AND, DOTH, FATHER, FOR, FROM, GOOD, HE, HER, HIM, HIS, I, I’LL, IN, IT, KING, LORD, LOVE, MASTER, ME, MOST, MY, OF, OUR, SHE, SIR, THE, THEE, THEIR, THERE, THY, THOU, TIS, WE, WHAT, WHY, YOU, YOUR
These are potentially interesting…
KWs of Shakespeare

16. … if the generally negative KWs happen to be positive
Why are IT, LORD and MOST positively key in Hamlet…
if they are negatively key in the other plays?
Which characters are they most key of?
Where are they found, how are these KWs dispersed throughout the play?
KWs of Shakespeare

17. Some are unsurprising “LOVE”:
Midsummer Night’s Dream – Helena, Lysander
As You Like It – Rosalind
Love’s Labour’s Lost – Armado
Much Ado About Nothing – Benedick
Two Gentlemen of Verona – Julia, Proteus, Valentine
Romeo & Juliet – Juliet, Romeo
KWs of Shakespeare

18. “SIR” Measure For Measure – Abhorson, Elbow, Pompey
Merry Wives of Windsor – Bardolph, Ford, Rugby, Simple
Henry IV part 2 – Bullcalf, Davy, Shallow
Comedy of Errors – Angelo, Dromio of Ephesus, Dromio of Syracuse
Two Gentlemen of Verona – Speed
KWs of Shakespeare

19. “MASTER”
Merry Wives of Windsor – Evans, Falstaff, Ford, Mistress Quickly, Shallow
Henry IV part 2 – Falstaff
Comedy of Errors – Dromio of Ephesus
KWs of Shakespeare

20. But some are puzzling Why is IT key in the speeches of Hamlet?
In the plays 0.95% (1 word in 100) but in Hamlet’s speeches 1.48%: a 50% increase in this one character’s speeches…
Or in the speeches of Horatio in the same play?
In the plays 0.95% but in Horatio’s speeches 2.33%: nearly 250% of the average in this one character’s speeches!
KWs of Shakespeare

21. IT in Hamlet In Hamlet’s speeches, distributed evenly:
In Horatio’s speeches:
KWs of Shakespeare

22. Some references to the Ghost…
KWs of Shakespeare

23. … but that cannot explain more than a fraction
KWs of Shakespeare

24. DO in Othello Nearly twice as frequent as in the other plays
Characteristic of Iago (nearly twice as often) and Desdemona (more than 3 times as often)
DOST characteristic of Othello (more than 6 times as frequent)
KWs of Shakespeare

25. Iago commanding
KWs of Shakespeare

26. Desdemona and conditionals
KWs of Shakespeare

27. Othello’s DOST: suspicion
KWs of Shakespeare

28. VERY propositional ((> textual) > (expressive))
Traugott (1990) points out that diachronically, the meaning of an item may evolve:
propositional ((> textual) > (expressive))
(Traugott, 1990:496)
KWs of Shakespeare

29. VERY in Hamlet
Adamson & Gonzalez-Dias (forthcoming) show that very moves from an adjective (“true”) and develops adverbial uses in the 14th - 15th Centuries. By the 16th Century, we get
VERY+N formal
VERY+ADJ formal, informal
VERY+ADV more informal
KWs of Shakespeare

30. VERY in Hamlet
VERY+N high status characters (Iago, Macbeth, Othello, Antony, Hamlet)
VERY+ADJ medium-low status (Mercutio (R&J), Beatrice (Ado), Fluellen (H5), Touchstone (AYL), Osric (Ham), Iago (Oth), Parolles (AllsW))
VERY+ADV low status (Pompey (MM)
Adamson & Gonzalez-Dias (forthcoming: table 3)
KWs of Shakespeare

31. Osric & Hamlet
KWs of Shakespeare

32. VERY + ADV
KWs of Shakespeare

33. Hamlet’s KWs
It, woo’t, very, phrase, the, t, could e’en, why, sense, of, a, or, whereto, this, let, how
… a questioning role
KWs of Shakespeare

34. Conclusions
Approximately 50% of the KWs are predictable names of characters and places, a higher ratio than in the BNC…
… because these are dialogues in plays.
The high-frequency KWs investigated will naturally vary in use from character to character and from play to play
but methinks they do vary too much for this variation to be mere chance
KW patterns can illuminate diachronic study of language
and understanding of character and role
but there is a long way to go …
KWs of Shakespeare

35. a warning to us all…
<COUNTESS>Marry, that's a bountiful answer that fits all questions.</COUNTESS>
<CLOWN>It is like a barber's chair that fits all buttocks; the pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawn-buttock, or any buttock.</CLOWN>
<COUNTESS>Will your answer serve fit to all questions?</COUNTESS>
<CLOWN>As fit as ten groats is for the hand of an attorney, as your French crown for your taffeta punk, as Tib's rush for Tom's forefinger, as a pancake for Shrove-Tuesday, a morris for Mayday, as the nail to his hole, the cuckold to his horn, as a scolding quean to a wrangling knave, as the nun's lip to the friar's mouth; nay, as the pudding to his skin.</CLOWN>
<COUNTESS>Have you, I say, an answer of such fitness for all questions?</COUNTESS>
<CLOWN>From below your duke to beneath your constable, it will fit any question.</CLOWN>
<COUNTESS>It must be an answer of most monstrous size that must fit all demands.</COUNTESS>
KWs of Shakespeare

36. References
Adamson, Sylvia & Victorina Gonzalez-Dias, “Back to the very beginning: the development of intensifiers in English”. Paper presented at 13th International Conference of English Historical Linguistics, Vienna, Aug
Aston, Guy & Lou Burnard, The BNC Handbook. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Crystal, David & Ben Crystal, Shakespeare’s Words: a glossary and language companion. London: Penguin.
Scott, Mike & Chris Tribble, Textual Patterns: key words and corpus analysis in language education. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Traugott, Elizabeth, “From Less to More Situated in Language: the Unidirectionality of Semantic Change” in S. Adamson, V. Law, N. Vincent & S. Wright, Papers from the 5th International Conference of English Historical Linguistics, Cambridge, Benjamins: Amsterdam, pp
KWs of Shakespeare