Shakespeare’s excellence has been a point of discussion and awe since his first performance. Whether creating a magnificent love story or an interestingly twisted tragic-comedy, Shakespeare’s ability to use the element of surprise to his advantage is a clear example of his excellence as a playwright and artist. In both A Winter’s Tale and the Tempest, the audience is aware of a major event or change before the characters involved have such knowledge. By removing the element of surprise from the audience, even if for only one aspect or event, Shakespeare is able to focus the audience’s attention to an aspect of character or plot that he feels is more impactful.

In A Winter’s Tale, the audience is aware of the location and welfare of Perdita for sixteen years while her father, Leontes, is completely uninformed. This allows the audience to respond with no worry over the welfare over the lost child, and focus on the love and loss experienced by Leontes, untainted and aided by the knowledge of the King’s lost daughter. When Leontes is reunited with Perdita in scene five, the audience has had knowledge of her life and experience since she was left as a baby outside Bohemia. As the fortunes of Leontes fall away, the audience sees a hopeless man and his hope in Perdita. Being able to see both sides of this situation gives the audience a unique perspective of the regret and joy experienced by the characters’, even before the characters themselves know of the sorrow or bliss.

Being the mediator between characters, the unvoiced audience is given more control, though this power is being completely manipulated and proscribed by Shakespeare. Shakespeare took great pleasure in maneuvering the emotions of characters and audience alike. Constantly, he attempted to find new ways to awe the audience. In A Winter’s Tale, Shakespeare took this further than any playwright before, by using a live bear (when possible) in scene 3.3 to maul Antogonus to death as he leaves the baby Perdita instead of a man in a bear costume. Such amazement in the theatre may be partly responsible for the desire of modern audiences’ to be stimulated by and interact with entertainers; each era having to overshadow the greatness of the preceding.

Though Shakespeare decides to surprise both characters and audience with the return of Hermione, the audiences’ privileged position of knowledge even makes her return more powerful. While offering some and withholding other information, the audience is under the illusion that there are no secrets, making the spectacle of the awakening of a statue even greater. As Hermione awakens from her stone bed, a sense of awe is created between the characters and the audience who are simultaneously shocked at the scene; an experience shared by both actors and viewers together, uniting the two. The father/daughter relationship portrayed in A Winter’s Tale between Leontes and Perdita is in stark contradiction to that of Prospero and Miranda in The Tempest, while the audience’s availability to gain knowledge of the characters before an event occurs in both plays.

The Tempest is full of instances of the super-informed audience. The story is built on the idea that the audience, along with Prospero, will be all knowing. Knowledge allows focus on the love of Miranda and Ferdinand, and the return of Prospero to his rightful position, Duke of Milan. Interestingly simple is the relationship of Ferdinand and Miranda for a Shakespearean love story. The appearance and use of Ariel as the eyes and ears of Prospero as well as the audience also allows the understanding of the complicated plan designed by Prospero to avenge himself. Ariel is not only responsible for the shipwreck, the hiding and separating of the shipwrecked, but also for informing Prospero of the plans of his enemies. Without Ariel, the play would fall apart.

Ariel makes Prospero’s plan possible. Without a character capable of being in two places at once, invisible, cunning, and loyal, Prospero alone would be unable to complete all needed tasks for the successful completion of his design. Ariel is a slave, but it seems he takes joy in his workings with Prospero, though even upon meeting Ariel, he requested his promised freedom from his master, which is granted at the close of the play. Ariel is left blameless; he had to do it, and Prospero can be understood as the puppet master, leaving both of their consciouses clean as their behavior was simply an order, in the case of Ariel, and a plan for justice for Prospero. Shakespeare’s ability to create loved characters such as Ariel is yet another expression of his excellence.

TheTempest continues to amaze audiences, as knowing what will happen to characters before they themselves do is enjoyable. As Caliban attempts to convince Stefano to kill Prospero, Ariel enters and we know Prospero will know of the plan before it is executed. Shipwrecked men fear for their lives, their King and the future of their country, while the viewer is able to relax in the understanding that those on stage are taken care of and in for a surprise like none they are expecting. Prospero’s separation and reunion of Ferdinand with his uncle and ship mates and the union of Miranda and Ferdinand is all part of a fantastic plan to place himself in a position of power, expose his brother for his corruption and exemplify the excellence of Shakespeare.

In both A Winter’s Tale and The Tempest, Shakespeare uses surprise to give the audience an advantage of knowledge over the characters whose lives such knowledge affects. His ability to create situations in which outside onlookers are able to be more informed than those involved, aids Shakespeare’s reputation as excellent. In both plays, he experiments with the relationship of fathers and daughters. In both instances, the daughters are portrayed as the beautiful shining light that makes it possible for their father’s to regain power. Though the relationship of Perdita and Leontes is quite distant, even non-existent until the close of the play, her return with Florizel to Sicilia creates what can be considered a happy ending. The relationship of Prospero and Miranda is much closer, more intimate and also leads The Tempest to a favorable ending for the main characters. Though both plays are deceptively happy, with awkward twists of joy implanted into scenes of despair, neither can be considered a feel-good family piece, but are actual portrayals of life: with the good comes bad and vice versa. And Shakespeare wouldn’t have it any other way.

Shakespeare is a master of using surprise as a catalyst to shock characters and audiences alike. Without doubt, each of these decisions has been made skillfully and decisively to allow Shakespeare to attain whatever outcome is it that he desires. The use of language and lovable characters are also tools that help create the exact situation desired by the playwright. Shakespeare’s ability to create characters and situations make his works excellent. Not only is he able to maintain an audiences’ attention, he’s able to twist they very ideas he planted in their imaginations and create a grand portrayal of the human condition from love to jealousy, sadness to joy, and even back from the dead.