Shakespeare's abiding relevance lies in the fact that he deals in such a unique way with universal themes such as love, greed, and the desire for political power. Because these themes are universal, they transcend the time and place in which they were written, speaking to many different people in many different cultures, down through the centuries and right across the globe. And the arts—especially literature—are the primary vehicle for the transmission of such universal themes.
But it's how Shakespeare handles these themes that allows him to speak to us in the present age. Unlike any other artist, Shakespeare, having created his unforgettable characters, stands back and lets them speak—however good, bad, or indifferent they are. There's no finger-wagging with Shakespeare, no telling people what they ought to do or how to live their lives. He simply gives each character, even the incredibly wicked ones, the space in which to tell their own stories. Once he's done that, he leaves it up to us how we should judge them.
In an age where agreement on common standards of morality is increasingly difficult to secure, Shakespeare's morally neutral rendering of his characters and their worlds has much greater salience for a contemporary audience than a more narrowly didactic, rhetorical approach.
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