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The Shakespearean fool is a recurring character type in the works of William Shakespeare. Shakespearean fools are usually clever peasants or commoners that use their wits to outdo people of higher social standing. In this sense, they are very similar to the real fools, and jesters of the time, but their characteristics are greatly heightened for theatrical effect. They are largely heterogeneous. The "groundlings" (theatre-goers who were too poor to pay for seats and thus stood on the 'ground' in the front by the stage) that frequented the Globe Theatre were more likely to be drawn to these Shakespearean fools. However they were also favoured by the nobility. Most notably, Queen Elizabeth I was a great admirer of the popular actor who portrayed fools, Richard Tarlton. For the Bard himself, however, actor Robert Armin may have proved vital to the cultivation of the fool character in his plays. ==The Fool== The fool was not a new character on stage. Indeed, a tradition had developed from Roman times through to Medieval times where fools entertained a varied public. The fool perhaps reached its pre-Shakespearean heights as the court jester in aristocratic courts across Europe. The jester was a dynamic and changing part of entertaining aristocratic households, and the entertainment they provided varied greatly: songs, music, storytelling, medieval satire, physical comedy and, to a lesser extent, juggling and acrobatics. Shakespeare both borrowed from the new motif of the jester, and contributed to its rethinking. Whereas the jester of the royal courts often regaled his audience with various skills aimed to amuse; Shakespeare's fool, in sync with Shakespeare's revolutionary ideas about theatre, began to depart from a simple way of representation. Like other characters, the fool began to speak outside of the narrow confines of exemplary morality, to address themes of love, psychic turmoil, and all of the innumerable themes that arise in Shakespeare, and in modern theatre. Shakespeare appears to have had objections to the older tradition of fools, as represented by William Kempe. ''Hamlet'' contains a famous complaint at improvisational clowning (Act 3, Scene 2). Perhaps central to the Bard's redrawing of the fool was the actor Robert Armin:
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