Analyses of Character Emotions in Dramatic Works by Using EmoLex Unigrams

Abstract

In theatrical pieces, written language is the primary medium for establishing antagonisms. As one of the most important figures of renaissance, Shakespeare wrote characters which express themselves clearly. Thus, the emotional landscape of the plays can be revealed from the texts. It is important to analyze such landscapes for further demonstrating these structures. We use word-emotion association lexicon with eight basic emotions (anger, fear, anticipation, trust, surprise, sadness, joy, and disgust) and two sentiments (negative and positive). By using this lexicon, the emotional state of each character is represented in 10 dimensional space and mapped onto a plane. This principle axes planes position each character relatively. Additionally, tempora-emotional evaluation of each play is graphed. We conclude that the protagonist and the antagonist have different emotional states from the rest and these two emotionally oppose each other. Temporal-Emotional timeline of the plays are meaningful to have a better insight into the tragedies.