Compare ways in which Shakespeare presents a character changing in Much Ado About Nothing and Macbeth. Shakespearean romantic comedies such as ‘Much Ado About Nothing’ feature one prominent aspect, complex love relationships amongst different pairs of characters, whereby the audience expects two or more characters to inevitably fall in love. Contrastingly, Shakespearean tragedies, like ‘Macbeth’, indulge in a noble and respected character changing into a tragic Hero, eventually resulting in his death. Similarly, one of the mutual features is the change in characters caused by external influences, whereby Leonato, Don Pedro and Claudio influence Benedick to love Beatrice, whilst the witches and Lady Macbeth influence Macbeth to kill the king; as other characters pursue this change, these changes are inevitable. However, Shakespeare presents Benedick’s change in a more positive and light-hearted manner, whilst Macbeth’s change revolves around negativity and wrong-doing as the approach to each individual genre is different, where comedies are humorous and happy, whilst tragedies are gloomy and grief-stricken.
Is Benedick the comic hero of the play? How far do you agree with this statement? Suggesting if Benedick is the comic hero of Much Ado About Nothing is difficult to pin point a precise hero as each character possess a different comical trait. For the reason that each character during the play being a character to laugh at or with for respite after tragic events, for instance Dogberry’s use of malapropism mocks authority and makes fun of those who are in it. Devices that are used by Benedick and Beatrice are Bawdy language, word play and puns, which are very different compared to Dogberry’s According to Aristotle the idea of comedy comes from speculation concerning men dancing, signing and cavorting around the image of a phallus.
“How does this add to your understanding of women’s role within society at this time?” In this passage, Curley’s Wife is confiding in Lennie. A few lines into the extract, she asks Lennie “Ain’t I got a right to talk to nobody?”- Which could show that women at this time were told what to do, and whom they were allowed to talk to by their husbands. Women at this time were seen as having a lower status than men. Obviously Curley’s Wife does not love her husband, which is delicately shown when she tells Lennie “I don’t like Curley, he’s not a nice fella.” It is noticeable that Curley’s Wife does not have a name throughout the novel. She is only addressed as “Curley’s Wife” – her real name is never said.
Homesh Krishnamoorthy Mrs. Nelson English 9E 10/04/2012 Comparison Paragraph between Franco Zeffirelli and Baz Luhrmann In Act 3 scene 1 of Romeo and Juliet, Franco Zeffirelli and Baz Luhrmann portray a differing interpretation of the scene. Based on my opinion of the play I believe Zeffirelli portrays a stronger interpretation of the themes and deeper ideas of the play based on characterization, setting, and the interpretation of the lines. To begin with, Zeffirelli accurately portrays the characters Mercuito, Benvolio and Tybalt by showing the audience how Mercutio is always making jokes and laughing around, and Benvolio being cautious of a fight. This leaves us with Tybalt, who is fierce and short-tempered, always looking to bring up a battle. In the beginning of the scene, Benvolio says to Mercutio, “I pray thee, Good Mercutio, let’s retire” (Benvolio 3.1.1), Mercutio abruptly interrupts him while saying “Blah, Blah, Blah” (Mercutio 3.1.2).
Chikamatsu Vs. Shakespeare Chikamatsu Monzaemon’s tragedy, The Love Suicides at Soneszaki and Shakespeare’s tragedy, Romeo and Juliet share many similarities. Both incorporate emotion to captivate the audience, and both utilize music to enhance the performances. The plot of Shakespeare’s play is similar to Chikamatsu’s in that the lovers are struggling to be with one another. Yet, The Love Suicides at Sonseki will leave the audience with the sense of having witnessed an actual event instead of a puppet theater show. The puppet play is written in an understandable language, where as Shakespearean plays are difficult to understand.
Shakespeare used “smoke raised” which suggests that although his relationship has the associations with “smoke” and “fumes”, he still wants it to be “raised” which shows his Petrarchan roots and the fact he is still a courtly lover. In this line of the play, Romeo also presents the idea that courtly love is not the only component that makes an arranged marriage fail. This is shown by saying “with” in the middle of the line. There are two things represented in the line: “smoke raised” and “the fume of sighs”; Romeo shows that courtly love is “smoke” created by the population. It is indicating that the courtly lovers among the people in the Elizabethan era were “sighing” out the courtly love “fumes” into the atmosphere making the “smoke rise”.
Of course MAAN follows Shakespeare’s traditional comedy structure but modern critics have their own agenda that a comedy, being such a complex genre, should conform to. Since the time of the ancient Greeks critics have struggled to define it, Plato described it as a series of events you would ‘blush to practice yourself’. Susan Snyder who writes for the Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare Company, states that - ‘Comedy involves men of middling estate, its perils are small scale, its outcomes peaceful’. This is an excellent summary for the majority of Shakespeare’s plays; however it is not necessarily accurate in relation to MAAN. It is true to say that a comedy involves ‘men of a middling estate’, in MAAN the protagonists share the company of the Prince Don Pedro, and are socially superior to the watchmen such as Dogberry and Verges.
Back in the 1600s Shakespeare wrote plays that would specifically please the Monarch, as there was more pressure to gain acceptance; his comical plays would restore Social Class in the form of marriage. Abigail's Party fails to follow this structure that is used even in modern plays and films, which is why I refer to it as a Social Tragedy, where the social class was broken. Like in Shakespeare's Tragedy 'Romeo and Juliet' the two lovers are married, then torn apart by death as a consequence of a conflicting social class, this can be loosely mirrored in Abigail's Party. A typical example within the play of an unhappy marriage would involve Beverly and Lawrence. Though they are married, which implies a certain amount of love and a strong relationship, they seem to fail at every part of the stereotypical marriage.
Phaedra is seemingly a love-struck character that embodies pathos and a pathetic nature while Clytaemnestra has a cold and calculative nature to her. However, both characters are at the whim of the patriarchal Athenian society which makes these two seemingly diverse characters closer in design than most would initially assume. With both characters, it is relationships with men that are seemingly at the root of perceived character flaws. In Greek society, "Unless extreme poverty compelled them to work, citizen women rarely ventured from the house...In this way they could avoid encounters with strange men who were not their relatives and might compromise their respectability." (Pomeroy) Within the plays, it would seem thematic issues of a woman’s downfall will commonly be connected to a relationship with a man.
For instance, Margery dresses up like Alithea, she not only hides who she is from her husband, but she also hides the fact that she is in love with Horner. Many of Wycherley’s references to plays throughout The Country Wife tied to double-entendres. Candido points out a few in his essay, such as when Sparkish says to Harcourt, “Oh, Harcourt, my mistress tells me you have been making fierce love to her all the play long, ha, ha....” In this line Sparkish is not only talking about a play but is unconsciously