Over the next week or so you will have several opportunities to display the knowledge you have gained and skills you have developed while reading
Hamlet.
1. On
Friday Monday, we'll have a test on the play.
Here is a fill-in-the-blank outline of what--in addition to the characters and events you have reviewed in groups--you'll need to know. We'll review this tomorrow and Friday.
Hamlet Review
2012
What have we learned about how language works in literature,
about Elizabethan theatre, about Shakespeare’s writing, and about Hamlet itself?
I.
Hamlet’s
sound
A. _______________
_______________ provide memorable closure
and summation
1.
“The time is out of joint: O cursed spite / That ever I
was born to set it right.” (1.5)
2.
“The play’s the thing
/ Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.” (2.2)
B. _______________
_______________ / _______________ _________________________
1.
provides structure, unity
2.
provides potential for emphasis by way of variation:
“to be or not to be; that is the question.”
II.
Hamlet’s
language
A. Word
play
1.
5.1 “lie”: lie down & tell lies
2.
4.7 “too much of water”: tears & drowning [&,
obliquely, Hamlet’s wish to melt (1.2)]
B. paradoxes:
“more than kin less than kind”
C. figurative
language/metaphors: king > worm > fish > beggar is a metaphor for
Hamlet’s questioning of the Elizabethan social structure (4.3)
D.
diction
E.
syntax
III.
Hamlet as
theatre
A. Acting
Choices (interpretations)
1.
“To be or not to be” (3.1)
a.
Zefferelli= ____________________
b.
Almereyda= ____________________
c.
Branagh= ____________________
2.
The Murder of
Gonzago / “The Mouse Trap” (3.2)
a.
Zefferelli= ____________________
b.
Almereyda= ____________________
c.
Branagh= ____________________
B. Visual
Choices (interpretations)
Ex. “to be or not to be”
1.
Branagh’s mirror= deceit, also outward action v.
self-directed action
2.
Zefferelli’s catacombs= death “the undiscovered
country”
3.
Almereyda’s Blockbuster= “Action” / “Go Home Happy”
(irony)
IV. Hamlet’s patterns
A. Characters
1.
Hamlet’s foils (contrasting characters) in terms of
action:
____________________ and ____________________
2.
Another similarity and contrast: Hamlet (acts mad,
wishes to die), Ophelia (is mad, allows herself to do die)
3.
Who “spies”? How?
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
4.
Who follows and obeys? Who flatters authority (kisses
up to those in power)?
____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
B. Plot
1.
Irony (3.3)
a.
Hamlet believes ____________________ is confessing for
his sins and so does not kill him.
b. The
reader/audience knows that ____________________ has failed to confess.
c.
Mel Gibson claims that Hamlet’s failure to kill ____________________
here triggers all the other deaths in the play (triggers the tragedy as such).
2.
Fitting deaths
a.
____________________ dies spying (3.4)
b. ____________________
dies passively (& in water) (4.7)
c.
____________________ dies drinking to Hamlet (Perhaps her
death triggers Hamlet to action vs. Claudius.) (5.2)
d. ____________________
(“I am justly killed by my own treachery.”) (5.2)
e.
____________________ (by sword and drink) (5.2)
f.
____________________ (“the rest is silence”: Does
Shakespeare intend this as a tragic and ironic contrast with Hamlet’s constant
speaking) (5.2)
g. ____________________
____________________ die as servants (4.6, 5.1, 5.2)
3.
Is Fortinbras rewarded for
a.
Deception?
b. Action?
C. Imagery
(Who or what is associated with these images?)
1.
water / liquids: _____________________________________________________
2.
weeds / flowers: ____________________________________________________
3.
snakes and other animals: _____________________________________________
4.
painting / make-up: __________________________________________________
5.
other: _____________________________________________________________
D. Historical
and Mythological Allusions
1.
Hyperion (Sun God) to Satyr (Goat Man) (1.2
soliloquy)):
____________________
and ____________________
2.
Priam and Hecuba (2.2 Player’s speech and Hamlet’s
second soliloquy):
____________________ and
____________________
3.
Julius Caesar (3.2 Murder of Gonzago/Mouse Trap scene)
4.
Alexander the Great (5.1 graveyard scene)
5.
other: : ____________________
E. Themes
1.
Fallen world
a.
Hamlet sees the world as corrupt.
aa. “How
weary, flat, stale, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world.”
bb. “tis
an unweeded garden”
cc. “Man
delights not me nor woman neither”
b. This
view is triggered – it seems – by his mother’s overhasty marriage (and later by
Ophelia’s lying).
aa. “Frailty
thy name is woman”
bb. “Get
thee to a nunnery.”
2.
Responses to corruption & trauma: Thought and
Action
a.
____________________ 1.2, 2.2, 3.1, 4.4
b. ____________________
/ ____________________ 4.5, 4.7
c.
____________________ 1.2, 4.4, 5.2
3. Deception: Appearance and
Reality, Seems and Is
a.
______________________________________
b. ______________________________________
c.
______________________________________
d. ______________________________________
How does the play illustrate the complexity and variety of
human responses to corrupt acts, traumatic loss, and the realization of human
mortality (including one’s own)? What does the play suggest about these
responses?
2. Friday (11/30) we'll get started working on a formal analysis essay in which we'll get to apply some of the analysis skills we've been working on and some of the essay writing skills we worked on during the first term.
Bring an annotated passage (100 lines, give or take) to class on Friday. Bring the annotated passage, a thesis, and a plan to class on Tuesday.
Here's the prompt:
AP English Language Q2/AP
English Literature Q2 Style Essay
Choose a passage from Hamlet that is rich in content and style.
Write a formal essay in which you explain how William Shakespeare’s use of rhetorical
and/or literary strategies in the passage contributes to the play's exploration of the effects of and reactions to trauma, corruption, wrongdoing, and other human flaws.
There's a lot to unpack here. What passage should you write about? What strategies are used in the passage? What themes are found in the passage that are also developed in the play as a whole? How do the strategies contribute to the development of the theme?
3. You'll also write something about how you would direct a performance of the passage you've chosen. More on this later.
