Literature lesson 5 January 2021

• Engels
• Middelbare school
• vwo
• Leerjaar 5,6

Shakespeare: recap

Type one thing that you know about Shakespeare

In a nutshell...

• 10 tragedies, 10 histories, 17 comedies, 154 sonnets
• married Anne Hathaway
• left Stratford-upon-Avon for London
• worked as an actor, then as a playwright

(Elizabethan) threatre:

• popular entertainment
• outside the city boundaries - why?
• Elizabethan theatre:

a. interaction between cast and audience 

b. no women allowed on stage

c. great emphasis on actor's costumes

d. little scenery, few props

e. seating - wealthy people in raised galleries

Romeo and Juliet

What do you know about Romeo and Juliet?

Romeo and Juliet

• a romantic comedy
• romance & young love, humour and witty dialogues
• written in the 1590s
• taken from Arthur Brooke's poem 'Tragical Historye of Romeus & Juliet'
• Shakespeare squeezed a 9-month story into a 5-day story and he changed Juliet's age (from 16 to almost 14). See link for other comparisons.
• other Shakesperean tragedies: Macbeth, Hamlet, Othello, King Lear.
• Tragedy = fate & destiny 

Interesting link:

https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/brookes-romeus-and-juliet

Take notes while watching

As you watch, make notes. What have you learned about:

The Montagues

The Capulets

Juliet

Romeo

Count Paris

Tybalt

Friar Lawrence

Which character is your favourite and why?

04:22

Listen to Jade's interview and jot down the important themes of the play.

Key moments and facts

Act 1 scene 1: the scene is set

Act 1 scene 4: R&J meet for the first time

Act 2 scene 1 (or 2 in many editions): the balcony scene

Act 2 scene 5: R&J get married in secret

Act 3 scene 1: Romeo kills Tybalt

Act 3 scene 5: The unhappy couple are parted

Act 4 scene 1: Dangerous solution

Act 5 scene 1: Romeo finds out Juliet is 'dead' and plans suicide

Act 5 scene 3: Romeo kills Paris, drinks poison. Juliet wakes up, stabs herself to death with Romeo's knife. Montagues & Capulets are reconciled.

Act 1 Scene 5

Watch the play and read your the lines in your reader (page 42, from 'If I profane...')

What is this scene about? 

03:30

Literary devices in this scene

• Sonnet
• Metaphor ('holy shrine', 'two blushing pilgrims')
• Simile ('As a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear')
• Soliloquy (a long speech given by the speaker to himself)

The famous balcony scene

Read this extract from the famous balcony scene, where Juliet is talking about her love for Romeo.

                      Shakespeare’s original version

JULIET

‘Tis but thy name that is my enemy.


Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.


What’s Montague?

It is nor hand, nor foot,


Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part


Belonging to a man.

O, be some other name!


What’s in a name?

That which we call a rose

By any other word would smell as sweet.

Translate the extract into Modern English

00:00

THE BALCONY SCENE

Use your reader and you will read the same extract while watching.

 Open to page '42' and focus on the second column of the page which begins with 'After the party Romeo does not join..'.