THE BATTLE OF THE SEXES IN "MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING"
BATTLE OF THE SEXES IN SHAKESPEARE’S “MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING” Love is a heart wrenching yet common emotion recognised worldwide. Fairytales consist of two people falling in love, getting married and living happily ever after, because we believe that love is illusory. However, ‘things are not as rosy as they appear’ and it is only by Shakespeare cleverly centring his play ““Much Ado About Nothing”” upon the eternal battle between the sexes and manipulatively crafting two pairs of contrasting lovers that he answers our burning desire of how to love. Claudio and Hero are the fairytale couple who personify the idealisation of love, but interestingly it is Beatrice and Benedick who we identify with because intrinsically we connect with these outspoken individuals and secretly we would like to be like them. Witty, spontaneous and gutsy, they are portrayed with a certain depth, possessing the more serious human virtues. They mellow in the course of the play as they come to experience a sincere love that the other characters are incapable of feeling and inevitably it is these two who create a marriage of true minds, a union of equals. ““Much Ado About Nothing”” is not merely a play about the composition of courtly love, because Shakespeare pits our protagonists against both their society and the social conventions of Messina. As we watch Beatrice and
MALE HONOUR IN "MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING"
HONOUR IN SHAKESPEARE’S “MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING” Shakespeare’s 16th century portrayal of Messina in southern Italy is a place where social conventions rule and order is kept through the strong bond of honour that exists among men. Honour is the only measure of the man and serves as a way for others to determine and evaluate that person’s character. Thus a person ‘becomes’ their honour. While women’s honour revolves around the womanly virtues of chastity and fidelity, men, being more complex beings, naturally have a more intricate and structured honour paradigm. The Knights of the Middle Ages epitomised honour systems with their strict adherence to the chivalric code. Knights were elite warriors, holding immense military and political power, and honour was a central component in the concept of conduct known as chivalry, which influenced models of behaviour for nobles during the Renaissance and was admired and exalted as a sign of nobility and social standing. Because this period of time marked an age of instability and constant conflict, honour for men was inevitably tied up in the act of war. In this environment, where one’s life lay in the competency of his fellow man, one who proved to be proficient and capable at war was naturally held in high esteem and regarded as honourable. War was an ever present reality and provided both an ideal and valuable test
THE ROLE OF MESSINA IN "MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING"
SETTING IN SHAKESPEAR’S “MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING” Messina is a place where people find it hard to behave with appropriate seriousness and in William Shakespeare’s well known play “Much Ado About Nothing” the most important ‘character’ in the play is in fact, Messina itself, detailing as it does a Shakespearean comic world, by nature light hearted, witty, optimistic and destined for a ‘happy’ outcome for its trials. Yet Messina also deals with serious matters. Love, the impediments to love, and the pain that must be reconciled before love can be confessed, reciprocated, and fulfilled, are all a part of life in Messina. All of Shakespeare’s great comedies explore in one way or another the problems of being serious in a society ruled by laws of comedy and it is this concept that we relate to in the world of “Much Ado About Nothing”. In this witty and light-hearted play there are verbal jokes, puns and forms of word play which the characters deliberately employ in their zest for life and there are practical jokes and tricks of varying levels of seriousness which the characters also play on one another. One of the most successful jokes is the parallel practical jokes played on Beatrice and Benedick in order to trick them into admitting their love for each other and as long as sensitive feelings and serious fates are not too much at stake, which they are
The Long, the Short and the Tall
The Long the Short and the Tall Willis Hall has claimed that he wrote the play "simply as entertainment." How far do you agree with the statement that The Long and the Short and the Tall is only meant to entertain an audience and not educate them? The Long and the Short and the Tall is a play set in the Malayan jungle in 1942 during the Second World War. The play focuses on a small British patrol group who were sent north into the jungle to check for signs of Japanese advance. The playwright is Willis Hall who was first a regular solider serving in Singapore. The play was written for amateur actors in Edinburgh as they had regional accents, which suited the roles for 1950's characters. The title "The Long the Short and the Tall" came from an anti-war song, which was popular during the Second World War. The Long and the Short and the Tall offers the reader a new perceptive of war, responsibility, and isolation while also entertaining. The author Willis Hall makes use of his first hand experience as a solider to give the impression that the realities of war were off-putting. The play raises many issues mainly one being "war," which is addressed in the whole first act. The five patrol members have no awareness of battle and are unable to come to terms with their situation. However, until the Japanese prisoner came, none of the inexperienced soldiers have been faced with the
Outline how Shakespeare uses the structure and conventions of pastoral in 'As You Like It' and highlight one or more possible interpretive emphases which you think arise from this.
* Outline how Shakespeare uses the structure and conventions of pastoral in 'As You Like It' and highlight one or more possible interpretive emphases which you think arise from this. You should support your reading of the play through close reference to the text, and the inclusion of appropriate background reading. 'As You Like It' finds its origins in the pastoral tradition of the renaissance in which the rustic field and forest provides a sanctuary from urban or courtly issues. The play itself takes place in a forest where the characters are hiding from treachery at court or injustice in the family. This pastoral tradition began with theocrites in ancient Greece, whose writings explored the sorrows of love and daily injustices in a rural setting. Virgil expanded the tradition, emphasising the distinction between urban and rural lifestyles even more. The Pastoral traditions, in spite of taking many literary forms, conformed to a traditional set of rules. A typical story would involve exiles from the court or city going into the countryside and living there either with or as shepherds. While in the rural area, they would hold singing contests and philosophically discuss the various merits of both forms of life. Eventually the exiles would return to the city having resolved their particular problems. The pastoral works within Shakespeare's 'As You Like It' have most