Shakespeare · KS3 English

Shakespeare's life and theatre

William Shakespeare (1564 to 1616) was born in Stratford-upon-Avon. He wrote about 37 plays and 154 sonnets.
Many of his plays were performed at the Globe Theatre in London. Poorer audience members (groundlings) stood in the yard, and boys played the female parts.
He wrote in Elizabethan and Jacobean England, when people believed in fate and in a natural order led by the king.

Comedies end happily, often with marriages and mistaken identities: A Midsummer Night's Dream, Twelfth Night, Much Ado About Nothing.
Tragedies end with the death of the main character, a tragic hero whose fatal flaw (such as ambition or jealousy) leads to their downfall: Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, Hamlet.
Histories are about English kings: Henry V, Richard III.

Noble characters usually speak in blank verse: unrhymed lines of iambic pentameter (about ten syllables with a da-DUM rhythm). Servants and comic characters often speak in prose.
A rhyming couplet often ends a scene.
Old words: thou and thee (you), thy (your), art (are), doth (does), hath (has), wherefore (why), ere (before), anon (soon). In "Wherefore art thou Romeo?", Juliet asks why Romeo has to be a Montague, not where he is.

A soliloquy is a speech by a character alone on stage, sharing their thoughts with the audience.
An aside is a short comment to the audience that other characters can't hear.
Dramatic irony is when the audience knows something a character doesn't.
Common themes: love, power, ambition, jealousy, fate, and appearance versus reality.

Tragedy: A play that ends with the downfall and death of the main character.
Comedy: A play with a happy ending, often with marriages.
Tragic hero: A main character whose fatal flaw leads to their downfall.
Fatal flaw: A weakness, such as ambition, that causes a character's downfall.
Soliloquy: A speech by a character alone on stage, revealing their thoughts.
Aside: A short comment to the audience that other characters can't hear.
Dramatic irony: When the audience knows something a character doesn't.
Blank verse: Unrhymed lines of iambic pentameter.
Iambic pentameter: A line of about ten syllables with a da-DUM rhythm.
Prose: Ordinary writing without a regular rhythm.