I don't know how to write about Shakespeare! Help!
And
Breathe
Do you know the play? No getting round that one, I'm afraid. You need to know the story and who's who. (AO1)
You can't write about what you don't know.
Ah - you do know the play? Excellent news. What now?
You can make better sense than this, honest.
OK - this is a general guide. I don't know which play you've studied or what the question will be in May, but I do mark the paper and I know what makes a good answer.
Read the question carefully and find the key words. They tell you what to write about.
It will always say:
'Starting with the extract, explore how Shakespeare presents (key word/s) in the extract and the play as a whole'.
The extract/speech will focus on the key word/s in the question. No-one is trying to trick you.
Good news - unless it helps you to get going, you don't need to write an introduction.
In any case never write 'In this essay I am going to write about key word/s in the name of the play. That's what the question has asked you to do. You don't need to tell anyone that you're going to answer the question! 😁
You could say something like 'Key word/s is very important in name of play because...' if that helps you. It might even get you some marks. (AO1)
If you then choose to write about the extract, don't write more than two paragraphs at most and remember to try and link it to the whole play. The key words are important. When you are looking at the language in the extract, try to keep your comments short and to the point. I don't want to know that 'crown' or 'weapon' are nouns. (I actually know that already.) I would be interested if you tell me that 'crown' means 'king' or that 'weapon' as in 'my naked weapon is out' has a double meaning though, if you link it to ambition or male aggression (2 key words from past papers). (AO2)
"I don't know enough quotations!"
Some people are really good at learning quotations. Most people aren't.
There is no doubt that short (5 words) quotations are useful. Very short (one word) quotations aren't.
But they don't need to be 100% accurate and close reference* is just as good, unless you are doing language analysis. To be safe, keep your language analysis to the extract, where you have it in front of you.
*Which means you really need to know the play!
Example: you could say that in the banquet scene in 'Macbeth' Banquo appears when Macbeth says
"our dear friend Banquo, whom we miss;
Would he were here"
or you could say that the ghost of Banquo only appears when Macbeth says that he misses his company.
Either would get the same mark.
If you then went on to explain why you think this happens, more marks. (AO1/2)
Remember that the question asks you to explore - which means giving your opinions about why Shakespeare does things. Since he has been dead for over 400 years, you can't ask him, so say what you think and why you think it*. (AO2)
*Your reasons need to be based on what's in the play (AO1) and/or the context (AO3), nothing else.
Even when characters are based on real people ('Macbeth', 'Romeo and Juliet', 'Julius Caesar', 'Merchant of Venice') Shakespeare is inventing characters to present a good play to entertain people. He isn't interested in what the actual people were like.
When he uses other people's stories, he often changes names and introduces new characters. For instance, Mercutio doesn't appear in the original story of 'Romeo and Juliet' and Romeo was Romeus.
Big Hint To Get Good Grade:
Always think about Shakespeare sitting in a small room, lit by candles, using a quill pen which needs to be regularly sharpened using a penknife, and ink that he needed to mix himself and with a deadline to meet.Oh, and he needs to be very careful about how much paper he uses as it's very expensive and playwrights didn't earn much.. (The fee for writing a play was about £5 - Shakespeare's father would have made about £100 a year.That's a lot of plays.)
He also has a limited number of actors to write for so he needs to make sure that the parts he writes fit the actors he has available- around 8-10. Extra actors, known as hired men, would be hired in as needed. Some were regulars, though - and he writes for them, too.
This is a craftsman - just as much as a carpenter or a blacksmith and he is paid by how good his craft is. If a horseshoe doesn't fit, the blacksmith isn't paid. If a play is rubbish, nor is the playwright.
> So, why does Shakespeare craft Macbeth as a ruthless killer?
> Why does he invent Mercutio and make the Nurse a garrulous old crone?
> Is Brutus really 'the noblest Roman'?
> Would Portia actually have managed to convince an entire Venetian court that she was a young male lawyer? Of course not so why does Shakespeare craft her as a believable young man?
The Big Hint is to remember that Shakespeare was doing a job. He was writing plays and inventing characters for a purpose. He knew his regular actors and wrote parts for them. He wasn't writing in a vacuum. He wrote for a specific theatre (or the court), a specific audience and for the actors he had available.
If you can remember that and write from that point of view you'll be into at least B4 and a higher grade. (There are 6 bands for 9 grades.)
Do you have your own ideas about the play you have studied? Go for it.
Every time I mark papers or teach Shakespeare, I learn something new from the people I am teaching/marking.
But how do I start?
Key word/s - jump straight in with a short quotation from the extract which shows you understand the question.
For instance: "In the extract Lady Macbeth's reference to 'the golden round' already shows that she is ambitious for the crown and is showing that she believes that the witches are telling the truth with their predictions." That's AO1 and AO2 covered in 1 sentence and it shows that you understand that the question is about ambition. If you can link it to something else in the play, great. If not, this is a good start, anyway.
Breathe
You can't write about what you don't know.
Ah - you do know the play? Excellent news. What now?
You can make better sense than this, honest.
OK - this is a general guide. I don't know which play you've studied or what the question will be in May, but I do mark the paper and I know what makes a good answer.
Read the question carefully and find the key words. They tell you what to write about.
It will always say:
'Starting with the extract, explore how Shakespeare presents (key word/s) in the extract and the play as a whole'.
The extract/speech will focus on the key word/s in the question. No-one is trying to trick you.
Good news - unless it helps you to get going, you don't need to write an introduction.
In any case never write 'In this essay I am going to write about key word/s in the name of the play. That's what the question has asked you to do. You don't need to tell anyone that you're going to answer the question! 😁
You could say something like 'Key word/s is very important in name of play because...' if that helps you. It might even get you some marks. (AO1)
If you then choose to write about the extract, don't write more than two paragraphs at most and remember to try and link it to the whole play. The key words are important. When you are looking at the language in the extract, try to keep your comments short and to the point. I don't want to know that 'crown' or 'weapon' are nouns. (I actually know that already.) I would be interested if you tell me that 'crown' means 'king' or that 'weapon' as in 'my naked weapon is out' has a double meaning though, if you link it to ambition or male aggression (2 key words from past papers). (AO2)
"I don't know enough quotations!"
Some people are really good at learning quotations. Most people aren't.
There is no doubt that short (5 words) quotations are useful. Very short (one word) quotations aren't.
But they don't need to be 100% accurate and close reference* is just as good, unless you are doing language analysis. To be safe, keep your language analysis to the extract, where you have it in front of you.
*Which means you really need to know the play!
Example: you could say that in the banquet scene in 'Macbeth' Banquo appears when Macbeth says
"our dear friend Banquo, whom we miss;
Would he were here"
or you could say that the ghost of Banquo only appears when Macbeth says that he misses his company.
Either would get the same mark.
If you then went on to explain why you think this happens, more marks. (AO1/2)
Remember that the question asks you to explore - which means giving your opinions about why Shakespeare does things. Since he has been dead for over 400 years, you can't ask him, so say what you think and why you think it*. (AO2)
*Your reasons need to be based on what's in the play (AO1) and/or the context (AO3), nothing else.
Even when characters are based on real people ('Macbeth', 'Romeo and Juliet', 'Julius Caesar', 'Merchant of Venice') Shakespeare is inventing characters to present a good play to entertain people. He isn't interested in what the actual people were like.
When he uses other people's stories, he often changes names and introduces new characters. For instance, Mercutio doesn't appear in the original story of 'Romeo and Juliet' and Romeo was Romeus.
Big Hint To Get Good Grade:
Always think about Shakespeare sitting in a small room, lit by candles, using a quill pen which needs to be regularly sharpened using a penknife, and ink that he needed to mix himself and with a deadline to meet.Oh, and he needs to be very careful about how much paper he uses as it's very expensive and playwrights didn't earn much.. (The fee for writing a play was about £5 - Shakespeare's father would have made about £100 a year.That's a lot of plays.)
He also has a limited number of actors to write for so he needs to make sure that the parts he writes fit the actors he has available- around 8-10. Extra actors, known as hired men, would be hired in as needed. Some were regulars, though - and he writes for them, too.
This is a craftsman - just as much as a carpenter or a blacksmith and he is paid by how good his craft is. If a horseshoe doesn't fit, the blacksmith isn't paid. If a play is rubbish, nor is the playwright.
> So, why does Shakespeare craft Macbeth as a ruthless killer?
> Why does he invent Mercutio and make the Nurse a garrulous old crone?
> Is Brutus really 'the noblest Roman'?
> Would Portia actually have managed to convince an entire Venetian court that she was a young male lawyer? Of course not so why does Shakespeare craft her as a believable young man?
The Big Hint is to remember that Shakespeare was doing a job. He was writing plays and inventing characters for a purpose. He knew his regular actors and wrote parts for them. He wasn't writing in a vacuum. He wrote for a specific theatre (or the court), a specific audience and for the actors he had available.
If you can remember that and write from that point of view you'll be into at least B4 and a higher grade. (There are 6 bands for 9 grades.)
Do you have your own ideas about the play you have studied? Go for it.
Every time I mark papers or teach Shakespeare, I learn something new from the people I am teaching/marking.
But how do I start?
Key word/s - jump straight in with a short quotation from the extract which shows you understand the question.
For instance: "In the extract Lady Macbeth's reference to 'the golden round' already shows that she is ambitious for the crown and is showing that she believes that the witches are telling the truth with their predictions." That's AO1 and AO2 covered in 1 sentence and it shows that you understand that the question is about ambition. If you can link it to something else in the play, great. If not, this is a good start, anyway.
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