1. Learning more about the Bard English II Miss Diorio
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Learning more about the Bard
English II
Miss Diorio

2. ABOUT HIS LIFE 1564-1616 Stratford-upon-Avon, England
Married Anne Hathaway and had 3 Children
Susanna
Hamnet and Judith
Wrote almost 40 plays (comedies, histories, tragedies)
Over 150 sonnets
5 epic poems

3. HIS COMEDIES All's Well That Ends Well Much Ado about Nothing
As You Like It
Comedy of Errors
Love's Labour's Lost
Measure for Measure
Merchant of Venice
Merry Wives of Windsor
Much Ado about Nothing
Taming of the Shrew
Tempest
Twelfth Night
Two Gentlemen of Verona
Winter's Tale
Midsummer Night’s Dream

4. HIS HISTORIES Cymbeline Henry IV, Part I Henry IV, Part II Henry V
Henry VI, Part I
Henry VI, Part II
Henry VI, Part III
Henry VIII
King John
Pericles
Richard II
Richard III

5. HIS TRAGEDIES Macbeth Antony and Cleopatra Othello Coriolanus
Romeo and Juliet
Timon of Athens
Titus Andronicus
Troilus and Cressida
Antony and Cleopatra
Coriolanus
Hamlet
Julius Caesar
King Lear

6. MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING Comedy written in 1598
Set in Messina, a port city in Sicily, Italy
Sicily is ruled by Aragon at the time of the play
No deaths? And a happy ending? What???
Plot centers around two couples
Benedick and Beatrice
Claudio and Hero

9. IAMBIC PENTAMETER
An iamb is one unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable (2 syllables total)
Between
Instead
5 iambs=10 syllables=1 line of iambic pentameter
For the most part, Shakespeare writes completely in iambic pentameter in his works
Sonnet—14-line poem of iambic pentameter with rhyme scheme ababcdcdefefgg
"To be, or not to be: that is the question". Hamlet Act III, Scene I
"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
by any other name would smell as sweet."
Romeo and Juliet Act II, Scene II

10. IAMBIC PENTAMETER AND RHYME SCHEME PRACTICE
Highlight all stressed syllables in each line.
Hero: If it proves so, then a love goes by haps
Some Cupid kills with arrows, and some with traps
Beatrice: What fire’s in mine ear? can this be true?
Stand I condemned for pride and scorn so much?
Contempt, farewell, and maiden pride, adieu
No glory does live on the back of such.