Word Trace, Part II

• Use a good online dictionary (Oxford is the best) and look up you word. Read all of the definitions. How does that enhance your understanding of the passages? Does Shakespeare make use of the different shades of meaning the word has?
• Replace your word with a closely related word. How does that change the meaning of the passages you have looked at? Look at each instance individually, and look at all of them taken as a whole.
• Are there literary devices/techniques/elements associated with the word? Is the word associated with a particular symbol or motif?

Macbeth Word Trace

This is what we will work on in class today and Friday.

Choose a word: good, blood/bloody, time, say, fear, hand(s), great, see, sleep, man, thought, look, eyes, heart, night, death, live, nature, love, etc.

Use a concordance (http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/concordance/) to find every instance in which the word is used in Macbeth. Choose 10-12 instances in which the word is used. Go back to the play and reread those scenes.

  Analyze the word in context. How does the use of the word connect to the themes of the play? What is being communicated?

Macbeth Questions

1. Find two or three examples in each act where appearance does not match reality.  
2. Find ten quotations which, taken together, reflect the development of the play.  You do not need to have an equal number of quotations from each act, but you must have at least one from each.  
3. How does the relationship between Macbeth and Lady Macbeth change throughout the play?
4. Look back at the twenty-seven scenes in the play and identify which ones take place at night or in darkness.

Please answer these in your notebook.  

Macbeth Act V

We finished reading Macbeth today. 

Macbeth Act IV questions

Here are the questions we worked on today.  They appear in a slightly different order than they appear in the book.

What is a traitor?  

For Macbeth, Macduff is a traitor.  But whether someone is a “traitor” or a “freedom fighter” depends on who is using the label.  Who would you call a “traitor” in the play?  Why?  Be specific.

How many children had Lady Macbeth?  

Some productions have made “children” a central concept in the play. What is your view?  Does it matter, in the play, whether Lady Macbeth has had children or not?

Different views of the witches.  

How would you present them on stage?

Macbeth Act III questions

We have finished reading Act III.  Please answer the following questions in your notebook:
(These questions are on page 96 in most books; I have typed the questions here for those of you who have the older edition.)

1.  Write six paragraphs, one for each scene, which show how Macbeth's kingship becomes less and less secure.

2.  In each scene, find a quotation which implies that appearance does not match reality.

Macbeth Act II

We are finishing Act II of Macbeth today.

Here is your assignment; a few of the books have a different question.

Much of the imagery in Act II is of violence, horror, and disruption of nature.  Identify one such image that you think is especially powerful from each of the four scenes.  Write a brief account of the effects of each image: what atmosphere it creates or what it reveals about a character.

Macbeth Progress

We are finishing Act I of Macbeth today.  Please answer question 2 on page 36. You can keep your response in your notebook.

Macbeth Word Trace: In Class Today

Choose a word: good, blood/bloody, time, say, fear, hand(s), great, see, sleep, man, thought, look, eyes, heart, night, death, live, nature, love, etc.

Use a concordance (http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/concordance/)  to find every instance in which the word is used in Macbeth.  Reread those scenes.  

 Analyze the word in context.  How does the use of the word connect to the themes of the play?  What is being communicated?

Macbeth Update

We have finished the second act.

Macbeth

Please remember to bring your book with you each day.

Also, Waiting for Godot scenes are due tomorrow.