Dramatic Significance Quotations

1. Practice Dramatic Significance Quotations

2. Approaching the Question • You are asked to discuss the dramatic importance of a quotation from the play. • To do so successfully, you must name the speaker, explain the context of the quotation, and most importantly, explain its significance.

3. Approaching the Question • A quotation can have dramatic significance for a number of reasons. For example, these lines could: • Develop plot • Create foreshadowing • Suggest something about character • Present an irony • Introduce an important symbol • Develop theme

4. Example Paris:Younger than she are happy mothers made. Capulet: And too soon marr’d are those so early made. This is a conversation between Paris and Old Capulet, Juliet’s father. They converse on the street after the initial brawl has taken place, and Paris attempts to ask for Juliet’s hand in marriage. Capulet seems reluctant to agree, warning Paris that marrying a girl too early and making her a mother can ruin the relationship. Here we see another reference to time—a motif that will repeat throughout the play, especially as it pertains to things moving too quickly. Capulet certainly alludes to his own marriage (an apparent cold and heartless relationship), which was ruined when he married too young. It is just this kind of love that Romeo and Juliet will hurry in to!

5. Approaching the Quotation • Experiment with sentence openers • Include sophisticated syntax techniques (E.g., Try using any of the dressup techniques on the wall, repetition, parallel structures, absolutes, figures of speech). The key is to showcase sentence variety—simple, compound, and complex sentences. • Keep your paragraph predominately in the active voice. (SUBJECT + PREDICATE, not “to be” verbs) • The crux of your answer is how you explain the dramatic significance; say something insightful related to character, theme, symbolism, irony, etc.

6. Student Name English 10 June 9, 2009 MERCUTIO’S “QUEEN MAB” SPEECH (I, iv, 53-94) Caught up perhaps in the excitement of going to the Capulet masqued ball, Mercutio shows his mercurial nature in this speech concerning Queen Mab, vacillating from one emotional extreme to another. Romeo, having just informed his friend that he has suffered from strange dreams, listens to Mercutio deliver this explanation about the power of fancy and imagination. He says that Mab herself is the maker of these dreams, a fairy of diminutive size who is responsible for nightly visits to all classes of people. As Mercutio elaborates about her nature, he grows feverish and emotional, eventually shouting crude descriptions of her work. This speech—and in particular the way Mercutio delivers the speech—is important in showing the dangers of becoming too emotional. It is in Mercutio’s nature to lose control, and clearly he does at the end of the speech as he is in tears, with Romeo counseling him, saying he “talkst of nothing”. Here Mercutio also shows his disdain for all things not real, especially ideal notions of love. For him, love can only be physical and holds little overall value. The theme of temperance, or more accurately intemperance, is developed in these lines.

7. Student Name English 10 June 9, 2009 “DO YOU BITE YOUR THUMB AT US, SIR?” (I, I, 44) Standing outside one of Verona’s many public markets in the mid-day heat, Abraham angrily questions two louts from the House of Capulets whether they have made a gesture towards he and Balthasar. It is clear the Capulets are looking for a fight, and Abraham is quick to respond to the insult. What seems strange here, however, are the frequent interjections of the word “sir”, for after each exchange between the Montagues and Capulets, the sentence ends with this polite salutation. “Do you quarrel, sir?” “Quarrel sir? No sir!” This irony helps characterize the feud between the rival families as somewhat ridiculous, and it sets up the rest of the play as one where a fight between them is imminent.

8. Approaching the Quotation • One note on style that needs addressing: extend the length of your independent clauses in complex sentence structures and avoid passive voice tense. (The subject of the sentence should “act”, not be acted upon). • E.g.: Pacing the confines of a chamber in the castle, Hamlet is reflective. • E.g.: Pacing the confines of a chamber in the castle, Hamlet reflects upon the meaning of life and death, particularly the dreadful consequences of taking one’s own life. • E.g.: Reproaching his mother for her incestuous and immoral behaviour,Hamlet is moved to kill Polonius. • E.g.: Reproaching his mother for her incestuous and immoral behaviour, Hamlet stabs Polonius through a tapestry that hangs in the room, his mad rage leading him to believe it is actually Claudius spying on him.

9. Example Hamlet is speaking. He talks to Rosencratz and Guildenstern. They have just arrived to “visit” Hamlet in Denmark. Hamlet tells them Denmark is a prison. He confronts them about the real reason they have come to see him. Then he launches into this speech about the nature of mankind. He seems to admire man. He calls men the “paragon of animals;” in other words, that mankind represents the pinnacle of life on Earth. He makes other positive assertions about mankind. Hamlet then says all mankind means nothing to him. It is just a “quintessence of dust”. Dramatically, this speech is important as it highlights Hamlet’s depression. Man “delights not [him]” because of the news of his father’s murder, and his mother’s troubling re-marriage. The speech might also represent Hamlet’s attempt to feign madness to Rosencratz and Guildenstern--two friends he knows are in the service of the King. Hamlet might embellish his depression to further delude the court. Angry and frustrated at his two school-fellows, Rosencratz and Guildenstern, for having lied to him about their purpose in Elsinore, Hamlet continues to inform them Denmark is a prison. He poetically outlines admirable traits in mankind, stating we are the “paragon of animals”, capable of great and noble action. Yet despite these lauds and accolades, Hamlet states that mankind means nothing to him, and that we are but a “quintessence of dust”. Dramatically, this speech further characterizes Hamlet as depressed with himself and his world. Man “delights not [him]”, for he lives in the wake of a murdered father, a lustful and incestuous mother, and deceitful and traitorous friends. In addition, Hamlet’s speech could be seen as a feign of madness--a clever ruse to lead Rosencratz and Guildenstern astray in the information they provide Claudius. “What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! In action how like an angel! in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me: no, nor woman either, though by your smiling you seem to say so.”

10. Act III Quotation King: “What do you call the play?” Hamlet: “The Mouse-Trap…. ‘tis a knavish piece of work: but what o’ that? You majesty, and we that have free souls, it touches us not: let the galled jade wince, our withers are unwrung.” (III, ii, 233)

11. Act III Quotation “O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven; It hath the primal eldest curst upon’t, A brother’s murder. Pray can I not, Though inclination be as sharp as will.” (III, iii, 37)