Helen A. Clarke

“ Which is the likelier, that Shakespeare intended the dialogue about Gonzalo's ideal commonwealth to be a satire upon it, or favorable to Utopian schemes? Which comes out the better at last in the wit-combat,—the quick Antonio and Sebastian, or the thoughtful Gonzalo? Is Sebastian's solicitude about Claribel a sign of a kindlier nature than Antonio's? Are there any indications that Antonio's mind is more alert than Sebastian's? What purposes of the action or plot are served by the introduction of Claribel? Is the King's grief as great for the daughter as for the son? ”

“ In the fairies may be seen many reflections of cosmic characteristics. Oberon and Titania are fairies of the night, and the old battle between light and darkness shows itself in the mad pranks which they play on unsuspecting mortals. ”

“ If the last is true, is not Shakespeare in the last act making fun of the audience, as well as of the players, who with a superior air pass judgment upon the play and indulge in very lame wit, while the real meaning of it quite escapes them. ”

“ Are all the men—Costard included—so much a prey to a sort of foppery of expression and love of animal spirits as to be properly subject to the satire the play provides for them? Are the women more sane in this respect, despite their wit, or not?
Is Shakespeare apparently on the women's side? ”

“ VIII THE WIT OF THE PLAY What are the main causes of amusement in the play? The audience, notice, is not kept in the dark one instant about any of the characters. Thus one of the sources of amusement lies in the fact that while the audience occupies somewhat the attitude of omnipotence, it has the pleasure of observing the characters of the play living their lives in the purblind way usual to mortals. Lessing said that a comedy should make us laugh at vices, but the vices must be those of characters who have good qualities also. ”

“ II THE RESEMBLANCES TO THE 'ALKESTIS' OF EURIPIDES In Greene and in Shakespeare the King wishes the Queen's death because he is uncomfortable so long as she lives, and he prefers his comfort to aught else, taking it as his conjugal right and royal prerogative. (See ii. 3, 1 and 204.) The Queen, understanding this, says, "My life stands in the level of your dreams, which I'll lay down." To her she says, "can life be no commodity" when love, "the crown and comfort of her life," is gone. ”

“ Superficial knowledge is knowledge of names but real knowledge is that which names mean. In a word, we but dull our minds and blind our eyes in poring over the outsides of things, unless we study to understand life and act a beneficent part in it. ”

“ The lovers, whose readiness to fall in with Prospero's plan has made his task light so far as they are concerned, could only imperil his and their future by a premature union; and Ferdinand, having stood the test of hard work, is now induced, by an awed and holy mood, produced by art, to keep his good resolutions. Describe the mask, and show its meaning and fitness for Prospero's purposes. Why is Prospero so disturbed at the reminder of so paltry a plot as that of Caliban and his associates? ”

“ THE MERCHANT OF VENICE Sufficiently indirect use of contemporary political events in a Play was a cause of popularity without seeming dangerous to the State.
As "Love's Labour's Lost" is an early example of a plot woven out of masked allusions to current topics, so even as definitely plotted a comedy as "The Merchant of Venice" here and there worked in an animating shred of contemporary reference. ”

“ Of the minor characters the fool is minor only through his station and unimportance in the plot; he really occupies much space in the play and in fact pervades it. How is Antonio connected with the plot? What traits of his does the play bring out? Is his fondness for Sebastian unnatural? How is he concerned in the foolery of the play? Is he necessary to the plot? As the fool represents the merry-making spirit of the play, so Malvolio stands for the dupes of it. ”

“ LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST Shakespeare makes us laugh in "Love's Labour's Lost" at the futility of the attempt of ascetic and academic men to shut out love and women from their schemes of life and study.
His early work in putting the past history of England into dramatic form may possibly have suggested to him to put more recent history on the stage by means of this Comedy. Light as it is, the point of it is to satirize the monastic and exclusive element in current educational schemes. ”

“ Does it not seem rather clumsy, or do you think it a further humorous touch that Viola should have to depend on Malvolio to find her 'woman's weeds again'? What becomes evident after tracing the events of the play through in this way? That the interest of the play does not depend so much upon the story itself, as, first, upon the amusing situations resultant from the story, and, second, upon the scenes which introduce the characters in Olivia's household who are really not at all concerned in the development of the plot, but who are the occasion of many added amusing situations. ”

“ QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION Upon what does the interest of the last Act centre? How does the ending suit the various threads of the Play?
Is Theseus or Hippolyta the wiser critic of 'the story of the night'; and which of them is the wiser critic of the play of Pyramus and Thisbe? ”

“ VI CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT In what sense can there be said to be a development of character in "The Comedie of Errors?" If no progress can be traced in the standpoint of any one character of the Play, save possibly in that of Adriana, is there yet not to be seen a gradual bringing forward of the traits inwardly differentiating the two pairs of twins, and stamping the personality of Adriana and Luciana and even in a slighter degree of the Goldsmith, the Creditor Merchant, Egean, and the Abbess? ”

“ Show how the two points of climax in event and feeling balance absolutely but do not sacrifice each other? Are Shakespeare's experiments in bold juxtaposition of extreme fortune and happiness and utterly irretrievable devastation anywhere so poignant as the arrival of Anthonio's letter at the betrothal of Bassanio and Portia?
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION Is the secret of Bassanio's adventurousness the supreme honor in which he holds love? Nothing else being of so much consequence, he yields everything to love. ”

“ To bring out this idea of the plot as successful less in itself than because it illuminates the quality and humor of the characters, compare with the "Comedie of Errors" or any of the Plays where events figure more prominently. Show how the events of this Play may be said to be created by the Characters. The Prince and his Brother (and their tools on each side who lend themselves to their plans with Dogberry, the highly unconscious, and the Friar, the highly conscious character) by being what they are constitute the diverse means of influencing the whole turn of events. ”

“ Is the Play the nobler or the weaker dramatically for the poetic and symbolic influence shed upon it by Act V?
THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR If this Comedy was written, as tradition reports at the bidding of Queen Elizabeth in order to show Falstaffe in love, it is interesting to see that Shakespeare confines his love-making to mercenary motives, and by causing him to make love to two at once renders him as a lover merely a cheat.
So keeping the word of promise to the ear, he obeys by breaking it to the sense. To show Falstaffe as a lover amounts to showing him as no lover at all. ”

“ ACT II THE PRINCE PLOTS FOR TRUE NOTING AND HIS BROTHER FOR FALSE Tell the story of the masked ball. What new light is thrown, first, on the characters and, then, on the plot by means of these fragmentary bits of dialogue heard as the revellers pass on and off stage together.
Is Don John really misled as to his Brother's intentions toward Hero?
What does Hero herself think?
Does Don Pedro himself show that he is acting for another—that the god, Love, dwells beneath his visor? ”

“ It is not how to bear misfortune with a cheery mind, but how to read the lessons in the vicissitudes of physical nature." C.A. Wurtzburg says: "The deep truths that may be gathered from the play are the innate dignity of the human spirit, before which every conventionality of birth, rank, education, even of natural ties, must give way." Give arguments drawn from the play in favor of or against all of these suggestions. Is it an evidence of Shakespeare's intention to be a moral teacher that he altered the fate of Duke Frederick? ”

“ He says, practically, that fame is a mere expression of opinion, and that as anybody can give anyone the name of being learned or the name of being anything, fame may be given by those who have very little notion of any real knowledge. ”

“ QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION Does Shakespeare's ideal of love and constancy, as revealed in 'The Winter's Tale,' imply that second marriages are offences against the first. Has the objection Paulina makes to his re-marriage such a cause or is it a necessity of the plot? ”

“ The Duke's attitude as a motive force having worked itself out in its relation to Orlando and Rosalind, the emotional cause of action in the love of Rosalind and Orlando is free to develop, and the remainder of Act III. is devoted chiefly to the presentation of the situation between the lovers, which, owing to the disguise assumed by Rosalind, gives rise to the charming inconsistencies attending the wooing of a proxy Rosalind who is in reality Rosalind herself. Around these central lovers, whose characters Shakespeare unfolds, revolve other interesting personalities. ”

“ Show how the brisk bit of dialogue between Hermia and Lysander (I. i. 141-166) implies the forthcoming plot. For example, it may be shown that 'to be enthrall'd to love' (the first folio reading is love instead of low, which was an emendation of Theobald's,) [Footnote: See foot note in First Folio edition.] and to have 'sympathy in choice' made as 'momentary as a sound, swift as a shadow, short as any dream,' is to be the fate of all the lovers in the play, except Theseus and Hippolyta, and to constitute the substance of the action. ”

“ Is Shakespeare, considering his time, the more democratic in his views of life, as shown by this Play, in comparison with those brought out in Tennyson's Poem. Why does Shakespeare leave the women in moral and actual command of the situation?
QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION Is co-education the right conclusion to draw from the exposition by the Poets of educational restraints and the relation of men and women to life?
What ideals of life as to Nature and Education must be included in educational schemes? Why does the Play not end with as many marriages as there are lovers? ”

“ QUERIES FOR DISCUSSION Is the folk-legend indicative of an inherent relation in marriage of the male and female natures, or is it merely an expression of established custom and legalized institution upon gaining for each the aims and line of conduct desired? ”

“ A King of Navarre and a Princess of France conferring in treaty over a disputed province and a claim of allowance for services rendered is an incident constituting a reference to a state of things in France then closely concerning England. The succession to the throne of France of Henry of Navarre, the champion of the Huguenots of France, was long contested. England was friendly to Navarre, the object of her foreign policy being to counterpoise the power of Spain and the Catholics of France, with whom Queen Elizabeth's most formidable rival, Mary Stuart, was allied in interest. ”

“ Play?
ACT V SPORT IS BY SPORT OVERTHROWN What were the main events of the last Act and of this one, and how do they bear upon one another? Why is the revenge planned by the Princess both fair and prudent? Are the men more in earnest than they seem? Do the women seem less in earnest than they are? Which man first draws a lesson from being outwitted, and how is it justified? Show how this lesson suits the trend of the Play, and advances upon the outcome of the preceding Act. To whom is Berowne's line (V, ii, 477) —"Speake for yourselves, my wit is at an end"—addressed? ”

“ They are so readily familiar that the cross-purposes making up the plot seem to be no longer troublesome either to themselves or the audience. The interval of reassurance makes the return of strangeness more unaccountable. ”

“ What indications can you find that Prospero images Shakespeare? If he is so interpreted, what parts may Ariel and Caliban be supposed to play? Is the history of the Enchanted Island and the transformation wrought a parallel with the history of the Stage and the transformation Shakespeare wrought? According to Montégut, Caliban stands for Marlowe, Ariel for the English Genius which Shakespeare frees from its barbaric prison. Dowden ('Mind and Art of Shakespeare') fancies Prospero as the great artist lacking at first in practical faculty, cast out therefore from practical worldly success ”

“ What part does the fool play in the game, and why? Note his private grudge against Malvolio. Is it a dramatic mistake that even the heroine is made the butt of these merry-makers? Trace Fabian's part in the duelling plot against Sir Andrew and Viola. Do these plots recoil in any way against the plotters? Sir Toby and Sir Andrew both get some home-truths from Malvolio while they are eavesdropping, while for Fabian and Maria these thrusts of Malvolio's are just as good fun as that which the knights enjoy better. How does some of the later fun recoil against Toby and Sir Andrew? ”

“ What do you think it effects as to character, amusingness, and unity with the plot of mistaken identity? The courtisan's open visit to the wife and direct effect upon the plot is in strong contrast to the intrigue of which the wife is informed by a third person. Bring this out, and show what the influence is.
Compare the argument of Plautus (For this see "First Folio Edition" of "Comedie of Errors," p. 76) with the opening scene wherein Shakespeare causes Egean to tell the story out of which the Play grows. ”