Since we only have one class next week (because of the Scissortail Creative Writing Festival), I want to take a break between plays and talk shop about Shakespeare through van Es' book. So read the chapters on "Time" and "Character," since these are very important for Much Ado and for our next play, All's Well That Ends Well.
Here are some questions to consider as you read, one of which we'll write about on Tuesday:
* What is the difference between a 'flat' and a 'round' character? Why was Shakespeare one of the few playwrights of his age to write 'round' characters?
* How do Beatrice and Benedict demonstrate a combination of the two types?
* Why, according to van Es, did Shakespeare move away both from flat characters and from the classical unities of time from his early to his middle plays?
* If comedy is about reformation (or seeing our vices), why do you think Shakespeare risks complicating his comic types and making them more interesting/human rather than based on 'humours'?
* van Es writes that the "manipulation of time is an exceptional achievement that sets the comedies apart from other plays" (76). What does he mean by this? How does Shakespeare manipulate time in the comedies besides simply compressing many days/weeks/months into a two-hour play?
* Related to the above, why did Shakespeare become more interested in time as a 'character' in his plays?
* van Es also suggests that comedies can also be defined by a movement from winter to spring, or of "fertility over the sterile." How can this help us understand some of the comedies we've read in this class so far?
* Why did playwrights follow the "classical unities" so closely for so long? Do we have any idea why Shakespeare abandoned it so early in his career?
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