The notes were prepared for use with an edition of Romeo and Juliet bound together with the book for West Side Story and in conjunction with a showing of Franco Zeffirelli's film version ... it that the Chorus says gives the couple the power to overcome the obstacles which separate them? Act II: Scene 1 Why do Mercutio's teasing speeches not bother Romeo? As the notes suggest, ll. 23-30 are a series of sexual puns comparing magic conjuration with sexual intercourse. Act II: Scene 2 This is the famous "Balcony Scene," one of the most renowned in ... the modern actress to convey the ambiguity...

• Word Count: 3150
• Approx Pages: 13
• Grade Level: High School

... work in tragedy between the ordinary human beings who are content to stay within the limits of the conventional world and the heroic souls who try to go beyond them. Notes 1 In his Shakespeare Our Contemporary, trans. Boleslaw Taborski (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1966), 130, Jan Kott makes explicit what many critics assume about Lear: "He does not see or understand ... anything. . . . Lear is ridiculous, naive and stupid." 2 The classic statement of this view is to be found in A. C. Bradley, Shakespearean Tragedy (1904; rept. New York: Meridian Books, 1955), 258-60. See especially...

• Word Count: 8939
• Approx Pages: 36
• Grade Level: High School

... a great deal about Feste's role in the play. Feste is shown to be not just a comic relief figure, like Sir Andrew; he is perceptive when others are not, as Viola notes after the encounter. The conversation is so spirited, because Feste and Viola actually have a good deal in common; both are paid servants who are much more than they seem to ... and require little stage direction. Shakespeare's ability to captivate an entire audience without resorting to blood and guts or slapstick makes Twelfth Night an extremely clever comedy and an enduring classic....

• Word Count: 1081
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... ,written in iambic pentameter has it's own rhyme scheme;rhyming in alternating lines.The couplet usually summarizes the preceeding twelve lines. In Sonnet 73 one will realize Shakespeare follows the classic pattern of the iambic pentameter with a slight variation; the poet utilizes the "spondaic foot" or heavey stress in the beginning of the fourth line in each of the quatrains. (quatrain ... the ashes of his youth.The same ashes or embers; once the fuel and provider of youthful energy; now are self consuming, bound for expiration and extinction.The timing, one notes, has yet again been ...

• Word Count: 453
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: High School