Lesson 3: love

• Engels
• Middelbare school
• havo, vwo
• Leerjaar 3

Lesson 3: love

Goals

- Theme of Love: romantic? sweet? cruel?

- Iambic pentameter

- Rhyme and rhythm colour the text

You've all read the article

What was the article about?

Why was there a war?

Why was the love between Bosko and Admira special? 

Theme: Is it possible for everyone to love whoever they like without consequences?

Have you ever had a boyfriend/girlfriend that your parents did not approve of? Would your parents be okay with everyone?

Shakespeare!

• With your group, make a storyboard of the most important moments in the play Romeo and Juliet
• Make a list of the main characters, give a short description

It is okay to look things up, but use your own words!

Sonnets and soliloquies: emotion and rhythm

Shakespeare uses a poetry trick to bring emotion to speeches

The same trick is used in his sonnets: the verse is in iambic pentameter which is like a heartbeat DAdumDAdum

we will discover what iambic pentameter is using Sonnets see how it works when it is hidden in a play

Read sonnet 18

• is there a rhythm? 
• is there a rhyme?
• how many lines to we have?

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

DaDUMdaDUmdaDUM

Rhythm: 

one short (unstressed) syllable + one long (stressed) syllable.

10 syllables per line, with 5 “beats”

Lines:

14 lines: 3 quatrains + 1 couplet

Rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef gg.

Look at the stressed syllables: most important words!

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

Video

Listen to Sonnet 18

Can you hear the beats? It is super subtle!

This, by the way, is how you mark stress in a text ---->

Back to R+J

when characters speak, they speak in iambic pentameter

when they are calm, the rhythm stays. When they have emotions, it breaks! This leaves the actor breathless (when too few words are on a line) or stumbling over their words (when there are too many words on a line).

 

Look at scene 3.3 in your handout.  

• What is going on?
• Count and mark the rhythm
• when the rhythm breaks, what is the character talking about?

 

What did you learn? Anything that struck you as remarkable/interesting/new?