| Students are required to answer one of the questions below and include the analysis of at least two plays. Two plays are a minimum and more can be used. Three sonnets are equivalent to one play, so a minimum of six sonnets should be covered in detail. The six sonnets are a minimum and reference should be made to other supporting sonnets and poetic works. If you are writing on the sonnets therefore, you should refer across the sonnets as whole; you may use other poetic works by Shakespeare, such as The Rape of Lucrece (1594) as supporting material.
In consultation with their tutors, students are also encouraged to formulate their own essay questions. Any question formulated by the student in consultation with their tutor should be articulated and agreed at least seven weeks prior to the submission date. You can begin framing it earlier if you wish, again in collaboration and consultation with your tutor. If you decide to write on film adaptations, two films constitute two texts, even of the same play.
1. Examine the relation of the sonnets to the Petrarchan and older Renaissance schools of love poetry. (In answering this question, you may use a selection of non-Shakespearean sonnets or poems as one of the two texts).
2. Examine the relationship between nature imagery and ‘love’ in the works of Shakespeare.
3. Examine and discuss the way madness (real or feigned) and error interfere with relationships of power an authority in at least two of Shakespeare’s plays.
4. ‘[Rosalind’s] role is to embody and make available to the audience the performative nature of those natural categories that we take for granted, such as gender’ (Penny Gay). Discuss the relationship between identity and performance as explored in TWO or more plays studied the unit.
5. Examine the conventions of pastoral in two of Shakespeare’s comedies.
6. ‘Shakespeare may be called a true feminist, since he not only expresses the need for women’s emancipation, but also acknowledges the reality of their present oppression.’ Assess the validity of this claim with reference to TWO or more plays studied the unit.
7. ‘[Shakespeare] became, during the colonial period, the quintessence of Englishness and a measure of humanity itself.’ (Ania Loomba and Martin Orkin). Discuss the representation of Englishness and/or the racial other in any TWO plays you have studied on this unit.
8. ‘In the English Renaissance theatre, the text is structured by the multiple and complex collaborations that the theatre demanded between patrons and players, playwrights and printers, playhouses and playgoers.’ (David Scott Kastan). Discuss the significance of staging and performance (either Renaissance or contemporary) of TWO or more plays studied this term.
9. Give an account of the ways in which film adaptations may change our understanding of Shakespeare’s plays.
10. Discuss the relationship between history and tragedy in Shakespeare’s plays.
Students are advised that material used in one assignment must not be re-used in another. This means that you should not use the same text as the central text in more than one exam question or assignment, either within or between units. You may refence and cite texts you have used previously, but without repeating the same material and you must not repeat the same texts as your main texts.
Do NOT answer the same essay question in the portfolio and final essay submission.
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