View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is Alfred's reply when Guildenstern asks if he likes being an actor?

2. How does the dialogue change when Rosencrantz and Guildenstern speak with Claudius and Gertrude?

3. What blunder does Rosencrantz make with the introductions?

4. What does the Player say to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern upon meeting them on the road?

5. How is the troupe's cart being pulled?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe the dialogue that shows the confusion of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern at this point.

2. How does the Player reinforce the idea that the troupe is willing to perform a vulgar show?

3. What does Guildenstern's comment that he is afraid today is his day mean?

4. How does Guildenstern continue trying to analyze the situation?

5. How does Gertrude reinforce the idea that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are friends of Hamlet's?

6. How does Guildenstern come across as the more intelligent of the two men?

7. Why is Guildenstern so repulsed by the Player's immoral suggestions for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern?

8. What does Guildenstern say that emphasizes their helplessness in a situation they do not understand?

9. What appears to be the relationship between the two men?

10. Why do Rosencrantz and Guildenstern speak differently to Claudius and Gertrude?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write a paper on madness. Using Hamlet as an example, write about the different ways he appears as mad in the play. Describe the moments in the play when Hamlet seems lucid and behaves like a normal person. Give your opinion about whether Hamlet was acting from madness when he wrote the additional scene to The Murder of Gonzalo.

Essay Topic 2

Write a critique of Stoppard's play. Detail what you think are its strong points and where you think it might have been improved. At the end of your critique, rate it from one to five stars as a recommendation for someone else to read or see.

Essay Topic 3

Write a paper on costuming for a play. Hamlet has been staged often in modern dress. Why, then, is it important in Stoppard's play that the costumes be Elizabethan? What do you think the costumes add to the play?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 777 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample