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

Short Answer Questions

1. Which character concocts a devious plot to break up a marriage in Much Ado Ado Nothing?

2. At the beginning of Much Ado About Nothing, where are Don Pedro, Claudio and Benedick returning from?

3. How does Lady Macbeth convince her husband to kill Duncan?

4. Who constantly torments Caliban at the beginning of The Tempest?

5. Who marries Cordelia at the beginning of King Lear?

Short Essay Questions

1. What bad decision does Antonio make regarding borrowing money in Merchant of Venice?

2. In The Tempest, how does Prospero bring his enemies to the island?

3. How does Valentine becomes the leader of bandits in Two Gentlemen of Verona?

4. Why does Belarius think Imogen is dead in Cymbeline?

5. At the end of As You Like It, what happy news arrives concerning the banished duke?

6. How does Lady Macbeth convince Macbeth to kill Duncan?

7. What is Don Pedro's attitude to Beatrice and Benedick at the beginning of Much Ado About Nothing?

8. What is the problem among the young lovers at the beginning of A Midsummer Night's Dream?

9. Under what circumstances does Lear go mad?

10. What is the rift in the spirit room at the beginning of A Midsummer Night's Dream?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The tragic figure of Shakespeare's stories suffer because they make rash decisions without considering the full ramifications of their actions. Write an essay discussing three tragic figures from the collection and the decisions they make. What drives the most destructive of these choices? What does the character want to accomplish, and what does he or she not consider regarding the ramifications of these choices? How do these choices undo this character, and what is Shakespeare saying about the human condition with this reversal?

Essay Topic 2

In Stories from Shakespeare, Charles Lamb includes a couple of narratives that fixate on the notion of money and how its accumulation and loss can destroy a human being. Write a two-part essay discussing both of these stories, and sum up the essay by theorizing as to Shakespeare's attitude toward money in general:

Part 1) What role does wealth and the lack of it play in the plot of Merchant of Venice? What characters are affected - either positively or negatively - by the accumulation of money? Who loses his soul in the struggle for money? Who nearly loses his life and is eventually redeemed by money in the story? How is money an ambiguous force in the story?

Part 2) How does Money prove the downfall of Timon of Athens? Discuss how all of his relationships in the story are defined by wealth. In the end, what does Timon believe is the point of money and man's relationship to it? What is Shakespeare saying about wealth in Timon of Athens?

Essay Topic 3

In much of Shakespeare's canon, death is not necessarily a complete end to an individual's influence over human events. Using The Winter's Tale, Hamlet, and Macbeth as subjects, write an essay discussing the role of ghosts and reincarnation in Shakespeare. Who returns to the realm of the living after death? When these characters return, how do they affect the world of the living? What is the nature of this return?

(see the answer keys)

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