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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. What head of state is with Antonio on the ship in The Tempest?

2. What does Portia disguise herself as at the end of Merchant of Venice?

3. What role does Ariel take on the island in The Tempest?

4. At the beginning of Macbeth, the title character is than of what township?

5. In King Lear, Edmund is the bastard son of what earl?

Short Essay Questions

1. How are Cordelia and Lear reunited?

2. How does Posthumus return to Britain at the end of Cymbeline?

3. In The Winter's Tale, how does Paulita convince the king of Bohemia to let her marry his son?

4. Why does Claudio think Hero is cheating on him in Much Ado About Nothing?

5. How are Hero and Claudio reunited at the end of Much Ado About Nothing?

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

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

8. How does Proteus betray his friend Valentine in Two Gentlemen of Verona?

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

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

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In Shakespeare's day, sea travel was the most common form of extended travel, particularly in the Mediterranean. As such, ship travel and ship wrecks play an important role in his plays as drivers of narrative. Write an essay, citing three stories, of the use of maritime travel in Shakespeare. How does sea travel offer narrative opportunities that land travel does not? Why do so many stories begin with a shipwreck? What narrative needs does he shipwreck provide?

Essay Topic 2

In many of his stories, Shakespeare juxtaposes two individuals who are close either as siblings or dear friends. He juxtaposes them through their actions, which reveal character. Write an essay about three of the stories in the collection in which pairs of characters are juxtaposed. What actions does Shakespeare use to juxtapose these characters? What is revealed through this juxtaposition? Do the characters become more or less similar as the story continues?

Essay Topic 3

Tales from Shakespeare translates the plays of William Shakespeare into a series of twenty stories intended for children. In this process, Charles Lamb has kept some of the more adult themes that were present in the plays. Write an essay in three parts dealing with the prevalence of adult themes in the collection:

Part 1) In comedies like The Winter's Tale and Much Ado About Nothing and tragedies like Othello, Shakespeare deals with infidelity and mistrust between lovers. How do these themes manifest themselves? Which characters suffer as a result, and what is learned from this painful experience?

Part 2) In King Lear and Hamlet, in particular, Shakespeare deals with the duty a child owes his or her parents. Discuss the strained relationships at the center of these stories. What sense of neglect or betrayal exists in them? How are these relationships more intense forms of everyday struggles?

Part 3) Shakespeare deals fairly unsparingly with intolerance in The Merchant of Venice and Othello. What types of intolerance are discussed in these stories? Which characters subjugate which? What is learned about this type of racial and religious intolerance over the course of the narrative?

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