Shakespeare speeches Name: Erika Hussey

TEXT 2: from ACT III, SCENE II of Julius Caesar

Context: Antony, who played a pivotal role in helping Caesar secure his position as Roman Empire (thus transforming Rome into an
autocracy), has been allowed by Brutus and the other conspirators to make a funeral oration for Caesar on condition that he not
blame them for Caesar's death. However, while Antony's speech outwardly begins by justifying the actions of Brutus and the
assassins ("I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him"), Antony uses rhetoric and genuine reminders to ultimately portray Caesar in
such a positive light that the crowd are enraged against the conspirators.

MARC ANTONY: Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;

I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred* with their bones;
5 So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous* fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer’d* it.
Here, under leave* of Brutus and the rest–
10 For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable men–
Come I to speak in Caesar’s funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was ambitious;
15 And Brutus is an honourable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome*
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill*:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
20 Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal*
I thrice presented him a kingly crown*,
25 Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And, sure, he* is an honourable man.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
30 You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?
O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
35 And I must pause till it come back to me.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7X9C55TkUP8

interred (4): place a corpse in a grave
or tomb with funeral rites; here,
Shakes appears to be using it
synonymously with buried or placed
under leave (9): with permission
Lupercal (23): Lupercalia was some
kind of Roman holiday. It was later
grievous (7): totally bad, usually so
faulted as to cause death
“captives home to Rome” (16): i.e., he
captured important people from other
countries and -->
“presented him a kingly crown” (24):
Caesar was actually elected dictator on a
“hath Caesar answer’d it” (8): paid the
penalty. 60 Roman senators participated in
his assassination, stabbing him 23 times
(CSI Rome).
“Whose ransoms did the general coffers
fill” (17): . . . held them for ransom.
Enemies of Rome would be these ransoms
to get these important people back.
he (27): i.e., Brutus
 known as Februa. Guess what month few separate occasions. His last
it was traditionally held in . . . appointment was dictator for life. He
never, however, accepted a position as
emperor.

PASSAGES PARAPHRASE RHETORICAL STRATEGIES EFFECT or FUNCTION OF

RHETORICAL STRATEGIES
synecdoche, parallelism,
juxtaposition, repetition,
exemplification, abstract
diction, rhetorical question,
alliteration, metaphorical
language

TEXT 3: from ACT V, SCENE V of Macbeth

Context: Macbeth is sort of a jerk. He’s spent the entire play plotting against people, killing kings and a whole bunch of other people.
You know, politics as usual. In this soliloquy toward the end of the play, Macbeth is preparing his army for a battle against Macduff
whose all mad and junk because Macbeth is tyrannically ruling Scotland through fear and murder. Oh. And Macbeth has just
learned that his wife, Lady Macbeth, has just killed herself. In this speech, then, Macbeth reflects on the meaninglessness and brevity
of life. Fun guy.
1.
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
2.
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
3.
To the last syllable of recorded time;
4.
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
5.
5 The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
6.
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
7.
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
8.
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
9.
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
10.
10 Signifying nothing.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZnaXDRwu84&t=4s

1. Begin by paraphrasing, line by line, what Macbeth says here.

2. What function does polysyndeton serve in line 1?

3. That’s a nice specific verb choice to begin line 2. What happens if I change creeps to moves?

4. “And all our yesterdays have lighted fools / The way to dusty death” (4-5). In what way has our past (“all our yesterdays”) guided
us? Why does it make use “fools” for having followed our past? What ultimately awaits us?

5. Why is the last line the most important?

TEXT 4: from ACT 1, SCENE V of Romeo and Juliet

Context: Romeo is sort of emo-y. He starts off the play totally in “love” with this girl named Rosaline. So he’s moping around,
hanging out with his friends, and they’re all like, Let’s go to this party. So they do and Romeo sees this other girl there. Her name is
Margaret. And he totally loves her. Wait. Her name is Juliet. Sorry.

O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!

It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope's ear*;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear*!
5 So shows a snowy dove trooping* with crows,
As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows.
The measure* done, I'll watch her place of stand*,
 And, touching hers, make blessed my rude hand.
Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!
10 For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MH9ZK7vSBYY&disable_polymer=true

Ethiope’s ear (3): i.e., a person from “Beauty too rich . . . earth too dear” (4): trooping (5): flocking
Ethiopia who would, presumably, have Too precious for this world; too valuable
dark skin to die and be buried in earth
measure (7): dance

stand (7): (social) standing

1. What is Romeo’s attitude toward Margaret Juliet? Identify all rhetorical strategies Romeo uses to convey this view.

2. What would you say Shakespeare’s style is here? Why is that style appropriate for this speech?

scenes from Dirtbag Romeo and Juliet

TEXT 5: from ACT II, SCENE VII of As You Like It

Context: I quite literally have no idea. I don’t think I’ve ever read this play. I know, because I read Spark Notes, that Jacques, the
character who speaks these lines, is a melancholy lord. In this speech, he tells us that there are seven acts or seven stages of life.

JACQUES: All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
5 His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling* and puking* in the nurse’s arms;
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
10 Sighing like furnace*, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard*,
Jealous in honour*, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
15 Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon* lin’d*,
 With eyes severe* and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws* and modern* instances*;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
20 Into the lean and slipper’d pantaloon*,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose*, well sav’d, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank*; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
25 And whistles in his* sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere* oblivion;
Sans* teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything

Video 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfECXVeCHJ8

Video 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLk4rXC8YoQ

mewling (6): crying
puking (6): the baby pukes; yes,
they had the word puke in the
1600s
“Jealous in honour” (14): Vigilant
in matters of honor
“Sighing like furnace” (10): emitting sighs as a
furnace emits smoke
capon (16): A cock that has been castrated
and fattened as a delicacy. Traditionally, this
delicacy was used to bribe magistrates.
“bearded like the pard” (13): Leopard.
The soldier’s bristling, hipster mustache is
being compared to the leopard’s whiskers.
Meow.
severe (17): intense

lin’d (16): filled, stuffed

saws (18): sayings “slipper’d pantaloon” (20): So the note I have hose (22): Leggings or yoga pants. I’m not
in my Norton’s says that this is a foolish old sure why they’d be “well saved.”
modern (18): trite man named after a figure in commedia
dell’arte, a popular Italian comedy. I’m not
instances (18): I think you can sub sure why the part about the Italian thing is
in the word actions here and you’d important, so I guess it’s not. Pantaloons are
be fine pants.
shank (24): calf his (25): its mere (27): complete
sans (28): without

Complete the chart for the seven stages of life. In your paraphrase, be sure to explain the signifiance of the diction choice Jacques
uses to characterize that stage (if there is one—not too much to say about infant or school-boy, is there?).

ACT/STAGE PARAPHRASE RHETORICAL DEVICES

infant (5)

school-boy (7)

lover (9)

soldier (11)
 justice (15)

slipper’d pantaloon
(20)

oblivion (27)

All the world is Hollandaise sauce and we are merely a poached egg.

All the world is a badly photo shopped meme and we are merely photo shoppers.

TEXT 6: from ACT III, SCENE I of Hamlet

Context: Hamlet is like the prince of Denmark. His father was murdered by his uncle, and then his uncle married Hamlet’s mother, so
now his uncle, Claudius, is king and also Hamlet’s father-in-law. Hamlet knows that Claudius murdered his father because his father’s
ghost showed up and told him so. So Hamlet’s kind of depressed. He’s also having problems with his girlfriend Ophelia because of
course he is. (He’ll later accidentally kill Ophelia’s dad. Whoops!) In this speech (which isn’t technically a soliloquy because Ophelia
is on stage pretending to read a book and Claudius and Ophelia’s dad, Polonius, are spying on Hamlet), Hamlet is having a bit of a
dilemma. And, actually, analysis of this speech is a bit of a dilemma, too. Is Hamlet wondering whether or not he should kill Claudius
or himself? At the very least Hamlet, who hasn’t done much during the entire play, is debating whether or not he should now act.
What the action should be, however, is difficult to understand. For me? I think it makes most sense that he is debating whether or
not to kill Claudius knowing that, if he does so, he could potentially be killed or executed and damned as a result.

To be, or not to be, that is the question:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings* and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
5 And by opposing end them. To die—to sleep,
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to: 'tis a consummation*
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
10 To sleep, perchance* to dream—ay, there's the rub*:
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled* off this mortal coil*,
Must give us pause—there's the respect*
That makes calamity of so long life*.
15 For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
Th'oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely*,
The pangs of dispriz'd* love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office*, and the spurns*
That patient merit of th'unworthy takes*,
20 When he himself might his quietus make*
With a bare bodkin*? Who would fardels* bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscovere'd country, from whose bourn*
25 No traveller returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience* does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue* of resolution
30 Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast* of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment*
With this regard* their currents turn awry
And lose the name of action.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjuZq-8PUw0

slings (3): as in slingshots
shuffled (12): cast
coil (12): turmoil; flesh
dispriz’d (17): unvalued
bare bodkin (21): mere
dagger
fardels (21): burdens
pale cast (30): tint.
Here’s the thing: a
greenish or yellowish (or
pale) tint was considered
a sign of bad health
(among other things).
consummation (8): the
point at which something
is complete or finalized
respect (13):
consideration
office (18): bureaucrats
spurns (18): kicks, insults
bourn (24): border
“pith and moment” (31):
Of profundity and
importance
perchance (10): by some chance;
perhaps
“That makes . . . long life” (14):
Makes adversity so long-lived (as
opposed to quickly ended in suicide)
“That patient . . . takes” (19): That
the deserving has to accept patiently
from the unworthy
conscience (28): Meaning here both
consciousness (introspective
knowledge) and moral conscience
regard (32): consideration
“there’s the rub” (10): In
some 17th century bowling
game, the rub is the obstacle.
It was the impediment you
had to work around if you
wanted to win the game.
contumely (16): scornful
abuse
“When he . . . make” (20): A
paid off account (i.e., a repaid
debt) was marked “Quietus
est” (“laid to rest”)
native hue (29): ruddy
compelxion—a sign of good
health

PROMPT: Analyze the rhetorical strategies Hamlet uses to convey his views on mortality.