Session 5 Much Ado

Big Question To what extent does Act 4, Scene 1 belong in a tragedy, rather than a comedy?

Recap Conventions of a comedy: Wit, humour, fools, mistaken identities, family conflict, marriage, thwarted lovers, happy endings Conventions of a tragedy: Fear, pity, inevitability, uncertainty, death, deception, disaster, catharsis, fatal flaw

Comic or tragic? “Give not this rotten orange to your friend” Who says this to who and why?

Comic or tragic? “ Hath no man’s dagger a point for me” Who says this to who and why?

Comic or tragic? “I do love nothing in the world so well as you, is not that strange” Who says to who and why?

Comic or tragic? “O God, that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the market- place.” Who says this to who? When? Why?

Viewing Act 4 Scene 1 https://www.digitaltheatre.com/account/library http://www.tes.co.uk/ResourceDetail.aspx?story Code=6319604&

Big Questions What conventions of Elizabethan comedy are kept and which are overturned in this scene? In what ways could this scene be viewed as tragic? What are the differences between how an Elizabethan and modern audience would respond to this scene?

Big Question To what extent does Act 4, Scene 1 belong in a tragedy, rather than a comedy?