RICHARD III ESSAYS ‘SPECIFIC SCENE’ QUESTIONS

NORMALLY… We know that, in a critical essay, you need to do two things: 1.Answer the question (and make sure the relevance of everything to that question is clear) 2.Analyse evidence in doing so.

NAE BOTHER This is usually pretty straight forward: Choose a play in which a central character behaves in an obsessive manner. Describe the nature of the character’s obsessive behaviour and discuss the influence this behaviour has on your understanding of the character in the play as a whole.

HOWEVER

CURVEBALL Critical essays will sometimes ask you to discuss how a specific scene affects the play: Choose from a play a scene which significantly changes your view of a character. Explain how the scene prompts this reappraisal and discuss how important it is to your understanding of the character in the play as a whole.

STAYING RELEVANT The tricky bit here is being able to talk about things that AREN’T that scene, while staying relevant to the question.

HOW? Choose from a play a scene which significantly changes your view of a character. Explain how the scene prompts this reappraisal and discuss how important it is to your understanding of the character in the play as a whole. This question fits well with our ‘sympathetic character’ path. An obvious scene that changes our view (from being sympathetic to horrible) is ‘I wish the bastards dead’. How can you talk about any other scenes while staying ‘relevant to the question’?

ROOT IT Basically, you just have to explain why you ARE talking about that thing. Make it clear how that thing fits in this essay. That is, I would say that ‘To understand fully why this is such a shocking scene, we must first consider why and how he is established as a sympathetic character.

ROOT YOUR DISCUSSION IN THE TASK.

ALWAYS CONNECT THINGS… Choose from a play a scene which significantly changes your view of a character. Explain how the scene prompts this reappraisal and discuss how important it is to your understanding of the character in the play as a whole. Intro: “Richard III” by William Shakespeare is a play where a scene significantly changes the audience’s view of a character. The scene which significantly changes the audience’s view of Richard’s character from being sympathetic to having no redeeming qualities is when, just after being crowned, he says ‘I wish the bastards dead’. To understand fully why this is such a shocking scene, we must first consider why and how he is established as a sympathetic character. [No analysis of this scene is required YET]

…TO THE TASK [Then, go back and establish him as sympathetic and work your way back to this scene – at which point you analyse] In the opening soliloquy […] This scene effectively establishes him as a sympathetic character. His mother… This sympathy, however, is completely undone when, after being crowned, he… His lack of redeeming qualities is reinforced later, when…