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Passport TO CULTURE Teacher’s Resource Guide SCH oolT ime Performance oo • Sch s e i r e S Macbeth Shakespeare LIVE! a l Ye r 8 200 -20 es Grad 09 7-12 just imagine More Activities and Resources Before the Performance 1. Have each student select a character from Macbeth and write a journal as that character to answer such questions as: What is a typical day like? Who are your friends? Who are your enemies? Who is in your family? What do you do for amusement or entertainment? What are you frightened of? What does your home look like? (1.2, 1.3)* 2. Give students this list of Elizabethan words and terms that are used in Macbeth along with their contemporary meanings: Act 1 thrice – three times hurly-burly – battle, chaos unseamed him from the knave to the chops – cut him open from his navel to his jaw corporal – of or relating to the body inane root – a root that, when eaten, can produce intense hallucinations compunctions – anxiety arising from guilt dunnes – darkest trammel – confine in a net surcease – completion – in this case Duncan’s death shoal - shallow 1 Act II knell – a stroke of a bell for death or disaster incarnadine – redden, to make red anointed – made sacred by the application of oil Act III indissoluble – cannot be dissolved or undone sundry – several, diverse, various gory locks – blood and gore soaked hair augur – predictions beldams – hags Pit of Acheron – a river in the Underworld in classic mythology Act IV brinded – strictly “tawny with bars of another color” as describing a striped cat harpier – possibly a harpy, a mythical birdwoman who symbolized vengeance entrails –intestines fenny snake – snake which inhabits fens or marshlands howlet – owlet or small owl farrow – a litter of pigs harp’d – struck the right note; guessed pernicious – very destructive; deadly Act V mated – overcome, bewildered Seyton – Macbeth’s armorer skirr – run rapidly over; scour physic – medicine bane – violent death; destruction hew – to cut or fell with blows ague – a fever with recurrent chills and sweating cow’d – made to feel fear painted upon a pole – likeness painted on a pole as an advertisement – as in a sideshow Divide students into groups of four. Have each group write a short skit or play that takes place in the present and uses at least five of these Elizabethan words or terms. Have each group present its work. (1.2, 1.3, 1.4) After the Performance 1. Show a film version of Macbeth to students (See “Delving Deeper” on page 8 of the Teacher’s Resource Guide.) Have students compare the film with the Shakespeare LIVE! production. Explore how the personality and choices of a particular actor shape a role. How do the setting and costumes affect the piece? Can students see the director’s concept at work? Compare the film director’s concept with that of the director of Shakespeare LIVE! Finally, have several students work together on a monologue from Macbeth. Urge each person to interpret the monologue as personally as possible. Have the students perform the monologue for the class. Discuss how many ways the same text can be interpreted. (1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4) 2. The supernatural is employed as a theatrical device in Shakespeare’s Macbeth. The world Shakespeare establishes in the play is one in which witches, ghosts and spectral weapons abound. With them comes a sense of unease about the evidence of one’s own senses and uncertainty. For example, upon first encountering the weird sisters, Banquo asks: Who are these, So withered and so wild in their attire, That look not like th’ inhabitants o’th’ earth And yet are on’t? Live you, or are you aught That man may question? Have students find other examples of the supernatural and their significance in the play. How do the characters interpret supernatural solicitations? How do they affect the characters’ behavior and the play’s action? (1.5) 3. The witches in Macbeth very cunningly use peer pressure to manipulate Macbeth and his wife. Find examples in the play of how the witches employ this strategy. Have the students ever felt pressure from their peers to act a certain way? Why do people give in to peer pressure? Explain that while peers can have a positive influence on each other, sometimes peers influence each other in negative ways. Divide the class into groups. Ask each group to decide upon an example of negative peer pressure. Then, have each group create a skit illustrating the causes, circumstances and consequences of the example it chose and perform its skit for the class. Discuss ways to avoid and/or walk away from peer pressure. (1.1, 1.2, 1.3) 4. Ask students to research what London was like in Shakespeare’s time (the late 16th and early 17th centuries). What main source of diversion was accessible to people of all classes? Why was theater eventually banned by the Puritans? (1.5) 5. Big events are afoot in the course of Macbeth: one foreign invasion is defeated, another succeeds, a king is murdered, his sons flee the country under suspicion of the deed – and – there are cannibalistic horses and other spooky signs. Assign the big events of the play to members of the class and have them create appropriate television or newspaper coverage. (1.4, 1.5) 6. Have the class research the Globe Theatre, the resident playhouse for Shakespeare’s company of actors. How was the Globe built, by whom and where? Who owned it? How was it staffed and administered? How was it designed? How were plays staged? Who were the actors in Shakespeare’s company? What was the status of an actor in society? Who attended the plays? What was the price of admission? How was seating in the theater organized? Have students share the information they gather. (1.5) 7. Conduct a research project on the source and history of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. (1.5) *Number(s) indicate the NJ Core Curriculum Content Standard(s) supported by the activity. Delving Deeper Bloom, Harold. Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human. Riverside, 1998. Mack, Maynard. Everybody’s Shakespeare: Reflections Chiefly on the Tragedies. University of Nebraska Press, 1993. Bradbrook, M.C. Shakespeare: The Poet in His World. Columbia University Press, 1978. The Riverside Shakespeare. G. Blakemore Evans, ed. Houghton Mifflin Company, 1974. Frye, Northrop. On Shakespeare. Yale University Press, 1986. Schoenbaum, Samuel. Shakespeare, The Globe, and the World. Oxford University Press, 1979. Books for Teachers and Students Kermode, Frank, ed. Four Centuries of Shakespearean Criticism. Avon, 1974. Kott, Jan. Shakespeare Our Contemporary. Norton, 1974. 2 Shakespeare, William. Kenneth Muir, ed. Macbeth (Arden Shakespeare: Second Series). Arden, 1977. Toropov, Brandon, and Joe Lee. Shakespeare for Beginners. Steerforth Press, 2008.