Transcription
All right, so we have talked about iambic pentameter and verse, which can help you bring the text to life. And within that verse, there are other literary devices that, um, authors use as clues to help the actor make choices. And so I'm going to highlight a few of those. I'm going to give you a few exercises to do in order to unlock your text or discover, explore your text. But, uh, there are a few, a few terms that I just want you to hold on to that we, that will definitely come up in class.
So, first one of those is antithesis, which is anti-thesis. And you, you can go, uh, look, look it up, please do. Um, but, uh, I'm gonna just very, very simply, uh, give a definition of comparing two things that are opposite. Um, and we have examples of this like in Romeo and Juliet, when they meet, "to smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss." We have a rough touch and tender kiss. And when we are aware that these, this comparison is being made, we can use the words to kind of bounce off of each other and color the word rough, roughly, and color the word tender, tenderly. There's another rough one, um, "rough winds do shake the darling buds of May." Rough winds, darling buds. Um, so this comes up a lot and, uh, in Shakespeare's work and, and in verse. So please be on the lookout for it.
Um, in general, too, there are just comparisons that happen in the, in the writing. And that is, I saw her there, and I saw him there, and she looked like this, and he looked like this, and she was going that way, and he was going this way. And so whenever you have those two things set up against each other, there must be an inflection made in the voice to, to help the, the listener follow the story. Um, and so it's not just spoken in the same opinion about each person or each thing that you're talking about, but we can really hear in the voice, um, the rise and fall and the stress of, of what's happening to those two things or three things that are being compared. Um, uh, the, uh, vocal change, uh, just helps really support the imagery for you. So in your imagination, really see it and let the voice reflect it.
Um, there is another literary, literary, it's not really a device, but it's something that comes up in the verse. And it's when there's 11 beats in the line. This is called a feminine ending, usually, uh, and it just means that there's a kind of something hanging on. In the most famous line of Shakespeare, "To be or not to be, that is the ques-" there's an extra beat. Yeah. And this often means that again, the heartbeat is uneven. So something has to be explored. I use this as an excuse to move forward in the text. And pretty much, I use everything as an excuse to move forward in the text, so that the thoughts are, are just coming and falling one into the other. "To be or not to be, that is the question," whether 'tis nobler in the mind bounces off the last thought. And that feminine ending kind of helps provide an unstable sentence so that you have to go search for stability.
Um, there are what is called half lines or shared lines. Um, half lines is the larger category, I'll say this. There's half lines, and then we have within that, we have, um, half lines that are shared between two characters. And pretty much, uh, all, always, uh, you should try to explore the idea of having those come one after another, but you don't always have to make that choice. Um, in Othello, where you'll see there's an example, we have, um, Othello saying, "She wakes," and Desdemona says, "Who's there?" Othello. And then Othello comes in, "I." Desdemona. And if we have those lines coming right back to back, "She wakes. Who's there? Othello. I." Desdemona. We get the kind of breathlessness of, of, um, Desdemona startling awake because Othello is sitting at her bedside.
Um, you can also make the choice to just have silence for the rest of the line until that next word is said. So it could be read, "She wakes." "Who's there?" Othello. So I still keep the beats going on, but that silence in between, uh, creates an acting opportunity. So I could say, "She wakes," and we take all that time, and we watch Desdemona wake up, and she finally says, "Who's there?" Um, I, in most cases, I usually find this to be, uh, those big pauses are tend to be really boring if they're not full of acted life. Um, and so it tends to be a stronger choice to use it to, to move forward on those shared lines.
Um, there is a line right before Othello says, "She wakes," and it's, um, "It strikes where it doth love." And then there are empty beats at the end of that line. That is empty space. That is Shakespeare's way of saying something happens here. And that's where she wakes up, actually. And then Othello is reacting to her when he says, "She wakes." So we have, "It strikes where it doth love." [space] "She wakes." He sees she wakes. "Who's there?" Othello. "I." Desdemona. Right away. And that creates this kind of unbalanced and then kind of exciting rhythm that takes place between the two characters.
Um, the, uh, other kind of half lines are not shared, but they are either what I just mentioned, but there's a space, or they're in a speech that a character is given. And that means that they're talking, uh, themselves. And there's a half line in their own speech, and then they continue, or they begin a new sentence in the middle of the line. For, uh, for me, this is a kind of a directorial, uh, indicator from Shakespeare that the thought is moving forward. And that's how it's generally treated. It means that there's something going on. That heartbeat, it had to put a period where in the middle of a line, and then start a new, a new sentence. And, oh my gosh, my heart's going, my thoughts are coming very quickly. A good place to see this is the example in the Scottish play. And if you look, there are no, uh, periods, question marks, or exclamation points at the end of any line. And those are the final punctuation that we have. Um, and so there's only unending punctuation or, uh, unfinished punctuation at the end of the lines. And all the thoughts begin in the middle, which means that the character is just barreling forward in his thoughts. And in fact, he does not get to finish. Um, Lady M comes in and interrupts his entire thought process, and we have this beautiful kind of unfinished thought that he, that he gives us.
So to review, we have, I talked about antithesis, some feminine endings, and then half lines with shared lines or half lines within speeches. Um, next, I talked about, I'll talk about monosyllables. It's good to notice, but, and some, some directors, teachers say, "Oh, this means you have to do it really slowly." I won't say that this is always the case, but it can be used as a tool. And for me, um, there's, there's an example from Julius Caesar that you'll see on the screen. And you'll see a monosyllable, just means that there's one syllable per word. Here we have eight whole lines with very few words that have more than one syllable. It's a way for Shakespeare to let us see that the character is choosing their words carefully. In this case, we have Cassius trying to convince Brutus to murder someone. So he is very careful with his choice of words. The, the opening of Merchant of Venice, "In sooth, I know not why I am so sad." All those words are one-syllable. And this is a device used, uh, by, uh, playwrights in order to say, um, not necessarily, "I'm slowing down my thought," but that the thought is being, uh, chosen, or the words are being chosen, uh, carefully. So, um, you don't have to choose words carefully and speak slowly, but if you want to try an actor's choice, you can see what happens if you just take a little extra time. "In sooth, I know not why I am so sad." And kind of give weight to each word as it comes out, um, and see how that feels for you. And if you end up saying, "In sooth, I know why I'm so sad," then that's the acting choice you make. Um, and between you and the director, you decide what's the clearest choice. But again, those monosyllables are there just as an option to say, "Okay, there's some very particular thoughts that are happening right now. Maybe we should give them some weight."
Um, the other thing that happens, uh, in, um, especially Shakespeare, uh, is his use of, um, uh, the sounds of the words. And this, I absolutely not only encourage, but but ask that you explore your speeches and your text in this way, using the consonants, using the vowels to discover the, the meaning or give meaning to the words. We can take the, the speech of the opening prologue of Romeo and Juliet. We have, uh, "Two households, both alike in dignity, in fair Verona, where we lay our scene," from an age-old grudge break to new mutiny, where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. From forth the fatal loins of these two foes." Yes, we have four F's in one line. Um, "A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life." We have three L's as well. We have loins, lovers, and life. Um, F is a very harsh, uh, sound. F. We have our most famous curse word in English with, uh, beginning with F. Um, and are also very, very, uh, aggressive or violent sounds. We have, uh, B in, um, King Lear's Edmund's bastardy, "bastard, bastard." Um, and so to just bring out the F sound here, uh, will help the speech. And then the L of love, yeah, the L of life, and the L of loins are all life-giving words. Yeah, life comes from loins, lovers make life, and life is life. Um, so, um, if we really use those consonants in the speech as a, as a juxtaposition, it can be very powerful. "From forth the fatal loins of these two foes, a pair of star-crossed lovers take their life." And can help the audience understand it. It can help you with making choices with the words, and it can be very exciting to add that aspect. That is called alliteration when there's a lot of consonants that happen one after another. The same thing can be done with vowels. That is that term is called assonance, uh, when you have a bunch of similar vowels that follow the same, uh, uh, or follow themselves. Um, there is also, just as I talked about aggressive sounds, um, there, all of the words, all the sounds in every language have their own kind of emotional quality. Um, so "bastardy," B, B, B. You can find some aggression there. Um, and then we have in Paris' final speech, uh, when he visits Juliet's tomb, there's a lot of sound and "wha" is all over Shakespeare. In the sad moments, it's just there. It is the, the, of a weeping. And, um, if we kind of key into the fact that, um, that the character is going through something and and using a lot of "wha" in their, in alliteration, we can really, really bring the words to life. Yeah, "sweet flower, sweet flower, whoa, weeping." Yeah, it's just all there. It's all there if you use it, um, naturally. If we really kind of start to use these consonants and vowel sounds, we will find that words have different lengths that we can play with. Um, I've already talked about the, the word "all" in class, um, but if you say "all" as is just "all," that's "all of it." Um, sure, you can do that, but that's "all of it." Yeah. If you put "all" in the word "all," the, the, the breadth of, of how much there is in that word, you'll find you can give it a slightly more heightened meaning and kind of paint the word as you say it. You can do, um, a similar, uh, thing in, um, Shakespeare uses the word "time" all over the place in his writing. And so it's important that we take the time that it takes to say the word "time." It's a very, it's a very, very, um, kind of long diphthong, long vowel, "time." Yeah. So never shortchange "time" because we're always fighting against it. Um, it is its own character and basically all of his writing. And so it's important to acknowledge it. If the word comes up in your speeches, keep an eye out.
Um, the, uh, other couple of devices to look out for are repeated words. Um, this happens in, uh, uh, Juliet's speech when she finds out that Tybalt is banished, or banished, shed. In this case, she kind of learns a new word. She repeats the word "banished." "He is banished. He is banished." Over and over. She also repeats the words "Tybalt," "Romeo." You'll see that, um, there are just a ton of words in this speech where that are they get repeated. And to be aware of them and use them, um, can kind of create an effect like almost like a word cloud to the audience, and they, they get overwhelmed by this in very particular information that's popping out at them. Um, so don't, uh, shy away from repeated words or even repeated phrases. And use them as bookends, use them as ways to connect thought. If you have a, if you have a, a word over here, and then a passage, and then that same word comes up down here, move through that thought, get to that other word so that we hear that those two things are connected and not, um, uh, just totally separate from each other. If too much time passes in between them because you take too many pauses that are not necessary, um, then the meaning gets lost.
Um, we also have, uh, Shakespeare was very famous for making puns. A pun is a play on words, or "jeu de mots" for you French people, um, which exists in French as well. Um, the, uh, word "nothing" is one of his most famously used words. Just as much as "Much Ado About Nothing." It can be taken as "noting" or "no thing." And "thing" being sexual nature. Um, we have, um, uh, "penis" being the thing. There's no thing. So it's "Much Ado About No Thing." "Much Ado About Vagina." In fact, the play has to do entirely with a woman's, uh, virginity. So, um, he plays with the words in this way. The, uh, opening line of Richard III, "Now is the winter of our discontentment, glorious summer by the sun of York." And "sun" on the page is spelled S-O-N, but of course, we hear it as S-U-N because we are also paying attention to winter and summer, which are there. Um, and so, um, he, it doesn't always have to be funny or a sexual joke. It can be used in a very theatrical or a dramatic way to inform what's going on.