English 10 Unit 6: Drama and Tragedy | Notes and practice

Notes

Reading drama

Plays are told through dialogue and stage directions, divided into acts and scenes.
A soliloquy (alone), an aside (unheard by others) and a monologue (long speech to others) reveal inner thoughts and create dramatic irony.

Greek tragedy

Performed in Athens for Dionysus, with masks, a chorus and offstage violence.
Sophocles' Oedipus Rex and Antigone show heroes destroyed by fate, pride and conflicting duties.
Aristotle's terms: tragic hero, hamartia (flaw or error), hubris, peripeteia (reversal), anagnorisis (recognition), catharsis (release of pity and fear).

Shakespearean tragedy

Five acts: exposition, rising action, climax (Act 3), falling action, catastrophe (Act 5).
Nobles often speak blank verse; others speak prose. Comic relief eases and sharpens tension.
Key language: thou = you, wherefore = why, hath = has, 'tis = it is.

Topics in this unit

Each topic has its own short notes and practice.

Practice

A wealthy general, admired by all, kills a rival out of jealousy, loses everything and finally sees his own error. Which Aristotelian term names his moment of seeing the error?

A sudden reversal, as when a king at the height of power is suddenly ruined, is called:

In Hamlet, the audience knows Claudius murdered Hamlet's father, while most of the court does not. This creates:

In ancient Greek tragedy, a violent death was usually:

"Ere the sun sets, I shall return" means:

Which statement best describes Antigone's choice?

Free response

Write your answer first, then open the scoring guide.

Free-response question

Read this original scene: "KING ARDO: [Laughing] Prophets! Fools who read the clouds. No army in the world can cross my walls. GENERAL: Sire, the scouts report ten thousand men by the river. KING ARDO: Then let them drown in it. [He turns away.] [Aside] Why does my hand shake so?"

(a) Identify King Ardo's tragic flaw and support it with evidence.

Show the answer and scoring guide

His flaw is hubris, or excessive pride. He mocks the prophets as "fools" and boasts that "No army in the world can cross my walls," dismissing a real threat of "ten thousand men."

Check off the points you earned:

1 point: identifies hubris or pride
1 point: supports it with a quotation or specific detail

(b) Explain what the aside reveals and how it creates dramatic irony.

Show the answer and scoring guide

The aside "Why does my hand shake so?" reveals that Ardo is secretly afraid despite his boasts. Only the audience hears it, so we know his confidence is a mask, while the general sees only a fearless king.

Check off the points you earned:

1 point: explains the hidden fear revealed by the aside
1 point: explains that the audience knows what other characters do not

(c) Predict how the scene might foreshadow Ardo's fate, using a tragic term.

Show the answer and scoring guide

The scene foreshadows a peripeteia, a reversal of fortune: the king who believes his walls cannot fall will likely see them fall to the army he ignored. His pride sets up his downfall, as with a classic tragic hero.

Check off the points you earned:

1 point: makes a reasonable prediction based on the scene
1 point: correctly uses a tragic term such as peripeteia, hubris, hamartia or anagnorisis