AQA Hamlet Exam A2

which characters havent been up yet?

Reply 181

Ophelia and Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - those are the only ones who haven't come up by remeber, they base the question on a theme as well or incorporate a relationship between characters (Hamlet & Claudius, Hamlet & Ophelia etc.) instead of a straight character

Reply 182

ok thank you :smile:

i really dont want R and G to come up. i did a practice essay on them and i had no idea what to write!! :s-smilie:

cant be good lol

Reply 183

*Shoe gal*

I've been using this website www.sparknotes.com . I find it really useful because it has the original text on one side, and then next to it, is a modern day interpretation of the text. It helped me with all those stupid long monologues old Hamlet does!

Reply 184

*Shoe gal*

I've been using this website www.sparknotes.com . I find it really useful because it has the original text on one side, and then next to it, is a modern day interpretation of the text. It helped me with all those stupid long monologues old Hamlet does!

haha joking :p:

yeaa, yorknotes are good too :yy:

Reply 185

lady-stardust

i am really struggling with all this hamlet malarky.
how are people revising it?

i've been brainstorming themes and so far i've got:
action and contemplation
appearence and reality
death
imprisonment and enclosure
madness and sanity
morality
poison, disease and corruption
presentation of women
religion
revenge
spying and secrecy
tragedy and revenge tragedy

characters: hamlet, ophelia, r&g, horatio, fortinbras, the ghost (and then claudius, gertrude, laertes and polonius who look like they've come up before).

i just don't really know where to start though...

Reply 186

lady-stardust

i am really struggling with all this hamlet malarky.
how are people revising it?

i've been brainstorming themes and so far i've got:
action and contemplation
appearence and reality
death
imprisonment and enclosure
madness and sanity
morality
poison, disease and corruption
presentation of women
religion
revenge
spying and secrecy
tragedy and revenge tragedy

characters: hamlet, ophelia, r&g, horatio, fortinbras, the ghost (and then claudius, gertrude, laertes and polonius who look like they've come up before).

i just don't really know where to start though...

im focussing on R&G, Ophelia and Hamlet (tho obv i am looking at others) and im doing a lot of work on his soliloquys atm.

just generally reading through it and picking out any usefull themes and quotes and stuff.

have you got York notes or anything? im reading through that and stuff too. . . . im so worried about this exam . ..

Reply 187

lady-stardust

yeah, i've just picked up the york notes today. i feel like i know the story pretty well, it's just the closed book part that is completely freaking me out. so many themes. so many quotes. damn shakespeare and his long plays...

R&G are really foxing me at the moment. what kind of things are people thinking about them?

Reply 188

lady-stardust

yeah, i've just picked up the york notes today. i feel like i know the story pretty well, it's just the closed book part that is completely freaking me out. so many themes. so many quotes. damn shakespeare and his long plays...

R&G are really foxing me at the moment. what kind of things are people thinking about them?

good, york notes are really helpful. just remember not to rely on them completely

dont think about the fact its closed book, if you know it well enough, you will be fine.

R&G are my problem too. someone posted earlier about R&G coz i asked about them. i have been looking at their relationship with Hamlet mainly but also Claud and Gert. with Hamlet their relationship changes quite dramatically. to start off with they are his 'excellent good friends' however by the middle they are people he 'trusts as [he] will adders fanged' and then he has them killed, after they try and kill him. it is a huge change.

the relationship between R&G and C&G is quite confusing though. R&G say that they are happy to be there and help, but are they completely aware of exactly HOW they will be helping? and if they do, you can understand why they do what they do because, how can they disobey the king?

also look at the role they play, do they actually have any purpose in the play or are they just tools?

hope that helps :biggrin:

Reply 189

The problem with Hamlet is there are SOO many theme! You could be there for hours thinking them up so you're better off looking and characters and the main themes so:

Madness
Deception
Acting
Religion
Appearances and Reality

and so on and so forth

Reply 190

lady-stardust

cheers for the R&G stuff. i am very confused about them.

as for their dramatic role, i would say as some kind of form of comedy. so 'bland' (better word here?), and completely indistinguishable from each other - “the indifferent children of the earth”, Claudius and Gertrude falling over each other to treat them equally - “Thanks Rosencrantz and gentle Gildenstern. // Thanks Gildenstern and gentle Rosencrantz.”
then you've got Hamlet's mocking of the two which is relatively humourous (okay, i'm scraping the barrel here hehe)

and then i'd say they were probably just a representation of the corruption within the court. they are so easily swayed and corrupted. they agree to help Claudius, but then reveal their purpose to Hamlet.
little things like the way Hamlet forces them to speak in prose in III.ii., even when the situation is so apparently formal show the way they can be easily swayed. (this also gives a slight sense of farce = humour again?)

-

religion is another one of those things i'm a bit shakey on. i mean there's quite a lot of references, of course, but really i only see it is a bit of a motif, repeated imagery. not sure i'd count it as a primary theme, but i know it's meant to be... any thoughts??

Reply 191

little_libertine

jken89

Ophelia and Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - those are the only ones who haven't come up by remeber, they base the question on a theme as well or incorporate a relationship between characters (Hamlet & Claudius, Hamlet & Ophelia etc.) instead of a straight character

this may be a ailly question, but has hamlet and gertrude coem up yet? i cant get in the aqa website cos my computer is maddd.

Reply 192

little_libertine

sorry about the bad typin. reaaallly sleepy :smile:

Reply 193

little_libertine

this may be a ailly question, but has hamlet and gertrude coem up yet? i cant get in the aqa website cos my computer is maddd.

Both Hamlet and Gertrude have come up but Hamlet is such a broad character he could easily come up again!

Gertrude's question was relating to her marriage to Claudius so you could easily get a question on her (maybe combining Ophelia) over their role as women in the play and the presentation of them as women.

Hamlet's question was on sympathy and to what degree does Hamlet maintain the audience's sympathy. So you could have so many more question on his madness, his procrastination, his soliloquies...the list goes on and on!

Reply 194

little_libertine

jken89

Both Hamlet and Gertrude have come up but Hamlet is such a broad character he could easily come up again!

Gertrude's question was relating to her marriage to Claudius so you could easily get a question on her (maybe combining Ophelia) over their role as women in the play and the presentation of them as women.

Hamlet's question was on sympathy and to what degree does Hamlet maintain the audience's sympathy. So you could have so many more question on his madness, his procrastination, his soliloquies...the list goes on and on!

ok! thanks!

*prays the exam will be on ophelia* :smile:

Reply 195

little_libertine

ok! thanks!

*prays the exam will be on ophelia* :smile:

*joins in with the praying*

im gonna die if its on R and G :s-smilie:

i still just cant write and essay on them . . .

Reply 196

Charlotte_Heart_NYC

8

www.shakespeare-online.com this is quite a useful website for people, has a list of essays as well.

Reply 197

wildforwilde

Im finding this quite difficult to revise on. Whenever we did practice questions in class my teacher kept on going on about focusing on the 'theatrical presentation'. Does that mean more focus on the way the language is constructed, the stage directions and how that would effect the meaning of the characters? What i want is to just do an analytical study of the characters without the technical babble.

I've watched quite a few of the different film adaptations and have seen it in the theatre which has brought it quite alive which has been useful.

I've also attached a little study guide to help anyone. There's about 20 critical essays, all done by proper keen shakespearian buffs, they also give you lots of different perspectives on the role the characters play. Some of them are a bit long winded but there definatlty worth a read. Elsewhere it has plenty of good summaries and lots about characters and themes etc. Hope that helps!

If anyone can post up some of what they consider key quotes that would be extremely useful.

Thanks!

hamlet.pdf500.0KB

Reply 198