Translating Shakespeare Assignment (Part I of Final Exam)

Translating Shakespeare (Part I of your Final Exam)

For this assignment, I want you to take 2-3 pages of Much Ado About Nothing and translate them into colloquial, modern American English.  The trick here is that (a) the meaning cannot change, (b) the characters and situations cannot change, and (c) your version should try, as close as possible, to use the same metaphors and allusions as the original, though you might need to find modern equivalents for some (ex: when Borachio talks about actors dressing as Pharaoh’s soldiers and Hercules in III.3, you could substitute a modern equivalent). 

When translating the pages, keep the following tips in mind:

·     You don’t have to translate it word-for-word; that is, you can translate 5 sentences into 1 modern sentence if it makes more sense to do so.  Try to be as literal as possible, but you don’t have to be too literal.

·     Keep it in play form, with characters speaking lines, etc.  We still want to read it like a performance.

·     However, you DO NOT have to use iambic pentameter.  Since we don’t use that anymore, you should translate everything into prose…but try to make passages of verse sound a little more “poetic” or “polished” than the rest.  Make us be able to hear or somehow sense that a different language is being spoken.  This could be the difference between slang and proper English, for example. 

·      As stated above, try to use make us ‘see’ the actual language through translation—update the metaphors, but try not to radically change them. 

For example, in Act II, scene 3, Benedick says: “Now divine air!  Now is his soul ravished!  Is it not strange that sheep’s guys should hale souls of out men’s bodies?  Well, a horn for my money, when all’s done.”  I might re-write this like so: “Ah, what beautiful music!  He’s desperately in love now!  It’s strange that just a few pieces of string and wood have the power to knock men’s souls right out of their bodies.  Well, if I were a betting man, I would put it all on music.” 

This assignment is an early part of your final exam (worth 25% of the final grade), so I want you to work on it early and have fun with it.  On Wednesday, December 3^rd (and on Friday, if necessary) I want to invite people to read their translations (or translations-in-progress) to the class.  You don’t have to, but those that do can win 5 points of extra credit toward their final grade.  So consider this a fun challenge and a way to end the semester in a lighthearted manner.  

For Monday: Much Ado About Nothing, Acts. IV-V

For Monday: Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, Acts. IV-V (last questions for class!)

Answer TWO of the following...

1. Shakespearean humor is almost always based on language, unlike the more physical comedy of today’s theater.  Discuss a passage that is funny/hilarious based on how characters use some aspect of language, from puns, sexual references, malapropisms (using the wrong word), metaphors, etc.  You might specifically examine the language of the lower classes, whose humor is more direct than their masters, but often easier caught by us hundreds of years later.

2. Beatrice has a powerful scene in Act IV, scene 2, where she exclaims, “O that I were a man for his sake! or that I had any friend that would be a man for my sake!” How do you think she’s defining a “man” in this passage?  Does she literally mean a male, or is there some subtle definition of man that makes her unable to find one in Messina, even despite Benedick’s presence? 

3. Discuss a scene (either an entire scene, or a few lines) where Shakespeare switches from prose to verse (or vice versa) to make a dramatic point.  Much Abo About Nothing, as we have discussed earlier, is rare that it has more prose than poetry, but in the later Acts we find entire scenes of poetry.  Explain why and how it is used in this scene, and what effect it has on the audience.  How does it act as a “setting” and a “costume” for the characters?

4. At the first wedding, Pedro insists that he and Claudio “Did see her, did hear her, at that hour last night/Talk with a ruffian...Who hath indeed, most like a liberal villain,/Confessed the vile encounters they have had/A thousand times in secret” (IV.1.).  So even though they saw “Hero” at the window, what really convinced them is what Borachio “told” them about the affair.  Why does all the action in Much Ado About Nothing take place in words rather than in actions?  Everything is told to the characters—and to us—second hand, from Hero’s infidelity to Don John’s capture.  Film versions always show us these events...so why does the play refuse to? 

For Wednesday: Much Ado About Nothing, Act II

For Wednesday: Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, Act II

Answer TWO of the following...

1. Compare the two long speeches Benedick has in Act II, Scene Three, on pages 32 and 39 of the Pelican Shakespeare edition (the speeches that begin “I know that, but I would have thee hence again,” and “This can be no trick.”  In both he reflects upon love and his opinion of marriage.  What changes in these two speeches, and is there any sense in the first that he might eventually come to the opinion of the second?  In other words, have they ‘brainwashed’ him into marriage, or was he merely looking to be convinced?

2. Shakespeare inserts a very cynical song in Act Three, Scene Three, right when everyone is wooing and making preparations for marriage.  Though no one seems to pay it close attention, why might this be Shakespeare’s sly way of making a point in the comedy?  What might be the message of this song and this particular moment of the play?

3. Where do we see verse (imabic pentameter) in Act 2?  Why do you think it is used and what it the effect it should have on the audience?  In class we discussed how language is the one way to change a character’s clothing and make the audience take notice.  How might the use of verse in this act in one particular scene do this? 

4. As befits a play set in Italy (home of Machiavelli), almost everyone in Act Two is, at some point, wearing a disguise and playing a role.  Of course, one of the difficulties of wearing a disguise is being mistaken for someone else.  Discuss how these disguises allow people to say things they normally couldn’t, and actually create “much ado about nothing.”  In other words, how does the play create a plot out of disguises and illusions that doesn’t really exist?  

For Monday: Much Ado About Nothing, Act One

Beatrice and Benedick in the 1993 film by Kenneth Branagh

For Monday: Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, Act I

Answer TWO of the following:

1. Since no one in the audience can catch every word of a performance, reading a play is useful since you can pause, re-read, and contemplate the meaning of a speech (or even a word).  Having read Act One, discuss a passage or a line that you never noticed in the movie but seems more interesting or confusing in the play.  What happens in the actual lines that may have been skimmed over in the film, or you simply didn’t catch the first time around?  Why is this passage significant, do you think?

2. The play suggests that Beatrice and Benedict have a history, though not much is said about it.  What is Beatrice’s chief complaint about Benedict?  What kind of man does she think he is?  What are his chief flaws?  Is there any way to guess what happened between them, and why she’s bitter (if you read her that way)? 

3. Most of Act One is in prose, which is normal, spoken English.  However, on page 12, once Benedict leaves, Don Pedro and Claudio start speaking in verse (and specifically, imabic pentameter—we’ll discuss this).  Why do you think there language changes here, when they were formally speaking in prose?  How might this mirror what they’re speaking of, and how Shakespeare wants us to ‘hear’ this conversation?

4. How might some elements of Act One carry Machiavellian undertones?  Who is acting or putting on a performance that is contradictory to their true self?  Who might be playing the role of a “prince” in some way, large or small?  Or, is anyone instructed to follow Machiavellian principles to “win” their desire? 

For Friday: Shakespeare's Sonnets

For Friday: Shakespeare, Sonnets 30, 35, 36, 42, 46, 71

NOTE: I gave the class a handout with these sonnets on Wednesday, but if you missed class or lost the handout, you can find the Sonnets here: http://www.shakespeares-sonnets.com/

Choose TWO sonnets in this sequence and discuss how it creates a metaphor that helps us see a familiar situation/emotion in a new light.  For example, in Sonnet 30, Shakespeare explains how he mourns “friends hid in death’s dateless night.”  This metaphor suggests that death merely “hides” people who are otherwise still in plain sight, yet the darkness is “dateless,” meaning it has no beginning or end.  It suggests that the memory of a loss remains fresh because no one really “goes away,” but they remain with you, merely hidden from sight—though you can still feel them.  So pick another poem (or other metaphors in this one) and explain how it does the same thing—challenges how we read the world through a unique poetic metaphor. 

BONUS: Even though the Sonnets are individual poems, they seem to be developing a hidden story about the poet and his lover.  Based on these 6 sonnets, what seems to be the general story behind them?  What kind of relationship is this?  What are the clues/metaphors that suggest what kind of love this is?  (we’ll discuss this more in class) 

Exam and Paper day on Monday

Remember that Exam #2 is scheduled for tomorrow (Monday's) class at 12:00.  If you wrote Paper #1, you should take Exam #2, unless you really want to write another paper (though I assure you, the exam is easier and only takes an hour!).  If, however, you took Exam #1 you must write Paper #2.  Paper #2 is due by 5pm on Monday.  Late papers are accepted with a -10 penalty a day for a maximum of 2 days (so by Wednesday at 5pm).  After that you get a zero.  Exams cannot be made up unless arrangements are made beforehand.  

For the rest of the week, we will discuss Shakespeare's language in preparation to read Much Ado About Nothing.  See you then!