Example 1

Sample Questions for Use in Class

1. Shakespeare and Stoppard: Different Plays, Same Body Count

Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead is based on Shakespeare’s Hamlet in both obvious and not-so-obvious ways. Obviously, Stoppard borrows two of Shakespeare’s minor characters and gives them top billing. But the two plays also have similar themes – both dwell on the futility of human action and the inevitability of death. Have students compare the two passages below (or others from the plays, if you so choose), discussing how each deals with the ideas of death and action/ inaction:

(A)

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

(B)

Rosencrantz: Do you ever think of yourself as actually dead, lying in a box with the lid on it? Nor do I really. Silly to be depressed by it. I mean, one thinks of it like being alive in a box. One keeps forgetting to take into account that one is dead. Which should make all the difference. Shouldn't it? I mean, you’d never know you were in a box would you? It would be just like you were asleep in a box. Not that I’d like to sleep in a box, mind you. Not without any air. You'd wake up dead for a start and then where would you be? In a box. That's the bit I don't like, frankly. That’s why I don’t think of it. Because you'd be helpless wouldn't you? Stuffed in a box like that. I mean, you'd be in there forever. Even taking into account the fact that you're dead. It isn't a pleasant thought. Especially if you're dead, really. Ask yourself: if I asked you straight off I'm going to stuff you in this box now – would you rather to be alive or dead? Naturally you’d prefer to be alive. Life in a box is better than no life at all. I expect. You'd have a chance at least. You could lie there thinking, well, at least I’m not dead. In a minute, somebody’s going to bang on the lid and tell me to come out. (knocks) "Hey you! What's your name? Come out of there!"

Example 2

2. Unintentional Borrowing

Even though there are no new stories, storytellers can end up borrowing from previous stories without knowing it because the sheer number of tales is so vast that no one can possibly be expected to know them all. Have students compare and contrast the two summaries below. What’s the same, and what’s different? How do these similarities and differences shed new light on both the old tale and the new one?

(A)
8 C.E.: Philomela Weaves a Tale

In Metamorphoses, the Roman writer Ovid tells the tale of Tereus and Philomela. Tereus is a strapping young soldier married to Philomela’s sister, Procne - but he’s still got the hots for Philomela. When Philomela tells him to get lost, Tereus assaults her, then cuts out her tongue so she can’t tell her sister what he did. Undaunted, Philomela weaves a tapestry showing the assault, then presents it to her sister. (We’re never told what Procne thinks of this fabulous “gift”.)

(B)
2008 C.E.: A Story in Pictures

In 2008, police in Los Angeles, California, arrested a 24-year-old man on suspicion of drug charges. While they were taking his booking photos, they noticed that he had an elaborate scene tattooed across his chest and shoulders. On closer inspection, the police discovered that it was a scene that exactly matched the scene of an unsolved liquor store murder that had happened a few years before - right down to the name of the liquor store, which appeared in the tattooed version. The tattoo’s owner later confessed that he had committed the murder, then had the event made into a tattoo. Needless to say, no one but the man’s prison mates are likely to see him show off his story for a long time.

Quiz 1 Questions

Quiz 2 Questions