English 144: Introduction to Shakespeare

 

Professor Adrienne L. Eastwood

 

Topics for Paper 1

 

Write an essay (1,500 words, 1 inch margins, 12 point font, double spaced) in which you address one of the following questions.  Feel free to use any of the primary materials from the BCS to enhance or supplement your argument. 

 

Your essays will be evaluated by how well you are able to convey your understanding of Shakespeare’s play text when working through your ideas about the topic you choose.  Be sure to include, wherever possible, references to specific scenes or passages as they support the claims you are making about the plays.

 

  1. Analyze the marriages (or some of them) in The Taming of the Shrew and Richard II.  What do you think Shakespeare is trying to suggest about marriage in relation to the social and political realities of early modern England? 

 

  1. Discuss constructions of masculinity in The Taming of the Shrew, Titus Andronicus, and Richard II.  How do dominant ideologies about masculinity affect the main—or peripheral—characters?

 

  1. Explore the issue of female sexuality in The Taming of the Shrew and Titus Andronicus.  How do cultural ideals about femininity take shape around related understandings about female sexuality?

 

  1. Analyze the relationship between language and power in The Taming of the Shrew and Richard II.

 

If you wish to write on a topic of your own devising, you should discuss the project with me well in advance (by no later than September 16th).  

 

 

ESSAYS DUE IN CLASS ON 9/23