Words: 445
I of the play, then go to the assignment and list at least two examples for each of the language patterns you have found in Act l. Give the scene and line number where you find each example. 1. Unusual word arrangement I could a tale unfold (l, v) In my mind’s eye (l, II) It cannot come to good (l, II) It started like a guilty thing (l, I) Leave her to heaven (l, v) More honored in the breach than the observance (l, iv) More in sorrow than in anger (l, I’) Neither a borrower, nor a lender be (l, iii) Not a mouse stirring (l, I) O my prophetic soul! (l, v) Something is rotten in the state of Denmark. , v) So much for him (l, ‘I) There are more things in heaven and earth, Horal, Than are dreamt of In your philosophy. (l, v) This too too solid flesh (l, II) To thing own self be true (l, Ill) 2. Omissions ‘Its bitter cold (l, I) ‘Its now struck twelve; get thee to bed, Francisco (I, I) 3. Words not quite our own (unusual words) That it should come to this! (l, it) All is not well (l, it) Frailty, thy name is woman! (l, it) Give thy thoughts no tongue (l, iii) I am sick at heart (I, I) -? never; I’ = in; ever = ever; oft= its = it is; pop = open; o’er -?over; gig’ = give; inner – often; a’ -?=he; even = even 1 .
Second person pronouns: thou, thy, thing, ye 2. Verb inflection: second person thou + a-t, -SST, or -est. = thou art, thou seemed; may be contracted: thou seam’s third person he, she, it + add -HTH = he knotted 3. Words common to Shakespeare, but not to us: some examples such as anon = soon beseecher curse bootless = without result cousin= any relative or close friend; monarchs often refer to each other as cousin, whether related or not and whether friends or not cuckold= a man whose wife is unfaithful; the butt of many Elizabethan Jokes, often offered to as wearing horns, the traditional sign of the cuckold.
References to the cuckoo, a bird that lays its eggs in the nests of other birds, also point to the cuckold. Forsooth= truly, used for emphasis forswear-?renounce or perjure hap-?perhaps, sometimes written as haply hence-?away from here; also later marred mild oath using a corrupted spelling of “Mary”; indeed mistress-?any woman, often the female head of the household, or the object of a man’s affection; seldom used in the modern sense of a woman engaged in an affair treating thence-?away from there wherefore-?why