Advanced Placement Classroom

Macbeth

Daniel G. Lipowitz, James Conley

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000493573
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Advanced Placement Classroom: Macbeth is a teacher-friendly resource for using one of Shakespeare's greatest tragedies in the Advanced Placement classroom. Students will examine the play critically and analytically to understand aspects such as the nature of villainy and the history of the events that inspired the play. An extended section provides teachers with information on societal implications that impacted the play's creation, including witchcraft and The Gunpowder Plot. Teachers also will be able to implement exciting hands-on projects such as putting Macbeth on trial for the murder of Banquo and developing a soundtrack for the play.Grades 7-12

CHAPTER 1
Why Shakespeare? “Soul of the Ages”

DOI: 10.4324/9781003232858-1

Why Shakespeare? Ben Jonson refers to him as "Soul of the age!" in the poem rep tinted at: the beginning of this text (line 17). Perhaps we should amend Jonson s wording slightly to read "Soul of the Ages." William Shakespeare continues to be relevant to every generation; for, like the masters in all fields of art, his creations dramatize universal truths that are not encumbered by time. Jonson lauds Shakespeare's greatness by placing him in the company of the classical Greek tragedians: Aeschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles (lines 33-34). In Macbeth, Shakespeare examines the decision-making process of a good man and a hero, one who serves his country in a distinguished way. Why is Macbeth relevant? Shakespeare shows us the pitfalls of temptation, a weakness embedded in all human beings. He forces us to empathize with the tragic hero and, like the great Greek dramatists, makes us wonder how we would behave if we were placed in the same set of circumstances.

To act on our dreams without considering the consequences of our actions is not the mark of one who has achieved a level of self-actualization, the understanding of who one is and what one may realistically achieve. Yet, Macbeth and his wife function inside a hallucinatory bubble where they believe that there are few ramifications other than their own rewards. Macbeth hesitates momentarily in his descent, but Lady Macbeth's pressure loosens any moral footing he may still possess.

Why Shakespeare? He helps us to see motifs that we apply to our own lives. The ability to discern peer pressure in its negative guise is a vital skill. The crossroads of free will and fate come into play, as the witches offer Macbeth choices. He soliloquizes, "If chance will have me king, why, chance may / crown me / Without my stir" (I. iii. 157-159). Unfortunately for him and Scotland, he chooses to stir, thereby destroying everything in his way Clearly, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth have thought about the crown before, but, in this play, the viewer learns that there is a gap between a wish and an action. For Macbeth, his inability to understand that chasm results in a descent into an inescapable abyss.

For your students who are new to Shakespeare, encourage them to reflect on the protagonist's decisions, to compare and contrast the ideas layered in this tragedy Things do not always appear as they are. Why Shakespeare? He is of his time and of our time, exploring the gray areas that test the human condition that make us who we are, leaving the solid blacks and whites to the lesser dramatists.

Discovering Purpose in Teaching the Bard

From the most inexperienced middle school/high school student to the Advanced Placement and college-level student, one of the first things that students say when asked about Shakespeare's plays is "Shakespeare's language is too hard to understand." What can they not understand about tales that are filled with treachery, deceit, sex, murder, supernatural beings, and a plethora of dirty jokes? As educators, we sometimes find ourselves "selling" an author or a work of literature to a reluctant audience; it just goes with the territory of being a high school teacher. After a while, however, many students will come around to the side of enlightenment (a marriage of good pedagogy and the student's increased interest level). Yet, Shakespeare in the 21st century still puzzles students, long after we have disseminated, enacted, quizzed, researched, and written about various aspects of his plays in class. Why does this enigma, Shakespearean text, still haunt the classroom walls that we inhabit each day?

Assessing Student Readiness for Shakespeare

As you begin to read and apply this study guide to your teaching and illumination of Macbeth, we would like you to examine your response to the question that each educator has had to consider: "Why Shakespeare?" Your answer to this question may be very different from the responses of your pupils. Take a moment to ponder your own teaching practice at the beginning of each unit of study:

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  How do you assess your students' readiness to tackle a new topic in literature?
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  What prior knowledge and schema exist in their knowledge banks about Shakespeare writings?
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  How can you, "the sage on the stage," bring his writing to life?
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  How do their responses focus your teaching practice?
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  What critical reading approaches contribute to clarifying the text?

Recently, we surveyed a group of our 12th-grade students prior to beginning an intensive study of Hamlet and Othello at varied academic preparation levels. With a high degree of consistency, a majority of our students responded that Shakespeare was dull because his writing did not relate to today, his language was too hard to understand, his plays are confusing, and reading his plays in class is pointless. Although our students reflect a small sample of high school students, what can we learn from their responses? These are daunting propositions prior to beginning any unit of study, regardless of the subject matter or discipline, yet these challenges define our true nature as educators. Many of us entered the teaching profession to enlighten these very students searching for meaning and connections in literature.

Often students are reluctant to criticize Shakespeare beyond the previously two stated comments of "too hard" and "confusing" because they do not know how to interpret and interact with Shakespeare's plays, and many of us (the teachers in the room) treat Shakespeare as the celebrity of English teachers worldwide. Don't believe us—just take a look around your classroom or at your workspace. Most likely, there is a poster depicting his image and numerous titles of his plays crowding your bookshelves. Shakespearean iconography in English classrooms is the "nerdier" equivalent to the velvet Elvises or the poker-playing dogs; his image is everywhere. OK, so maybe we are embellishing this point a bit, but his artistry envelops our lives. There are many among us who look toward our Shakespearean unit(s) with enthusiasm, trepidation, or more than likely, a combination of the two.

The growing excitement stems from the suggestion that Shakespeare and his writings are seminal to the human experience. Like most of the literature, drama, and poetry that we include in our curricula, Shakespearean drama transcends time and place; Shakespeare's assessment of human behavior remains accurate. Scholars would agree that this observation is not merely rhetorical hyperbole of an English teacher. Issues that his characters struggle with across the canonical works of Shakespeare directly relate to the human experience, particularly with adolescents. These issues include:

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  coping with the death of a parent/loved one;
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  being in love, most likely for the first time;
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  feeling uncertain about self-identity;
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  feeling lost in the world;
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  having to make choices and painfully comprehending that not every choice has a positive outcome;
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  coming to the realization that the world is far different from the one presented at a young age; and
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  recognizing that there are people in the world who are selfish and do not care about how their actions affect others.

Although Shakespearean text provides students with remarkable examples of inspired writing, educators often are very reluctant or ill equipped to be critical of the Bard's words. However, be mindful that students will take their cues on literary analysis from their teachers; not allowing them the room to criticize may stunt their love of Shakespeare's poetry and glimpses into the human heart. As scholars, while we may be able to disagree with an interpretation of a specific character, we should all strive to make the unclear, clear, and help students to see the value in Shakespeare. Critical analysis will promote a deeper understanding through higher order thinking and interpretation.

Prior to beginning Macbeth, the age-old expression, "the teachable moment," must be considered. Make your mark on your students during these moments; teachers certainly are unaware when they may appear and for how long they will persist. Revel in these times; they are the unplanned instances when the classroom dynamics sustain and energize us.

Underpinnings: Critical Approaches to Macbeth

Although there are numerous schools of literary criticism ranging from the traditional historicist/new historicist approaches of textual analysis to the new criticism and postmodernism movements of recent literary research, we feel very strongly that our approach in Advanced Placement Classroom: Macbeth will provide many historical connections that, when presented, will help to extrapolate a thorough understanding of the play in the Advanced Placement, honors, or academic classroom. The new historicist approach asks the reader and classroom practitioner to examine the social, economic, and political underpinnings that constitute the structure of a work of literature; our study of Macbeth falls under this category of literary critique. Shakespeare was a man of his times who skillfully crafted his dramas accordingly. Therefore, his overt and sometimes concealed feelings are embedded in his texts, disguised in allusions and themes that may be unclear to the 21st-century reader. We would argue, and some scholars may disagree with us, that literature has the history of its artistic expression embedded within the words of its composition. The contemporary references by Shakespeare in his works, some that may be either unknown to the reader and/or beyond the scope of a close-textual analysis of a specific play, are important in the artistic landscape of the play. Lilian Wins tan ley's Macbeth, King Lear, and Contemporary History (1970) clearly echoed these sentiments:

Shakespeare did not write for the men of the twentieth century nor for men of the nineteenth century; he wrote for the men of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries and thus the interpretation that the men of his own day would be likely to place upon his plays is exceedingly important. (p. 1)

There may be Shakespearean scholars who choose to examine his works from a contradictory critical slant. This teaching guide to Macbeth attempts to establish that the play is filled with numerous references to contemporary and social events, of which Jacobean audiences would have been aware, regardless of their varied educational background and social strata.

Jacobean England, specifically during the first performances of the Macbeth in 1606, was a time rife with suspicious activities that threatened King James I with assassination, specifically, the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. As a result, a great many productions were heavily censored, and playwrights were "forbidden to represent contemporary monarchs upon the stage even if they [the monarchs] were represented in a favorable light" (Winstanley, 1970, p. 4). Because Elizabethans and Jacobeans were prohibited from discussing these ideas in a public forum, theatergoers attended performances with the foreknowledge that the stage played a significant function by remaining in close proximity to the events of the day. Concealing their personal feelings toward political events, playwrights utilized a high degree of symbolism and often shrouded their words in distant historical characters and events so that audience members could connect their contemporary times to those of past generations.

In attempting to expound on historical events throughout this guide, we anticipate that classroom practitioners will be able to connect the contemporary issues of the early 17th century to the ir effective close-textual reading in the 21st century. We have detailed a number of significant historical events that Shakespeare incorporated into his productions, not only to provide a "theatrical tweaking" to the hierarchy and society of his time, but also to examine the human psychology of the individual character.

Finally, the classroom practitioner must be aware of the presence of King James I in the audience for the inaugural production of Macbeth. Specifically, its subject and themes are closely connected to the Scottish ancestry of James, a topic of great interest to the new monarch of England. Shakespeare and other playwrights of the 17th century would have written laboriously not only to avoid the...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Preface
• Chapter 1 Why Shakespeare? "Soul of the Ages"
• Chapter 2 Macbeth: A Literary and Analytical Look
• Chapter 3 Rethinking Character: The Human Nature of Villainy
• Chapter 4 The Historical Macbeth: Unraveling the Truths, Lies, and Misrepresentations
• Chapter 5 Composing Macbeth: Understanding the Societal Implications of the Jacobean Period
• Chapter 6 Drama in the Classroom and on Stage
• Chapter 7 Writing Critically About Macbeth
• Chapter 8 Student Activities and Differentiated Instruction
• Chapter 9 Additional Materials for the Classroom: Lesson Ideas, Guided Questions, Key Quotations, and Facts Regarding Macbeth
• References
• About the Authors
• Common Core State Standards Alignment