Shakespeare Insult Sheet
Get out a sheet of paper or your ipad or laptop or phone and do the following:
Vocabulary Unit 6
6. Defect
Part of Speech: (Noun)
Definition: an imperfection, flaw, or blemish of some kind
(Verb)
Definition: to desert a cause or organization.
Sentence: There is no one who does not have at least one serious character defect.
In 1948 the Dixiecrats defected from the Democratic Party and held their own presidential convention.
Defect – noun
Synonyms: imperfections
Antonyms: flawless, perfect
Defect – verb
Synonyms: to leave
Antonyms: to join
1st original sentence:
2nd original sentence:
A sentence using the word defect from a literary source:
Tymiah:
The soup that I purchased from Macy’s had a defect which is why they allowed me to return it for a refund.
Alejandra:
Anguish:
After the mother lost her son she felt great anguish.
Shakespearean Insult Sheet:
Thou means you
Thou + an insult from Column A + an insult from Colum B + insult from Column C
Divide into two groups – the Capulets and the Montagues and hurl insults at each other! –
Watch the opening scene of Romeo + Juliet
Tuesday, April 10th:
Your Vocabulary Unit
6 is due today.
Romeo and Juliet Act One Vocabulary Handout passed out
Humors: mood
400 years ago people
believed that our personalities or moods came from fluids produced in our organs.
Melancholy: deep
depression or sadness.
Sanguine: ruddy,
cheerful
A person who had a
great deal of healthy blood was said to be happy and even-tempered and marked
with a healthy ruddy (red) complexion.
A person who has too
much bile is said to be ill-tempered
Bile: a scalding,
acidic fluid produced by the gallbladder to aid in breaking down food.
Lily-livered: a
coward
400 years people
believed that courage resided in the liver. If you were a coward, people thought your liver was pale
and/or yellow.
Page 787
Romeo and Juliet
Read the Prologue,
which tells us what the story is about and how it will end.
Vocabulary:
Grudge: a
long-standing feud or dislike for another person. Not getting over an insult
from another person can result in a grudge.
Mutiny: to disobey or
refuse to obey the orders of a superior officer.
Civil: well behaved
Civil: that which
pertains to a country. A civil war is when a country is torn apart internally
by fighting between its citizens.
Households – families
Both alike in dignity
– both families are very wealthy and of the same status.
Setting: Verona,
Italy
Milan:
The Montagues - Romeo
is a Montague.
Julian:
The Capulets - Juliet
is a Capulet.
The two lovers die
because of their parents’ hatred for each other.
Readers:
Julian – Sampson
Yessenia – Gregory
Milan – Tybalt
Benvolio – Jason
Julia – Abram
The two servants are
trying to be tough and they’re not – they’re cowards. Sampson mispronounces words
and Gregory corrects him.
Choler – a fever
To draw is to draw a
sword from its sheath
Wednesday, April 11th:
Romeo and Juliet
Page
788
Julian
– Sampson
Gregory
– Yessenia
Abram
– Tymiah
Benvolio
– Salamata
Milan
– Tybalt
Kevin
– Officer
Alejandra
– Capulet
Hilary
– Capulet’s mom
Montague:
Adolfo
Katherine
– Lady Montague
Tymiah
– the prince
The setting is a hot, steamy day
(Sunday) in Verona in July.
Puns: a pun is a play on words, or a
joke using words that might have similar sounds but different meanings. In the
opening scene there are a lot of jokes and puns where Gregory and Sampson are
insulting each other good naturedly about their courage, their fighting skills
and their skill with the ladies.
Coals
Colliers: people who carry coals.
When you carry coals you get all dirty.
Choler: (collar) a fever
Draw your neck out of the collar: take
your neck out of the hangman’s noose!
Maidenhead: virginity
Maid is a young unmarried woman.
Valiant: Brave, courageous
To move: to be moved with passion or
emotion; but this has a double meaning: in this case, to run away in fear!
A lot of Romeo and Juliet is NAUGHTY!!!!!
SAMPSON and GREGORY are servants of the
house of Capulet. They are full of bluster and brag about what great fighters
they are and what they are going to do if they run into the servants of the
Montagues. And of course, their jokes quickly become naughty and sexual.
And of course, they do run into the
servants of the rival house of the Montagues and both sides engage in cowardly
bluster.
Sampson: "My naked weapon is out;
quarrel, I will back thee!"
Sampson's line has a rather naughty
subtext which you can probably figure out. But consider what Sampson is saying
to Gregory - start the fight and I will back you! These are two bumbling
guys. Would you trust either of them to back you in a fight?
Sampson counsels: "Let us take the
law of our sides; let them begin."
Gregory brags: " I will frown as I
pass by, and let them take it as they list."
Sampson counters with: "Nay, as
they dare. I will bite my thumb at them; / Which is a disgrace to them, if they
bear it."
Biting one's thumb at someone was a
vulgar sign of disrespect and would definitely start a fight.
Abraham and Balthasar from the House of
Montague enter, and Sampson, full of bravado, bites his thumb at them.
Abraham bristles and demands: "Do
you bite your thumb at us, sir?"
Sampson, playing the lawyer, answers:
"I do bite my thumb, sir."
Abraham:" Do you bite your thumb
at us, sir?"
Sampson, now not so certain, turns to
his buddy and asks, " Is the law of (on) our side, if I say ay
(yes)?"
Gregory gives an unequivocal
"No!"
Sampson immediately backpedals and
answers: "No, sir, I do not bite my thumb at you, sir, but I bite my
thumb, sir."
The tension quickly escalates, the four
fools draw their swords - Sampson to Gregory, "Gregory, remember thy
swashing blow!" - and the servants fall into fighting. Benvolio, Romeo's
cousin and close friend, appears and when he sees yet another street brawl is
going on, immediately begs the men to put up their swords, but then Tybalt,
from the House of Capulet, shows up and pulls out his sword and wades
into the fight with gusto! This, in an instant, reveals the personalities
of the two men.
A Little Historical Detour on
Renaissance Medical Theory:
Lily livered: coward
In the 1600’s the medical community
believed humors, which were basically four fluids that were exuded from the
organs, caused or affected personalities. The four bodily humors were part of
the Shakespearean cosmology inherited from the ancient Greek philosophers
Aristotle, Hippocrates and Galen. The human personality contained one of
the basic elements of earth, water, fire and air; the qualities of hot, cold,
moist and dry; and a predominance of one of the four humors: black bile, yellow
bile, phlegm and blood. Together, each component created a person's personality
and governed her or his behavior.
An angry person was one whose spleen
produced too much yellow bile (think acid reflux) which caused him or her to be
irritable and out of sorts. This person was said to be choleric, which is a
term used to this day to describe someone who is irritable and grouchy.
A melancholic person (or depressed
person we would say today) would have too much black bile produced by the
spleen, making her or him sad or melancholic in nature.
A person whose blood produced a great
quantity of fluids was easy going and pleasant – or sanguine, which comes from
the Latin word for blood. The sanguine person was also marked by a healthy
ruddy (reddish) complexion. In Spanish the word for blood is sangre and in
French, it is sang. Both French and Spanish are Latin based languages.
Lily-livered: coward
It was believed that courage came from
a really healthy red liver. If your liver was pale or white, that meant you
were a coward; hence the term “lily-livered” or yellow bellied.
Back to Story:
Shakespeare named the character
Benvolio to let us know that he is a good or beneficial character in the play.
Benvolio: Ben means good so
Benvolio is a good and peace loving guy. He is Romeo’s best friend. The prefix
“bene” or “ben” means good or having good effects.
Examples:
Benevolent: the giving of alms or
sustenance to another.
Beneficial: something good
Tybalt: is the name of a cat in a
story. In Shakespeare’s time, many people named their cats “Tybalt”. So when
Tybalt's name was pronounced on the stage in the 1500's, it probably got a few
chuckles from the audience.
Tyrant: a despotic ruler
The brawl is getting more and more out
of control as more boys and young men climb into the fray and more people
gather to watch.
An elderly man and his much younger
wife appear. They are Lord and Lady Capulet, Juliet's parents. He asks
for a sword but she says he should have a crutch instead!
Why does Lady Capulet say to her
husband: “Give him a crutch!”
Pair up with a partner, go over the
Prince’s speech and translated it into modern, contemporary speech.
Pernicious: a disease that devours and
consumes; evil and destructive; a disease that is long standing and resistant
to treatment or modification; behavior that is resistant to modification or
discipline.
Imagery/metaphor:
Purple fountains issuing from your
veins: injuries resulting in tremendous blood loss from sword fights.
Vocabulary:
Civil: domestic; at home
Brawl: fights; melees; free for alls.
Moved: angry; moved to anger
Airy word: some words spoken to provoke
another
Thrice: three times
Prince:
If ever you disturb our streets again,
Your lives will pay the forfeit of the
peace.
If you ever start another fight in the
streets you will pay for it with your lives (the state will execute you for
starting a riot.)
Thursday, April 12th:
Warm-up:
Work on the vocabulary in the Act One Romeo and Juliet packet.
Read Act 1, Scene 1
Warm-up:
Work on the vocabulary in the Act One Romeo and Juliet packet.
Read Act 1, Scene 1
After the fighting has cleared away,
the Montagues, Romeo's parents, speak to Benvolio who recounts the events of
the brawl to them:
Vocabulary:
Adversary: foe, enemy
Drew: to pull his sword from its sheath
Fiery: having the quality of fire;
passionate, enraged, quick to anger
Withal: with
Benvolio is making fun of Tybalt when
he says:
"The fiery Tybalt, with his sword
prepared,
Which, as he breathed defiance to my
ears.
He swung about his head and cut the
winds,
Who nothing hurt withal hissed him in
scorn...."
Although Tybalt was shouting insults to
Benvolio and swinging his sword around his head, cutting the air, he hurt no
one and the wind hissed him in scorn. He was making a big show of being
tough, but despite all the noise he was making - the insults, the fancy
swordplay - he didn't hurt any one and the air mocked him with hissing.
However, the parents are more
interested - and worried - about their son, Romeo, and ask Benvolio to tell
them if he knows what is bothering him. Benvolio tells his parents that
one morning when his mind was troubled, he went for a walk through town an hour
before dawn, and there he saw Romeo by the grove of sycamore trees that grow on
the west side of the city. When Romeo saw him he ducked into the grove,
obviously not wanting to socialize. Benvolio, judging Romeo's behavior by how
he (Benvolio) was feeling - Benvolio also wanted to be alone - didn't pursue
him. Benvolio says to Lady Capulet:
Benvolio says to Lady Capulet:
Madam, an hour before the worshiped sun
Peered forth the golden window of the
East
A troubled mind drave me to walk abroad
Where, underneath the grove of sycamore
That westward rooteth from the city's
side,
So early walking did I see your son:
Towards him I made, but he was ware of
me
And stole into the covert of the wood;
I, measuring his affections by my own,
That most are busied when they're most
alone
Pursued my humor not pursuing his,
And gladly shunned who gladly fled from
me."
Because Benvolio, a well born
youth, is discussing a delicate, rarified subject - another well born youth's
depression - to his mother, the language is in blank verse (unrhymed verse in
iambic pentameter). It was believed well into the twentieth century, that
the well born, or those of an intellectual, artistic sensibility, were more
prone to moods of depression. The language used in this scene is refined,
reflecting that belief that only those of refined temperament could be
depressed or melancholic; therefore, Benvolio uses figurative language -
allusion, personification and imagery - and blank verse to speak with this
aristocratic lady about her depressed son.
Benvolio's monologues is rich with
imagery for Shakespeare's word choice (diction) creates vivid images in the
readers' mind that she sees the golden sunrise, the early dawn, the grove
of sycamore trees.
Figurative Language:
"An hour before the worshipped sun
Peered forth the golden window of the
East..."
Personification: giving human qualities
to inanimate objects. The sun is peering through the golden window of the east
- or in other words, it's rising.
Vocabulary:
Drave: old fashioned word for drove
Grove: a small group of trees
Sycamore: a type of tree
Romeo's parents are very worried about
their son. He's totally emo! He walks alone all night and when the sun rises,
he goes home, locks himself in his room, and draws the curtain. Montague
tells Benvolio, his nephew:
Vocabulary:
Augmenting: to add to
Aurora: Roman goddess of the dawn
Sounding: sounded out for what is
troubling him. The depths of the water are “sounded out” to determine how deep
the water is.
Montague's monologue is also filled
with rich imagery, allusion and personification:
"Many a morning hath he there been
seen,
With tears augmenting the fresh morning
dew (Romeo is crying.)
Adding to clouds more clouds with his
deep sighs: (Like all depressed people he sighs a lot.)
But all so soon as the all cheering sun
Should in the furthest east begin to
draw
The shady curtains from Aurora's bed
(The Roman goddess Aurora pulls the curtains from her bed)
Away from the light steals home my
heavy son (Heavy means depressed.)
And private in his chamber pens himself
(Locks himself alone in his
room.)
Shuts up his window, locks far daylight
out (Draws the curtains.)
And makes himself an artificial night:
(Sits in
darkness.)
If he were a student today, he'd
probably wear black nail polish and dress in black.
The parents ask Benvolio, his cousin
and best friend, to find out what is bothering their son.
Lord Capulet is worried that Romeo may
be destroyed by his depression before he can grow to full manhood. He says
about his son:
"As is the bud bit with an envious
worm
Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to
air
Or dedicate his beauty to the
sun."
This is a simile for two things are
compared using "as". Romeo is compared to a flower bud and his
depression is compared to an envious worm which will destroy him before he can
spread his sweet leaves to the sun.
Ere: (pronounced like "air) Before
The parents ask Benvolio, his cousin
and best friend, to find out what is bothering their son.
Romeo is seen walking towards them, and
the parents, wanting Benvolio to speak to him, withdraw before he sees them.
Friday, April 13th:
Oxymoron – when two contradictory words are put together to
form a new word.
Pretty +Ugly = pretty ugly
Awful + Good = awfully good
h 1. Light heavy
weight
Vague: not clear, not definite, inconclusive, without a
clear outline
Bittersweet: poignant; sweet but also slightly sad; for
example, the ending of The Titanic is bittersweet (poignant.
Worked on Oxymoron handout – finish on Monday and link to
Romeo in Act 1, Scene 1 – “Oh lead of feathers” speech
