About This Lesson
Soliloquies are full of possibilities. Getting students inside a soliloquy can lead to all kinds of deep reading and surprising discoveries about the words, characters, and big questions of a play.
You can teach this lesson as its own close-reading exercise or as part of a larger Shakespeare unit. As a pre-reading lesson, it’s a great introduction to Shakespeare’s language, but it’s also useful for teaching a soliloquy in context, right when the speech occurs in the play.
By the end of this exercise, ALL students will have spoken and read Shakespeare’s original language multiple times; discovered that soliloquies are internal arguments; discussed various student interpretations of this soliloquy; and, in a lively and authentic way, explored all those cool things going on with complex texts: tone, structure, characterization, and big ideas.
This lesson is a student-driven, language-focused experience, and an essential practice of the Folger Method. Read all about the principles and practices behind the Folger Method in the attached handout, too!
Enjoy this Folger Shakespeare Library lesson?
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