SENIOR CERTIFICATE EXAMINATION QUESTIONS AND
ANSWERS
+
A HUGE COLLECTION OF ADDITIONAL ESSAY AND
CONTEXTUAL QUESTIONS & ANSWERS
ALSO INCLUDED:
THEMES
CHARACTERS
PLOT
SUMMARIES
, Hamlet
TENSE
What's Inside Shakespeare wrote Hamlet in the present tense.
ABOUT THE TITLE
Book Basics ................................................................................. 1 Hamlet is a tale of mourning, madness, and revenge. The play's
title refers to its central character, Prince Hamlet of Denmark, and
In Context ..................................................................................... 1 to his murdered father, King Hamlet, whose death he must avenge.
Author Biography .......................................................................... 2
Characters .................................................................................... 2
d In Context
Plot Summary ............................................................................... 5
Shakespeare's plays are timeless, with a universality to which
Scene Summaries ...................................................................... 10
anyone can relate. Hamlet, for example, has a modern militaristic
Quotes ........................................................................................25 feel to its set and costuming, while at the same time it maintains
a very medieval sensibility. The same can be said of
l Symbols .................................................................................... 26 Shakespeare's other plays: the stories, characters, and conflicts
all have 21st-century analogues.
m Themes................................................................................... 27
Some of the timelessness of Shakespeare's work has to do with
e Suggested Reading .................................................................28
the source material for his plays. The tragedy in Hamlet may, in
part, stem from the deaths of Shakespeare's son and father. In
addition, however, the play is said to have come from ancient
stories that developed from some common ideas: killing a brother
j Book Basics for personal gain, committing adultery, and faking madness as a
method for hiding in plain sight. Stories based on the idea of
AUTHOR fratricide—the killing of one's brother—for personal gain easily
William Shakespeare bring to mind the biblical tale of Cain and Abel: these themes
have been incorporated into tales for thousands of years.
YEARS WRITTEN
Shakespeare, however, masterfully captured these universal
1599–1601
tales and put his unique spin on them.
GENRE
Beyond the Cain and Abel story, the oldest-known source for
Drama, Tragedy
Hamlet is historian Saxo Grammaticus's Gesta Danorum
PERSPECTIVE AND NARRATOR ("Deeds of the Danes"; translated into English as The Danish
Hamlet is written in objective third-person point of view. To History; c. 1185–1202). In this tale, Grammaticus documents
give audiences some insight into characters' inner thoughts, long-standing oral legends. And though this is most likely the
Shakespeare uses short speeches (asides) and longer earliest written source material, scholars speculate that
speeches (soliloquies) in which characters speak their Shakespeare may have relied on a more contemporary work,
thoughts aloud.
ANSWERS
+
A HUGE COLLECTION OF ADDITIONAL ESSAY AND
CONTEXTUAL QUESTIONS & ANSWERS
ALSO INCLUDED:
THEMES
CHARACTERS
PLOT
SUMMARIES
, Hamlet
TENSE
What's Inside Shakespeare wrote Hamlet in the present tense.
ABOUT THE TITLE
Book Basics ................................................................................. 1 Hamlet is a tale of mourning, madness, and revenge. The play's
title refers to its central character, Prince Hamlet of Denmark, and
In Context ..................................................................................... 1 to his murdered father, King Hamlet, whose death he must avenge.
Author Biography .......................................................................... 2
Characters .................................................................................... 2
d In Context
Plot Summary ............................................................................... 5
Shakespeare's plays are timeless, with a universality to which
Scene Summaries ...................................................................... 10
anyone can relate. Hamlet, for example, has a modern militaristic
Quotes ........................................................................................25 feel to its set and costuming, while at the same time it maintains
a very medieval sensibility. The same can be said of
l Symbols .................................................................................... 26 Shakespeare's other plays: the stories, characters, and conflicts
all have 21st-century analogues.
m Themes................................................................................... 27
Some of the timelessness of Shakespeare's work has to do with
e Suggested Reading .................................................................28
the source material for his plays. The tragedy in Hamlet may, in
part, stem from the deaths of Shakespeare's son and father. In
addition, however, the play is said to have come from ancient
stories that developed from some common ideas: killing a brother
j Book Basics for personal gain, committing adultery, and faking madness as a
method for hiding in plain sight. Stories based on the idea of
AUTHOR fratricide—the killing of one's brother—for personal gain easily
William Shakespeare bring to mind the biblical tale of Cain and Abel: these themes
have been incorporated into tales for thousands of years.
YEARS WRITTEN
Shakespeare, however, masterfully captured these universal
1599–1601
tales and put his unique spin on them.
GENRE
Beyond the Cain and Abel story, the oldest-known source for
Drama, Tragedy
Hamlet is historian Saxo Grammaticus's Gesta Danorum
PERSPECTIVE AND NARRATOR ("Deeds of the Danes"; translated into English as The Danish
Hamlet is written in objective third-person point of view. To History; c. 1185–1202). In this tale, Grammaticus documents
give audiences some insight into characters' inner thoughts, long-standing oral legends. And though this is most likely the
Shakespeare uses short speeches (asides) and longer earliest written source material, scholars speculate that
speeches (soliloquies) in which characters speak their Shakespeare may have relied on a more contemporary work,
thoughts aloud.
