William Shakespeare1564-1616

King Lear

Personal Details

1564 - Born

1582 - Married Anne Hathaway

1592 – Career had begun

1599 – Shakespeare and friends build The

Globe

1603 – 1610 – Bubonic Plague

1616 - Died

WHY DO WE READ

SHAKESPEARE?

WHY DO WE READ SHAKESPEARE?

Reason #1:

GREATEST WRITER IN THE HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE!

WHY DO WE READ SHAKESPEARE?

Reason #2:

HE WROTE 37 OF THE MOST POPULAR PLAYS IN THE

HISTORY OF THE WORLD.

King LearShakespeare's original version has been

regarded as one of his supreme achievements.

The Globe Theatre

The Globe Theatre

The Globe Theatre

WHY DO WE READ SHAKESPEARE?

Reason #3:

HE WROTE 154 SONNETS

WHY DO WE READ SHAKESPEARE?

Side note:

What is a sonnet?

• 14 lines

• rhyme scheme

• iambic pentameter

The Sonnetiambic pentameter

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate.

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks

The Sonnet

154 sonnets of 14 lines of iambic pentameter

= 2, 156 lines of iambic pentameter

WHY DO WE READ SHAKESPEARE?

REASON #4

Because he thought and felt like we do today.

All the world's a stage,And all the men and women merely players.They have their exits and their entrances,And one man in his time plays many parts,

WHY DO WE READ SHAKESPEARE’S KING LEAR?

Reason #5: KING LEAR HAS BEEN ON THE LIST OF TITLES FOR PROMPT THREE OF THE AP LIT TEST 17 TIMES SINCE 1975.

What years?

77, 78, 82, 88, 89, 90, 96, 01, 03, 04, 05, 06, 08, 10, 11, 12, 14