Macbeth questions

As I said in class, answer these questions (which mostly require you to speculate, not summarize or analyze) before you read the first two scenes of Act II. In case you lost the handout, the questions are:

Some Macbeth Questions

1. What is the plan for killing Duncan?

2. Why might this plan succeed?

3. Why might this plan fail?

4. For the most part, the plan is Lady Macbeth’s? Why is it largely her plan and not her husband’s plan?

Writing Assignments for The Odyssey

1. For March 12/13, read “The Geography of The Odyssey.” The link is available at the website. Write a response of one to two double-spaced pages. What is your opinion of the value of the epic’s historical and geographical basis? How does the discussion in this essay shape your own understanding of whether the tale is geographically and historically reliable? How might we benefit from knowing what’s accurate about the story? Why are people so interested to discover the factual origins of The Odyssey?

2. For March 18/19, write a creative piece of at least 500 words. You have two options for this story:

          a. Create a “lost tale” of the Odyssey, something else that happened to Odysseus and his crew along the way. This could even happen after the events of the epic.

          b. Tell a story of yourself on a journey (a trip to the mall; a drive to a relative’s house), but give it Greek epic elements: gods, fate, monsters.

For either version of assignment #2, I’m not expecting anyone to write in iambic pentameter (though you can try), but I do want you to break the story into lines of approximately 10 syllables.