Hi everyone.

My name's Mrs. Riley, and today we are going to be doing some learning together all about Shakespeare's Macbeth.

In our lesson today, we're focusing on soliloquies and we are going to be looking at the features of a soliloquy.

By the end of the lesson, we're going to have a go at writing a soliloquy ourselves.

So let's get started.

The outcome of today's lesson is to explain what a soliloquy is and identify its features.

Here are our keywords.

Now don't worry if you've never seen these words before, I wouldn't have expected you to have seen some of these words.

So we are going to go through the definitions and by the end of the lesson you're gonna feel really comfortable with what each of these means.

But don't worry right now if they look a little bit scary.

Let's start off by just practising saying them because they're quite big words.

My turn, your turn.

Soliloquy.

It's quite a difficult word to say that isn't it? Monologue.

Here comes the trickiest one.

Iambic.

Pentameter.

Let's say that one one more time.

Iambic.

Pentameter.

Amazing.

And finally, blank verse.

Well done.

A soliloquy is an act of speaking one's thoughts aloud when by oneself or regardless of any hearers, especially by a character in a play.

So it's probably something that we don't do that often, just in normal life.

Be like you going on a walk and instead of just thinking in your head, saying your thoughts out loud.

Now, in real life we would probably just think the thoughts in our head, but of course in a play that's not very helpful because we wouldn't know what they're thinking.

So in a play, it's really helpful if the character says what they're thinking out loud because it gives a chance for the audience to understand how they're feeling.

So that's why soliloquies are really important in plays.

A monologue is a long speech by one actor in a play or in a film.

Iambic pentameter is a style of writing poems in lines of 10 syllables with emphasis on the second, fourth, sixth, eighth and 10th syllable.

That's a lot of information.

Let's for now just focus on the fact that iambic pentameter is a style of writing a poem.

Blank verse is unrhymed poetry written in iambic pentameter.

So iambic pentameter and blank verse are both specific styles of how you might write a poem.

Don't worry, we're gonna go over this a lot later in the lesson.

So in our lesson today, first we're going to look at the features of a soliloquy, and in the second learning cycle we'll be writing and performing a soliloquy.

Let's start with the features of a soliloquy.

So plays often include monologues where one character gives a long speech and a soliloquy is just a type of monologue, a type of long speech.

Now the key difference is that in a soliloquy, the character isn't in a conversation with anyone, but they're just speaking to themselves or saying their thoughts aloud.

So here's a little visual to help us.

Here this would be a monologue because we've got two characters speaking to one another and we can see one character then has got a long bit of speech.

That would be a monologue, a long speech to another character.

In this visual we can see we've just got one character giving a long monologue, but because they're not saying it to anyone, they're not in a conversation, this would be a soliloquy, a long speech to themselves.

So both are used in plays, monologues, a long speech to another character, a soliloquy, a long speech to themselves.

Let's check what we've just learned.

What is a soliloquy? A, a monologue that one character says to another.

B, a stage direction.

C, a character speaking their thoughts aloud, or D, an argument between two characters.

Pause the video while you think about your answer.

That's right, the correct answer is C.

A soliloquy is a character speaking their thoughts aloud.

Soliloquies are written in the first person because the character is using the I, me, my to talk about themselves.

So if they're saying how they're feeling, they're going to be saying, I am feeling very confused about this decision that I have to make.

So they'll be using I or me or my, or maybe we.

The etymology, which is the origin, it means where the word has come from, of the word soliloquy is from two Latin words.

Solus is a Latin word that means alone, and loqui is a Latin word that means to speak.

So if we put those together, we can see how we get the word soliloquy and we can see speaking alone, that makes sense with the definition of the word.

So why do you think playwrights include soliloquies in their plays? We've touched on this a little bit, but can you pause the video now and in your own words explain why you think a playwright would include a soliloquy in a play? Pause the video now.

Okay, well done.

It's so that the audience understands the character's inner thoughts and feelings.

It gives the chance for the audience to get a look inside a character's head.

Let's read part of a soliloquy where Lady Macbeth expresses her desire to become more ruthless to kill King Duncan.

Now this is in its original Shakespearean form.

So the language in this, a lot of it might seem a little bit strange and might seem a little bit confusing, but don't worry too much.

It's quite nice sometimes to see the authentic version of what Shakespeare wrote, even if it means that it's a little bit more difficult to understand.

So here's a soliloquy, a long speech, that Lady Macbeth says when she's trying to express her desires to become ruthless to kill King Duncan.

Fill me from the crown to the toe top-full of direst cruelty.

Make thick my blood, stop up the access and passage to remorse that no compunctious visitings of nature shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between the effect and it.

Come to my woman's breasts and take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers, wherever in your sightless substances you wait on nature's mischief.

So what an amazing soliloquy that Shakespeare wrote that Lady Macbeth says.

I'm just going to unpick it a little bit for you because like I say, it's quite a confusing passage.

In this soliloquy Lady Macbeth, we know wants to become ruthless.

So she's saying, fill me from the top to the bottom of cruelty.

Make me really cruel.

Make my blood thick and almost block any passage, so that remorse is when you sort of feel sorry or you sort of you feel bad about doing something.

So she's almost saying, I want to block those natural feelings of remorse so that I don't have to feel sorry for what I've done.

And she says, come to my woman's breasts.

Now we know that mammals feed their babies with milk.

So she's almost saying, take my milk and replace it with gall, which is, gall is like a horrible acidic, almost like a bile, like if you were sick and then there was nothing left for you to be sick and some horrible sort of acidic bile came out.

That's kind of what gall is.

So she's almost saying replace my milk, which is a very natural and maternal thing to have and replace it with this almost kind of poisonous liquid because she wants to almost strip herself of her any kindness or feelings of remorse or feelings of maternal, any maternal or motherly feelings.

And instead she wants to be filled up with cruelty.

So that's just a little bit about what that passage is about.

That we can see that it is a soliloquy because she's not in a conversation with anyone, she's just speaking her thoughts aloud.

So it's a long speech to herself.

It gives the audience a chance to understand how she's feeling at this exact point in the play.

So what does a soliloquy tell us about a character? A, their favourite colour.

Their inner thoughts.

How they are honestly feeling, or their taste in music? Pause the video now.

Well, it doesn't tell us their favourite colour.

It does tell us their inner thoughts and how they are honestly feeling.

It doesn't tell us their taste in music.

So Shakespeare mainly uses blank verse in his plays.

Blank verse refers to unrhymed poetry written in iambic pentameter.

So let's think about this a bit more.

Iambic pentameter we know is a type of poetry and these are the rules it follows.

Each line has 10 or 11 syllables.

Now we know a syllable is like a sound.

So in the syllable, in the word Macbeth, there are two syllables.

Mac-beth, you could almost clap them.

In Lady Macbeth.

La-dy Mac-beth, there are four syllables.

So if you were going to write a poem using iambic pentameter, each line would have 10 or 11 syllables.

Five of the syllables are unstressed, so it's a softer sound and five of the syllables are stressed, so it's a hard sound.

A bit like this de dum de dum de dum de dum de dum.

You must think I'm going mad, but I'm trying to show an example there of the 10 syllables and that one is softer and one is harder.

So if I clapped it, it would be de dum de dum de dum de dum de dum.

And if I counted those syllables, it would be one two, three four, five six, seven eight, nine 10.

And you could see there that it was one, two, one was unstressed and soft, two was stressed and hard.

So if we now take a line that's written in iambic pentameter, this is a line that Shakespeare wrote.

We can see here that it's got the 10 syllables with every other syllable is stressed.

So if I read it in a funny way, it will make it clearer that my keen knife see not the wound it makes.

So we can see there that is the first word is unstressed.

My is the stressed word, keen unstressed knife is stressed, de dum, de dum, de dum, de dum, de dum.

That my keen knife see not the wound it makes.

So you can see there every other syllable is the stressed one, the dum part.

So these are the five stressed syllables.

They're the second, fourth, sixth, eighth and 10th.

So they're the even numbers.

Okay, so let's look at another example of iambic pentameter.

To our own lips.

He's here in double trust.

First as I am his kinsman and his subject, strong both against the deed, then as his host.

So each line, let's check if it has 10 or 11 syllables.

So the first one has 10.

I'm not going to go through each one, but I'll show you the first one, to our or maybe it's better to count them by hands.

To our own lips he's here in double trust.

So there's 10 syllables, the second line has 11.

If you want to pause the video, you can so that you can count those out.

And the third one has 10 syllables.

So there are 10 or 11 syllables in each line.

So that's the first rule of iambic pentameter.

Five stressed and five unstressed syllables.

So if we look at that de dum de dum pattern, so we can see there the second, fourth, sixth, eighth and 10th syllable are stressed.

And we know in the one where there's 11 it just means that it just slightly changes on that little rule.

And this is written in blank verse because it does not rhyme.

So iambic pentameter rhymes.

Blank verse is iambic pentameter, but it doesn't rhyme.

That's really important.

So Shakespeare's plays don't rhyme.

Okay, what is true of blank verse? It uses iambic pentameter, it rhymes, there are 10 or 11 syllables in each line, there are five stressed sounds and five unstressed sounds.

Pause the video and decide what is true of blank verse.

Pause the video now.

Okay, so blank verse uses iambic pentameter.

It doesn't rhyme.

There are 10 or 11 syllables in each line and there are five stressed and five unstressed sounds.

Sometimes if there's 11, if there's 11 syllables, it just means that there are six unstressed.

So Shakespeare famously wrote types of poems called sonnets, which are also written in iambic pentameter.

This is a very famous Shakespeare sonnet.

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate.

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May and summer's lease hath all too short a date.

So this isn't a play, it's a type of poem called a sonnet, and it's written in iambic pentameter.

There are 10 or 11 syllables in each line.

Again, if you want to pause the video to read and check, then you can.

There are five stressed and five or six sometimes if it's 11 unstressed syllables following that de dum de dum pattern.

But this is not written in blank verse like Macbeth is written in because it rhymes.

We can see here, day rhymes with May and well it kind of rhymes temperate and date.

Maybe if you read it like temperate and date, then it would rhyme.

Maybe that's how they read it in Shakespearean times.

So true or false, a sonnet is written in blank verse.

True or false? Pause the video now.

That's right, it's false.

Could you justify your answer with one of these? Pause the video now.

Well done.

The correct justification is that a sonnet is not written in blank verse because it rhymes.

Blank verse is written in iambic pentameter, but it doesn't rhyme.

Okay, it's time for your first task, I would like you to read the extract from a soliloquy in Macbeth.

I'd like you to count how many syllables, remember it might help by clapping them, there are in each line and write it at the end of the line.

Then I'd like you to either highlight if you've got a highlighter close to hand or you could just circle the stressed or the hard syllables.

So remember if we have that de dum de dum de dum, it's the second, fourth, sixth, eighth, 10th, the stressed syllables in each line.

So here is the extract.

This is from a soliloquy in Shakespeare's play Macbeth.

I'll read it to you.

To our own lips.

He's here in double trust.

First as I am his kinsman and his subject strong both against the deed then as his host, who should against his murderer, shut the door, not bear the knife myself.

Besides this Duncan.

And then it continues, I stopped it there.

So first you are going to be count reading and counting the syllables.

If it helps to clap, then I would clap.

Then you are going to, when you write that at the end, it will hopefully be 10 or 11 if Shakespeare was following his rules correctly.

And then you are going to highlight or circle those five syllables, which are the stressed or the hard sounds.

It should be the second, fourth, sixth, eighth and 10th syllable.

Good luck, pause the video now.

Okay, well done.

So hopefully you've got 10 syllables in the first line, then 11, then 10, then 11, and then 11.

So Shakespeare was following his rules.

And here are all of the stressed or hard syllables.

We can see it's always the second, fourth, sixth, eighth and 10th syllable in each line.

Okay, so now we're going to practise writing and performing a soliloquy.

I hope you like acting.

So playwrights include soliloquies at key moments of a play.

These could include all of these when a character has just found out some significant, which means important, news, when a character has an inner conflict and is uncertain how to proceed, when a character has a moral dilemma.

So when they're trying to decide something, perhaps they can't decide should I do the the good thing or the bad thing? When a character is feeling strong emotions.

Can you think of any key moments in Shakespeare's play Macbeth when a character might deliver a soliloquy? So maybe they've just found out some important or significant news.

Maybe they have an inner conflict, maybe they're feeling strong emotions.

Pause the video and see if you can think of an key moment when a character might deliver a soliloquy.

Pause the video now.

Okay, well done.

One that I was thinking of is when Macbeth hears the witches' prophecies, because he's just found out some very important or significant news and he probably has got some quite strong feelings about hearing that he might become king.

So that might be a point that he would deliver a soliloquy.

True or false? A character might deliver a soliloquy if they've just found out something important.

Pause the video.

Is it true or false? Well done, it's true.

Pause the video again while you justify your answer with A or B.

Well done, the correct answer is soliloquies often happen at key moments in a play when a character has strong feelings that the playwright wants to share with the audience.

Okay, it's a chance for me to do an activity and then you are going to do the same thing.

So first it's my turn.

So you can be watching me being the teacher, seeing if I'm doing this correctly.

So I will imagine I am Macbeth in the play when he has just heard the witches' prophecy that he will become the king.

I will think of a line that might be in a soliloquy at this part of the play.

Then I'll try to say it in blank verse.

So 10 or 11 syllables, not rhyming and that remember I'm gonna have the five stressed and five unstressed syllables.

Okay, so here I go.

So let me just get into character.

So I'm Macbeth, the witches have just said to me, oh Macbeth, you are going to be the king.

How would I be feeling? What might I say if I was going to deliver a soliloquy then? Maybe I might say, is it possible that I might become the king? Now let me just check how many syllables are in that.

It's probably easier if I use my fingers, is it possible that I might become the king? Okay, so that's 12 syllables.

Sorry, I don't have 12 fingers, 12 syllables.

Now I know I need to have it have 10 or 11.

So I'm gonna think how I could rephrase that sentence to make it 10 or 11.

Is it possible that I might become the king? Perhaps instead I could say, can it be true that I will be the king? Now I've got, let me just check, 10 syllables.

Can it be true that I will be the king? And I can see there that I've got again, those stressed and unstressed syllables.

Can it be true that I will be the king? Okay, what do you think? Did I do a good job? Oh, some mixed reviews, right, it's your turn now.

So you are going to imagine you're Macbeth in the play.

He's just heard that he is going to become king from these witches.

Think of a line that might be in a soliloquy at this part of the play and then rewrite it so it's in blank verse.

So there's 10 or 11 syllables.

Pause the video and good luck.

Okay, well done.

That was really, that was quite hard and you did really well.

So good job.

Here's an example of what you might have said.

Are these devils telling the truth? Now, that's only eight syllables, it's not enough.

So we could rephrase that.

Can these wicked devils be telling the truth.

Now that's 11.

Let me just check.

Can these wicked devils be telling the truth? Yeah, it's 11.

So now it is in blank verse and you could clap the syllables and you could also check that you've got that de dum de dum pattern.

Okay, so after the witches have told Macbeth that he will become the Thane of Cawdor, and then the king, he writes a letter to his wife, Lady Macbeth, to tell her the news.

How do you think Lady Macbeth would react to this news? Use what we already know about Lady Macbeth to help you answer.

Pause the video now.

Okay, well, we know that Lady Macbeth is cruel and ruthless.

We know she's ambitious and wants to become queen.

We know she's impulsive.

She doesn't worry about the consequences of her actions.

She's manipulative and controlling of Macbeth.

So if I think about all of those character traits of Lady Macbeth and she's just had a letter from Macbeth saying, I have been told by the witches I'm going to become king.

I think she's going to start scheming straight away, thinking, how can I make this happen? We know that she's impulsive, she's cruel, and she's ruthless.

So she's probably going to start thinking about how to get rid of the current King Duncan straight away.

So why does Macbeth write a letter to Lady Macbeth to tell her the witches have predicted he'll become king, to tell her he wants to kill Duncan, or to tell her that he will not kill Duncan? Pause the video now.

Well done, the correct answer is to tell her that the witches have predicted he will be king.

So after reading the letter, Lady Macbeth delivers a soliloquy.

She starts scheming about how she must persuade Macbeth to forget being kind and do what needs to be done to become the king.

This allows the audience to understand her feelings and see what kind of person she is.

So for your task now, which is the last thing you're going to do this lesson, you are going to work as a pair and you are going to write this soliloquy that Lady Macbeth might say after reading Macbeth's letter.

So imagine she's at her castle, she's just received and perhaps someone's come probably delivered the letter on horseback and she's opened it up in a room by herself.

And she's found out that the witches have prophesied that her husband is going to become the king.

And what is she going to say at this part of the story? At this part in the play.

So it's obviously quite difficult writing in blank verse because you have to make every line 10 or 11 syllables.

So you don't need to write the whole thing in blank verse.

But I would like you to try to write the first two lines.

Remember, it doesn't need to rhyme.

There's a blank verse checklist to help you then once you've written it, so you're gonna write your soliloquy and then the first two lines, you're going to rewrite them to make sure they're in blank verse.

Then you are going to practise performing it, thinking about your acting skills and how to make your performance engaging and dramatic.

And then you need to be prepared to perform to the class because some of you might want to perform to the class and you might get picked to deliver your soliloquy.

So here's the blank verse checklist.

It doesn't rhyme, but it does use iambic pentameter, which means each line has to have 10 or 11 syllables and then you're going to have the five stressed and five unstressed, the de dum de dum de dum de dum de dum pattern.

Okay, so good luck writing your soliloquies.

I think these are going to be amazing and I think your acting is going to be amazing too.

So pause the video now while you complete this task.

Okay, well done.

I'm sure you have written some amazing soliloquies and done some incredible acting.

Here's an example of what you might have written.

What is this my one love hath been promised? Thane of Cawdor he may be, but king as well? But he's too good and kind, I must make him see that true power can be his, if one simple act be carried out, I will make him see.

I will pour my spirits in his ear.

So we can see there in that soliloquy that the first two lines follow blank verse.

They don't rhyme, but they have 10 or 11 syllables.

We can see here, look, we've got the de dum de dum de dum de dum de dum pattern where the second, fourth, sixth, eighth and 10th syllables are the stressed or the hard sounds.

There are 10 syllables in that first one and 11 in the second line.

And then the rest of it doesn't follow blank verse, but it's just good to just practise it just for two lines so we understand how playwrights or people who write poetry use blank verse.

Okay, so let's summarise what we've learned today.

Soliloquies are used in plays to show the audience how a character is feeling.

In a soliloquy a character is speaking and thinking aloud to themselves.

Remember that where it comes from, that Latin speaking alone.

Shakespeare mainly uses blank verse in his soliloquies.

Blank verse is unrhymed poetry written in iambic pentameter.

Iambic pentameter has 10 or 11 syllables in each line.

Five stressed, hard or five unstressed or soft sounds.

So I think you should be giving yourself a serious pat on the back after this lesson.

When you first heard those keywords at the beginning of the lesson like iambic pentameter and blank verse, I bet you thought, oh, I'm not sure about this.

But now not only do you understand what they are, but you've actually written your own poetry in iambic pentameter or in blank verse.

So if you wanted to, you could go off and perhaps have a go at writing your own poem or your own sonnet in iambic pentameter because it's a skill that you can now add to your list of things you can do.

So well done for such incredible concentration and hard work in this lesson, and hopefully I'll see you for some more learning later on in this unit.

Bye.