Term test Review

Term 2 Test 1 Review

Wait, so that poem was about a bird?

“Shakespeare of London”

• Summary: acting in Shakespeare’s time required serious skill and bravery. Audiences were harsh critics, and would not tolerate anything that looked fake, so actors had to learn to do everything for real—dance, sing, fight, fall, etc. Most importantly, actors had to be powerful speakers, because without elaborate sets, lights, and effects, the only way an audience was going to understand the play was through the actor’s speeches.

1—What was the author’s purpose for this passage?

• Acting was not an easy profession on the Elizabethan stage or one to be taken up lightly. An actor went through a strenuous period of training before he could be entrusted with an important part by one of the great city companies. He worked on a raised stage in the glare of the afternoon sun, with none of the softening illusions that can be achieved in modern theater, and in plays that made strenuous demands upon his skill as a fencer, a dancer, and an acrobat.
• Correct: B—this paragraph tells us how hard it was to be an actor—which is the central idea—as well as the tasks actors had to undertake (fencing, dancing, acrobatics)—which are the supporting details
• Incorrect: A, C, D—A and D are both about Shakespeare, and this article wasn’t about him. C is about Londoners, and they aren’t mentioned at all in the paragraph.

2- By including the phrase, “had an initial handicap that could only be overcome by intelligence and rigorous discipline,” what does the author want to express to the reader?

• Handicap doesn’t always mean physical disability! Read the dang sentence! It says Shakespeare was old and that made it harder for him to become an actor since most actors trained from childhood! RAA! READ, PEOPLE!
• Besides, if Shakespeare had a busted leg or something, don’t you think we would have mentioned it in class?
• Correct: B
• Incorrect: A, C, D—both A and C say he was physically impared, D says he had a “fear” of the stage. Since when? Where does it say that?