In Shakespeare’s plays, which group of characters is most likely to speak in prose rather than blank verse?
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Correct answer: Lower-class characters and comic relief
Shakespeare often used the shift between verse and prose to signify social status. While noble characters typically speak in blank verse, commoners or 'clowns' often speak in prose to reflect their down-to-earth nature.
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More Blank Verse questions
- What is the term for a pause or break in the middle of a line of blank verse?
- When a character's speech continues from one line of verse to the next without a grammatical pause, it is called:
- Which metrical substitution involves reversing the stress of an iamb to a stressed-unstressed pattern, usually at the start of a line?
- What is an 'end-stopped' line in Shakespearean verse?
- Which of the following is a 'shared line' in Shakespearean drama?
- What is the purpose of 'scansion' in the study of Shakespearean verse?