A2 AQA Macbeth - Focus on Power and Ambition

ADVICE – The word proactive, and independent are the key notes with this coursework. You should never say I don’t know, you’re expressing a view and establishing a case. “How far and to what extent can lady Macbeth be considered to be a femme fatal?

In terms of note taking, with Gothic you need to learn your notes. Take a highlighter, or separate AO2 AND AO3. AO2 gets left out. If AO2 doesn’t score you won’t hit the mark.

If it moves write it down. Everything is crucial in this, you need to be able to answer anything. If you don’t understand then ASK FOR HELP.

NO HOME ESSAYS, ONLY TESTS IN CLASS.

ALL PLANNING AT HOME. First 2 or 3 will be planned and text based. Test 3 and 4 remove the text and plan.

What we know about Gothic so far –

1.      Purpose of gothic story, to send a message usually on morals etc. Such as Macbeth’s message on quest for power? A morality play. Is too differentiate between good and evil.

2.      The age of reason; used as a contradiction. To explore the human fascination with the supernatural and the unknown. To look deep within the human soul.

3.      Gothic writers write in the gothic tradition because it serves a purpose in addition to exploring the fascination with the unknown. Macbeth is written to coincide with the change of the century. Frankenstein coincides with a turn of a century as well. Dracula was written at the turn of the 20^th century. A new century brings in political instability and therefore a questioning of morals.

4.      The gothic horror embodies an age of uncertainty and apprehension. SOCIAL, MORAL AND POLITICAL CHANGE.

5.      Mary Shelley was a romantic such as Coleridge and Wordsworth etc. Took drugs experimented with what they had.   All anti-establishment figures. Take aspects from the past and bring them into the future.

6.      The romantic movement – sensibility – individual feeling, compassion, humanity and their right to explore it. It was a modern concept, and it had not been done before. They were liberal and radical, dangerous to the establishment. They questioned things based on what had happened in Europe. The French Rev etc. They questioned the age of reason. The age of reason was dominated by science. Even God was questioned. Science seemed to be reaching out to play god, discovery of electricity etc. Adam and Eve allegory, romantics latched onto.

7.      Victorian society was established, stable and successful. Because of the long reign and the British empire, they were the pre-eminent power in world politics. And as that wasn’t questioned or challenged things wouldn’t have changed. But then Victoria died, as Elizabeth did. Absolute parallel with Macbeth and Frankenstein. Nationalism on the rise; German ambition. Russian expansion etc. Republic of Ireland at end of WW1. Beginning of 20^th century all hell was breaking lose in terms of political instability. At home – women questioning…