Keri Sadler
eNotes Educator
Achievements
14
Educator Level
959
Answers Posted
554
Answers Bonused
About
Earned Badges
-
eNotes Educator
This badge is awarded to all eNotes Educators. Only official Educators can answer students' questions on our site. Educators are teachers, professional researchers, and scholars who apply to our... -
10K Points Earner
Educators earn points for every question they answer. This Educator has earned over 10,000 points. -
25K Points Earner
Educators earn points for every question they answer. This Educator has earned over 25,000 points. -
Expert
An expert badge distinguishes Educators who demonstrate strong knowledge in a particular topic, such as Hamlet or Math. It is awarded when an Educator has posted more than 25 answers on a given topic. -
Scholar
The scholar badge recognizes Educators who are especially knowledgeable about a particular author. This badge is awarded once an Educator has posted more than 50 answers on works by a specific author. -
Poetry Whiz
Bonuses are awarded when an Educator has gone above and beyond and impressed the editorial team by offering an especially lengthy, nuanced, or insightful answer. This badge is given to an Educator... -
Literature Whiz
Bonuses are awarded when an Educator has gone above and beyond and impressed the editorial team by offering an especially lengthy, nuanced, or insightful answer. This badge is given to an Educator...
Recent Activity
-
Answered a Question in Cymbeline
In a word, no! John Barton (in his book "Playing Shakespeare") talks about original pronunciation, and I've put a link below to an audio excerpt which gives you an idea of how scholars think that... -
Answered a Question in Oedipus Rex
Usually in answering questions about classical authors' intentions, the answer is "who knows?". Sophocles didn't leave us any information about precisely why he wanted to write the play - there... -
Answered a Question in Oedipus Rex
The unities were invented by Aristotle in his famous incomplete work the "Poetics", and they work as follows: The unity of action: the play should have one main story which it follows from... -
Answered a Question in Paradise Lost
Milton calls to his muse to "sing" of... Of Man's first disobedience, and the fruit Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste Brought death into the World, and all our woe, With loss of... -
Answered a Question in A Midsummer Night's Dream
I'm not sure plays - particularly plays as complicated as Shakespeare's - ever have a "main moral". The play is about all sorts of things: dreams, sex, acting, fairies and spirits, magic, love,... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
Hamlet announcing that he might pretend to be mad: As I perchance hereafter shall think meet To put an antic disposition on— Later Polonius thinks: ... I have found The very cause of... -
Answered a Question in Romeo and Juliet
The nurse's job as a "wet nurse" was to breastfeed the baby, so as noble ladies like Lady Capulet didn't have to do it themselves. Of course, the nurse's child, Susan, was the same age as Juliet,... -
Answered a Question in My Last Duchess
The way Browning used the dramatic monologue was very often hugely ironic, simply in the way it was deployed. The form gives you a - usually, at least - uninterrupted monologue in a character's... -
Answered a Question in The Canterbury Tales
Chaucer doesn't actually specify what sort of clothes the Franklin is wearing. The General Prologue entry for him details mainly his natural diet, which changes with the seasons, and specifies... -
Answered a Question in Shakespeare's Sonnets
The only printing of the Sonnets that date to Shakespeare's lifetime is dedicated to "Mr W.H.", who is described as the "only begetter of these ensuing sonnets" - in short, the person who has... -
Answered a Question in The Merchant's Tale
The Merchant's Tale has many themes in common with the other Canterbury Tales. Here are some of the most important: May, the scheming and sexual wife of January poses many questions about the role... -
Answered a Question in Romeo and Juliet
Rosaline isn't a singer! She's the girl Romeo is in love with as "Romeo and Juliet" opens, who never speaks any lines, and who he forgets more or less as soon as he sees Juliet. It's a pretty... -
Answered a Question in William Shakespeare
The answers above fall into a bit of a trap - the matter is far more complicated than they suggest: as there are at least two plays which we think Shakespeare wrote which have not survived. Meres... -
Answered a Question in A Doll's House
Any question asking about tragedy is a trick question, whether it thinks it is or not. Definitions of tragedy are manifold - and usually depend on Aristotle's Poetics, a work which is incomplete... -
Answered a Question in Christopher Marlowe
Both terms refer to the Elizabethan idea of what happens after you die. If you are admitted to heaven, your spirit rises upward to God - and you are "saved" (a word with the same root as... -
Answered a Question in Othello
Shakespeare tends to deal with contrasting pairs: so in the way that Romeo and Juliet is about both love and hate, Othello is about jealousy and its opposite, faith (trust!). Othello actually... -
Answered a Question in Macbeth
The murderers are simply saying that the world has been so cruel and horrible to them that they don't really care if they die. They don't mind putting themselves in danger, and therefore will be... -
Answered a Question in The Merchant of Venice
Good question - both are plausible readings! Shylock has taken the centre of most modern interpretations of the play (of the modern filmed version of the play which, with Al Pacino as Shylock,... -
Answered a Question in The Merchant of Venice
It depends what you think of Bassanio! Clearly the casket game is designed to avoid the gold-digger: the fact that Portia's picture is in the lead casket is designed to select a husband who doesn't... -
Answered a Question in William Shakespeare
Shakespeare's plays are classified into three main groups: histories, comedies, and tragedies - though it's important to remember that these classifications are largely imposed by modern critics... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
It's - pure and simple - a plot point. Hamlet has been sent by Claudius to England, and, with exceptional brevity, Shakespeare has Horatio read out a letter from Hamlet. Thematically, I don't... -
Answered a Question in Julius Caesar
Cassius hasn't accused him of anything just yet: all he's done is told Casca that he's been running around in the middle of the storm - Cassius has ....bared my bosom to the thunder-stone And when... -
Answered a Question in The Merchant of Venice
The song itself is a bit of a puzzle. Who sings it? Who can hear it? Is Bassanio commenting on it, or are we supposed to think of it as a sort of narratorial (i.e. Shakespeare's) comment on the... -
Answered a Question in Romeo and Juliet
I suppose one of the key things that is traditionally seen to mae Romeo immature is the way he suddenly changes his romantic desire from Rosaline (an off-stage character, never seen, whom he loves... -
Answered a Question in Romeo and Juliet
Here's what Romeo says: I do protest I never injur'd thee, but love thee better than thou canst devise. And so, dear Capulet, whose name I tender As dearly as my own, be satisfied. Mercutio is... -
Answered a Question in Lord of the Flies
He can't help himself, really. In the same way that he joins in with the hunts despite himself ("the desire to squeeze and hurt was over-mastering") so too he can't quite resist that inbuilt... -
Answered a Question in Julius Caesar
Brutus is a tactical disaster. Crucially, he keeps getting major tactical decisions in the play wrong: and whether because of his idealism (that is, the belief that he is doing the right thing for... -
Answered a Question in Macbeth
Well, as you'd expect, the two of them are very jumpy! Have a look at this extract, and the sharp, quick lines that they speak, thinking that someone has discovered them: MACBETH: I have done the... -
Answered a Question in Lord of the Flies
There was a sudden bright explosion and a corkscrew trail across the sky; then darkness again and stars. There was a speck above the island, a figure dropping swiftly beneath a parachute, a figure... -
Answered a Question in Julius Caesar
I don't actually think there's an argument for considering it insincere! Brutus clearly means what he is saying: the problem is that it is an argument which starts - not ends - with a conclusion.... -
Answered a Question in Julius Caesar
Put simply, this scene humanises Caesar, who has only appeared up to now (in the play) as a public figure, or in other people's descriptions. We've heard Cassuis pronounce him a "colossus",... -
Answered a Question in A Midsummer Night's Dream
Good question. Firstly, I'd argue that the whole concept of "true love" is rather undermined by the events of the play. Hermia and Lysander, of course, the "true lovers" (and remember, criticism... -
Answered a Question in Macbeth
All's well. I dreamt last night of the three weird sisters: To you they have show'd some truth. (Act 2, Scene 1) Macbeth and Banquo agree to discuss the issue of the witches and their prophecies... -
Answered a Question in Edward II
It depends entirely how you define tragedy. In the Elizabethan sense, you'll notice that criticism as a whole doesn't distinguish very clearly between "histories" and "tragedies". Plays, like... -
Answered a Question in Romeo and Juliet
The two "houses", as Shakespeare calls them, are the Capulet and Montague households. Romeo is the son of Lord Montague, and Juliet the daughter of Lord Capulet. Tybalt is a cousin to Juliet - Lady... -
Answered a Question in Macbeth
Well, Lady M thinks that the blood will wash straight off her hands, and that will be the end of it. But, a little later, Macbeth has a vision of himself standing in a river of blood I am in blood... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
Before I answer this question, it's worth pointing out that there could be several possible answers, "Hamlet" is a huge, complex play which accommodates a whole variety of interpretations. I... -
Answered a Question in The Merchant of Venice
I think you've hit the key point that the casket game is deeply flawed in many ways. Not only does it presume to choose for Portia exactly whom she should marry, there is no evidence to suggest (in... -
Answered a Question in The Merchant of Venice
Antonio assumes that the story is simply about interest; Shylock, on the other hand, knows that it refers to what he calls "thrift" - we might rather call it "cheating". The point is this: when... -
Answered a Question in The Merchant of Venice
Good close reading! Yes, it's no accident that the two first scenes of "The Merchant of Venice" start with characters professing their weariness, and one of the effects this creates is to set up a... -
Answered a Question in Hamlet
They are difficult quotes to interpret, don't worry. You might paraphrase Hamlet's lines as follows: If you do get married, I'll give you a plague for your dowry. A dowry is an amount of... -
Answered a Question in A Midsummer Night's Dream
Puck's final speech to the audience actually is an apology for any offense that the "shadows" (note that this - far darker word - is usual in the play instead of fairies: Oberon is "King of... -
Answered a Question in Lord of the Flies
Both Ralph and Jack see the opposition drawn out in the novel between hunting, the pig-killing and savagery on the one hand, and civilisation, rules, law and order and the signal fire on the... -
Answered a Question in A Midsummer Night's Dream
"The course of true love never did run smooth" is one of the play's most famous quotes, though, when you look at the action of the play itself, it's clear that "true love" is a rather problematic... -
Answered a Question in Lord of the Flies
Fear has taken over the island: right at the start of the chapter, remembering (for one of the final times in the novel) their old life at school, Samneric laugh, and then suddenly stop laughing:... -
Answered a Question in A Doll's House
The answer, purely and simply, is because she loved him. There was no forced marriage or unfair setup - from what Ibsen tells us, it's clear that Nora actually loved and cared for Torvald deeply.... -
Answered a Question in Julius Caesar
You've said it yourself, really. Cassius, particularly as he is trying to persuade Brutus to join him in leading the conspiracy, emphasises the "honourable" before the "dangerous", and tries to... -
Answered a Question in Lord of the Flies
It's not actually depicted in the book, but Robert reports that Wilfred is going to be beaten by Jack and the others. Robert changed the unspoken subject. 'He's going to beat Wilfred.' 'What for?'... -
Answered a Question in Othello
"Othello" is a tragedy, and along with "Hamlet", "Macbeth" and "King Lear", considered among the four "great" tragedies of Shakespeare. Unlike some of the tragedies though, there is little sense of... -
Answered a Question in Julius Caesar
Caesar starts the play with a superstitious instruction to Antony to touch his wife Calpurnia as part of the ritual they are in the middle of. Clearly Caesar is prone to superstitions and...
Showing 301-350 of 423