Tom Stoppard's play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, draws on two previous theatrical works: Shakespeare's Hamlet and Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead follows the "off-stage" exploits of two minor characters from Hamlet, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. While the two main characters in Stoppard's play occasionally make brief appearances in "Hamlet," as scripted in Shakespeare's original tragedy, the majority of the play takes place in other parts of the castle where Hamlet is set. While "off stage" in this way, the characters resemble the main characters in the absurdist Waiting for Godot. As in Beckett's play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern pass the time by impersonating other characters, engaging in word play, and remaining silent for long periods of time. These same two characters were also featured in a parody of Hamlet, the short comic play by W. S. Gilbert entitled Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Gilbert's play makes Rosencrantz and Guildenstern into central characters and alters the storyline of Hamlet. What is the author's purpose in this passage?

Follow the directions (and example) given to create your own sonnet. william shakespeare's sonnet 130 my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun, coral is far more red, than her lips red, if snow be white, why then her breasts are dun: if hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head: i have seen roses damasked, red and white, but no such roses see i in her cheeks, and in some perfumes is there more delight, than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. i love to hear her speak, yet well i know, that music hath a far more pleasing sound: i grant i never saw a goddess go, my mistress when she walks treads on the ground. and yet by heaven i think my love as rare, as any she belied with false compare. instructions: write fourteen lines of iambic pentameter. use a sonnet rhyme scheme. use the first eight lines to set up your idea (the octave). use the last six lines to conclude your idea (sestet). (variety may be added by including a substitute foot from time to time such as the two anapests in line 3 above.) work in small groups giving each other feedback. reading the sonnet aloud allows you to hear the words and rhythms of the lines. generate questions that will clarify the use of words and forms. for example: was the idea of the sonnet presented in the first eight lines? how was sound used to enhance the meaning of the sonnet?