Objectives: Students Will Understand The Following

Objectives
Students will understand the following:
Many writers have told the tale of King Arthur and the people around him, including Guinevere, Lancelot,
1. Merlin, and Mordred. The legends are part of our heritage.
Materials
For this lesson, you will need:
Texts of the dramatic monologues cited in the Procedures: Robert Browning's "My Last Duchess"; T.S.
Eliot's "Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock";
poems from Edgar Lee Masters's Spoon River Anthology, such as "Lucinda Matlock" and "Richard Bone";
• Alfred, Lord Tennyson's "Ulysses"
• Access to reference materials that explain why the Kennedy era was referred to as Camelot
Procedures
After basic instruction on the tales surrounding the legendary medieval British monarch named King Arthur,
invite your students to try their own hands at writing literature. Tell students that you will lead them through
the steps necessary for each of them to create a dramatic monologue supposedly composed at some point by
one of the following characters: Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot, Merlin, or Mordred. (You can hold off on
1. using and defining the term dramatic monologue until later in this activity.)
Ask students to brainstorm individually about each of the following characters: Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot,
Merlin, and Mordred. To stimulate the brainstorming, suggest the students jot down thoughts that each
character might have about his or her triumphs, failures, joys, and sorrows. Consider also asking students to
imagine how each character might respond to the question, "What secret have you been keeping from
2. readers?"
Based on the quantity and quality of their brainstorming notes for the characters, each student should select
the one character he or she finds most intriguing. Direct students to freewrite about their character for at least
3. 15 minutes.
Tell students to put their brainstorming and freewriting notes aside for a while so that you can familiarize
them with the literary genre known as dramatic monologue. You might begin by defining the term: a
dramatic monologue is a poem in which the only voice is that of a character who speaks to one or more
listeners. Usually, the reader learns about the character's personality through the words of the poem.
Sometimes the reader learns more than the character may think he or she is revealing. The reader may also
infer the setting, the situation, and facts about the listeners—such as how the listeners may be reacting as
they hear the speaker and how that reaction then affects the speaker.
Students are probably familiar with the term monologue from plays. Some scholars have said that a dramatic
4. monologue is, in effect, a monologue without the rest of the play.
Ask students to name previously read poems that, they now realize, are dramatic monologues or that they
recall as having been so described. Alternatively, if students are not familiar with any of the following
exemplars of British and American dramatic monologues, interject one or more of them into this lesson now.
They are part of many high school curricula:
 Robert Browning's "My Last Duchess"
 T.S. Eliot's "Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" (sometimes described as a dramatic
monologue, sometimes as an interior monologue)
 Poems from Edgar Lee Masters's Spoon River Anthology, such as "Lucinda Matlock" and
5. "Richard Bone"
 Alfred, Lord Tennyson's "Ulysses"
After discussing what the listener or reader learns about the speaker from the dramatic monologues you
study or review, go on to analyze the verse lines so that students notice the following characteristics:
 "My Last Duchess": rhyming couplets in iambic pentameter
 "Ulysses": blank verse (iambic pentameter)
 "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock": varied rhythms and rhyme schemes
6.  Spoon River poems: free verse
Now ask your students to once again take up their brainstorming and freewriting notes about Arthur,
Guinevere, Lancelot, Merlin, or Mordred and use the notes as the basis of an original dramatic monologue
by one of these characters. Writers can use for their creation any of the verse styles discussed in the
preceding step.
Remind students that their dramatic monologues can relate the character's triumphs, failures, joys, and
sorrows—and can also include the character's response to the question, "What secret have you been keeping
7. from readers?"
End this activity by asking all the students who selected the same Arthurian character to read their poems
aloud to the class one after the other. Elicit responses from the rest of the students to the poems about one
8. character before going on to the next batch of poems about another character.
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Adaptations
Of the dramatic monologues cited in the Procedures, probably only the poems by Edgar Lee Masters
will be sufficiently accessible to middle school students, so use only them as exemplars for this age
group.
1. How does the story of the sword in the anvil contribute to the mystique and power of King Arthur?
2. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of a social system built on loyalty, honor, and trust.
What qualities did King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table possess that would still make them
3. heroes today?
Explain what you think is the meaning of the statement that the Arthurian legend is "psychological
4. archeology".
5. Discuss the ways in which Le Morte d'Arthur is a very moral tale.
6. What dimension does the Holy Grail story line add to the legend of King Arthur?
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Evaluation
Given the difficulties of evaluating students' creative writing, use a pass/fail grading system for this
assignment, passing those students who show effort during brainstorming and freewriting, who apply
themselves to writing a poem, and who cooperate in performing their poem for classmates.
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Extensions
The Age of Camelot
Remind students of the name of King Arthur's palace and court—Camelot. Tell students that after the
death of John F. Kennedy in 1963, the Kennedys' time in the White House was referred to as Camelot.
Ask students to figure out why observers gave the Kennedy era that name. Students may conduct
research as necessary.
A Medieval Day in the Life of . . .

Ask the class to do research on what daily life in a medieval castle was like. Students can tell their
stories as "A Day in the Life of . . ."; some should write about a knight, some about a lady of the court,
and some, a knave. Remind students that their reports should describe their subject's dress, food,
responsibilities, luxuries, or hardships; the reports should also explain how their subject celebrated a
festival or other occasion.
Learning Objectives
After this lesson, students will be able to:
 compare and contrast characteristics American and European short story authors
 discuss themes in short story selected text
 identify short story characteristics in selected text

Objectives: Students Will Understand The Following

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Students will understand the following:

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