Act 5 — Much Ado About Nothing — Edexcel GCSE English Literature 1ET0
Edexcel GCSE English Literature · 1ET0
Act 5
The plot, part by part
What you need to know
The challenges from Leonato, Antonio and Benedick, Borachio's confession, Claudio's penance at Hero's tomb, the second wedding,
the lovers' sonnets and the closing dance.
Key quotations: 'I pray thee, cease thy counsel', 'Thou hast so wrong'd mine innocent child and me', 'You are a villain; I jest not', 'What your wisdoms could not discover, these shallow fools have brought to light', 'Runs not this speech like iron through your blood?', 'Possess the people in Messina here / How innocent she died', 'Thou and I are too wise to woo peaceably', 'Done to death by slanderous tongues / Was the Hero that here lies', 'One Hero died defiled, but I do live, / And surely as I live, I am a maid', 'A miracle! here's our own hands against our hearts', 'Peace! I will stop your mouth', 'man is a giddy thing, and this is my conclusion', 'Prince, thou art sad; get thee a wife, get thee a wife'.
Structure: the comic resolution, with Claudio's penance at the tomb, the veiled bride, the lovers' sonnets as proof, and Don John's punishment left until after the dance.
Context: a comedy's ending in marriage, and how far the ending repairs the wrong done to Hero.
Edexcel's Shakespeare question has two parts: part (a) on the printed extract marks only language, form and structure (AO2), so context earns nothing there; part (b) on the play elsewhere, from memory, marks the argument and its references (AO1, 15 marks) and context (AO3, 5 marks), not language analysis. Say which part each worked paragraph and exam tip is for.
