Henry V Lesson Plan

How is Act II structured? How does this structure shape the action of the Act?

Students should recognize that, after the opening chorus, the four scenes in Act II alternate between comic, low-brow scenes involving commoners and serious courtly scenes involving high-stakes political interactions between monarchs and aristocrats. This alternation coincides with a switching in linguistic register: the comic scenes are mostly in prose while the serious scenes are in verse. Students can reflect on what this structure does dramaturgically. The comic scenes give us our first glimpse at commoners and begin to outline the class divides which will become very relevant in Acts III and...