https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFY0WUOmEZk

I enjoyed this interpretation of the monologue as there is a lot of variation in the vocals. It keeps it very interesting and brings out some of the comedy parts. It hasn't been modernised as it is kept

• Shepherdess
  
• She treats Silvius like Garbage
• Thinks she can do better than Silvius
• 
  

An "iamb" is an unaccented syllable followed by an accented one. "Penta" means "five," and "meter" refers to a regular rhythmic pattern. So "iambic pentameter" is a kind of rhythmic pattern that consist of five iambs per line. It's the most common rhythm in English poetry and sounds like five heartbeats:

Recording ourselves speaking our monologues around college:

We got given the task of finding a place in college to speak our monologue in a very naturalistic way. We had to record each other and then watch it back to see what happened. To start with I thought shakespeare was very over the top because of the way it was written. A little bit like panto but after doing this exercise I realised how it can be modernised and made very naturalistic. I firstly tried speaking my monologue through a phone like I was talking to my friend.

Adding a movement to every word:

When speaking out the monologue we had to add random movements with every single word that was said. Whether it went with the words or not. Something had to happen on every sound. I found this quite hard. Even though I am a natural mover, I found this very different because I was talking at the same time and I wasn't moving because of a trigger or emotion, it was totally random. I didn't feel that this exercise worked for me because I couldn't connect to my monologue when there was unnecessary movements.

Sitting down, completely still whilst saying the monologue:

So this exercise was the opposite to the previous one as it is complete stillness. By doing this exercise I actually thought about what I was saying and the emotions that came with it because I wasn't doing anything else that distracted me from what is happening in the scene. I connected

In the first week after I had chosen my monologue I simply learnt my lines and made sure I understood everything that was happening in the scene. I had to look up certain words that I did not understand, so I had lots of notes on my script already. I started to imagine the scene and where it would be set and as I was still learning lines I would start to walk around the space to see where the words would naturally take me. I decided that Silvius would be down, diagonal, left of me and I would be walking in from the opposite way.

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In the second week I started to imagine how I would feel in each part of the monologue. I wrote down my emotions and some units of actions that fit with them. It took me a while to find the right emotion for each part because the monologue is so choppy and it changes so quickly. It is like a tennis match with her emotions and speech. This meant it took me a while to identify the emotions and then even longer to make it feel a little bit natural when saying it in the monologue.

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The third week I tried to think about my actions, where I would move and what I would do where. I tried out many different things and then showed a classmate to see what they would think. Their response was that at times it was too over the top. I tried to think about keeping it natural like how I would say this monologue on a normal day. This is when the exercise when we had to film ourselves speaking our monologues helped because it bought real truth to what were saying. With minimalistic movements as well. Obviously performing in front of a camera is different to how you would need to do it on stage because it would have to be bigger for stage purposes, but this helped me bring the truth into it. I could then work on a balance between both of them.

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Fourth week I learnt about the Iambic Pentameter. This was an interesting lesson as this made such a difference to the speech. It bought out words that were left behind before and made some lines a different meaning to what I knew. This week was purely working on the Iambic Pentameter and the pace of the monologue. I sat down and kept saying the monologue through with the iambic pentameter and would try to say it not like a robot. This developed my monologue by keeping the pace a little slower with the right pauses with each punctuation and bought out the correct words to make it comedic. Before I only knew the obvious words that stood out. After adding in the punctuation I think it bought the monologue alive.

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Fifth week and onwards I did lots of exercises on my monologue to see what would happen to them when I did them. I got different people to watch my monologue and give me feedback so I could develop it some more. Now I had the basics of my monologue done, with pace, punctuation and units of action it was time to play around with it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpEqv7DAPV4

Shepherds live the simple life.

In pastoral literature, shepherds are always running around singing, dancing, and debating.