Racine's Phedre - Act V

Please answer at least two questions or bring up your own ideas:

1. What atmosphere does the play create once the curtain falls? What role does the fifth act add to this atmosphere?

2. Aricia is absent since the middle of Act II yet reappears here at the beginning of Act V. What type of character is she in this act? What impression does the coupling of Aricia-Hippolyte give you? What function does she serve as a character?

3. Discuss Theseus's evolution through out play.

4. Why does Phedre commit suicide by poisoning herself? What might this have to do with the symbolism of the labyrinth and Minotaur as well as the themes of love, desire, and sexuality we have discussed?

Racine's Phedre - Acts III and IV

Choose at least two questions for your response:

1. Theseus's return is exactly in the middle of the play. Why do you think Racine places it here, effectively marking it as the event that divides the play in half?

2. What is Oenone's role - especially in Act III? Why does Oenone, and not Phedre, propose the idea of blaming Hippolytus for the problems of the household? Is Oenone the incarnation of evil? Is she Phedre's double? Is she amoral?

3. Why do you think Act III is the shortest in the play? What function does it serve? For what are the spectators ready after it ends?

4. How does Phedre in Act IV resemble the Phedre we have already seen? How does she evolve? And toward what?

5. How are the feelings the spectators have in Act IV for Theseus, Hippolytus, Phedre and/or Oenone? Are these feelings simple (meaning the same character evokes always the same reaction) or complex (the reaction varies according to scene)? Why?

6. Choose one or two quotes for your own discussion/interpretation.

Racine's Phedre - Act II

For Act II - Choose two quotations from Act II that you feel reveal insight into the play's plot, characters, themes, etc. (Those working in French please choose your quotes in French and write your post in the appropriate language).

Racine's Phedre - Act I

For Act One - think about the following (guideline questions which you may use, from which you may draw inspiration for responses, or ignore)

1. The way the play presents a character or multiple characters - a play is only based on speech, so how do the words of these characters reveal or betray their personality, emotions, etc. Use specific quotes from the text (with page numbers please).

2. What are some of the main conflicts you see within Act One? What do these conflicts say about this family, these characters? How is Racine "setting the scene" for what might come?

3. What lines strike you as particularly powerful in this act? Why? What language, verb tenses, vocabulary, imagery, symbolism, etc. does the play use to create such force?