MAAN Essay At the beginning of Shakespeare’s play Much Ado About Nothing, Beatrice and Benedick were known to be constantly bickering and using their wit to one-up the other in their arguments. As the story developed, Beatrice’s and Benedick’s friends separately convinced the two that they were in love with the other. This character development represents and embodies the idea of a metamorphosis due to the progression of their relationship. Beatrice’s and Benedick’s metamorphosis affects Beatrice’s ability to open up to someone and Benedick’s recent somewhat complacent tone while talking to others rather than his usual, sarcastic self. After Beatrice was aware of how much Benedick supposedly liked her, instead of bottling her feelings about …show more content…
Hero’s near death, he became someone she confides in. Now, Beatrice can share her feelings with Benedick, elucidating the importance of having someone there for her, “Yea, and I will weep a while longer”, with Benedick responding “I will not desire that” (4.1.249-252). The change in Beatrice and Benedick’s relationship was a result of their friends attempting successfully to match-make. The two began as bickering, sworn enemies who told themselves they did not want love. Benedick’s friends deceived him into falling in love with Beatrice, and afterward, Hero and Ursula made Beatrice fall in love with him, possibly due to how they didn’t want to hear any more complaining. Although he friends meant for Beatrice’s and Benedick’s relationship to happen all in good fun, the two accelerated into a nearly full blown relationship, with Benedick saying “I do love nothing in the world so well as you, is not that strange?” (4.1.259-260). After Benedick expressed this to Beatrice, she began to open up to him about how she feels rather than bottling her feelings and true opinion about love. Ever since Benedick fell in love with Beatrice, his tone and attitude toward most people completely changed; he wasn’t cracking as many jokes and being a bit more submissive to others’ jokes toward him and Beatrice.
The pair’s metamorphosis as a couple helped strengthen their relationships with friends and halted their egotistical attitudes from annoying their friends with their derogatory jokes and metaphors. Not only are many of the characters more at peace due to the status of Beatrice’s and Benedick’s relationship, but the storyline has become more intriguing; even the worst of enemies can eventually love each other. Once Benedick thought Beatrice was in love with him, he openly expressed his love to her despite Beatrice’s apparent resistance, “Against my will I am sent to bid you come in to dinner”, with Benedick responding “Fair Beatrice, I thank you for your pains” (2.3.201-202). Benedick’s change of heart is elucidated by the way he treats Beatrice. After she realized he loved her, Beatrice accepted his love and began respecting him a lot more than she did when they were nearly enemies. Although Beatrice’s and Benedick’s relationship is not pristine, it’s apparent that the two will be together whether they like it or not due to their persistent attitudes. Benedick’s tone toward Beatrice is only getting nicer; he is very calming toward her even when she’s distant and moody “What offense, sweet Beatrice” (4.1.272). The pair’s new, not bickering words toward one another put almost every character at ease and enticed others to poke fun at
them. Beatrice and Benedick are becoming closer, prompting people to wonder if they will get married or possibly have more arguments with each other through a conflict of interest. Their metamorphoses have enhanced the fascinating storyline and have changed character’s opinions of each other and the world. The story has become more interesting because the two people who were thought as prickly and unable to be in a relationship have found love between them. Beatrice and Benedick became more intimate with each other in Act 4; finally, Beatrice could share her feelings with someone other than her cousin which strengthened their trust in one another.
The characters, Beatrice and Benedick have a very complicated relationship. They are always exchanging words and calling each other names. They call each other names from the very beginning of the play to the very end. In act 1, Benedick says “ If Signior Leonato be her father, she would not have his head on her shoulders for all of Messina, as like him as she is ” (1.1.111-113). Beatrice follows by saying, “ I wonder that you will be talking, Signior Benedick, nobody marks you ” (1.1.114-115). These quotes show that they have always had a complicated relationship because they insult each other without them expecting it.
At the beginning, Benedick’s attitude is negative towards women in general. He swears he will never marry, as he is very critical of women and does not trust any of them not to cheat on him. He seems to oppose with Beatrice in a competition to outwit, outsmart, and out-insult each other. Obviously he has been in some sort of past relationship with Beatrice because when he meets her at the masked ball, she describes him as a selfish pig. We can infer that Benedick has some kind of deep feelings for her because after she insults him he is hurt and says, “Will your grace command me any service to the world’s end? I will go on the slightest errand now to the Antipodes that you can devise to send me on. I will fetch you a toothpick from the furthest inch of Asia . . . do you any embassage to the pigmies, rather than hold three words’ conference with this harpy” (II.i.229–235). This blatantly means that he does not wish to talk to her.
Beatrice and Benedick show their apparent distaste for each other right from the first scene. Beatrice mocks Benedick to the Governor of Messina, claiming that she always beats him in a battle of wits and the last time they crossed paths Benedict’s “five wits went halting off, and now is the whole man governed by one” (1,1,50). Clearly relishing resuming their ‘merry war’, Beatrice cuts Benedick down at the first opportunity, telling him “I wonder that you still will be talking, Signor Benedick, nobody marks you” (1,1,105). Incredulously, Benedick retorts, “what my dear lady distain! Are you yet living?” (1,1,95). So, the dynamic of the two is set and it goes on from there in the same vein. Yet, the reader, even at this early stage may ponder if the lady doth protest too much.
A healthy relationship requires many different characteristics. Benedick and Beatrice have a healthier relationship than Hero and Claudio because they share more of the attributes that create a well working partnership. The trust and communication skills Benedick and Beatrice share are greater than those of Hero and Claudio. While Hero is wearing “rose-colored glasses”, Beatrice is aware of the bad and good in her relationship. Ten years down the road, Benedick and Beatrice will most likely be happily together, while Hero and Claudio are solely wishing to see other
Set in the sixteenth century, Much Ado About Nothing is revolved around the thought of love and marriage. Primarily, this is prevalent in the two main characters, Beatrice and Benedick. They have once been courted which suggests more maturity than the majority of couples in Shakespeare’s various plays. In the duration of the play, the violent language between Benedick and Beatrice is most evident through their ridicule. Both characters always speak critically regardless of whether they are talking to each other or out loud about one another. This is highlighted when Beatrice exclaims, “What should I do with him—dress him in my apparel / and make him my waiting gentlewoman? He that hath a / beard is more than / a youth, and he that hath no beard is less than a/ man; and he that is more than a youth is not for me, and he that is less than a/ man, I am not for him...
Beatrice and Benedick seem to have had some relationship before the beginning of the book that ended badly. This suggests that the initial situation between Beatrice and Benedick was one of mutual attraction, not of the overt hate they seem to flaunt at the beginning of the play. Scorn of this magnitude is rare among people who dislike each other from the start, and seems very unlikely in a broken up couple. In addition, both Beatrice and Benedick turned out to be very willing to abandon their smear campaigns as soon as they are convinced the other is aching for them. It is ridiculous that one would abandon one's own principals to bail out a hated enemy in trouble. This makes clear that their attitude toward each other is an act. If this is so, what is the purpose of the act...
They speak about how Beatrice loves Benedick, and this results in Benedick saying “Love me? Why, it must be requited.” (2. 3. 226-227). Similarly to Benedick, Beatrice is lured into overhearing a conversation between Hero and Ursula about how Benedick desperately loves her and how Beatrice is too mean to him. She overhears Hero say “But nature never framed a woman’s heart of prouder stuff than that of Beatrice. Disdain and scorn ride sparkling in her eyes” (3. 1. 51-52). This provokes Beatrice to return Benedick’s love, she says “Stand I condemned for pride and scorn so much?...And Benedick, love on; I will requite thee” (3. 1. 114,117). Both Beatrice and Benedick go from “hating” each other to loving each other. Beatrice says she likes to remain independent and says she wants to distance herself from love. However, that is not actually the truth because she may try to portray that personality around others, but in this scene when it just her talking to herself she admits that she loves him. Benedick has been hurt by love before, possibly cheated on. This makes him reluctant to show any love to anyone, but he loves Beatrice. So when he hears she loves him, he admits to himself that he loves her. Eventually Benedick proclaims his love to Beatrice, however, it comes at a quite unusual time.
In Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare, Benedick displays his shift away from being too prideful for commitment to wanting to commit to loving Beatrice in act five scene two lines 26-41. Through his allusions to tragic love stories, use of homonyms, and song and poetry, Benedick shows a transition from bachelorhood to marriage because of his desire to impress Beatrice while also conveying his inward fears of commitment.
This is part of her “merry war” with Benedick. Beatrice appears to loathe Benedick and vice versa; they engage in many “skirmishes of wit.” However, although Beatrice appears hardened and sharp, she is vu...
In Much Ado About Nothing, written by William Shakespeare, people in the city of Messina make strong transformations. A soldier, named Benedick, makes the most radical change in comparison to everyone else. Throughout the play, Benedick transforms from a hater of women and marriage, to a loving husband.
Beatrice thanks god for how cold and witty her personality is. Beatrice knows that her and Signior Benedick have the exact same personality and points of view on love. Beatrice doesn 't find it exciting when a man confesses his love for a women, she would much rather hear her dog bark at a crow. Benedick also thinks the same way as Beatrice. Benedick says that he will always live a bachelor, he thinks marriage is a waste of time. Benedict explains his point of view on love when he tells Beatrice, “Then is courtesy a turncoat. But it is certain I am loved of all ladies only you excepted; and I would I could find in my heart that I had not a hard heart, for truly I love none” (1.1.118-125). In this quote Benedick has such a cheeky way of telling Beatrice that he knows that he is loved and praised by many women other than Beatrice. Benedick states that he does not have a hard heart by that he means he is capable of loving someone but he chooses not
Beatrice and Signior Benedick are suggested to have had an unpleasant past with each other, which is translated to the mocking relationship
She shows this by verbally fighting with Benedick; Beatrice chooses to display her dominance through arguments and witty comebacks, even though societal standards say to be compliant towards men, especially in conversation. Beatrice shows no mercy or attempt to follow society’s rules but keeps her “acerbic speech” that “appears at times more conventionally male than conventionally female,” she shows this in various conversations, mainly with Benedick (Hunt). In the beginning of the play when everyone is acquainted Beatrice defiles Benedick’s presence. Right after Benedick speaks to Leonato, Beatrice says, “I wonder that you will still be talking, Signior Benedick; Nobody marks you.” Saying this comment, Beatrice shows no fear of saying what is on her mind, though it may be disrespectful. Beatrice shows no care of what we should say or not say but banters with Benedick for her own entertainment and pleasure. However, as comments exchange between the two, Benedick fights but quickly loses his will to continue the witty
Shakespeare makes sure that Beatrice comes off as a woman who is not afraid to speak her mind to anyone. This is portrayed in the beginning of act one, when the mail messenger comes to announce that the soldiers are on their way to Messina. They start a conversation about Benedick and he tells Beatrice that Benedick is a "lord to a lord, a ...
Another factor that contributes to Beatrice and Benedick's relationship being stronger is the influences of others. They have ...