#3 Antithesis: Serving Up the Text
Antithesis means setting one word against another to create a contrast. “Setting the word against the word,” is how Shakespeare describes it. Much of the logic and meaning in Shakespearean verse results from the use of antithesis, and characters constantly use antithesis to make their points. By comparison to something already known or spoken, the subject being discussed itself becomes clearer.
1. To find antithesis look for parallel sentence structures and compare the contrasting words or images.
ROMEO: O, me! What fray was here?
Yet tell me not, for I have heard it all.
Here’s much to do with hate, but more with love.
Why then, O brawling love, O loving hate,
O anything of nothing first create!
O heavy lightness, serious vanity,
Misshapen chaos of well-seeming forms!
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health,
Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!
This love feel I that feel no love in this.
Dost thou not laugh?
What can you tell about Romeo’s state of mind?
2. Serve up the text. Serve up the first part of the comparison, then return back the contrast. John Barton says this should feel like a tennis match.
GERTRUDE: Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended.
HAMLET: Mother, you have my father much offended.
GERTRUDE: Come, come, you answer with an idle tongue.
HAMLET: Go, go you question with a wicked tongue.
3. Serve up the words that are being contrasted, return them to win your point. Here’s a scene, one of the most famous for its antithesis, from Richard III.
RICHARD: (serves) Lady, you know no rules of charity,
Which renders good for bad, blessings for curses.
ANNE: (returns) Villain, thou know’st no laws of God nor man.
(serves) No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity.
RICHARD: (returns) But I know none, and therefore am no beast.
ANNE: (serves) O wonderful, when devils tell the truth!
RICHARD: (returns) More wonderful, when angels are so angry.
(serves) Vouchsafe, divine perfection of a woman,
Of these supposed crimes, to give me leave,
By circumstance, but to ACQUIT myself.
ANNE: (returns) Vouchsafe, diffus’d infection of a man,
For these known evils, but to give me leave,
By circumstance, to CURSE thy cursed self.
4. Hit the contrasting words, not the connecting words: “or,” “but,” “so,” or “rather.”
5. Looking for and playing antithesis will focus your action on your partner and energize your connection to him or her. Serve to win, return to win!