Please enable JavaScript.

Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.

Much Ado About Nothing - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Marriage is front and center in Much Ado About Nothing.
        act 1, scene 1 - Claudio sets eyes on Hero + intends to marry her. (He moves fast.)
        The plot thickens: there’s scheming to marry Beatrice and Benedick, to un-marry Hero and Claudio, + then to actually marry Hero and Claudio.
        Marriage, though it’s the primary source of the drama, is treated like a necessary thing, otherwise the characters wouldn’t go through all the trouble it takes to get hitched.
        Still, though marriage is foregone conclusion, it’s also treated lightly as a constant source of jokes.
        Benedick only teases about marriage so much because it’s such an ever-present part of life. A
        nother central component of marriage is the issue of deception; the butt of the marriage jokes is how everyone cheats on everyone.
    - - Act II, Scene i Beatrice
        'Adam's sons are my brethren, and truly I hold it a sin to match in my kinred.' (2.1.57-64)
        Beatrice asserts that all of Adam’s sons are her brothers, and she’d commit the sin of incest to marry them.
- - - - Proud
        After dancing with Beatrice at the masked ball he is offended by her comments about him.
        "But that my Lady Beatrice should know me, and not / know me!" (Act 1 Scene 2)
        Beatrice called him the 'prince's fool' and this hurts Benedick's pride. His offence at her mistaking him shows how full of self he is.
      - Witty
        Leonato explains to the messenger that Beatrice and Benedick are both witty.
        "they never meet but there's a skirmish of wit / between them," (Act 1 Scene 1)
        A 'skirmish' suggests a tussle or a fight, which shows us that Benedick and Beatrice are well matched in their cleverness.
      - Changeable
        After eavesdropping on his friends in the orchard, Benedick is quick to admit his feelings have changed.
        "When I said I would / die a bachelor, I did not think I should live till I / were married." (Act 2 Scene 3)
        Despite his earlier claims that he would never marry, he softens and changes when he suspects Beatrice loves him.
      - Against Marriage
        
        'if I do, hang me in a bottle like a cat, and shoot at me' (1.1152-215)
    - - act 3 scene 2: Benedick changes
  - - - 'he hath borne himself beyond the promise of his age, doing in the figure of a lamb the feats of a lion'
        good warrior, looks meek but in reality is strong