The Merry Wives of Windsor

Compare the Ford and Page marriages. How do trust and jealousy produce different models of household governance? Use specific examples to justify your response.

Compare Slender, Doctor Caius, and Fenton as suitors. What forms of status do they represent, and which does the play endorse? Use textual support to explain your answer.

What does forgiveness look like in the final scene, and how does it transform revenge into communal memory rather than an ongoing feud? Use specific examples to justify your response.

Research Elizabethan Windsor. How does the play reflect this social and historical context? Does it depart from reality in any way?

How does the play balance hospitality and hostility? Consider dinners, hunts, and invitations alongside raids and exposures. Use specific examples to justify your response.

What role do props play as symbolic illustrations of moral judgment? Use textual support to explain your answer.

Analyze the Host of the Garter’s role in The Merry Wives of Windsor. Is he merely comic relief, or does he actively shape outcomes in Windsor? Examine how the character’s moments illuminate larger themes such as wit over force, marketplace ethics, and the town’s preference for spectacle and coordination over legal authority.

Analyze Falstaff’s rhetoric. How do mythic allusions and comic bravado both empower and expose him? Use textual support to explain your answer.