Study Guide for The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas. Study Guide by Sabrina Justison. Sample file

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1 Study Guide for The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas Study Guide by Sabrina Justison Copyright 2013 Sabrina Justison. Published by 7 Sisters IHH, LLC. All rights reserved Please be respectful of copyrighted material. Purchase entitles you to only one copy of the book. For additional copies, please go to for additional information, please see terms of use and privacy policy

2 Study Guide for The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas Study Guide by Sabrina Justison The Three Musketeers Study Guide 1 You may read any translation of The Three Musketeers while using this study guide. I used the Dover Thrift Edition, Suzanne E. Johnson, Editor, when I created it. This Study Guide with vocabulary is appropriate for high school students of varying levels. I. Basic: Look up the definition (appropriate in the context of the book) for each vocabulary word. Use the questions as a springboard for discussion with your student (or for more fun, get together with a group of students who have just read the book for a discussion/costume party.) II. College Prep: Assign your student these questions to answer independently as he or she reads the book, and follow up with discussion. For each vocabulary word, look up the definition (appropriate in the context of the book) and write a paraphrase, or use the word in an original phrase or sentence. III. Honors: Watch any of the many movie adaptations of this book and write a 5 paragraph compare/contrast essay.

3 The Three Musketeers Study Guide 2 Background Information: France had undergone a brutal decade of civil war. The French Revolution ( ) had left no family untouched. France was a nation in need of healing. In 1802, Alexandre Dumas was born. He grew up during this time of woundedness in his country; his father who had served as a General under Napoleon died in 1806 when Alexandre was four years old. He and his mother had nothing; his childhood was not an easy one. He made his way to Paris as soon as he became an adult, and in time his writing gained him great popularity. He wrote plays initially (first published in 1831) and later novels. The Three Musketeers was a novel published in serial form in the newspaper Le Siecle in Paris in the spring and summer of 1844 when Dumas was 42 years old. With The Three Musketeers, Dumas did something no French author had ever done before. He combined seamlessly two genres of fiction, and the public couldn't get enough of it! While they were familiar with Historical Fiction and with Romances, they had never before read a book that wove the two types of writing together so beautifully. Dumas not only told their history of the mid-17 th century political intrigues between Royalists and Cardinalists in Paris, civil war between Catholics and Hugenots (French Protestants), battles and assassinations he also gave faces and personalities to those historical events. He remained faithful to the primary historical facts but told about them through the eyes of characters he had skillfully made believable, passionate, flawed and sympathetic. The Three Musketeers came a generation after the French Revolution, and the country needed to remember times of shared history that could help to rebuild national identity, unity, and patriotism. Dumas went back 150 years before the Revolution to tell just such a story. It's interesting to see the book draw to a close. Ideals that seemed rock-solid in the hearts of the characters in the first half of the book are drawn into serious question as the story closes. The Romanticism doesn't end happily ever after. Many scholars view this ending as Dumas' rejection of Romantic ideals of optimism and the triumph of the individual. For the purposes of this study guide, we will focus on characters and relationships in The Three Musketeers.

4 The Three Musketeers Study Guide 3 The characters on whom we will focus are the following: D'Artagnan Athos Porthos Aramis Monsieur de Treville King Louis XIII of France Queen of France, Anne of Austria Prime Minister of France, Cardinal Richelieu George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham Comte de Rochefort (also referred to as the Man of Meung) Madame Constance Bonacieux Milady de Winter (also referred to as Milady Clarik) Planchet Grimaud Mousqueton Bazin Lord de Winter John Felton

5 The Three Musketeers Study Guide 4 Vocabulary Look up each word and write a PARAPHRASE of the definition in your own words. baldric lackey fleur-de-lis procurator soubrette (the general definition, not the opera-specific one) bastion impunity infamy

6 The Three Musketeers Study Guide 5 Read Chapters 1-4. Make notes of personality traits you notice in each of these 5 characters (you do NOT need to answer in complete sentences):!"d'artagnan!"athos!"porthos!"aramis!"m. de Treville ========== In 2-3 complete sentences, describe the relationship that exists or is developing among these 5 men.

7 The Three Musketeers Study Guide 6 Read Chapters 5-6. What do you begin to observe in the relationship triangle that exists among King Louis XIII, Cardinal Richelieu, and M. de Treville? 1-2 sentences. Read Chapter 7. Make notes of personality traits you notice in each of these 4 characters and the relationship of each lackey to his master (you do NOT need to answer in complete sentences):!"planchet Planchet to D'Artagnan -!"Grimaud Grimaud to Athos -!"Mousqueton Mousqueton to Porthos -!"Bazin Bazin to Aramis -

8 The Three Musketeers Study Guide 7 Read Chapters These chapters set the stage for the developing plot, the court intrigues in Paris and the tension with England. What do you observe about the following characters (you do NOT have to answer in complete sentences):!"king Louis XIII:!"Queen Anne of Austria:!"Cardinal Richelieu:!"Madame Constance Bonacieux: Read Chapter 12. In 1-2 complete sentences describe the relationship between Queen Anne and George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham.