Murder in the Cathedral

drastic. Thomas went from running away from his problems, to facing them and ultimate killing

himself because of it. At the beginning of the play Thomas was running away from people that

wanted to kill him or hurt him, because of his belief that the king didn’t have power over the

church. Throughout the play, Thomas questioned himself on why he was doing what he was

doing, and in the end he decided that if death was coming he couldn’t cheat it. I admire Thomas

on how made his final decision based on what he truly believed. Thomas’s final decision, was

what he believed in. I think that if he was content with his decision and if he felt that it was the

best choice, than I am happy for him and don’t disagree that he should have waited for the

I think that the personification of the Tempters helped a great deal in the play. I feel that

the tempters helped the reader understand why Thomas did what he did and they also helped the

. . .
I feel that without the tempters, the play wouldn’t have shown the reader

the reason behind Thomas’s decisions. I don’t think that it would be believable for the king to visit

Thomas, either.

To me, it seemed as though he thought maybe he would be a martyr or that he might not because

of his reasons behind the decisions he made, either way he wanted the people to remember him. I liked it how they

described how Thomas could have so much and be happy if he would just go along with the king,

instead of against him. Whatever the king wanted said or done, he could and

would have others do it for him. Also,

toward the end of the play, they also foresee Thomas’s death in the cathedral. It put it into perspective and

proved that it isn’t a good idea. Overall, the chorus did help set some scenes up, but I think the play may

have been more interesting without them. I also feel that they did it to explain that it was, in some ways, good for the people also. I think that a king wouldn’t be dumb enough to go out among people that loved

Thomas and confront him. Finally, I also liked it,

because it showed me why church and state should be separated. I think this story should be used as an example in history classes

when discussing the separation of church and state and how they became different.

Overall, I liked the play, but as I said earlier, it was to predictable and they almost told

you what was going to happen before it did. They tell the people that Thomas is the one that messed

with the harmony and changed things for the worse. Like at the

beginning, when they said someone will die and that the people did fine without Thomas.

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Approximate Word count = 737
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)

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