Romeo and Juliet
‘A pair of star‐cross’d lovers take their life’ – Prologue Name: __________________ Class: ______________ Romeo and Juliet Essentials Written: 1591‐1595) Published: 1597 Genre: Tragedy Verona Northern Italy Setting: Verona Themes: Love, passion, desire, fate, chance, duty, conflict, religion, time, duality, you get the picture Main characters: Romeo, Juliet, their parents, Mercutio, Tybalt, Benvolio, Friar Laurence What actually happens? Lots – so keep up! In the streets of Verona another brawl breaks out between the servants of the feuding noble families of Capulet (Juliet) and Montague (Romeo). Romeo, the son of Montague, runs into his cousin Benvolio, who had earlier seen Romeo moping about over his first love, Rosaline Meanwhile, Paris, seeks Juliet’s hand in marriage. Her father Capulet, asks Paris to wait two years, since Juliet is not yet even fourteen. Capulet dispatches a servant with a list of people to invite to a masquerade and feast he is holding. He invites Paris to the feast, hoping that he will begin to woo Juliet. Romeo and Benvolio encounter the Capulet servant bearing the list of invitations. Benvolio suggests that they attend, since that will allow Romeo to compare his beloved to other beautiful women of Verona. Romeo agrees to go with Benvolio to the feast, but only because Rosaline will also be there. The feast begins. A melancholy Romeo follows Benvolio and their bestie, Mercutio to Capulet’s house. Once inside, Romeo sees Juliet from a distance and instantly falls in love with her; he forgets about Rosaline completely (the swine!) They kiss, not even knowing each other’s names. When he finds out from Juliet’s nurse that she is the daughter of Capulet—his family’s enemy—he becomes distraught. When Juliet learns that the young man she has just kissed is the son of Montague, she grows equally upset. Someone call Jeremy Kyle – quick! Romeo hurries to see his mate Friar Lawrence, who, agrees to marry the young lovers in secret since he sees in their love the possibility of ending the age‐old feud between Capulet and Montague. The following day, Romeo and Juliet meet at Friar Lawrence’s cell and are married. The next day, the Montague and Capulet boys go head to head in another battle resulting in the deaths of Mercutio and Tybalt. Romeo flees from the scene. Soon after, the Prince declares him forever banished from Verona for his crime. Friar Lawrence arranges for Romeo to spend his wedding night with Juliet before he has to leave Verona for good. Juliet learns that her father, affected by the recent events, now intends for her to marry Paris in just three days. Friar Laurence concocts a plan to reunite Juliet with Romeo. The plan goes horribly wrong and when both lovers are convinced of the other’s death they take their lives  Seeing their children’s bodies, Capulet and Montague agree to end their long‐standing feud and to raise gold statues of their children side‐by‐side in a newly peaceful Verona. The nitty gritty… Stop it, you’re making a scene… The play is divided into five big chunks called acts. Each act tells us a part of the story. Put them all together and you get the whole story. Acts are also divided up into even smaller chunks called scenes. Scenes break up the story. A new scene might be in a different place, at a different time, or feature different characters. I can’t understand a word of this! YES. YOU. CAN. Some of this old Shakespearean language can be difficult to get your head around. But once you get the hang of reading it, things will become a lot clearer. Just remember these rules: 1. Don’t stop reading at the end of a line 2. Follow the punctuation – read to the end of the sentence, not the end of the line One fairer than my love! The all‐seeing sun There is no full stop here so Ne’er saw her match since first the world began. carry on reading! This is only one sentence but it runs over two lines; this is known as enjambment 3. Most lines start with a capital letter – but this doesn’t always mean it’s a new sentence 4. Full stops, question marks and exclamation marks show you where the sentence ends Sense doesn’t make Shakespeare… Sometimes you have to switch the words around! Shakespeare likes to mess around with the order of words. It helps him to fit the sentences into the poetry If a piece of writing looks like it’s back‐to‐front – don’t panic! Play around with the word order and it’ll make sense How’s the form Shakespeare? Shakespeare mostly writes in ‘blank verse’, the form preferred by most dramatists in the 16th and early 17th centuries. Blank verse has a regular rhythm, but does not rhyme. It is a very flexible medium, which is capable – like the human speaking voice – of a wide range of tones. To make matters more complicated… Shakespeare used a particular form of blank verse called iambic pentameter. In iambic pentameter the lines are ten syllables long. Each line is divided into pairs of syllables, known as ‘feet’. Each ‘foot’ has one unstressed  and one stressed syllable  – a pattern that often appears in normal speech.           Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs Interesting point… Iambic pentameter was used to help actors remember their lines as it is the natural way in which we speak. Also, the rhythm (di‐dum) mirrors that of the human heart! Getting to grips with the vocab! Aside dramatic convention by which a character on stage says something that the audience can hear but not all the other characters Blank verse unrhymed lines of iambic pentameter Dramatic irony occurs where the development of the plot means that the audience is in possession of more information about what is happening than some of the characters are Hyperbole a figure of speech: emphasis by exaggeration Iambic pentameter a line with five stressed beats, in a di‐dum weak‐stress/strong‐stress pattern Irony saying one thing while meaning another Paradox, paradoxical an apparently self‐contradictory statement with an underlying meaning or truth beneath its superficial absurdity (craziness) Pun play on words, where two or more different meanings are drawn out of a single word for witty or comic effect Rhetoric the art of speaking effectively so as to persuade an audience Rhyming couplet a pair of rhymed lines Satire literature which examines vice and folly and makes them appear ridiculous Soliloquy literally ‘to speak alone’ – a speech from a character when alone on stage, traditionally enabling him/her to express inner thoughts and feelings Verisimilitude likeness to reality