Classics Club review: ROMEO AND JULIET

For the most recent challenge, Spin #33 for Classics Club I read Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare. Clearly no one needs me to "review" it since it has been published for five hundred years and is Shakespeare most loved play. Instead of a review I will share a few insights, interactions, thoughts and factoids:

I listened to the audiobook of Romeo and Juliet by ArkAngel: AudioGO. It was a full cast dramatization. I worried that this would be more like watching the play than reading it, and then would it count? Never mind that, it was an excellent choice of a way to consume Shakespeare's most famous play. I noticed many aspects of the play I'd never noticed before watching it in a theater or on the big screen.

My daughter touching Juliet in Verona.

I have seen Romeo and Juliet performed live twice. Once it was set in Elizabethan times with clothing to match. The second time it was set in modern times. All the props and clothing were black and white to represent the two "households alike in dignity": the Montagues and the Capulets. That was very clever but I still preferred the Elizabethan production better. BTW-- even if directors change the clothing/time period, whenever Shakespeare is performed, the words are not changed. The language is exactly as Shakespeare wrote it.

Of the eight movie productions of Romeo and Juliet I have only seen one: Frank Zeffirelli's version from 1968. In fact, I am sure the first time I saw it was in a high school English class. There is partial nudity in it. Imagine seeing that in school today? The actors who played the lead roles are so young and beautiful. Both of them. They ARE Romeo and Juliet in my mind's eye.

The play is set in Verona, Italy. We visited Verona on an Italian vacation and joined the queue to place our hand on the breast of a sculpture of Juliet. It is unlikely that Shakespeare ever visited Italy. My husband recently recalled seeing a balcony in Verona said to be the spot where Romeo climbed up to see Juliet. We laughed at the thought -- they were fictional characters, after all.

The opening prologue is delivered in the form of a sonnet, a 16-line poem that Shakespeare is well-known for. It tells the audience what will happen in the play. It starts with those famous lines I quoted above: Two households, both alike in dignity, In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean... The Renaissance audiences of Shakespeare's day would have understood how two rich yet feuding families could affect the whole town. Everyone was forced to choose sides. The death of the children from both families brought peace to the land.

Family crests of the two houses, both alike in dignity – Montagues & Capulets

Romeo and Juliet was not an original story. It was based on an Italian story called 'Mariotto and Gianozza' which, at this time, was over one hundred years old.

Shakespeare wasn't the first author to write about the Montagues and Capulets. Dante included a reference to them in his Divine Comedy, written some 250 years before this play: 

"Come and see, you who are negligent, / Montagues and Capulets, Monaldi and Filippeschi: / One lot already grieving, the other in fear. / Come, you who are cruel, come and see the distress / Of your noble families, and cleanse their rottenness."

Shakespeare stole the idea for this play from a poem by Arthur Brooke: “Brooke’s poem describes the ‘deadly’ feud between two wealthy, noble families—Capulet and Montague. Against this backdrop of ‘blacke hate,’ he tells the ‘unhappy’ tale of a beautiful youth, Romeus Montague, whose heart is entrapped by the wise and graceful Juliet Capulet.” (Paper and Packaging)

Juliet is thirteen. THIRTEEN! In Act I, Scene III, Lady Capulet says that Juliet is “not [yet] fourteen.” She is actually just about two weeks shy of her 14th birthday. Romeo’s exact age is never given. Too young for marriage? Apparently not, since Juliet's father arranged for her to marry Paris on Thursday, just a day after her untimely death.

What we know as the "balcony scene" wasn't called that by Shakespeare since the word 'balcony' wasn't even coined yet. It first appeared in literature in 1618, almost twenty years after Romeo and Juliet was first published in 1599.

When the play was first performed, Juliet's role was played by a male. The first time Juliet was played by a female was in 1662, long after the Bard's death. Mary Saunderson was the first female to play Juliet, She also played the parts of many other female roles in other Shakespeare plays.

The 1998 winner of  the Oscar for Best Movie, Shakespeare in Love, is a personal favorite. In it we see a possible explanation for Shakespeare's inspiration for Romeo and Juliet. In addition to this film, West Side Story is probably Romeo and Juliet's most famous adaptation. But there have been many: Bollywood Queen; Gnomeo and Juliet; Warm Bodies (Zombies); Private Romeo; and Romeo Must Die, to name a few.

The name 'Romeo' has become synonymous with a male lover.

How popular is Romeo and Juliet? YouGov conducted a survey of British people. 51% of Brits have read or seen it, second place is Macbeth. Have you seen it or read it? I can now say I've done both.

 

This week we travel to the Ashland Shakespeare festival in Ashland, Oregon. We have tickets to see -- Romeo and Juliet!

PS - The Oregon Shakespeare Company's adaptation of Romeo and Juliet set the star-crossed lovers in modern times, they lived under a bridge and poverty was part of the theme. Odd but still touching. I really focused on the age and immaturity of the lovers.

-Anne