A plague on both your houses…What is the first thing that comes to mind when

you think of William Shakespeare, or Romeo and Juliet?

…old and boring …tragic love story…hard to understand …stuck up

..two feuding families …romance…Romeo, wherefore art thou

Romeo?….play with old costumes …who? Huh?

So about this Shakespeare..

• William Shakespeare was an unknown man from Stratford on Avon, who ended up becoming a famous playwright in London

• When he was 18 he married 26 year old Anne Hathaway, their daughter Susanna was born 6th months later. They also had twins, Judith and Hamnet, but he died at age 11

• He spent much of his life in London, as an actor and author, at the Globe theater, and when he died he left his wife the 2nd best bed in his will

He wrote his own epitath…

"Good Friends, for Jesus' sake forbear, To dig the bones enclosed here! Blest be the man that spares these stones, And curst be he that moves my bones."

Elizabethan Theater…all the world’s a stage

• In Shakespeare’s time, theaters were on the south side of London, along with bearbaiting, taverns, and some very friendly women

• Theaters were sometimes closed to try to stop the threat of plague, or because they were “immoral”

• All of the actors were men, it was illegal for women to be onstage…so Juliet was being played by a teenage boy in a dress…there’s a reason Shakespeare’s plays have lots of talking, but not too much kissing onstage

• You could get into the Globe theater for a penny, and stand during the whole play, or pay a bit more for a seat, most stood, and were called “groundlings”

• Food was sold, and if the play wasn’t good or exciting, the audience would heckle or throw things at the actors

Theater Terms• Monologue- When one person is talking, for a

long timeEx. Mercutio’s Queen Mab speech• Aside- When a character is talking to the

audience, and all the other characters pretend not to hear

• Suspension of disbelief- When the audience pretends not to notice all the stuff that is fake or unrealistic

A way with words• Shakespeare added over 2,000 words to the

English language in his plays, if he needed a new word, he made one up, you may recognize…

Eyeball, dwindle, watchdog, gloomy, hobnob, swagger, rant, moonbeam, fashionable

• There are also expressions he coined that are very common today, like “a heart of gold,” “wild goose chase,” “vanish into thin air,” “good riddance,” “break the ice,” “a laughing stock,” “clothes make the man,” “dead as a doornail”

• He also wrote some pretty good insults

When we are acting…• You will sit in your character’s seat• Keep your folder in order• When you are onstage (in the middle) you will:- Speak loud enough to be heard- Not have conversations with the audience- Move if it fits in the scene, not wander around- Stay until you are supposed to exit, then sit down- Pay attention to the script, so you know your line is coming up• When you are the audience you will: - be silent so we can hear the actors and know what’s going on - follow along with the script, and go onstage when it is your turnIf you cannot follow these expectations, you will start completing extra questions, be assigned detention, or written up

Match the quote with the characters1. “What, drawn and talk of peace? I

hate the word, As I hate hell, all Montagues, and thee! Have at thee, coward!”

2. Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight! For I ne’er saw true beauty till this night”

3. “Wisely and slow, they stumble that run fast”

A. Friar Lawrence B. Tybalt C. Romeo

Romeo and Juliet Sources

• Guess what? Shakespeare didn’t come up with the story of Romeo and Juliet all on his own!

• He borrowed ideas and characters from other stories that already existed, especially a poem in 1562 by Arthur Brooke called The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet

• The poem is probably Shakespeare’s main source, but the poem is based on several different Italian stories

• There’s also a story by Ovid, an ancient Roman writer, called Pyramus and Thisbe, in which two lovers from rival families plan to meet in secret, but through a misunderstanding (who hasn’t thought their girlfriend was devoured by a lion?) end up killing themselves

• Shakespeare was definitely aware of the story, because he used a version of it in one of his plays

• So the moral is, you don’t need the most original idea, just to have the best, most dramatic version of it

• And just as Shakespeare borrowed ideas to come up with Romeo and Juliet, people have borrowed the play’s ideas to create new entertainment

• A well-known example is West Side Story, a musical with two different gangs replacing the feuding families

Other examples: • Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luherman’s update)• “Love Story” (Taylor Swift)• Pretty much any story with lovers from two

different worlds (yes, Twilight), • Gnomeo and Juliet• Shakespeare in Love• Warm Bodies

Themes, Symbols and Motifs• A theme is a main idea, or the moral or lesson of

the story…themes in Romeo and Juliet include the power of love, passion and violence, individuals versus society, and that you can’t fight fate

• A symbol is something that stands for more than itself…symbols in Romeo and Juliet include poison, roses, fire, stars, and masks

• A motif is an idea or subject that occurs over and over …motifs in Romeo and Juliet include opposites such as light vs dark, and youth vs age

Themes• Power of love:Obviously, love is important to the story: it’s why everything happens. Romeo and Juliet’s love is so powerful it’s more important to them than their families, their loyalties, or even their lives• Passion and Violence: Of course the same violent passion leads to violence, from Tybalt’s death to the lovers’ suicide. As strong as the love in the play is, the families’ hate and anger is equally forceful

• Individual against society:In the play, what the lovers want as individuals is in conflict with what their families and society wants. Juliet doesn’t want to marry Paris, but her dad is telling her she has to, and society would back him up. (“An you are mine, I’ll give you to my friend”) Romeo can’t just change his name and never have to deal with his family again. The Capulets, Montagues, and the townspeople don’t want to stop feuding or seem dishonored just because two teenagers like each other. It takes a horrible tragedy to get them to change.

• Can you fight fate?At the beginning of the play, we’re told Romeo and Juliet are “star-crossed” lovers, meaning it’s already decided their love will end badly. During the play, both lovers have bad feelings about what is going to happen, Romeo before the party, Juliet when he leaves for Mantua. When Romeo thinks Juliet is dead he cries “I defy you, stars!” challenging fate, and planning to kill himself so he can be with Juliet, who isn’t dead. There are many near-misses and points where things could have so easily gone another way and ended happily, but didn’t, that it seems like their fate or destiny has already been decided for Romeo and Juliet, and no matter what they try, they can’t change it. But still, you have to wonder…

Symbols• Poison- the hate that is tearing apart two families,

the poisons and potions that Friar Lawrence makes and gave to Juliet, the poison Romeo bought from the apothecary, and money, which corrupts

• Rose- Love and sweetness, gentleness, associated with Juliet and Paris, also death

• Fire- consuming passion, such as love, that is also destructive, associated with Romeo and Juliet, anger

• Stars- fate, fear of what will happen, beauty and purity of the love between Romeo and Juliet

• Masks- insincerity, hidden love, helps people break the rules, reason Romeo and Juliet could meet, but why they didn’t tell their families

Stars

A pair of star-crossed lovers….

I defy you stars!

Earth-treading stars that make dark heaven light

…my mind misgivessome consequence yet hanging in the stars…

Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die, Take him and cut him out in little stars,And he will make the face of heaven so fine That all the world will be in love with night

And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars , From this world-wearied flesh

Two of the fairest stars in all of heaven

Rose

Juliet:"What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet."

Symbol of love and passion

Verona’s summer hath not such a flowerOur bridal flowers serve for a buried corpse

Sweet flower, with flowers thy bridal bed I strew

This bud of love…may prove a beauteous flower

The roses in thy cheeks and lips shall fade

Masks JULIET: Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face; Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek

Give me a case to put my visage in:A visor for a visor! what care IWhat curious eye doth quote deformities?Here are the beetle brows shall blush for me. Mercutio

What, dares the slave come hither, cover’d with an antic face? - Tybalt

My fan Peter! Good Peter, to hide her face, for her fan’s the fairer face of the two -Mercutio

Poison

Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end

With baleful weeds and precious-juiced flowers…Poison hath residence

This distilled liquor drink thou off: through all thy veinsshall run a cold and drowsy humour; for no pulse shall keep his native progress

What if it be a poison which the friar subtilly hath ministr’d to have me dead?

A dram of poison

Such mortal drugs I have, but Mantua’s lawis death to any he that utters them

There is thy gold- worse poison to men’s souls, doingmore murder in this loathsome world than these poor Compounds that thou mayest not sell. I sell thee poison, Thou hast sold me none

Fire

“These violent delights have violent ends, And in their triump die, like fire and powder Which, as they kiss, consume”

PRINCE What, ho! you men, you beasts,That quench the fire of your pernicious rage, With purple fountains issuing from your veins, On pain of torture, from those bloody hands Throw your mistemper'd weapons to the ground.

Love is a smoke raised with the fume of sighs; Being purged, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes;

Oh, she doth teach the torches to burn bright

And fire-ey’d fury be my conduct now…Now Tybalt, take the “villain” back again!

Motifs

• In Romeo and Juliet it’s all about the opposites: life and death, love and hate, dark and light, Montagues and Capulets, high and low, peace and fighting, young and old

• It’s full of imagery with darkness and light: ex. in the balcony scene Juliet’s at a lighted window, with Romeo in the dark garden, comparing her to the sun. Throughout the play there are references to darkness and light, night and day ex. “O come gentle night..” or the darkness of the Capulet tomb

• Youth and age is another motif: Romeo and Juliet have a passionate, teenage love (that may not be very mature), they fall violently in love at first sight, and won’t live without each other, and feel that adults don’t understand (Juliet says “old folks feign as they were dead, unwieldy, slow, heavy and pale as lead”)

• Meanwhile Friar Lawrence is trying to tell them to love moderately, Romeo’s parents are worried about him, and Juliet’s dad wants her to marry a ‘safe’ guy he picked

• But at the same time, the adults are in large part to blame for the tragic ending: they were trying to use the lovers for political advantage, the friar comes up with the convoluted poison idea, and the hatred and feuding between the adults in the families means the lovers are afraid to tell their parents the truth

Graffiti ActivityIn fair Verona, where we lay our scene… Somewhere, in the town of Romeo and Juliet’s Verona is a graffiti wall, a place where the characters have been carving, drawing and writing about what’s important to them. You are one of the citizens of Verona, and after the tragedy, you are showing it to a visitor, and explaining what all the messages mean. Then, you are going to add three messages of your own. (54 points)

Cliff Notes Recap

Practice QuizTrue and False Quiz

Trivia Quizzes