1. By William Shakespeare
Romeo and Juliet
By William Shakespeare

2. A Brief Introduction
Romeo and Juliet was written by Shakespeare in 1594 or 1595.
Romeo and Juliet was an experimental stage piece, not a traditional play.
The themes of the play include the anti-thesis between love and hate, the use of a light and dark polarity, the use of time, and the use of Fate in the dreams, and omens that foreshadow the play’s tragic conclusion.

3. The Montagues Lord and Lady Montague – Romeo’s parents Romeo Montague
Balthasar and Abram – servants to the Montagues
Mercutio – Friend of Romeo and relative of the Prince

4. The Capulets Lord and Lady Capulet – Juliet’s parents Juliet Capulet
Nurse – Juliet’s attendant
Tybalt – cousin to Juliet
Sampson and Gregory – servants to the Capulets

5. Overall Summary
Romeo and Juliet is a story about two teenagers who fall in love but are forbidden to see each other by their parents. They meet one night at a party (Romeo is actually there to check out another girl, Rosaline) and quickly fall in love. Unfortunately, Juliet’s parents already have a husband picked out for her. So, the two decide to get married and enlist the help of Juliet’s nurse to act as a messenger between the two and Friar Laurence who agrees to marry them. However, plans go awry after Romeo is banished from Verona and doesn’t get filled in on the plans that Juliet has for them to live happily ever after…

6. A Brief Plot Summary
Act I – Shakespeare establishes an on-going feud between two families, the Montagues and Capulets.
Juliet’s father decides that even though Juliet is only 13 it is time to find her a husband.
Romeo (a Montague) and Juliet ( A Capulet) meet and fall in love.

7. Act II – One of the Capulets challenges Romeo to a duel
Act II – One of the Capulets challenges Romeo to a duel. Romeo’s friends fear for his safety.
Friar Laurence conspires with Romeo to arrange a secret marriage.
By the end of Act II, Romeo and Juliet are married.

8. Act III – The duel between Romeo and Tybalt takes place after all, and Romeo kills Tybalt.
The Prince spares Romeo’s life, but banishes him from Verona.
Juliet’s father announces that she shall wed Paris in 3 days.
Juliet makes plans to seek the advice of Friar Laurence where unbeknownst to her Romeo is hiding.

9. Act IV -- Juliet threatens to commit suicide rather than marry Paris.
Friar Laurence convinces her to fake her death in order to be with Romeo.
Juliet follows the Friar’s plan, and her corpselike body is discovered by her nurse.

10. Act V – Romeo receives word that Juliet is dead.
He buys a fast-acting poison and travels to Juliet’s tomb so that he may die beside her.
Paris is also at the tomb. He and Romeo fight, and Paris is killed.
Romeo drinks the poison. Juliet awakens and stabs herself to death with Romeo’s dagger.
The feuding families end their feud and erect golden statues to the lovers.

11. Setting
The story is set in the late 1500’s mostly in the town of Verona, Italy. However, there are a few acts set in Mantua, Italy a smaller town just a few miles away.

12. Timeline Sunday – Act One Monday – Act Two Tuesday – Act Three
Wednesday – Act Four
Thursday – Act Five

13. The Feud
Romeo’s family, the Montagues, have a long standing feud with Juliet’s family, the Capulets. While the audience never learns about the source of the ancient quarrel, we do learn that it has recently grown stronger.

14. Comedy and Tragedy
Romeo and Juliet begins as a comedy but ends as a tragedy
Elements of a tragedy
Must have a tragic hero/heroine
Ends in the death of many of the main characters
Elements of a comedy
A struggle of young lovers to overcome difficulty that is often presented by elders
Separation and unification
Heightened tensions, often within a family
The shift from comedy to tragedy is what sets Romeo and Juliet apart from the rest of Shakespeare’s plays

15. Themes The power of love Love as a cause for violence Fate
The inevitability of fate
Hate
Hate as a forced emotion

16. Writing Style
Parts of Romeo and Juliet are written as a sonnet, a poem of 14 lines written and rhymed in iambic pentameter. Each sonnet ends with a couplet. In a Shakespearean sonnet the rhyme scheme is ABAB CDCD EFEF GG
A couplet is two consecutive lines that rhyme.
Iambic pentameter refers to the rhythm of each line. It is an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one.
“Bŭt sóft! Whăt líght throŭgh yóndĕr wíndŏw bréaks?”

17. Plagiarism!?
Shakespeare did not invent the story of Romeo and Juliet. A poet named Arthur Brooks wrote the story of Romeus and Juliet as a long poem that was itself not original, but rather an adaptation of adaptations that stretched across nearly a hundred years and two languages. Many of the details of Shakespeare’s plot are taken directly from Brooks’ poem, including the meeting of Romeo and Juliet at the ball, their secret marriage, Romeo’s fight with Tybalt, the sleeping potion, and the timing of their suicides.

18. Interesting…
The Italian city of Verona, where Romeo and Juliet lived, receives about 1,000 letters addressed to Juliet every Valentine's Day.
“Star-crossed lovers” refers to two people who are in love but have conflicting astrological signs. In Shakespeare’s times, people believed the course of their lives was determined by the exact second they were born.

19. Verona Today
Today, Verona has an incredible amount of graffiti, which is legal, provided that you are writing about your love for someone.

20. Your assignment (due April 7th with summary and PowerPoint)
Shakespeare play title
Introduction
Summary
Setting + Timeline
Comedy or Tragedy
Theme

21. Resources for other plays
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