dramatis personae romeo and juliet synopsis

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1 All original material copyright Seattle Shakespeare Company 2013

2 romeo and juliet synopsis The play opens with a brawl between servants of the feuding Capulet and Montague families. The Prince of Verona breaks up the fight and threatens death for anyone who disturbs our streets again. A great celebration is being planned by the Capulets to which everyone in the town is invited except the Montagues. During the party they introduce their young daughter Juliet to Count Paris in the hopes that they will marry. Romeo, Benvolio (both Montagues), and Mercutio decide to attend this party in disguise so that Romeo will get his mind off of Rosaline, an unattainable girl who he loves. Romeo is enchanted the moment he sees Juliet from across the room, and forgets all about Rosaline. He talks with her and she becomes as entranced as he is. Juliet s cousin Tybalt notices that Romeo and his kinsmen are trespassing at the party, but at Lady Capulet s command he does not start a fight. Romeo sneaks back into the garden, where he hears Juliet talking to herself about the danger of loving an enemy. He appears and speaks to Juliet. They exchange vows of love, and plan to marry in secret the next day. Romeo begs Friar Lawrence to marry him and Juliet. Friar Lawrence agrees, hoping that the marriage might end the feud between the families and bring peace to the town. The two lovers are married and part, planning to meet secretly that night. That afternoon Tybalt attempts to pick a fight with Romeo. Romeo refuses, but Mercutio takes up his sword to return Tybalt s insult. As Romeo tries to break up the fight, he restrains Mercutio, who is fatally stabbed. Romeo, enraged at the death of his friend, kills Tybalt and is banished by the prince. The Nurse tells Juliet that Romeo has been sentenced to banishment for killing Tybalt. Romeo and Juliet have only one night together after they are married before Romeo must leave the city or be killed. Unaware that Juliet has already married Romeo, the Capulets plan for her to marry Paris. Juliet goes to Friar Lawrence for help. He gives her a sleeping potion that will make her appear dead for two days, and tells her to take it the night before her wedding to Paris. The Friar says he will send a message to Romeo letting him know of the plan so that Romeo can find her in the tomb, and they will be reunited when she awakes. dramatis personae The Montagues Romeo Son of Lord and Lady Montague Mercutio Related to Prince Escalus and a close friend to Romeo Benvolio Romeo s cousin and friend Abraham A servant of the Montagues The Capulets Juliet Daughter of Lord and Lady Capulet Lady Capulet The head of the house of Capulet, she is Juliet s mother and enemy of Montague Nurse Juliet s nurse Peter Servant to the nurse and Juliet TyBALT Juliet s cousin Sampson Servant of the Capulets Gregory Servant of the Capulets Others Friar Lawrence A Franciscan friar and close friend to Romeo Paris A relative of Prince Escalus and Lady Capulet s choice of husband for Juliet Prince Escalus The prince of Verona, he is related to Mercutio and Paris Romeo hears about Juliet s death not through the Friar s messenger, but from his servant. In grief, Romeo returns to the city determined to be with Juliet in her death. He goes to the apothecary and buys poison, then goes to Juliet s tomb. There, he find Paris and they fight. Romeo kills Paris, then takes the poison and kills himself. Juliet awakes too late to stop him, and sees her love dead beside her. Friar Lawrence arrives but is unable to divert further tragedy. Using Romeo s dagger, Juliet takes her own life. The two families find Romeo and Juliet dead together in the tomb, and realize that they need to put their feud behind them. 2

3 background on romeo and Juliet For never was a story of more woe Than this of Juliet and her Romeo Prince, Act V, sc. iii Shakespeare s Romeo and Juliet first appeared onstage in Shakespeare had borrowed the story from a poem published in 1562, the year he was born, called The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet, written first in Italian by Bandell, and now in English by Arthur Brooke. Shakespeare followed the poem s plot and often used some of its very words in his dialogue. Shakespeare took the story and infused it with a deep humanity and truth, introduced new unforgettable characters, compacted the action into a few short days, and evolved the two lovers into fully realized young people who build between themselves a love that is inclusive of their minds, spirits, and bodies. The exhilaration, maturity, purity, and completeness of their shared love is not expressed as understandably anywhere else in literature. The teenage lovers, Romeo and Juliet, become the world wide icons of true love for generations after. Can you remember a time in your life when you were not aware of Romeo and Juliet? Do you know lines from the play? How did you learn them? Can you remember when? Is it possible that these two characters and the lines you know from the play are programmed into our social consciousness? A fourteen line prologue starts the play. This prologue also has an A B, A B rhyme structure (which means that the last words of the A lines will rhyme, and the last words of the B lines will rhyme), as well as a rhyming couplet at the end. It is a specific form of poetry called a sonnet. Shakespeare wrote and published 154 sonnets during his life. They were very popular and include some opening lines that you may recognize, the most famous perhaps being from Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer s day? Shakespeare also included two more sonnets in Romeo and Juliet. One is another prologue happening right after Juliet and Romeo meet. It reminds us of the children s predicament and contains a very illuminating line about how they overcome the obstacles immediately before them: Text: Being held a foe, he may not have access A To breathe such vows as lovers use to swear; B And she as much in love, her means much less A To meet her new beloved anywhere. B But passion lends them power, time means, to meet, Tempering extremities with extreme sweet. Rhyming Couplet Prologue, Act II The remaining sonnet is for you to discover. It will be comprised by two characters in conversation together. They might be the only two characters in all of Shakespeare s plays who are able to do this. Sonnets are held to be a perfect form for expressing love. Do you think Shakespeare may be reveling even more to us about the play by the use of Sonnets? The opening Sonnet/Prologue tells what we need to know about the play at the beginning. It then goes much further: it tells us the ending. We learn that the greatest love story ever known is born in a world of rage. The ancient feud between the Capulet and Montague households (whose genesis we will never know which prevents us from taking sides) infuses fair Verona, with prejudice and hatred. Civilians are killing one another. We know that two children, Romeo and Juliet, are star-crossed meaning that fate will be working against them. We know that they will take their own lives. These children are the terrible sacrifice needed to end the rage. We, as an audience, will spend this two hours traffic wishing fervently that we could save them. That is all part of the painful beauty of experiencing Romeo and Juliet. As you listen, pay special attention to all the love in the play, gently remembering that rage has poisoned everyone who lives in Verona. Can you feel compassion for: Parents who try very hard to do well for their children? Friends who hold honor to a breaking point? Mentors who, though well-meaning, misguide? ACTIVITY: This is fun to do by yourself or in a challenge with a friend. You will need paper, pen, and the ability to time yourself (and friend) to the second. The names of Romeo and Juliet have been used in many modern song lyrics. Give your self two minutes, and see how many songs you (and your friend) can write down that include either one or both names of our young lovers. Who was able to write down the most? Did you have any overlaps? How many different genres of music are included? Now look at each song and think of the context in which Romeo and/or Juliet are being referenced. Knowing the whole story, as you do now, how many of the songwriters are referring to Romeo and/or Juliet with real knowledge of the play? Do you notice other meanings or associations with the names of Romeo and Juliet that have nothing to do with Shakespeare s real characters? By Stephanie Shine. Used with permission from Tennessee Shakespeare Company. 8

4 who is shakespeare anyway? and is surrounded by beautiful forests. One of the Arden tenant farmers is named Richard Shakespeare. In 1557, a year after her father s death, 17-year-old Mary weds beneath her class by marrying Richard s son, John. John Shakespeare is 26 and a yeoman which means he is a small prosperous farmer of no nobility. Mary brings a large dowry with her, including an estate named Asbies. A dowry is the combination of money, goods, and property a woman brings into her marriage. Can you guess how John and Mary may have met? Class and status were very important in Shakespeare s lifetime. Are such social distinctions still important today? If so, where do you notice them? In America? In other parts of the world? The couple settles into John Shakespeare s house on Henley Street in Stratford-upon-Avon. You can visit this house today as well as Mary Arden s childhood home. Portrait of William Shakespeare, By a name I know not how to tell thee who I am Romeo, Ace2, sc. ii Who is this man, who will write at least 38 timeless plays, two epic poems, and 154 sonnets? We don t have many facts. He isn t born into high status, so no one will bother to write about him, other than recording his baptism and marriage, until he becomes a successful playwright. Even then, there are no interviews, articles, personal diaries, or contemporary biographies for us to draw from. William is born, the third child to John and Mary, on April 23 in He will be the first child to survive infancy. There will be five siblings born after him. His dad is very ambitious. His fortunes rise and fall during William s childhood. John trades in wool, farm products, lends money, and he makes gloves, saddles, and harnesses. He is quite successful, earning enough to buy a second home. He even has a seat on the Board of Alderman (a civic governing council). We have his words. Most of what we know about him comes from his work, and even then he can be a mystery! He gives us clues into his own beliefs and feelings, but more often, he holds as twere the mirror up to nature (Hamlet, Act 2, sc. i) so well and so fairly, that we see many aspects of fully developed human behavior. This leaves us ever searching for him. But what about the living breathing person, William Shakespeare? We know what is happening around him in his world from the factual history of the political, social, and literary events occurring in both London and Stratford, England and through documented occurrences and educated guesses about his life. His mother, Mary Arden, comes from a wealthy, noble family. But since she is a girl, she is not schooled and is illiterate. Her family has extensive property and many tenant farmers (peasants who rented her family s land) working the estate in the province of Warwickshire, three miles outside the town of Stratford-upon- Avon, in England. Stratford is a pretty hamlet with a population of about 1,500 at the time. It is 102 miles northwest of London. It sits on the River Avon Shakespeare s birthplace. Photo by Stuart Yeates. John submits an application for a Coat of Arms. This would put the family in the heraldic registry and elevate their status permanently, giving John and his sons the title of Gentleman. But John is controversial and the application is denied. He runs into money problems, falls behind in his taxes, and eventually is forced to mortgage Mary s estate, Asbies. He is finally asked to leave the board of Aldermen in By 1590, the family s only possession will be the house on Henley Street. William goes to school, sees visiting players perform in his town, and experiences the ups and downs of his family s stature in Stratford society. When he is 13, he witnesses the death of his 7-year-old sister, Anne, and his parents grief. 3

5 When William is 18, he marries Anne Hathaway, who is 26. Anne is from a neighboring village a mile from Stratford named Shottery. She is the daughter of a farmer. Again, because she is a girl, she has not gone to school and cannot read or write. William and Anne s fathers are old friends and even act as signatories on loans for one another. The wedding is a rushed affair, and six months later they become parents to Susanna Shakespeare. The fact that Anne is pregnant when she is married is an embarrassment to both families, especially to ambitious John Shakespeare. The young family lives with Mary and John, where they will stay for the next 15 years. Two years later in 1585, Anne gives birth to twins, Hamnet and Judith, named after William and Anne s closest friends Hamnet and Judith Sadler. There will be no more children. Sometime between 1585 and 1590, William moves to London to pursue a life in the theatre. He keeps an interest in the family business and returns for visits. He begins as an actor, which he will continue to be throughout his career. Soon after, he starts writing. He will write from his imagination, his personal experiences, and the world around him. He will first write to entertain and then he will write to question, to elevate, and to heal. He will develop the art form of playwriting. people have their individual beliefs? Who stands to gain or benefit from religious reform? Just think, our own United States of America will be founded in response to this same religious persecution! We, as Americans, start here. William will experience the terror of a vulnerable political structure with the waning of the heirless Queen Elizabeth. He will witness threatened invasions from other powerful countries and constant uprisings from the oppressed within English rule. This glove-maker s son from Stratford will play several times before Queen Elizabeth. His acting troupe, The Lord Chamberlain s Men, will become The King s Men when James of Scotland ascends the English throne upon the death of Elizabeth in William Shakespeare will be wildly successful and famous in his lifetime. He will become a shareholder in an acting troupe and part owner of a theatre. He is an artist-manager. He will become very wealthy. In 1597, he will buy a beautiful home for Anne and his children in Stratford named New Place. He will put in another application for a Coat of Arms for his family this time it will be granted. His heart will be broken by the death of his only son in He will see plague ravage his country and thousands upon thousands of fellow countrymen die. He will witness his nation s struggle with religious identity, as newly formed Protestantism wars with Catholicism. There will be no religious freedom in his lifetime. Instead, people will be forced to attend Anglican Church services whether they believe or not, and death will often be the answer for those who keep the old religion as it had been for non-catholics in previous generations. Do religious wars still exist today? Can beliefs truly be enforced on other people? Why might this happen? What is risky about letting Today s Globe Theatre in London. He will become a grandfather. He will bury his father and his mother. He will buy a fine home to retire in and provide for his family. He will own large tracts of land in his ancestral Warwickshire. He will die of unknown causes on his 52 nd birthday in He will leave humankind a treasure of unsurpassable wealth a loving guide to being human. Can you think of other legacies like Shakespeare s? Is it hard to believe someone from a background like Shakespeare s could have achieved what he did? Can the gift of genius defy class and status? Elizabethan engraving representing the population taken by the plague. Used with permission from Tennessee Shakespeare Company. 4

6 Elizabeth s england in print in his works are such everyday terms as critic, assassinate, bump, gloomy, suspicious, and hurry; and he invented literally dozens of phrases which we use today: such un-shakespearean expressions as catching a cold, the mind s eye, elbow room, and even pomp and circumstance. Detail from a portrait of Elizabeth I, ca. 1588, by George Gower. William Shakespeare s characters lived in England (Richard II), France (As You Like It), Vienna (Measure for Measure), fifteenthcentury Italy (Romeo and Juliet), the England ruled by Elizabeth s father (Henry VIII) and elsewhere anywhere and everywhere. All Shakespeare s plays even when they were set in ancient Rome reflected the life of Elizabeth s England (and, after her death in 1603, that of her successor, James I). Thus, certain things about these extraordinary plays will be easier to understand if we know a little more about Elizabethan England. Elizabeth s reign was an age of exploration exploration of the world, exploration of man s nature, and exploration of the far reaches of the English language. This renaissance of the arts and sudden flowering of the spoken and written word gave us two great monuments the King James Bible and the plays of Shakespeare and many other treasures as well. Shakespeare made full use of the adventurous Elizabethan attitude toward language. He employed more words than any Engraving of an Elizabethan ship, by C.J. Visscher other writer in history more than 21,000 different words appear in the plays and he never hesitated to try a new word, revive an old one, or make one up. Among the words which first appeared Elizabethan England was a time for heroes. The ideal man was a courtier, an adventurer, a fencer with the skill of Tybalt, a poet no doubt better than Orlando, a conversationalist with the wit of Rosalind and the eloquence of Richard II, and a gentleman. In addition to all this, he was expected to take the time, like Brutus, to examine his own nature and the cause of his actions and (perhaps unlike Brutus) to make the right choices. The real heroes of the age did all these things and more. Despite the greatness of some Elizabethan ideals, others seem small and undignified, to us; marriage, for example, was often arranged to bring wealth or prestige to the family, with little regard for the feelings of the bride. In fact, women were still relatively powerless under the law. The idea that women were lower than men was one small part of a vast concern with order which was extremely important to many Elizabethans. Most people believed that everything, from the lowest grain of sand to the highest angel, had its proper position in the scheme of things. This concept was called the great chain of being. When things were in their proper place, harmony was the result; when order was violated, the entire structure was shaken. This idea turns up again and again in Shakespeare. The rebellion against Richard II brings bloodshed to England for generations; Romeo and Juliet s rebellion against their parents contributes to their tragedy; and the assassination in Julius Caesar throws Rome into civil war. Many Elizabethans also perceived duplications in the chain of order. They believed, for example, that what the sun is to the heavens, the king is to the state. When something went wrong in the heavens, rulers worried: before Julius Caesar and Richard II were overthrown, comets and meteors appeared, the moon turned the color of blood, and other bizarre astronomical phenomena were reported. Richard himself compares his fall to a premature setting of the sun; when he descends from the top of Flint Castle to meet the conquering Bolingbroke, he likens himself to the driver of the sun s chariot in Greek mythology: Down, down I come, like glist ring Phaeton ( ). All these ideas find expression in Shakespeare s plays, along with hundreds of others most of them not as strange to our way of thinking. As dramatized by the greatest playwright in the history of the world, the plays offer us a fascinating glimpse of the thoughts and passions of a brilliant age. Elizabethan England was a brief skyrocket of art, adventure, and ideas which quickly burned out; but Shakespeare s plays keep the best parts of that time alight forever. Adapted from The Shakespeare Plays, educational materials made possible by Exxon, Metropolitan Life, Morgan Guaranty, and CPB. Reprinted with permission from Insights, the Study Guide of the Utah Shakespearean Festival, Cedar City, Utah and 5

7 words, words, words No household in the English-speaking world is properly furnished unless it contains copies of the Holy Bible and of The Works of William Shakespeare. It is not always thought that these books should be read in maturer years, but they must be present as symbols of Religion and Culture (G.B. Harrison, Introducing Shakespeare. Rev. & Exp. [New York: Penguin Books, 1991], 11). We, the Shakespearean-theater goers and lovers, devotedly and ritualistically watch and read the Bard s plays not for exciting stories and complex plots. Rather, Shakespeare s language is a vital source of our supreme pleasure in his plays. Contrary to ill-conceived notions, Shakespeare s language is not an obstacle to appreciation, though it may prove to be difficult to understand. Instead, it is the communicative and evocative power of Shakespeare s language that is astonishingly rich in vocabulary about 29,000 words strikingly presented through unforgettable characters such as Hamlet, Macbeth, Lear, Othello, Rosalind, Viola, Iago, Shylock, etc. In the high school classroom, students perceive Shakespeare s language as Old English. Actually Shakespeare s linguistic environment, experience, and exposure was, believe it or not, closer to our own times than to Chaucer s, two hundred years earlier. Indeed, the history and development of the English language unfolds as follows: Old English, ; Middle English ; and Modern English 1500 present. Shakespeare was firmly in the Modern English period. At the time Shakespeare wrote, most of the grammatical changes from Old and Middle English had taken place; yet rigid notions about correctness had not yet been standardized in grammars. The past four centuries have advanced the cause of standardized positions for words; yet the flexible idiom of Elizabethan English offered abundant opportunities for Shakespeare s linguistic inventiveness. Ideally it is rewarding to study several facets of Shakespeare s English: pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, wordplay, and imagery. The present overview will, however, be restricted to vocabulary. To Polonius s inquisitive question What do you read, my lord? (Hamlet, ) Hamlet nonchalantly and intriguingly aptly replies: Words, words, words ( ). This many-splendored creation of Shakespeare s epitomizes the playwright s own fascination with the dynamic aspect of English language, however troubling it may be to modern audiences and readers. Shakespeare added several thousand words to the language, apart from imparting new meanings to known words. At times Shakespeare could teasingly employ the same word for different shades of thought. Barowne s single line, Light, seeking light, doth light of light beguile (Love s Labour s Lost, ), as Harry Levin in his General Introduction to The Riverside Shakespeare (9) explains, uses light in four significations: intellect, seeking wisdom, cheats eyesight out of daylight. Another instance: Othello as he enters his bedroom with a light before he smothers his dear, innocent Desdemona soliloquizes: Put out the light, and then put out the light (Othello, 5.2.7) Here light compares the light of Othello s lamp or torch to Desdemona s light of life. In both instances, the repeated simple ordinary word carries extraordinary shades of meaning. Usually such a tendency in a Shakespeare play indicates a more or less conscious thematic intent. (Paul A. Jorgensen, Redeeming Shakespeare s Words [Berkeley and Los Angeles; University of California Press, 1962], 100). Living in an age of the grandiose humanistic confidence in the power of the word (Levin 9), Shakespeare evidently felt exuberant that he had the license to experiment with the language, further blessed by the fact that there were no English grammars to lay down rules or dictionaries to restrict word-formation. This was an immeasurable boon for writers (Levin 10). Surely Shakespeare took full advantage of the unparalleled linguistic freedom to invent, to experiment with, and to indulge in lavishly. However intriguing, captivating, mind-teasing, beguiling, and euphonious, Shakespeare s vocabulary can be a stumbling block, especially for readers. In the theater the speaking actor frequently relies on tone, semantic drive, narrative context, and body language to communicate the sense of utterly unfamiliar terms and phrases, but on the page such words become more noticeable and confusing (Russ McDonald, The Bedford Companion to Shakespeare: An Introduction with Documents [Boston: Bedford Books of St. Martin s Press, 1996], 184). Unlocking the meaning of Shakespeare s vocabulary can prove to be an interesting challenge. Such words include those which have dropped from common use like bisson (blind) or those that the playwright seems to have created from Latin roots... but that did not catch on, such as conspectuities (eyesight or vision) or unplausive (doubtful or disapproving). Especially confusing are those words that have shifted meaning over the intervening centuries, such as proper (handsome), nice (squeamish or delicate), silly (innocent), or cousin (kinsman, that is, not necessarily the child of an aunt or uncle (McDonald 184). Because of semantic change, when Shakespeare uses conceit, he does not mean vanity, as we might understand it to be. Strictly following etymology, Shakespeare means a conception or notion, or possibly the imagination itself. Perhaps several Shakespearean words would have been strange to Shakespeare s audience because they were the products of his invention or unique usage. Some words that probably originated with him include: auspicious, assassination, disgraceful, dwindle, savagery. Certainly a brave soul, he was a most audacious inventor of words. To appreciate and understand Shakespeare s English in contrast to ours, we ought to suspend our judgment and disbelief and allow respect for the process of semantic change, which has been continually eroding or encrusting his original meaning (Levin 8). Shakespeare s vocabulary has received greater attention that any other aspect of his language. Perhaps this is because it is the most accessible with no burdensome complications. Whatever the cause, Shakespeare s language will forever be challenging and captivating. Written by S. S. Moorty. Adapted from The Shakespeare Plays, educational materials made possible by Exxon, Metropolitan Life, Morgan Guaranty, and CPB. Reprinted with permission from Insights, the Study Guide of the Utah Shakespearean Festival, Cedar City, Utah and 6