Transcript Document

Romeo and Juliet
By William Shakespeare
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…
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.
Timeline
Sunday – Act One
Monday – Act Two
Tuesday – Act Three
Wednesday – Act Four
Thursday – Act Five
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.
Comedy and Tragedy
Romeo and Juliet begins as a comedy but ends as a
tragedy
Elements of a comedy
•A struggle of young
lovers to overcome
difficulty that is often
presented by elders
Elements of a tragedy
•Must have a tragic
hero/heroine
•Ends in the death of many
of the main characters
•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
Themes
Love
•The power of love
•Love as a cause for
violence
Hate
•Hate as a forced emotion
Fate
•The inevitability of fate
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.
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.
Verona Today
Today,
Verona
has
an
incredible amount of graffiti,
which is legal, provided that
you are writing about your love
for someone.
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?”
Shakespeare’s Meter
• Meter: the set rhythm of a piece of writing
• Iamb: an unstressed syllable followed by a
stressed syllable, marked “u/”
• Iambic Pentameter: 5 iambs in a row
– “u/u/u/u/u/”
• Blank Verse: Unrhymed iambic pentameter
Shakespearean Sonnet
• Sonnet: 14 line lyric poem with a
complicated rhyme scheme and defined
structure
• Shakespearean Sonnet: uses iambic
pentameter and has 3 quatrains (group of 4
lines) and a couplet
– 1st quatrain introduces the situation
– 3rd quatrain often shows a shift in thought
– Couplet resolves the situation
Shakespearean Language
• Couplet: two lines of poetry that rhyme,
usually at a character’s exit or at the end of
a scene
• End-stopped lined: punctuation indicates
the reader to pause at the end of each line
• Run-on line: no punctuation at the end of
the line; meaning is completed in the line or
lines that follow
Shakespearean Language (cont.)
• Allusion: Reference to something else; for our
purposes, a reference to something from a work of
literature in modern culture (song, movies, etc.)
• Rhyme: Repetition of accented vowel sounds and
the sounds following them (cat, hat, mat)
• Assonance: Repeated vowel sounds followed by
different consonant sounds (cat, bag, late)
• Alliteration: Repeated consonant sounds, usually
at the beginning of words (sally, sells, sea,)
Shake-a-spear Activity
• Your task is to break down the
Shakespearean sonnet with your partner.
• Mark the unstressed and stressed syllables
• Identify the rhyme scheme (abab…)
• Highlight alliteration
• Highlight assonance
• Highlight any and all similes, metaphors,
and personification
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Romeo: If I profane with my unworthiest hand
This hold shrine, the gentle sin is this:
My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.
Juliet:
Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
Which mannerly devotion shows in this;
For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss.
Romeo: Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?
Juliet:
Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.
Romeo: O then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do.
They pray: grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.
Juliet:
Saints do not move, though grant for prayers’ sake.
Romeo: Then move not while my prayer’s effect I take.
(He kisses her)